The Colony Season 2

One of the creepier shows on TV returns.   Good start to the season.

http://dsc.discovery.com/tv/colony/

I wonder how the hell they come up with these people to be on this show.. ick! 

They setup a situation.. in this case, they contend there was a biological war.  They strand 8 people in the middle of an area.  In this case, it's about a 12 acre area.  so big enough that they can't walk out in a day.  The people are then responsible for coming up with their own food, water, electricity, as well as defense.

They are free to raid the buildings or areas around them and determine where to eat and sleep.  Since it's a city area, they have to figure out their own sanitation and water situations. 

A lot of it is invention.. like "how do we get electricity" "how do we get food".  The show sends in "raiders" every so often who will torment the people.  The raiders are just scripted people... with the authority to beat the s--- out of the people involved, destroy their goods or steal from them.  So, late at night, a raider may come in and burn something, steal something, or just wake them up to prevent them from getting sleep. 

For the duration of filming, they do not have "challenges" or real contact, they decide the direction the show takes.  Only if something medical emergency comes up is there intervention.

It's.. different.  This last week, they were desperate to get power.  The week before they found a truck full of rotting pigs (pigs covered in maggots, etc. that was a few weeks old and rotten).  While they rotated puking and dragging, they managed to get the meat so they could cut the fat off of it and boil it into eco-diesel.  Pretty innovative.

Yes, the raiders absolutely can hit and punch.  And they do.  In Ep2 this year they comment on how they took a beat down at the raider's hands, showing off cuts and needing bandages... while worrying about whether or not they might be at risk for tetanus.  Good stuff.

Previews for next week show them flushing out rancid port-a-potties of very old sewage to try and clean up the area.  Talk about putrid s---..

Show producers say a lot of the things are "just as they were left" from Hurricane Katrina.  So, who knows.

http://www.salon.com/entertainment/tv/the_colony/index.html?story=/ent/tv/heather_havrilesky/2010/08/07/the_colony_apocalyptic_reality_show

Anytime you've got one group of people making a forge to build machettes, and you end the show with another group chasing down machette wielding "home team" and they are using cattle prods.. yeah, that's some good stuff :)  I loved them trying to figure out how to preserve meat, and then getting it screwed up so that they end up with nothing out of all that fish.. wah wah wah!

It's not huge.  But when you're not provided food and you've got people coming in burning your stuff up, walking out in a one walk is difficult.  Have a good meal in the morning and walk straight out is I assume possible.  Last season when someone walked off too far they got "abducted" for being seperated from the rest and held up.  So, I think there is that as an option

Always good to have the raiders come in and BURN THEIR HOUSE DOWN.   Wow.  Even though they obviously waited until they were next door, but jesus, as a psychological game you'd think at some point seeing someone torch a place you were just at and sleeping the night before would creep you out

How many reality shows have a woman walk to get berries to find herself getting jumped by 3 bald guys, beaten, hog tied, with a garbage bag thrown over her head?

I can't figure out why anyone would ever go on this show.  This would mess your whole psyche up

Just brutal.   Absolutely brutal.  I'm sure they know it's a show, but if you were jumped like that..

"As part of the experiment, one of the colonists is abducted to see how they and the group cope with stress and negotiate for her potential release"

GTFO.

The moment they were fighting her on the ground and they tore her shoes and necklace and stuff off while they wrestled her on the ground and put the cuffs on while screaming at her and putting a garbage bag on her head.. F that.  You might KNOW it's a game, but in that moment, don't tell me that wasn't crazy scary.  That is just insane.

"Now that they have been submerged for weeks a traumatic event can cause them to lose the lines between what is real and what is not.. as their mind struggles to grasp with the results"

You know that they understand it's a reality show.  But on one level, it's so messed up that panic still overwhelms them.   Just crazy.   And yet, one of my favorite crazy moments every week :)

So, tonight their water was poisoned, dead fish everywhere. 

And they slaughtered a gator.

And tried to concoct a motorbike of sorts.

With the water apparently poisoned or contaminated, they struggled to claim rainwater while worrying about dehydration in the crazy heat.

Good times.