Banshee S01E01: "Pilot"

The two best things that the new Cinemax original series have going for it are the fact that Alan Ball is involved in the project and the fact that Cinemax is cable television and thus is immune from the "if it is good, it will be canceled" disease. If you want to read a positive review of Banshee, this paragraph will have to suffice. Consult that friend of yours who likes everything and ask him/her what he/she thought.

While Alan Ball is certainly credited as an Executive Producer, very little of his vision can be seen in Banshee. The people who are really in charge are Jonathan Tropper and David Schickler. If you are expecting Six Feet Under television programming, you will be disappointed. I wouldn't even expect True Blood quality television, although this show could certainly benefit from the campy sense of humor that the supernatural romance program offers. This is not Alan Ball, and it is not the series that is going to put Cinemax up there with Showtime and HBO as the home to great drama.

The pilot of Banshee does exactly what every cable television program does in its first episode. It establishes quickly that you are going to be able to see naked people, women especially. Shortly thereafter, it introduces you to one or two characters that you are likely to want to see naked in the future. This is the hook for most mindless viewers, and nearly every successful cable program has had these, but the really good ones complement the hook with character development and a good story. Banshee throws in some violence, bad language, and teenagers making bad decisions and calls it a day.

As for the story, it is a typical small-town Yojimbo set-up. A dishonorable hero enters town. In this instance, it is ex-convict Lucas Hood (who looks nearly identical to his antagonist in the opening sequence - at least in Anime they change hair color or clothing in order to distinguish clones). Hood is inevitably going to have a show-down with the bad men and women who run this town. He's inevitably going to lose a lot. But he's inevitably going to win and look really cool in the process. He will probably spit blood often.

I can't say that the actors are unskilled at acting. I can say that they didn't get much of a chance to do so. There seems to be very little character development written into this script, and where it is present it is carried out in stereotypical ways: a bar conversation here, a lingering shot on a disturbed woman there. You know the drill. Sometimes it feels like the dialogue is approaching clever. There was a lawyer in the beginning who said, "Is that a judge in your pocket or are you just happy to see me?" If this line were brought up and buttressed by other smart and funny dialogue, I might think we were dealing with something interesting. But it was alone, and it honestly felt like a fluke.

Banshee is a bust. It doesn't leave me wanting to watch the next episode. It leaves me hoping that other television programs premiering this month like The Following and The Americans have the strength to fill the gap in good new programming.

I've syndicated this review at Examiner. You can read it here. If you click on it a few times, spend some time there, or navigate to a new page, I might get some money. But I'm only asking that of you if you liked reading the article here and want to show your appreciation.

Mathew St. Patrick

Actor Mathew St. Patrick. You may recognize him as Keith on Six Feet Under. You may also be thinking, "Oh, jeez. Another Six Feet Under post." I may respond, "You think in italics?" Six Feet Under is worthy of all the praise it gets, and Mathew St. Patrick is one of the best actors who has ever been on the show.

Jeremy Sisto

Actor Jeremy Sisto. I feel like I've seen him in every movie I've ever seen sometimes, but - and this is going to emerge as a theme - nothing really compares to his work on Six Feet Under. I once asked a room of people if Jeremy Sisto has ever played a role where he wasn't a creep, stalker or weirdo. My friend Ryan Thrasher, a trivia aficionado and former Jeopardy contestant, spoke up instantly: "Grand Canyon. It's a movie starring Kevin Kline and Steve Martin and Jeremy Sisto plays a completely normal boy." Well, there you have it.

Six Feet Under

It didn't take me five seasons to decide that Six Feet Under is worthy of your consideration. It took me four episodes. The amount of creativity and emotional depth that I found in an ordinary, every-day episode titled "Familia" put Six Feet Under over the top. Already, it was one of the best television programs I had ever seen. The funny thing is that the show keeps getting better and better. I just started the third season a couple of days ago, so let's not get into deep discussions about material I haven't seen and spoilers that many of Cavemen Go's readers don't want spoiled. Most of my friends have Six Feet Under at the top of their favorite television series of all time lists, and I've been told that no matter how much the series, and in particular the series finale, is hyped, it will be surprising and amazing. It will live up to and surpass all hype.

Of course, I do have one warning. Six Feet Under deals with realistic difficult situations on nearly every single episode. Six Feet Under made our months of long distance dating difficult incredibly hard on Amy during the fall, and many of the themes of the second season are sickeningly close to some of the most difficult things I have ever faced in my life. I got flashbacks to bad times and felt anxious quite often. In a way, I think that Six Feet Under should have a warning label listing possible side-effects. But the metaphor of a drug with side-effects is not accurate in describing the show. It's more like the kind of coming of age trials that some native tribes put their teenagers through, difficult things that one must confront in order to be an adult. In many ways our culture revolves around domestication and the preservation of immature tendencies, a kind of sheltering perpetuated not only by parents but by mass media and most of the capitalist economy. Perhaps Six Feet Under is the first small step toward liberation. If not, it is just a fantastic television program.

Peter Krause

Actor Peter Krause. You've probably seen him in any of a number of different acting roles, but really, the reason I'm featuring him today is because of his fantastic work on Six Feet Under. I think Krause's role as Nathaniel Fisher, Jr. is one of the most important roles in television history, up there with Mulder, Scully and Special Agent Dale Cooper. Well, probably above them, and less of a FBI agent sort of thing...