I've managed to catch a few of these shows online now, and have been rather struck by a few things:


-- Preparing for singular events/scenarios. I kept thinking, are the interviewees REALLY just preparing for one big thing, or is that just the narrative the producers asked them to follow?

-- Several of the people interviewed appeared to be quite overweight and/or in poor health. For some reason I'd always thought that hard-core "preppers" would focus more on fitness in the event of a major meltdown.

-- The direct involvement of children in their plans. I wondered how much the parent's actions might affect their lives later on, for good or ill.

-- The wide range of socio-economic-political backgrounds. I was surprised that some appear to be quite affluent, or were firefighters/cops.

-- Pets. If one was as concerned about the situations they described, why would they have cats or small dogs in the first place? The young woman who calmly mentioned the possibility of killing her cats with a gun was a bit disturbing, for some reason.

-- The willingness to go on television. I thought that people in this mindset would be more cautious. But I suspect that these are rare exceptions...