Can 'Preacher' join the Pantheon of Extraordinary AMC Dramas?
I've written extensively in the past about AMC's near-flawless winning streak of complex, riveting dramatic output for TV. The network sits somewhere in the middle of all the others in terms of content, with its own direction that's wholly unique. The people behind the machine are the best at what they do.
Mad Men seems ancient when we look at the network's current slate of shows. But it remains a pinnacle of television, a masterpiece of serialised storytelling. Since then, the network has been most successful in a very different style of story: western hybrids. Apart from Halt and Catch Fire, period dramas haven't been entirely their thing. Instead, AMC has taken advantage of a kind of western resurgence, replacing Indians and Cowboys with antiheroes and, often, anti-villains.
The Walking Dead is the obvious example. The zombie drama has been something of a cultural phenomenon, seeping into every facet of pop culture with a series driven by a simple premise; what happens after the apocalypse begins and zombies start to outnumber humans? The network has taken advantage of this new modern direction, which incites that even the most obscure regions of pop culture deserve a spin-off, or a reboot, or just a plain old continuation. Because we got Fear the Walking Dead.
Breaking Bad, of course, is Mad Men's only competitor in terms of critical adoration, despite neither of them hitting anywhere near the commercial heights of The Walking Dead. Breaking Bad, though, got much closer. Its Albuquerque setting grounds it utterly and completely in a western landscape, complete with shootouts and morally complex characters. The difference between modern western-flavoured television and the westerns of old is the seemingly self-aware nature of these shows, exploring and exploiting antiheroes as characters far removed from the classic heroic figure. Better Call Saul, extending off of Breaking Bad, sits somewhere between the former and Mad Men, a drama set in Walter White's same playground, but driven by human interaction almost exclusively.
Preacher is the next big AMC series to reach our screens, and it comes with plenty of anticipation. An adaptation of the cult classic comic book that ran from 1995 to 2000, Garth Ennis' series about a foul-mouthed preacher with a strange entity within him who sets out on a literal search for God, who has abandoned heaven, is perhaps the most ambitious series order that AMC has given. It falls right into the same ballpark as the network's other western-infused dramas. Preacher is a loud, horrifying, and often disturbing series, one many considered unfit for adaptation.
And that was perfectly true for a long time. The property had been gestating in developmental limbo for nearly two decades, but Seth Rogen and Evan Goldberg found a way to make their dream project come true. The first possibilities surfaced back in 1998, when Ennis himself sold the film rights and wrote a series of drafts based on his first story-arc. Financing conflicts arose due to investors being put off by the religiously controversial element. A run of disappointments followed as pre-production and production had been greenlit (with James Marsden in the lead role) and ultimately abandoned.
In 2006, HBO commissioned a pilot, to be produced by Mark Steven Johnson and Howard Deutch. Johnson pitched the show as one issue of the comic per episode, wanting to be as faithful to the comic as humanly possible. August 2008 saw new executives decide to abandon the project, claiming it was too stylistically dark and, again, religiously controversial. Sam Mendes was next posited for the director's chair for a film adaptation after the rights were acquired by Columbia Pictures. Again, failure. It would be five more years before the project found its fated home.
From what we've seen so far, the series seems intent on taking the story in an original but faithful direction. The comic book is a road story through and through, an on-the-go adventure that never settles into one locale. Already, that's a difficult thing to manage on television, which by its own DNA requires 'hubs' for its characters, given budgetary and time limitations.
The Walking Dead, though, has done it with immense success. It's found a way to keep things ticking along while settling into its home turf one season at a time. Preacher starts off, on the page, in a small Texas town. The key trio of characters linger there for one issue, before the roller-coaster takes off. It seems very likely that the first season, or first portion at least, of AMC's adaptation will spend its time in the town of Annville and settle its characters in for some small-town conflict.
The series is a controversial one to begin with; it's unashamedly confronting. You give someone a book titled Preacher, and this is not what they'll be expecting. It's certainly going to be toned down for television, particularly for AMC, though the network has slowly loosened its grip in some areas. Still, while we can expect some profane visuals, it'll fall expectantly short of the grotesque lengths Ennis took his series twenty years ago.
When it comes to casting for any major adaptation, it's without a doubt the number one issue fan upheaval is likely to be caused by. Dominic Cooper seems a perfect fit for the character of Jesse. Joe Gilgun can certainly work as the Irish vampire Cassidy (you read that right), and for Jesse's ex-girlfriend Tulip, Ruth Negga has been cast as the originally Caucasian, blonde badass. Negga fills only the last of these adjectives, and yet it's a refreshingly vibrant change to a series that certainly will need to be modernised for the sake of a modern audience. The comic isn't racist or sexist, by any means, but it digs uncomfortably right into these pits. Its bold approach is what made the comic so beloved, so the series still needs to maintain that particular angle. It just needs to find the right way.
And early reviews suggest that the perfect balance has been found. The pilot is being touted as one that should not work, but absolutely does. Reactions so far are making Preacher sound like a game-changer, which is a welcome relief for anxious fans of the comic. So with the pilot hitting screens for the wider audience on May 22, the question waiting to be answered is this: Can Preacher reach the same heights as AMC's other revolutionary masterpieces? And while it will be a long time before we can fairly answer that question, the network can do no wrong. If a show has done poorly critically, it's managed to maintain commercial success regardless (Fear the Walking Dead has proven to be hit and miss with critics, as good as its parent sometimes but unfortunately poor in other areas).
Only rarely does the network not pull it off. Halt and Catch Fire has been gifted faith and renewed for a third season despite extremely poor ratings. The network is comfortable enough to take such a risk, which is great. Hell on Wheels has never been regarded at the same level as The Walking Dead or Breaking Bad, but its a solid series in its own right (proven by its five season-long lifespan, which concludes this year). Preacher may well prove that the modern western angle is AMC's angle, the same way that superhero drama (and often with a young-adult tone) is The CW's forte. And where comic book adaptations always conjure up images of costumed heroes, it can only be a good thing to see less detectable, quality comic book series get deserved adaptations.
Breaking Bad and The Walking Dead are almost universally loved. Mad Men is a critical darling, in some circles the greatest television show of all time. Fear the Walking Dead and Better Call Saul are proven examples of how spin-off's can be done successfully. This is before mentioning BBC network team-ups like Humans and The Night Manager, and 2015 debutante Into the Badlands. Preacher has every chance of joining AMC's three or four great shows, and looks like it'll be the boldest and most over-the-top series on the network to date. For this writer it's going to be, hopefully, a quick week, because it's been a long wait. Finally, Preacher begins its sermon for the first time in just seven days' time.
