SummaryIntelligence officer John Tavner (Michael Dorman) is given an assignment to stop Iran from getting nuclear armaments while working at Milwaukee's McMillan Industrial Piping in this dark comedy from Steven Conrad.
SummaryIntelligence officer John Tavner (Michael Dorman) is given an assignment to stop Iran from getting nuclear armaments while working at Milwaukee's McMillan Industrial Piping in this dark comedy from Steven Conrad.
The delightfully creative series from writer, director and creator Steven Conrad (The Pursuit of Happyness, The Secret Life of Walter Mitty) returns better than ever, a wholly original vision that has distant-cousin connections to the vibe of the Fargo television series and Wes Anderson films, while being its own weird thing.
There’s much to appreciate in Conrad’s mastery of building tension toward ludicrous outcomes in some case, or punctuating stretches of relative calm with explosions of chaos and violence.
Season 2 is shorter (both in episode count and length), darker, and lacking in much of the whimsy that kept Season 1 afloat, but it’s an intriguing narrative with unique payoffs.
If your personal tastes run to off-kilter comedy, then this weird, atmospheric spy caper, back for Season 2 on Amazon, is right up your alley: think of a series mixing the offbeat sensibilities of the Coen Brothers with the quirky darkness of David Lynch.
Had the day off of work today, so I planned to check out an episode of the new season this morning. 8 episodes later, I can tell you it's top notch. Some of the best writing, directing, and cinematography I've seen in a show. Cohen Brothers + Wes Anderson + special sauce.
Rushed. Scattered. Inundated with uninteresting secondary characters and an incomprehensible plot designed from the ground up to drive this once promising entry from the shelf to the wastebasket.
Watching our weathered hero juggle seemingly impossible tasks made even more so by a revolving door of often comical blunders sourced from his intelligence team, alias's coworkers, friends, background characters and self was a joy during the previous season. But no longer. The overarching sense of realism that grounded the insanity of season one as an incredibly unlikely but still plausible worst case scenario is nowhere to be found in this second season. And without that believability the plot unravels to the point of being almost unwatchable after just the first few episodes.
Not to mention the admittedly small complaint about the second seasons horrible revision to its introduction sequence which now features a musical accompaniment ("Sure Shot" Beastie Boys) that is perhaps lyrically relevant with regard to the themes of the season but which is woefully out of place in terms of its musical tone. I mention this somewhat petty complaint above my many others both because it is so starkly contrasted by the phenomenal song choice of the first season ("Train Song" Vashti Bunyan) and also because it exemplifies everything that is wrong with the second. Namely, that everything that happens - every decision made during the course of the season, such as the song selection for the new intro, only ever makes half-sense.
That is not to say season two doesn't have its moments. It does. The action sequences are enjoyable. And it's equal parts amusing and intriguing to have our seemingly permanently concussed hero explain his government funded tactics to one of his cohorts or directly to the viewer - answering questions I never knew to ask. Questions like, "how to knock a female unconscious with a bicycle?" Sadly, these moments don't occur nearly often enough to propel the season to anywhere near the height of the first.
My advice? Unless you're flush with time, avoid this newest chapter of Patriot and spare yourself the poison it will surely inflict upon the beloved memory of the first.
I loved season 1, but season two is god aweful. They are really overplaying the whole music thing. I'm not a chick, I don't want to watch a musical. It was fine in season one, a sprinkle here or there, not is like some lame crutch, overused every second. And whats with all the random characters. Season 2 is so bad I had to stop at episode 5, what a shame.
There is one key message to this series: Only Americans are human beings. The rest of us are simply props. We can be beaten, abused, kidnapped or killed without consequence. This will make the mighty Americans a little sad at the time, but they'll sail off into the sunset to live happy lives in the future, oblivious to the pain and destruction they left in their wake. Vile xenophobic racist claptrap