The Last Train/Cruel earth

[Merlanthe]

Hey just wondered if anybody else had ever seen this apocalyptic mini series and what they thought of it?

I've been rewatching it lately on youtube as someone was nice enough to post the entire mini series on youtube here http://www.youtube.com/user/AftermathShow though you have to scroll down a bit to find it. Imho its a great series and a shame they dont repeat it on tv or release it on dvd.

Its an interesting drama about a group of strangers who happen to get on the same train on the day that a deadly meteor shower causes mass devastation and wipes out most of the population. The people on the train are saved becasue one of them is in possesion of a cannister of stuff that freezes people into human popsicles for a set amount of time given to her by her government scientist boyfriend. The group awaken years after to discover a seemingly empty world filled with ruins and savage wild dogs and are left trying to understand what has happened to them.

 

[inflatabledalek]

Started off very strongly, but as it went on I thought it got sillier and sillier and wound up a bit of a mess (though that's based on memories of what I thought at the time rather than a rewatch).

The Beeb's Invasion Earth from close to the same time had a similar problem, brilliant opening episode (spaceships in the Blitz!) before loosing its way as it went along.

 

[MacLeod]

^To be fair a lot of shows start off strong and tail off towards the end. Some of that however might be down to expectations.

 

[lurok]

Started off very strongly, but as it went on I thought it got sillier and sillier and wound up a bit of a mess (though that's based on memories of what I thought at the time rather than a rewatch).

That's my vague memories as well. Intriguing premise that went nowhere fast. Invasion Earth is drawing a blank though.

 

[Merlanthe]

it only had 6 episodes

I dont agree about the rest of the episodes getting sillier. Most of the epsiodes had a good premise behind them that made sense in the situation and each episode contributed to advancing the overall plot and fleshing out the characters and the strange new world that they found themselves in. There was a tendancy to dwell upon character drama especially with Jandra (her getting together with the police guy was unbelievably fast) that may have made the middle episodes seem slow moving. But the ending was quite good it was bitter sweet and they didnt drag it out once they had wrapped up the main storyline of them finding Arc and discovering what had happened to the people who had been laced in suspended animation there.

I found the idea that those who did manage to survive the catastrophe ended up being unable to rebuild their civilisation because the next generations suffered from infertility quite interesting. Only those who were frozen from before the apocalytic meteor strike were fertile but had to regress to a less civilized form of socioty in order to survive which made the whole frezing the governments top scientific minds kinda ironic when their children ended up relying upon more practical survival skills rather than scientific knowledge.

 

[Starkers]

I still have the VHS tape with all six episodes recorded on it from he original ITV run

I enjoyed it, it suffered a little from silliness in places but it was nicely done, and though it sagged a bit in the middle I think it ended strongly, although the 'Let's all be friends.' seemed a trifle odd.

 

[Butters]

The one thing I remember from this mini series is that it took place in a parallel universe where the Grand Central railway had been modernised in the 1960s and survived in to privatisation in the 1990s. In our universe, the line was closed.

That had nothing to do with the story, but I like attention to detail like that.