Image Credit: NBC
Overgrowth
In a world without electricity where most people have fled the cities, a defining feature of landscape is the wild overgrowth of plants. Vines creep up once-majestic buildings like the U.S. Capitol. Weeds sprout up through concrete on every city street. Flowers crawl up a now non-functional Ferris wheel. (The show’s intro segment displays a time lapse of the growth of this greenery.)
Meerdink and his team did a lot of visual research into how natural greens can overtake buildings, streets and vehicles. They didn’t have to go far for a valuable resource available on the subject – in Wilmington, N.C., where Revolution is shot, the vines of an invasive species called kudzu cover unkept areas everywhere.
“It sort of provides a little research laboratory for us to look at and study, and then we take that and make it our own,” Meerdink said.
Revolution’s striking shots of recognizable buildings like Wrigley Field covered in greenery have reminded some fans of a History Channel series called Life After People. The 2008 series depicted what the world would look like in the years after a hypothetical, sudden extinction of humanity, revealing just what would happen to iconic buildings if they fell into neglect. Meerdink noted that the series “was referenced when I first started [working on the show]. That is a great sort of template for what our world might be.”
NEXT PAGE: The automobile in a post-blackout world
