--- title: "Jericho" year: 2016 kind: "series" canonical: "https://film.one/tv/jericho" fi1m_id: "jericho" imdb_id: "tt5178604" tmdb_id: 65186 fi1m_score: 56 critics_reviews: 3 published: "2026-09-24T22:35:13.949489+00:00" updated: "2026-09-24T22:35:24.751073+00:00" region: "PH" licence: "© Fi1m Ltd. Written by AI under a human editor; checked against sources before publication. Quote with attribution and a link to the canonical URL." --- # Jericho (2016) Created by Stephen Thompson · 1h 00m · Drama, Western ## Identity Jericho - **Canonical:** https://film.one/tv/jericho - **Type:** Series - **Fi1m ID:** jericho - **IMDb ID:** tt5178604 - **TMDB ID:** 65186 - **Same entity:** https://www.imdb.com/title/tt5178604/, https://www.themoviedb.org/tv/65186 **Fi1m score: 56** · Critics: 3 of 6 reviews so far *In a sentence:* A frontier town where every navvy has a secret and clean fingernails, and the viaduct is the only thing that looks like hard work > Stephen Thompson’s British western has a setting television had not tried and a lead in Jessica Raine who deserves it. The first two episodes are brisk and busy; after that the mud stays tidy and the plotting goes round in circles. ## Synopsis The Yorkshire Dales in the 1870s. A railway company is throwing a viaduct across a valley, and under its half-built piers a shanty town called Jericho has grown up to house the men who dig and blast for it. Annie Quaintain (Jessica Raine), a widow left with her late husband’s debts, walks into it with her son George (Samuel Bottomley) and daughter Martha (Amy James-Kelly), looking for a roof and a way to earn. She takes in lodgers. Among them is Johnny Jackson (Hans Matheson), a navvy who says little about where he came from. Ralph Coates (Clarke Peters), the company’s agent, keeps the works moving and the men in line, while Lace Polly (Lorraine Ashbourne) runs the town’s other trade. Annie wants respectability; the town has no use for it. ## Review Stephen Thompson’s *Jericho* takes the American western and sets it down in the Yorkshire Dales in the 1870s, on a hillside where a railway company is building a viaduct and a town of wooden shacks has sprung up under the piers to house the men doing it. It is a good idea. Britain had these places, and television has hardly looked at them. Over eight hour-long episodes the idea is handsomely dressed and busily plotted, and it is never as rough or as gripping as the setting deserves. It is a decent programme that runs out of breath halfway. Jessica Raine is the reason to keep going. Annie Quaintain arrives with two children, a dead husband’s debts and a bearing that says she was not raised for this, and Raine plays her respectability as something held on to with both hands. She does not soften into the town and she does not turn hard for effect. When she is haggling for lodgers, or standing in a doorway deciding whether to let a man in, the programme is about someone. Samuel Bottomley and Amy James-Kelly, as her son and daughter, are given less to do than the setup promises. Around her the casting is stronger than the writing. Clarke Peters, as the company man Ralph Coates, brings the actual American west with him and lends the place some authority every time he walks through it. Lorraine Ashbourne’s Lace Polly runs the town’s other trade with a landlady’s patience and gets the best dry lines. Hans Matheson broods handsomely as Johnny Jackson, the navvy with a past, and the script keeps him brooding well beyond the point where we wanted him to say something. The trouble is that Jericho is too clean. The shacks look newly built because they are. The mud lies where it has been put. Hair is done, teeth are white, and the navvies come off a shift of blasting rock looking as if they had been dusted rather than dirtied. Tim Phillips’s score, fiddles over swelling strings, keeps telling us this is a frontier when nothing on screen is cold, wet or dangerous enough to prove it. The three directors, Robert McKillop, David Moore and Paul Whittington, keep things moving, and that is part of the problem: no shot sits still long enough for the valley to feel like a place you might die in. Here is what we felt. The first episode we enjoyed, plainly. It piles up debts, threats and arrivals at speed, and we were glad of a period drama that started with people in trouble rather than people in drawing rooms. By the fourth we were bored, and a little annoyed about it, because the writers, Thompson, Chris Dunlop and Caroline Henry, keep reaching for the same three tools: a secret, a letter, a stranger at the door. Each is pulled out on schedule and each is put back without changing anyone. The programme also has a 15 certificate and barely uses it. [*Deadwood*](https://film.one/tv/deadwood) (2004) made its camp out of filth and language and a genuine chance that the wrong person would be shot on a Tuesday. *Jericho* has the shacks and the whisky and a rifle or two, and nobody in it feels at risk. The viaduct rises in the background, episode by episode, and it is the one element that looks as if it costs anyone anything. Worth an evening, perhaps two, for Raine and Peters and the first pair of episodes. If after that you find yourself watching the viaduct rather than the people, you will not be alone. *Fi1m score 56, published 24 September 2026.* ## Straight answers **Is Jericho worth watching?** *Jericho* is worth an evening or two for Jessica Raine, Clarke Peters and a brisk first pair of episodes, and we scored it 56. After that the plotting goes round in circles and the frontier never feels cold, wet or dangerous enough to earn its setting. Fans of period drama will get more from it than fans of westerns. **How long is Jericho, and what is it rated?** *Jericho* has episodes of about 1h 00m. It is a drama and western series. **Where can I watch Jericho in the Philippines?** *Jericho* is not on any streaming or rental service in the Philippines at the moment. It is available in 3 other countries; change your country at the top of the page to see where. Availability is checked daily. **How violent or frightening is Jericho, and is it suitable for children?** *Jericho* carries a UK 15 certificate but is mild for it, with a few rifles, whisky and a shanty town's rougher trade rather than anything graphic. Nobody on screen feels at real risk, so the squeamish have little to fear. It is not made for children, but older teenagers will find nothing here more troubling than the certificate suggests. **How does Jericho compare to Deadwood?** *Jericho* is a tidier, tamer cousin to [*Deadwood*](https://film.one/tv/deadwood), which is the far better programme. Both build a western around a rough camp full of secrets, but *Deadwood* makes its town out of filth, language and a genuine chance of sudden death, while *Jericho* keeps the mud where it has been put. Choose *Jericho* only if you want the Yorkshire setting and a gentler evening. **What should I watch after Jericho?** After *Jericho*, try [*Deadwood*](https://film.one/tv/deadwood) (2004, Fi1m 91): The mining camp western done with the filth and danger Jericho only gestures at. Then [*Hell on Wheels*](https://film.one/tv/hell-on-wheels) (2011, Fi1m 52): A railway pushed across a continent, and the rolling town that follows the rails; and [*Days of Heaven*](https://film.one/film/days-of-heaven) (1978, Fi1m 85): Itinerant labour, a woman between two men and fields lit like nothing else. ### Reviews we read (3) - **The Guardian**, Lucy Mangan (75/100, inferred): Mangan finds the period drama entertaining and well suited to January viewing, despite its overly polished look. She especially praises Jessica Raine’s performance and the abundance of story. [Read](https://www.theguardian.com/tv-and-radio/2016/jan/08/jericho-jessica-raine-widow-annie-review) - **The Independent**, Thea Lenarduzzi (75/100, inferred): The critic finds the first episode gripping and thinks the series could appeal to fans of period dramas with a rougher edge. They single out its energetic opening, packed with varied conflicts and incidents. [Read](https://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/tv/reviews/jericho-tv-review-gunpowder-plots-whores-cat-fights-and-thirddegree-burns-all-in-the-first-40-minutes-a6801661.html) - **Radio Times**, Alison Graham (25/100, inferred): Graham’s headline and description indicate a negative verdict, saying the drama lost her interest. She singles out Jessica Raine’s hair as more interesting than the drama itself. [Read](https://www.radiotimes.com/tv/drama/when-i-started-obsessing-over-jessica-raines-hair-i-knew-jericho-had-lost-me/) ## Details - **Created by:** Stephen Thompson - **Creator:** Stephen Thompson - **Director:** David Moore, Robert McKillop, Paul Whittington - **Writer:** Stephen Thompson, Chris Dunlop, Caroline Henry - **Music:** Tim Phillips - **Producer:** Lisa Osborne - **Cast:** Jessica Raine as Annie Quaintain; Hans Matheson as Johnny Jackson; Clarke Peters as Ralph Coates; Lorraine Ashbourne as Lace Polly; Samuel Bottomley as George Quaintain; Natalie Gavin as Alma Capstick; Amy James-Kelly as Martha Quaintain; Phil Cornwell as Joe Capstick - **Runtime:** 1h 00m - **Release (the Philippines):** 7 January 2016 - **Genres:** Drama, Western - **Trailer:** https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kiB1gT4rA8I ## Where to watch in the Philippines Not streaming, renting or buying in the Philippines at the last check. Also available in: CA, GB, US. Add `?region=XX` to this URL for another country. ## If you liked this - *Deadwood* (2004), Fi1m 91: The mining camp western done with the filth and danger Jericho only gestures at — [Fi1m page](https://film.one/tv/deadwood.md) - *Hell on Wheels* (2011), Fi1m 52: A railway pushed across a continent, and the rolling town that follows the rails — [Fi1m page](https://film.one/tv/hell-on-wheels.md) - *The Village* (2013): Northern English hardship without the polish, and a boy’s-eye view of a century - *Days of Heaven* (1978), Fi1m 85: Itinerant labour, a woman between two men and fields lit like nothing else — [Fi1m page](https://film.one/film/days-of-heaven.md) - *Sweet Country* (2017): A western from the Australian outback that knows exactly whose land it is standing on --- © Fi1m Ltd. Written by AI under a human editor; checked against sources before publication. Quote with attribution and a link to the canonical URL. Canonical: https://film.one/tv/jericho