The first season of NBC’s ‘Revolution’ may have ended tensely, but it looks like things will get even worse in the second! Show runner Eric Kripke expressed, “We’re trying to be the first network show that loses two cities in the first fifteen minutes. The East Coast is totally destabilized.” At the end of the first episode, nukes were headed toward Philadelphia and Atlanta, in a “Watchemen”-esque attempt to reunite the rest of the United States.
Acknowledging the divisive reaction fans and critics had to some of the storylines last season, Kripke admitted, “I’m harder on the show than any human being, and as I was watching the second half of the season, I kept thinking there was a lot of power for a place that has no power. But I was really excited to kind of go back to basics. A powerless world is a fascinating concept… The writers are so sick of the power. They want this to be a show about swords again. They want to get back to the basic core it was sold to America on, which is unintentionally hilarious since there’s only been one season. Who needs to do some soul searching after one season? Apparently, this one does and has… If last year was about a war, this year is about this mystery. No question of a better season two than season one.”
Joining Kripke onstage at the panel were series stars Billy Burke, Tracy Spiridakos, Giancarlo Esposito, JD Pardo, David Lyons.
The great majority of questions were, not surprisingly, directed at fan-favorite Esposito who plays militia leader Major Tom Neville, who summarized his character, “He’s a good chess player and I appreciate that. He’s trying to gain some power… but it doesn’t last for long… You see a guy who’s broken… but still thinking and wondering how this all came about. When you have to be a leader you have to make hard decisions and there’s going to be a body count… All I ask my children to do is just listen, don’t talk back. But sometimes parents get tired.”
Jokingly, Pardo, who plays his son Jason, chimed in, “Kids get tired, too.”
Esposito retorted, “He’s younger and better looking and he gets tired. But Neville has to start listening to his son.”
When asked about the constantly evolving relationship between Monroe and Miles, Kripke offered a complex response that hinted at plots to come.
“Guys who have that sort of history, because guys don’t talk about their history, so there’s punching… they’re two great characters, and such a Cain and Abel story, and they were so split apart. There are these bad people, these people who claim to be Americans who came up from Cuba, but the idea was create a villain this year that’s so bad and so insidious our heroes and our villains have to work together, and ultimately we’re going to tell a story about all of these people coming together to fight the same enemy.
We wanted to have this villain that uses the iconography of the stars and stripes, but you’ll see that’s a mask and they’re really bad dudes. We wanted a villain that was much more about a mystery, about how deeply ingrained they are in the United States, and watching that unfold and how far back that conspiracy goes, it’s a far more satisfying engine…. season one became a war show, but this… lets us dig into the concept of the show instead of running and gunning.”
This may refer to the revelation that the President of the United States was hiding in Guantanamo Bay in the finale of the first season as well the sudden appearance of a US Secretary in the trailer.
When asked about killing off favorite characters, Kripke replied,
“It’s mostly to keep [the actors] in line. But seriously, it’s a very specific story tool. When you’re creating a world as dangerous as we want it to be, you can’t play by the rules that certain people will never get hurt. You’ll start to lose the tension and suspense. You have to prove once in a while that it’s that dangerous… We kill the people we love.”
Last season, we saw the deaths of Danny, Nora and Randall’s suicide. Spoilers – The trailer appears to reveal another shocking death!
Kripke closed the discussion by reassuring the audience, “I’m relentless about improving the show. As good as it was, it could be better. Let’s take power off the table and let the show be all about the other issues. How do you survive with the savagery all around you? It’s always been a show about hope and love… we could start making it a show about all these ideas and it’s not just about the power. It’s going to be a much more interesting expanse of canvas. We’ve pushed through the power… and let’s start talking about this world.”
It sounds like things will get even more exciting this season! Check out the trailer and comment with your thoughts!
(Source Hitflix.com, NBCSandiego.com)
