Survivors New Dawn Announced (Vol 1 Now Out)

Lisetened to New Dawn 1 yesterday.

Overall, it was good, but could have bee better.

The non-mention of Paul has been discussed in my post above and that strikes me as a major conituity cock-up on BF's part and did take away from my enjoyment of the set.

Ep 1 - a very good, dramatic, exiting episode. I worked out what was going on long before Abby and perhaps Abby was a bit thick not to have worked it out sooner. The female led government did make me smirk as I thought of the 2 Ronnies Worm that Turned. The whole women good / men bad / strong female characters / Tenko mark 2 etc etc has been commented on previously by me and others, so no point in rehashing it all here, but suffice it to say the same points still apply.

I expected Zack to be in the remaining episodes as an ally of Jenny, but it didn't happen. There doesn't seem to be a place for heroic male charcaters in Survivors anymore

Interesting, but irrelevant, point. If the King was 12th in line to the throne pre-Death, and assuming the Death took pleace in 1975 when season 1 was first broadcast, then I think the King must be Lord Nicholas Windsor, 2nd son of the Duke of Kent.

Ep 2 - an interesting episode with quite a bit to say but I don't think it went quite far enough in terms of its exploration of the issues it raises. Minimum ages to stand for election are not that unusual in the democratice world today - e.g the US Congress - so I don't see it as evidence of a fscist state. It was bit unclear in the script if the age limit applied to voting as well as standing, or just standing. At the start it seemed like voting, but some dialogue at the end seemed to suggest it was just standing.

The discussion of sexuality did not go far enough - I think the need to repopulate needed to be brought into the discussion of LGBT rights in the post death world and there needed to be some sort of debate/conflict amongst the main characters. Instead what we got was an echo chamber where all the characters agreed that the gay characters' parents homophobia was a bad thing. I'm not saying it was a good thing or condoning it, but the episode kind of just stated the obvious and left it at that. By limiting the other side of the argument to mindless homophobia the episode basically set up a straw man that could be easily knocked down. I would have preferrred BF to take advantage of the unique context of Survivors to ask difficult questions about how society reconciles individual liberty and freedom of sexuality with the overriding need to repopulate. They did however avoid the cliche of the religious zealot who blamed the death on 1960s permissiveness, so it wasn't all bad

THe episode was a good exploration of the tensions that inevitably arise between the moderate and the militant elements in any movement for change, and in the end the episde came down on the side of the moderates.

As for Jackie, was it just me or did her characterisation remind anyone else of Ann Reynolds? Almost as if BF writers in both series are just writing for Louise Jameson herself.

Episode 3 was a return to form and very traditional Survivors fare. This could have been an episode that occurred at any point in the series' timeline (that's not a bad thing) and it was a high point to go out on

FInally, the cover. There doesn't seem tohave been much logical thought put into these. THey are nice pictures, well made, but why are the characters no older that they were 20 years previously? COuld the cover artist not have used pictures of Carolyn Seymour and Lucy Richards from the 1990s? Jackie does not apear to have aged either, but then using 2015 pictures of Louise on the series 2 boxest (when Jackie was supposed to be the mother of 2 young children) was a bit of a goof at tthe time - they should have used 1970s pictures of Louise for the series 2 boxset. At least Jackie looks about the right age on the New Dawn cover.