FAQ

Guns do work. There's many scenes of characters using guns. However, the country the main characters live in, The Monroe Republic, has outlawed private firearms ownership. Most of the guns are in the possession of the authorities or criminals.

In addition, it's been commented by several characters that ammunition for modern, pre--Blackout, firearms is essentially impossible to manufacture* and thus rare. It's use is reserved mainly for important militia uses. Even rank and file militia members have resorted to using black powder weapons. A flashback scene in the first season fall finale shows fierce fighting in the early years of the blackout and General Monroe comments that they are running out of ammunition and will soon need to ration it.

*This of course doesn't explain how people in the pre-electricity era had copper jacketed bullets for use in their S&W six-shooters and Winchester rifles. Most local gun clubs have members that regularly make new ammo by refilling their spent cartridges and casting their own bullets.

Production of power requires the power. There is no diesel because they cant make diesel without the electricity. But we can see steam engines. Bicycles are appearing eventually but not applicable for lots of uses. Think about taxes rangers riding bicycles through the jungle and shooting at Miles Matheson, Impossible and meaningless.

While obesity rates have increased in the modern era, and particularly among wealthier nations, obesity is by no means dependent on a modern consumer society. There have always been obese people and will always be obese people.

The in story explanation is that whatever happened caused systems to fail over the course of several seconds. Some failed before others. Modern airplane controls are electronic so the rudder and flap control would have been lost along with the shutdown of the jet engines but there is no good explanation why every jet would enter a flat spin instead of just diving at high rates of speed. Pilots on one of their discussion forums claim it is hard to put an airliner into a flat spin so having all of them perform the maneuver would not have occured.

But not all modern aircraft would go into a dive. 737's would revert to manual reversion. If would make the aircraft very difficult to land but it could be done.

The real reason that the lighting was still on is that television is a visual medium and it's much more visually effective to allow the characters to look around and see the lights flickering out than it is to have them all just suddenly go out for no reason.

The cities were largely abandoned, soon after the electricity stopped. The Matheson family was shown walking away from their home, with what they could haul in a child's wagon. As they walked through the streets, they were nearly alone. Almost everyone has fled from the city.

All cities would become uninhabitable, soon after such a disaster. In the immediate aftermath, there would be widespread looting, and other violence. Then there would be shortages of food, medicine and other essentials. Within weeks, disease would spread throughout any areas of concentrated population. People would flee, to escape the violence and disease, and to seek food.

Well-built buildings can last a long time -- if they're occupied and maintained. Deserted buildings soon start to fall into disrepair, and then decay. In the second episode, we see buildings burning, and no fire departments to respond. The fire fighters have probably left -- and even if they were still there, their equipment no longer worked. It's apparent that looters have vandalized many buildings. Vandalized buildings decay rapidly.

We don't need to imagine what happens to unoccupied buildings, that have suffered from vandalism. Just search for photographs of the urban decay in Detroit, over the last couple of decades.