TV Show Review

TV Review: PREACHER: Season 1, Episode 5: South will Rise Again [AMC]

Dominic Cooper Preacher Ruth Negga South Will Rise Again

AMC‘s Preacher See TV Show Review. Preacher, Season 1, Episode 5: ‘South will Rise Again,’ did briefly allude to the Civil War (to grave effect), but referred more directly to the fortunes of one particular character. The circumstances surrounding that Civil War reference, however, brought us one step closer to a major player from the past leaving his mark on the show’s future. First things first, though, he had to get some killing hate started up again.

So the Cowboy (Graham McTavish) walks into a saloon, but what would’ve been a cliche, on some other show, was all too brutally real, here. The history of the American South West ain’t John Wayne & NRA nostalgia, folks. While our hardened horseman was able to ignore most of that ugly, one unfamiliar family’s fate did prompt him to prevent the same befalling one he had been briefly acquainted with. Ratwater was no country for a lot of types, but the Cowboy drew the line at innocent children & their families. At least the ones he thought were innocent. Since no good goes unpunished, he wound up giving misfortune a second shot at him – and misfortune rarely misses twice.

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So that’s how the Cowboy got his killing hate back. Where he goes with it… clearly we were just meant to ask that question (even if some of you already have a pretty good idea). Frankly, that question was the single most compelling thing about the episode; but, fortunately, it wasn’t the only stay-tuned hanger offered.

At present, some misdirected rage had made an attentive rebound-in-waiting out of Cassidy (Joseph Gilgun), after misdirecting rager, Tulip (Ruth Negga), got a grip on the fact that her new suitor was a real, live vampire (not the fake, undead kind). I’m not sure if Cass knew of the ‘boyfriend’ Tulip spoke of; but she gave him just what he needed to egg her on to one final effort to reach out to Jesse (Dominic Cooper).

The point was to force him to acknowledge who he was – but in terms of being the man he had been, versus the man he was only trying to be. The problem for Tulip was that Jesse was on a mission from God (he thought), and was too busy being a Superstar of Jesus Christ to have his wilder nature played to.

Not on the surface, anyway.

For all his talk about being a changed man, Jesse got a twinkle in his eye every time he saw an opportunity to flex his new vocal chords. Maybe he relished the chance to effect real, positive change, or he just liked the challenge; but it there was definitely some hubris, there. Having traded one weapon of leverage for another, and settling on his voice as a weapon of choice, his compelling people towards what he regarded as right was just another gun to a Komodo Dragon’s head. Maybe he wasn’t as changed as he needed Tulip to believe (or did believe, himself).

So Tulip traded in boyfriends, and given everything its members don’t know about each other, it may be a while before the band gets together (at this rate, I’m thinking a season ender deal).

Beyond another snippet from the past, about what’s to come, and Tulip catching Emily (Lucy Griffiths) in a compromised position (scaring the piss out of her, I might add), the balance of the episode focused on Jesse giving a shout-out to God, from center stage.

Emily noticed something was off; but her run-in with Tulip might’ve been distracting. Arseface (Ian Colletti) may have noticed; but he may have been too grateful, having bad blood with the Loaches voiced away, to be troubled. No, the real fly, at the bottom of the soup bowl, may be Donnie (Derek Wilson).

Once his wife, Betsy (Jamie Anne Allman) got him going again (leveraging a new threat to his manhood against the funk he was already in), it didn’t take much for him to start piecing his own Preacher problems with a much larger one. The one man he looked up to – as a real, red-blooded American Alpha dog – had suddenly found religion, and they had a run-in with the Preacher in common. Betsy seemed to take his conspiracy theory in stride; but considering her own Alpha dog was going puppy on her, I imagine she made some allowance for it.

As Donnie & Betsy seem to prove, masochism & sadism go hand in hand; so I’d keep an eye on Betsy, too – if stepping out of her Sub role is what it takes, to get her Dom back, sadism may come easy.

As for Donnie’s Alpha dog hero: I think he just plastered the fine print, to Jesse’s Power of Command (the one about the road to Hell being paved with good intentions), all over the walls of his office. Sure, I saw it coming. Still Hella fun.

Not having any fun at all: DeBlanc & Fiore (Anatol Yusef, Tom Brooke), the Heaven sent Hellraisers just shy of having gone AWOL. With all the fun Cassidy had been having (literally) at their expense, the sorry sods were actually under the impression that a deal had been brokered, and that Jesse was playing hard to get (after being the recipient of the vice they had payed for).

If I didn’t feel sympathy for the poor devils before, then watching them get to the point of speaking to Jesse, directly, did the trick. Of course, if it came down to them catching a break (and all going right in life, the Universe, and everything), versus the Jesse-Tulip-and-Cassidy band hitting the road (with the Power of Command to abuse)….

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It’s like I said… more stay-tuned hangers than a Cowboy getting his killing hate back.

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Sam Joseph

Sam is an Avid consumer/observer of Geek culture, and collector of Fanboy media from earliest memory. Armchair sociologist and futurist. Honest critic with satirical if not absurdist­­ wit with some experience in comics/ animation production.
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