I was hooked on Jericho long before I saw the first episode. Apocalypse stories strike a chord (end-of-western-lifestyle stories being one subset), and it is so rare to see a network produce this kind of work. "Warday" by Streiber and Kunetka is one of my 'missionary' books, the ones you buy over and over again just to give away to others. Jericho seemed like a cross between Warday and PBS American Playhouse's "Testament" at first - an awesome combination.

It sort of veered off in the direction of One Life to Live after that, but, like Vaznetti says, it really started to come together as Hawkins' story was exposed and the neighboring town war arc came to fruition.