Jericho (2016) UK series

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This pic clicks to source.

This thread is for the 2016 UK series Jericho, which aired in January and February of this year on ITV. A second season won't be commissioned, and I'm not seeing purchase information on amazon or whether this series will air in the United States.

:EDIT: One of the actors, Diddy Wheldon, has alerted me to Jericho being available on both Amazon streaming and Zavvi. Hard copy is still region 2 only, so if you are on the American side of the pond, you'll need a converter player if you order that.

Jericho is a mini-series based on the Ribblehead Viaduct construction, but retold as a fiction story about a little construction town called Jericho springing up around the Culverdale Viaduct in the later 1800s. The series focuses on a transient time period to imagine the ways in which local people caught up in this particular wind of industry change were affected, and how their society may have struggled to adapt before collapsing.

Jericho is an ITV Studios Global Entertainment production, and the date on this particular link is 9-3-16, but I don't know what that might mean. You will need an account to view the shows, the first one is 90 minutes and the other 7 are 60.

Jericho was written, created, and executive produced by Steve Thompson, who has also written for the Doctor Who and Sherlock series, among a notable list of other shows. Its three directors were Paul Whittington (eps 1 and 2), Robert McKillop (eps 3, 4, and 5), and David Moore (eps 6, 7, and 8), which I suspect may be a partial reason for the somewhat shaky reviews. All are seasoned directors, and filming naturally moved between set locations at Huddersfield and Colne Valley in West Yorkshire, England.

This thread will review each episode of Jericho independently. This thread is not intended to be a recap experience, but an introduction to the set locations, period costuming, story telling, and the actors telling the stories.

Neither I nor SyfyDesigns receives compensation for anything written in this thread. As we go along and questions arise, questions may be answered in following threads, as I have permission from one of the actors to ask as many questions as I want. Viewers who are interested in time period documentaries and docu-dramas will appreciate the biographical style of what living with railroad construction in the 1800s was like. I personally think Jericho is great viewing with a notable cast, which I'll link as we go along, and I'm sorry it won't be getting a second season. I do hope it will be broadcast on a U.S. network, but just in case it won't be, I know a few Americans who would love to know and see more about this show, so I'm sharing.

I'm still working on the episode reviews. In the meantime, please check out this trailer.

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Ep. 1.1

Note- I get 10 graphics per forum frame, and all my captures for Jericho click out to full size.

Opening scene- polishing a spoon. My very first thought is I've done that. I've polished the good silver for my mother-in-law, and I've sat at a restaurant table wrapping silverware in napkins. The background noise is men, and the scene is a woman looking- something. More than reflective, sad maybe? Resigned? Holding down a mountain of dread?



I am a woman and that very first few seconds already have me. Sometimes I wonder what life would have been like if I'd lived a hundred or two hundred years ago.

Very quickly we see furniture being moved out and possibly a carpet bag on the table beside her. Very quickly my head rattles off a list of possibilities- evicted, auction, death of a husband, moving for some reason. Not sure yet, but I'm obviously hooked if I'm already going down a list.



Jessica Raine plays Annie Quaintain in Jericho. (Jessica also played Verity Lambert in An Adventure in Space and Time, a story about the origins of Doctor Who in the television industry, so squeee.) In this interview in which she's called 'the unstoppable Jessica Raine', she says about Jericho, "It really illuminates how much women have been written out of history". YES. That is exactly the feeling I got in the first few seconds of the opening scene.

My husband and I have already mini-debated Hell on Wheels versus Jericho, and while I admit HoW is very well done and probably as realistic as a portrayal can get, I feel sick watching it, so I don't. I'm sure the shock of all that screaming and bloody gore is how they retain their ratings, so look at them go, right? The reason I compare these two shows is because they are both historical portrayals of how local communities flipped upside down during the industrial revolution as railways introduced our first world connections in high speed. I personally favor Jericho, and just because it got dropped after the first season has nothing to do with quality, but in my opinion, the way audiences have been trained by the entertainment industry to spike ratings over the shock yank that I call 'experience addiction' in a Walking Dead article I wrote.


click here for real info on the train used in the show

One of the really fun things about period documentation is authenticity in costuming and sets, so let's check it out. You can see filming this series was no small feat.
Jericho: Behind the scenes of a new ITV period drama
Is ITV drama Jericho Britain's first western?
Vintage specialist delivers props to Jericho
Actress Jessica Raine about Jericho: It’s got a bit of grit to it


How's this for behind the scenes? lol, thanx Diddy. She said it was boiling hot in those costumes. I don't know how women didn't just faint all the time back then.



I think the bigger part of my music collection is soundtracks, so I was hoping I'd find one for Jericho, but so far all I know is that the composer is Tim Phillips (his dotcom), who was once in a rock band called CatHead and was the performer for "Song for Ten" in the 2005 Doctor Who Christmas special The Christmas Invasion.

Annie Quaintain's children are played by Sam Bottomley and Amy James-Kelly (sometimes credited as Amy Kelly). I like noticing kids because sometimes you see them in stuff later all grown up and go oh yeah...



Our first look at Hans Matheson playing Johnny Blackwood.



Our behind the scenes look at Hans getting a cuppa tea, lol.



Aaaaand a really iffy shaky moment may or may not lead to a romance later... Those are usually the best kind.



This is where my friends would expect me to make a minecraft joke.



Big thanks to Diddy Wheldon (check her on facebook), who plays a navvy in eps 1-8 {note IMDB error}, for alerting me to a U.S air date on Acorn TV. This snip just below clicks to the press article. If you like train history, if you love the idea of a 'European western' and absolutely beautiful scenery, if you are looking for a woman's perspective in a really good show, THIS.