I meant to do this before the 4th season started, but oh well...
Post-apocalyptic media has had a field day lately, which I couldn't be happier about. Where else can you depict issues such as resource allocation, the nature of leadership, environmental devastation, the consequences of war, etc, AND have people in face paint fighting each other with kung fu and bizarre weapons?
When I found out we finally would have a straight, non-zombie post-apoc show (I tried The Tribe, but it was just too low-budget for me), I was was a little excited, but my expectations were low, since it was on the CW, the network to watch white teens get mopey about their crushes on (even their superheroes spend way to much time mooning).
Parenthetical rant time:
When will TV creators of action/detective/fantasy/science fiction shows realize that less is more with romance? Especially when stakes are high - it just makes the characters seem to have really bad priorities. There's a reason why "Romantic Plot Tumor" is a trope. Just give us a little and we can use our own imaginations - look at the fans of X-Files and Buffy the Vampire Slayer. Tumblr is full of people shipping the hell out of The 100 characters based on a handful of small scenes, which is the way it should be - not the creators boring us with what starts to seem like fanfic of their own characters.
Yes, there is love and sex on The 100, but these teens are spending too much time making hard decisions with no easy answers and trying to survive to do much mooning. Just give it a few episodes, as some of the younger actors aren't so good in the beginning and it just seems like a Lord of the Flies update. It gets interesting when the teens find out earth isn't as uninhabited as it might seem and what the consequences of that are.
The 100 is also pretty non-stereotypical as far as depiction of race, gender and GLB characters. No show has more young women in leadership roles. And it's nice for us older people that, although mature characters are ultimately supporting the younger ones, they have their own complexities and are not just there to support or thwart the youth.
Anyway, you can check out the first 3 seasons on Netflix.
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