I’ve never read the graphic novels upon which AMC’s new show Preacher is based, so I have no idea how faithful the show is. What I do know is that in its 90-minute premiere, Preacher is able to establish a small corner of its bizarre world, one that draws the viewer in. I don’t entirely know what’s going on – which is arguably the point – but it’s a hell of a lot of fun to watch.
A show like this lives or dies on the strength of its characters, which Preacher handles with aplomb. It helps to have Breaking Bad vet Sam Catlin handling showrunner duties, but executive producers Seth Rogen and Evan Goldberg (who also directed “Pilot”) are no slouch when it comes to handling characters either. Jesse Custer (Dominic Cooper), the titular preacher, is both resigned and intense, with a mysterious past doing, as one character explains, “things.” The show doesn’t hand-wave away Jesse’s past; it’s content to tease it out one scene at a time. The first of these comes when a kid named Chris (played by Thomas Barbusca, a breakout of Wet Hot American Summer: First Day of Camp) asks Jesse to hurt his had in retaliation for hurting his mom.
“How hurt do you want him?” Jesse presses, before going into detail about what exactly would happen if he granted Chris’s with. “Violence makes violence makes nothing at all,” he finishes. Cooper’s performance is nicely layered, and the nicest surprise about Jesse is that the actually has faith. Preaching is not a way to lay low or start a new life; this is a man who genuinely wants to repent and atone, and while he doesn’t want to hurt Chris’s father Donny, he agrees to try to help anyway. Later, when he gets in a brutal fight with Donny and Donny’s friends, the look on his face is more sad than exhilarated. He looks as though he’s just relapsed.
Cooper does some great facial acting, which is important for a taciturn character like Jesse. Cooper is probably best known for playing Howard Stark in Captain America: The First Avenger and Agent Carter, and in Preacher he clearly relishes the chance to play the strong silent type. He excels at it.
But as much fun as Cooper – and Jesse – is to watch, he’s somehow not even the best character on Preacher. Right now its a two-way tie between Cassidy (Joseph Gilgun) and Tulip (Ruth Negga). Both are delivering fun performances that never veer into camp, and have some of the better character introductions I’ve seen recently.
Cassidy we meet on board a private jet, doing blow and telling rowdy stories. It’s slowly revealed that the men aboard have come to kill him, with little success. “Go to hell, abomination!” one cries, dousing him with holy water. Cassidy kicks the holy hell out of these guys – sorry for the pun – after they attack him with crossbows and spears, in a nice anachronistic touch. Rogen and Goldberg handle all of Preacher‘s fight scenes very well; they have a good command of space, and a nice sense of restraint that keeps them from cutting away too much. I sincerely hope they return to direct future episodes.
Tulip, though – who doesn’t love Tulip. We first see her in a brutal fight in a car careening through a Kansas cornfield (another excellently directed sequence) before killing two men and enlisting kids to help her make an ad hoc bazooka. That would be funny enough, but the funniest part about the bazooka is that it totally works, which helps establish Preacher‘s anything-goes ethos.
Preacher sets its pieces into place with remarkable alacrity, delivering a solid pilot that promises even better installments to come. The sight of Cassidy and Tulip in Jesse’s church at the end of the episode is a great shot, and after only one episode with these characters I’m excited for more. AMC looks to have another hit on their hands, and it might be their weirdest one yet.
A Few Thoughts
- Nice Groundhog Day reference: the pushy congregant (Brian Huskey) is named Ted Reyerson, as a nod to Ned Ryerson, who bothered Bill Murray in much the same fashion.
- “You cut your hair. I hate it.”
- “No matter what you’ve done, if you need Him, He has to be there for you.” Jesse says this to Eugene, but it sounds as though he’s talking to himself.
- Cassidy sums up Jesse very well: “Did somebody beat you with the dark and handsome stick?”
- Goddamnit, of course there’s going to be a Talking Preacher.
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