David Farnor | On 24, Jun 2018

Preacher is AMC’s warped adaptation of Garth Ennis and Steve Dillon’s graphic novels. Never seen the show? We break down the reasons why you should catch up:

It’s unique

In a world of Peak TV, it’s not often you come across a TV series that’s genuinely unique, but from its opening episode – which kicked off with someone exploding – Preacher has been unlike anything else on the small screen. Even the premise alone is unusual: it follows Jesse Custer (Dominic Cooper), a Texas preacher who becomes possessed by a strange entity called Genesis that gives him the power to make people do anything he says.

The mythology

Ennis’s comic books have built up a universe of impossibly big ideas and the TV show’s co-creators Sam Catlin, Seth Rogen and Evan Goldberg dive right into the story’s complex mythology. Season 1 sees Jesse deal with his new powers, which blur the lines between demonic abilities and divine intervention – and Season 2 sends him on a quest to track down God himself, who is missing from Heaven.

Your new favourite vampire

Jesse is joined on that quest by his best friend sidekick, Cassidy. A 119-year-old vampire, he’s not your standard companion: he’s disloyal, selfish, drugged-up, sex-obsessed, foul-mouthed and has a total disregard for anyone’s plans, whether they come from Custer or God. Played by Joe Gilgun with a wicked charisma, he hails from Dublin, which balances all of those despicable traits with Irish gift of the gab. The result is an endless font of one-liners and depraved action – and the undead and vicar double-act you never knew you needed.

Ruth Negga

Along with the duo for the ride is Tulip, Custer’s sort-of-ex-girlfriend. But where she might be just defined by her romantic involvement with Jesse, Preachers gives her the chance to evolve beyond her on-page origins, becoming not only a criminal but a force of nature in her own right. She’s bad-ass and can hold her own in a fight, but she has her own story to explore (and hide), which makes her an intriguing figure as versatile as she is dangerous.

The insane action

Our diverse, bizarre trio get into all manner of scrapes, and from the car-through-a-cornfield and flamethrower-on-a-plane opener, the extravagance of the action only gets more and more ridiculous. By the end of Season 1, they even get a lethal foe to ramp up the stakes: The Saint of Killers, a gun-slinger whose origins go back to the 1800s and a hell all of his own.

It’s seriously twisted

All that action is driven by an increasingly warped ensemble of strange characters and eccentric enemies. There’s Eugene, Jesse’s most faithful parishioner, who has a bumhole for a face, perverse caretaker TC, who works for strange spiritual medium Gran’ma, and the enigmatic mastermind Herr Starr, who’s head of secret organisation The Grail. They cross paths with each other, not to mention even older vampires, nasty enforcers, a helpful Hitler and more. The more these oddballs collide, the more twisted things become, and soon we’re being whisked along on a rise that includes everything from blasphemy to a moral dilemma involving infanticide.

It’s hilariously unexpected

By now, you get the idea: this is a show where can only expect the unexpected. And Preacher manages to make those surprises all part of the fun: rather than frustrate or confuse you, a constant line in deliriously dark humour holds the supernatural skills, the violent spills and the theological thrills together. Never before has a show been so gross, so profane and so profoundly entertaining.

 

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