11 Thoughts on Preacher Season 1.

There are spoilers for the entirety of season one in this post! So don’t say you were not warned. Also, usual note on that I don’t really watch the gory bits and I am not here at this party for the gross and violence. Having said that, most of it was pretty much integral to the world building and plot so… you take it and hide behind a cushion.

1.     Dominic Cooper is Jesse.

I’ve loved Dominic Cooper since The History Boys but he often plays characters where you can see him as an actor. Dominic Cooper as Howard Stark etc. but here he inhabits this role so completely it’s mesmerising. He’s not anyone but this preacher – he stinks the sweat and is him. For me it was a joyful performance throughout, complicated and tightly wound. I can’t wait to see where it goes next. Also, for a show that did no explaining as to why Jesse was chosen by Genesis – Dominic Cooper’s performance kind of did. The presence of this person here, now means something. His boots, his skinny jeans, his collar and his hell of an accent.

2.     Tulip Love.

This lady is kick ass and complicated. Woo! Her introduction was insane and just the crazy side of awesome. Super sassy, mouthy and strong she appears but she is also just the right side of broken and her eyes shine with vulnerability. One of the most important flashbacks was her and Jesse as kids and their connection there cements how they are connected now and will forever be. Anyway, it’s super refreshing to have a female lead that says what she thinks, does what she wants and knows who she is. Love her!

3.     Cassidy’s loyalty.

I really loved the friendship between Cass and Jesse and how this developed and deepened throughout the season. It’s kind of hard to sympathise and empathise with someone who literally sucks blood to survive but he manages. He’s funny, tough and a real good listener – what more do you want in a best mate? He rounds out the main trio in a nice way, the love triangle thing not hopefully going to overshadow the fact he loves them both. It's hard to know what somebody like Cass believes in, so it's kind of nice he found Jesse.

4.     Emily’s Small Smile.

I feel Emily is underrated – she stuck around and put up with Jesse’s shit long before all of this went down. True, she was head over heels for him but still, there was something inside of her that connected with him. She knew he was not as he seemed and yet she helped him anyway. I feel the plot complications that happened with the character (becoming friends with Tulip – yeah ok /feeding Miles to Cass – um what) weren’t explored enough in the last couple of episodes to justify that murder. We needed to know more, and hell now we won’t. Although I live in hope – Lucy Griffiths has a fab screen presence.

5.     The Cowboy Stuff.

Ok, so bear with me here as someone unfamiliar with this world and not that interested in violence the only clue about who this person was came from reading some recaps. Dear Showrunners – assumed knowledge is ok but when without it your character doesn’t make any sense at all you have a problem. The Saint of Killers is an interesting concept – just use it. Don’t be cute. And do we really have to spend that long in his personal hell? No. I would also argue that the violence in these sections was amongst the worst in the show and not strictly necessary. Yeah. We get it is hell. He kills people. He wears a hat. 

6.     The titles were kind of awesome.

Boom! Ace overall. But also the opening one a bit off. AFRICA. Really guys? An entire complicated collection of countries and cultures and you go with AFRICA. If you can manage ALBUQUERQUE you can manage to not be lazy and stupid. The joy of these were how specific they could be – it was a nice nod to the comic origins of the story and there is potential for them to be used more. Less generic slightly awkward unconscious racial bias and we are cooking with gas.

7.     Donny Who?

I’m not sure anyone figured out who Donny was or what he needed to be in this show. And his switch in the last episode was really weird and happened entirely off screen. Cop out much? Hell yes, we have seen various guises of this man and how he travels to them – why do we not get to see his conversion properly and thought process after the confrontation in the church. Interesting to note in his interaction with the car boot (which I didn’t watch) I totally thought he had killed himself – nice twist with the hearing thing.

8.     Eugene’s return.

Ah, this was heart breaking, but excellent use of the character. Having not read the comics, I really loved this kid. I felt terrible for him. I thought it was a really nice use of the form and medium to have him return as he did. I hope we see a lot more of him and I hope he does escape hell – whether to return as a villain out for revenge or to find some sort of peace.

9.     Annville’s Acceptance of Violence.

YEAH IT’S TOTALLY NORMAL THAT YOUR SHERRIF STRANGLES BLEEDING OUT ANGELS IN BATHS. Good lord. Sometimes I felt this show need to get a grip. I mean I know it was stylised violence but I couldn’t watch a lot of it. I don’t know about you but frequently I have hundreds of bodies piling up with loads of angels killing each other in my motel room all the time. Great scene, great sequence. How the hell did that get cleaned up? There was a vibe of weirdly charged violence to the place that when it got razed I’m sure someone somewhere took a breath and felt the earth was cleansed. 

10.  Angels.

Quite creepy. Into comics. Lonely.

11.  The meat thing.

I am frequently thankful to be vegetarian!

Preacher Season 1 is out now – you could pay money to an evil company that doesn’t pay tax and mistreats its workers or you could liberate it from a biscuit tin yourself.