The Gun Counter

After the discussion on "Revolution", I decided to bring this show up. Started watching it on Netflix Streaming and have noticed a bunch of problems with it.
Hero is a deputy sheriff wounded in the line of duty who's in a coma. He then starts looking for his family. That's the gist of it.

First, the hero is the ONLY one not attacked when the hospital is overrun.

Second, he strips the sheriff's station of weapons and only gets a few shotguns, a couple of pistols, and a couple of rifles. And 700 rounds of assorted ammo. He doesn't know of any gun stores? Or people who owned guns?

Third, the zombies can climb and run. Doesn't sound right.

Fourth, he gets trapped in an Abrams (Chieftain in disguise) and doesn't bother checking to see if there's any fuel, or look for manuals on how to fire the guns?

Fifth, he finds his family, along with a bunch of other survivors and they leave to find the CDC. One vehicle is a motor home, his cop friend's driving in an open jeep. In the middle of zombie country. They couldn't find better vehicles? Like say, Hummers, closed vans, tanks?

Anyone else watching it? Oh yeah, gun handling seems good. He fires a .357 mag inside a tank and actually gets disoriented for a few seconds.

I watch it, and surely I've posted about it in the past. And yeah, there are some pretty big holes in the story, but all in all, it's pretty good IMO. The new season is starting soon on AMC.

I saw all of series one and got a couple of episodes into series two before giving up. Wouldn't have watched that far but my wife liked it.

It sounds like you have the same issues I had with it Rod. Without giving any spoilers - it doesn't get any better, if anything it gets worse.

One major gripe I had apart from the plot holes was that it didn't feel like a zombie film, it seemed more to me like a soap opera -but with zombies. Eventually the characters annoyed me so much I was rooting for the zombies...

Highspeed wrote:I saw all of series one and got a couple of episodes into series two before giving up. Wouldn't have watched that far but my wife liked it.

It sounds like you have the same issues I had with it Rod. Without giving any spoilers - it doesn't get any better, if anything it gets worse.

One major gripe I had apart from the plot holes was that it didn't feel like a zombie film, it seemed more to me like a soap opera -but with zombies. Eventually the characters annoyed me so much I was rooting for the zombies...

My brother in law is a fan and said the same thing. Season Two sucked but supposedly Season Three has gone back to it's roots.

Rod wrote:First, the hero is the ONLY one not attacked when the hospital is overrun.

There is an explanation for this later in the series.

[spoiler]His friend couldn't move him, but the hospital was being overrun and the military was actively fighting zombies and shooting anyone who looked funny. So his friend barricaded his door with a gurney before fleeing.[/spoiler]

Second, he strips the sheriff's station of weapons and only gets a few shotguns, a couple of pistols, and a couple of rifles. And 700 rounds of assorted ammo. He doesn't know of any gun stores? Or people who owned guns?

It's been awhile; they've been picked clean.

Third, the zombies can climb and run. Doesn't sound right.

For most of them it's more like a fast hobble than actual running.

Fourth, he gets trapped in an Abrams (Chieftain in disguise) and doesn't bother checking to see if there's any fuel, or look for manuals on how to fire the guns?

The crew was dead, "everything's inop/run out" isn't a terribly crazy assumption to make in the heat of the moment, especially after nearly blasting out his own eardrums. Besides, something's funny about an Abrams with a bottom hatch, from what I understand.

Fifth, he finds his family, along with a bunch of other survivors and they leave to find the CDC. One vehicle is a motor home, his cop friend's driving in an open jeep. In the middle of zombie country. They couldn't find better vehicles? Like say, Hummers, closed vans, tanks?

These are likely all the characters' own vehicles. When everything's falling apart, people might not be willing to trust whatever they can salvage from a traffic jam. Besides which, for whatever reason, the military had tanks and it didn't do them much good.

Anyone else watching it? Oh yeah, gun handling seems good. He fires a .357 mag inside a tank and actually gets disoriented for a few seconds.

The real problems with the show aren't the setting so much as the fact that they weren't really given enough of a budget to pull off what they're trying to accomplish. Entire episodes that could be about something turn into an hour of whispered arguments with a zombie at either end of the episode to remind you that it's supposed to take place in a zombie apocalypse.

I'm hoping the third season will be better, but I wouldn't bank on it.

I just tried to watch the season 2 premier. Quit watching halfway through. Over an hour of episode for a runaway kid who didn't have the sense to come back? Is the rest of season 2 this bad?

I like this series. Of course it's got holes you could drive a winnebago through, but so what? I mean, after you suspend your disbelief in Zombies, a lot of other things are pretty manageable.
I will say that season two was 90% crap. That said, the season finale, where they find the girl, was some of the best TV I have ever seen. Really.
Of course I could pick apart stuff, and talk about how I would have done it better, and what have you, but it is a pretty fun show. YMMV. Not sure how the next season will go.

I did like the redneck kid in series two, but the rest of them just annoyed the crap out of me.

[spoiler]The young brother of the racist redneck in series one who chewed his own arm off because he didn't have the sense to cut through that tiny little bolt holding the pipe instead of the hardened steel of the frigging handcuffs. Well, he didn't chew his own arm off, but if you've seen it you'll know what I mean[/spoiler]

The TV show is based on a graphic novel series. The book series does a great job of character development, and, as time goes on, is less about zombies and more about the search for security in a world turned upside down where few can be trusted.

I Netflixed the first season of the TV show and was disappointed.

Highspeed wrote:I did like the redneck kid in series two, but the rest of them just annoyed the crap out of me.

[spoiler]The young brother of the racist redneck in series one who chewed his own arm off because he didn't have the sense to cut through that tiny little bolt holding the pipe instead of the hardened steel of the frigging handcuffs. Well, he didn't chew his own arm off, but if you've seen it you'll know what I mean[/spoiler]

Well,

[spoiler]he IS a meth head.[/spoiler]