End of the World TV

Later this year Survivors will return to BBC One for its second series while next year NBC will air its new series Day One and fans of Jericho are holding out for a television movie to tie up all the loose ends from the series. What do all three shows have in common? They deal with the ‘end of the world’ and follow a small group of survivors in a post apocalyptic world. We take a look at some of the more famous examples of ‘End of the World’ TV.

The Last Train

Six-part series on ITV in 1999 that followed a group of train passengers who wake up to find the world a very different place. The working title for the series was Cruel Earth and the serial aired under this name in Canada and America. The train passengers are on their way to Sheffield when an accident results in them being cryogenically frozen and they awake decades later to find an England devastated by a metor strike. Government Scientist Harriet is one of the passengers onboard the train and is desperate to reach the “Ark”, a top secret government project. As the group travels to the “Ark” they encounter other survivors and face the harsh reality of life in post-apocalyptic England.

The series was compared to Terry Nation’s series Survivors which dealt with a small group of plague survivors. An early episode features the group exploring an empty Sheffield where they encounter a wild pack of dogs; Survivors featured a similar scene set in London. The series was to be remade for American audiences under the title The Ark but the idea never went beyond a pilot. The Last Train was written by Matthew Graham who would go on to co-create Life on Mars and its spin-off Ashes to Ashes. Both shows feature a character waking up in an unfamiliar time although with both shows they are in the past as where The Last Train saw the characters wake up decades on for their own time. Graham also wrote a 2006 episode of Doctor Who as well as co-creating the short-lived and bonkers drama Bonekickers.

Jericho

Short-lived American series that centres on the residents of the town of Jericho in Kansas, America. The series opens with a nuclear attack in the nearby city of Denver which results in the loss of power and communications isolating the small town of Jericho. In all 23 cities were nuked in America. Although power is later restored, eluded to be done by the Government, the power soon goes off again and the themes of the series are communication, information and identity. The series also introduces conspiracies such as who was behind the attack and the state of the government.

The first series did not rate well for broadcasters CBS and so it was cancelled by fans organised a mass protest which involved sending nuts to Execs as the broadcaster [don’t ask why nuts]. Due to the mass volume of fan response CBS relented somewhat and commissioned seven new episodes which would comprise the show’s second season. CBS promised that if ratings improved they would order more episodes but unfortunately for the show ratings for the seven new episodes did not improve and it was cancelled once more. There has since been talk of a feature film or a television film to tie up the loose ends from the series and a continuation in the form of comics.

Cult 1970s series created by Terry Nation which concerned the plight of a small band of Survivors following the accidental release of a plague that wipes out most of the world’s population. The series opens with the flu already taking its toll on the country but its full effects aren’t apparent to everyone but slowly over the course of the first episode it slowly begins to dawn that soon the dead will out number the survivors. The first series of Survivors follows Abby Grant as she travels across the country, encountering other survivors along the way, in her search for Peter, her son. Abby is quickly joined by Greg and Jenny and they soon form a community where other survivors join them. Abby Grant disappears after the first series and does not feature again in the series. The second and third years are not as popular with fans as they go in a slightly different direction with the third year becoming more about the restoration of Government than the plight of the survivors.

Terry Nation wrote the first series but left after disputes with producer Terrence Dudley over the direction of the show. Nation went on to create Blakes 7, another popular BBC series of the 1970s. Also departing after the first series was actress Caroline Seymour who played Abby Grant, Nation’s central character of the first season. Seymour was another person who disagreed with Dudley’s direction and so was written out of the series. The only actor to remain with Survivors for all of its episodes was Lucy Fleming who played Jenny Roberts.

Survivors 2008

A “re-imaging” of the classic 1970s series of the same name, an influenza outbreak kills millions and results in the breakdown of society. Once again the central character is Abby Grant [Julia Graham] who catches the influenza but manages to survive and goes on the hunt for her missing son, Peter. Along the way Abby encounters other survivors such as Greg, Anya and Tom. They form a small community and Abby’s search for Peter leads her to come into contact with another community of survivors lead by the only surviving member of the Government, Samantha Willis [Nikki Amuka-Bird]. However, Abby and her followers quickly release that life in post-plague England will have little in common with what went before. Also in the background is a mysterious Lab which is looking for survivors and is hinted as being responsible for the outbreak.

Although the series is touted as being a “re-imaging” of the original television show strictly speaking this is not the case. The BBC acquired the television rights for the novelisation of the first series, also written by Terry Nation, and not the actual rights to the series itself. This is way there are differences between the two seasons beyond the need to update certain aspects of the story for a modern audience. One noticeable different, which was made on the part of writer Adrian Hodge, was the killing off of Jenny Roberts [Freema Agyeman] in the opening episode as a “shock twist” for audiences. The first series ran for six episodes and was mostly filmed around Manchester although the action wasn’t detailed as taking place in any particular location. The second series, due to air later this year, has switched filming to Birmingham and will also run for six episodes.