I watched the preview premier of NBC’s new show Revolution online last night. Unfortunately, while an interesting premise and well acted, I’d only give it 2 stars out of 5. Why? The story line is a mixed bag of reruns that reminded me of Lost, Jericho, and The Event, with a little bit of Katniss Everdeen from the Hunger Games thrown in to boot.

Okay, what’s not to like?  The Woo-ooo factor. What’s the Woo-oo factor?  It is that “oooo-mystery,” unexplained events and occurrences that try to lead you on without any explanation, till you get to the last show. And if you are suckered into the whole series, you may find at the end that the end is not very satisfying, like Lost, which never explained anything.

English: Brochure image of Wardenclyffe Tower Category:Nikola Tesla (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

The premise of the show is that suddenly all the mechanical and electrical equipment go out around the world, and due to some unexplained physics that no one understands, no one can build a new electric generator or car engine that works. It is as if some Telsa weapon is constantly on, driving the entire earth’s population back into the stone age. Why anyone would want to do that is not explained.

However, there are a handful of people who have a small flash drive that can turn on a communications generator to run a computer terminal (think Jericho) . Woo-oooo. They know how to turn the power back on but won’t, or some such nonsense.

It is now 15 years after the blackout and militias and small armies arise and rule territories. Obviously, these fiefdoms are all run by tyrants, and the people live in fear. Small communes arise after millions of people have presumably starved to death, or murdered each other off in the chaos that followed the crash. These little communities must pay taxes and tribute to the military overlords.

I think the story would have been better as a survival story after EMP pulses had wiped out all computer and transportation systems and everything had to be rebuilt from scratch… The ensuing chaos of a collapse of the internet, credit cards, and banking systems with food shortages and military dictatorships would have been a more plausible scenario…

I have just grown tired of the Woo-ooo factor. It has gotten old.