The Colony

Two Sunday's ago, quite by accident, my husband and I stumbled upon a new reality series on the Discovery Channel called The Colony. The premise is this: the world as we know it has just undergone a simulated cataclysmic disaster (nuclear war, pandemic, natural disaster, take your pick...) which has destroyed civilization, and a group of 10 people with various sets of skills and knowledge must now figure out how to survive in an urban setting within a devastated Los Angeles. There are engineers, a nurse, a machinist, a handyman, and a doctor - and the show is about how they use their skills to interact and survive.

The series is one of many apocalyptic stories that seem to be the trend these days. There's Jericho, 2012, Knowing, and upcoming movie The Road. The Colony begins each show with these words: "We are on the edge of a global catastrophic disaster. Human conflict, nuclear bombs, natural disasters, chemical and biological warfare. Without warning, the world as we know it can come to an end." It really freaks me out! After about the third episode, I turned to my husband and said, "I am not sure how long a 'trend specialist' (me) would survive if something like this happened to us." Of course I was kidding, trying to infuse a little humor into our fearful observance of The Colony. "Maybe we should start working out..." I continued. I kind of let that last comment dangle out there. We laughed, nodded our heads, got serious again and finished watching the show. It's interesting to watch how the people use their skills to create needed items like water purification systems, showers, power sources and weapons from found objects gathered from the warehouse in which they now are barricaded. These people even face looters and marauders (obviously sent in by the show to wreak havoc on the colony without physically harming the colonists) who steal from them and rock their sense of safety.

Even though it's just a TV show it really does get you to thinking about how fragile our lives are, and how useless so much of our prized stuff probably is in light of a disaster. It makes me want to get my house in order, have a plan, be ready! For now, I am just ready to watch the next episode. Check it out! Take the survivors quiz online to see if you are a survivor.