First off, if you’re not already watching Banshee, then please, I beg you, minimize this page, cue up Cinemax’s online streaming service MAX GO, set aside, oh, about 33 hours and then get back to me. It will be worth it, I promise.
No, Banshee might not be the best show on TV right now, at least not based on our usual definition of “best.” It won’t win an Emmy for top drama or be crowned by critics as successor to The Wire. But, you know, Banshee doesn’t care about your paltry awards or high art. It’s here to entertain, to enthrall, to engross, to scratch those voyeuristic itches that you may or may not be too embarrassed to admit you have. It’s here to provide a kick-ass hour of TV every week and, goddamn, does it succeed.
For those not familiar, the premise is simple: super thief, unnamed, is released from prison. His first move is to track down his former lover/accomplice, who also happens to be the daughter of the crime boss he once ripped off. He finds her down in a fictional small Pennsylvania town named Banshee, though not, of course, before finding time for a quickie in the bathroom of some seedy roadside bar.
One problem: the lady friend changed her name and now has a husband and kids. Oh, and during his first day in Banshee he winds up in a kerfuffle with some local gangsters and the new town’s sheriff. They all kill each other, allowing our former thief to assume the identity of Banshee’s sheriff, Lucas Hood.
And that’s just the pilot.
https://youtu.be/-fNj5e5BLTA
Think of it like this: Banshee is a R-rated live-action comic book, and I mean that in the most complimentary of ways. It’s Deadpool before Deadpool was a Hollywood thing, only there’s no Ryan Reynolds-like wit (though our anti-hero does take a similar type of beating). It’s Daredevil and Jessica Jones — only better and completely original. Instead of playing off comic book plotlines, Banshee creates them. Every character is morally ambiguous and complicated and clichéd, but in all the ways that you’d hope.
The villains are eclectic and captivating, from the former Amish-man-turned-town-crime-boss to the Jason Statham-Transporter rip-off to the obese mustachioed gangster who shows up for just one episode, but makes you want to know everything about him.
And that’s the thing about Banshee: every character’s got a backstory that you’re just dying to read. All are deserving of spinoffs.
Oh, and let’s not forget all that sweet juicy pulp. Do you enjoy films where the local police station comes under attack and the cops have to spend the night fending off the bad guys and wind up enlisting help from some of their prisoners just to stay alive? Of course you do.
What about shootouts where the heroes appear to be twice as trained as the soldiers they’re attacking and manage to take out 40 men each? Duh.
Heists where we get to follow the whole thing via security footage?
Duels featuring elaborate hand-to-hand combat and sweet ninja weapons? Dirty Army commanders? Chain-smoking tortured FBI agents? Secret and mysterious government agencies? Prison cafeteria brawls? A town that has a Native American reservation, an Amish community, clans of neo-Nazis and an army base all mere miles away?
(Lots and lots of sex?)
This series has all of that, and so much more. And most importantly, Banshee knows exactly what it is. After all, it’s not every day you see a showrunner (Jonathan Tropper, previously known more as an author of contemporary slice-of-life like This Is Where I Leave You) voluntarily pull the plug because, as he wrote last year for Grantland, “the story, as it was originally conceived, was over.”
Banshee returns on Friday for its fourth and final season. I can’t wait, but I’m also sad to see it go. It’s hard to find a show that knows its purpose, that exists to satisfy viewers as opposed to hoity–toity critics or those individuals who dole out all the fancy awards. (Though it is worth noting that many critics do indeed love Banshee.)
Is Banshee the best show on TV? Honestly, who cares? You won’t find a more entertaining hour of television anywhere else. In the end, that’s all that matters.
