Television Review: Preacher (Season 1, 2016)
Those who lived through the recent Golden Age of television have long become desensitised to many things that would have sparked furious protests just a decade earlier, and in the previous century might have landed their creators in asylums, prisons, or graveyards. With dozens of scripted series competing for viewers’ attention each season instead of just a few national TV networks, even once-untouchable taboos were forced into the brutal race against time. Among them, given the victory of hipster quasi-intellectuals in the US cultural war, one such taboo was religion—particularly the rural Protestant fundamentalism so despised in Hollywood. This reached its peak in Preacher, a TV series adapting the cult comic by Garth Ennis and Steve Dillon, often deemed blasphemous and heretical from the Christian perspective. Behind the series stood AMC—the network known for the prestigious works like Mad Men and Breaking Bad, as well as the wildly popular adaptation of The Walking Dead comic books—thus giving the show high expectations.
The titular protagonist, portrayed by Dominic Cooper, is Jesse Custer, a preacher leading a church in the Texas Panhandle town of Anville. Haunted by a dark, traumatic criminal past that propelled him to change his ways and start a new life, he now struggles with his inability to meaningfully aid his flock, eroding his faith and prompting thoughts of abandoning the ministry. Matters take a drastic turn when he discovers an extraordinary gift: the supernatural ability to force anyone to obey his word as command. This coincides with the return of his ex-lover Tulip O’Hare (Ruth Negga), with whom he shared a criminal history. She relentlessly pushes him toward un-Christian vengeance against their former partner who has betrayed them. But even more striking is the arrival of Cassidy (Joseph Gilgun), an Irish vampire seeking refuge in Anville from fundamentalist vampire hunters who’ve pursued him for centuries. When two more bizarre outsiders appear in Anville, it turns out their interest isn’t in Cassidy but in the power he wields—a being born from the union of an angel and a demon, causing chaos for God in heaven.
In an era where explicit sex and violence are hard to distinguish from competitors, the show’s creators—including Seth Rogen and Evan Goldberg—made Preacher controversial and shocking solely through its blasphemous treatment of Christianity. In other words, the series presents an “alternative” universe where God exists but has vanished for unknown reasons, triggering apocalyptic consequences amid graphic violence, bloodshed, and grotesque, bizarre sex—all underscored by black comedy. This spiritual approach might remind some of Rogen and Goldberg’s apocalyptic black comedy This Is the End, but audiences will likely focus more on the vivid characters brought to life by a talented cast, including Cooper relishing a role beyond his usual leading man or second-fiddle parts. The script didn’t need to reinvent much, as most characters were lifted directly from the comic. However, the plot diverges: while the comic used the protagonist’s quest for the missing God as an episodic journey across America, the series devotes an entire season to a “origin story”, confining the action to a single Texas town. This functions less as a microcosm of conservative rural America than a Fellini-Lynchian menagerie of grotesque figures, fetishes, and worldviews—a bizarre, exaggerated, and not entirely believable collection.
Preacher is well-acted and directed, but its relentless grotesquerie grows tiresome and repetitive over time. The apocalyptic finale, however, hints that the next season might hew closer to the beloved comic, offering a dramatic fresh start to an increasingly fragmented audience.
RATING: 7/10 (+++)
(Note: The text in the original Croatian version is available here
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