World Premiere Trailer: Preacher
This recap contains spoilers for the Preacher series premiere, Season 1, Episode 1.
Something is coming war, shouts an African preacher as an unidentified force from Outer Space, as the initial title card suggests, hurtles towards Earth. Midway through his sermon his triumphant speech gets interrupted as hes shell-shocked by that unidentified force, which knockshim to the ground.
While his flock deems this a miracle, its quite the opposite as he stands up and starts claiming hes the chosen one, he explodes. Just. Like. That. That gut-filled, gory explosion, the frightened, blood-soaked flock and a creaky upside down cross outside the church pretty much set the tone for the first season of Preacher.
Meet Preacher, or Jesse Custer (Dominic Cooper). The small town of Annville, Texas generally chooses the former. Hes a drinker, a smoker and his past haunts him just a bit. He skipped town for several years but is back in Annville and has taken up his late fathers congregation. But dont let his western boots and silver tipped wing collar fool you hes still a man of G*d. Kind of. When young Chris Schenck (who you may recognize from the annoying Peter Pan Geico commercials) approachesCuster after a sermon and enlists him to hurt his dad because hes been abusing his mother, this preacher entertains the idea but ultimately takes the lawful option, calling on thetowns Sheriff to take care of the domestic situation at the Schenck home to no avail, of course. Pray for me, Preacher, says littleSchenck. If anyone were listening, I would, mutters Custer as the kid walks away.
Meanwhile on aprivate flight, an Irish barman entertains a boozing group of yuppies. But on a quick trip to the bathroom, this Irishman sees a bible and realizes hes been ambushed by these same yuppies. Why? Because hes not exactly like them.
Meet Cassidy (Joe Gilgun), a sadistically cheerful Irish vampire who lives on the run. He singlehandedly kills everyone aboard the private flight in spectacularly unhinged fashion. They try to eliminate Cassidy by pouring Holy Water on him but, clearly, that would have been too easy. Thekiller moment (pun intended), however, is Cassidy annihilatingthe pilot with a broken champagne bottle and then using said bottle to siphon out a few pints of blood so that, hopefully, after the inevitable crashof the now unmanned plane and Cassidys subsequent skydiving escape, he can regenerate himself. Unfortunately, hes completely disfigured upon landing and his elixir is bust, but a passing cow provides enough nourishment to get Cassidy back on his feet. Arent you a sight for sore eyes, why dont you come down here and given good ol Cassidy a kiss? he says before he devours her. So far, so gory.
Back in Texas, Custer goes to visit Walter, an older member of his congregation who apparently isntdoing so well. But when he arrives at Walters home, Custer runs into his past one he clearly isntready to handle, so he ducks out.
Meet Tulip, or should we say Priscilla Jean Henrietta OHare (Ruth Negga), who is, quite simply, a badass and also Custers ex-girlfriend. We get the first glimpses of saidbadassery in Kansas, as she tries to eliminate two thugs in a moving car. She pulls a Mike Tyson and bitesone of their ears off (later telling Custer its simply a leftover piece of shwarma). Awesome! So awesome! yells a little kid who, with his sister, sees Tulips murderous rampage. He was a really bad man, clarifies Tulip. In addition to kicking a*s and shaping the minds of young children, Tulip is a mastermind; she builds a bazooka out of alcohol, used cans, duct tape and tin toy soldiers. But no matter how tough she is, Custer clearly lefta dent in her heart the day he left Annville. But back to the bazooka with it, she takes out a helicopter, more thugs and finishes what we later learn was a job.
Tulip tries to convince Custer to take on one of those jobs. But it looks like hes sticking to being a preacher, although shes heard that he pretty much sucks at it. We get little tidbits of their previous relationship,but were barely scratching the surface.
Meanwhile, in Russia, theres been an incident similar to the one in Africa. Enter DeBlanc and Fiore more on them later we saw them briefly in Africa after the incident with that exploding preacher, so its safe to say well be seeing them again.
Back in Texas, Preacher goes to visit the Sheriffs son,Eugene, who is also known as Arseface. His face is permanently disfigured into, wellyou know, because he tried to kill himself. Hes pretty chipper considering the fact he attempted suicide. His castrating Sheriff of a father doesnt think Eugene should be going to church because he might be distracting to other churchgoers. Wow, way to be harsh, pop. But whats even harsher is that Eugenes prayers and conversations with G*d have all of a sudden becomevery quiet.
Do you think that there are some things so bad that even G*d wont forgive? Eugeneasks Custer. Custer reassures him that G*d doesnt hold grudges. His suggestions to Eugene, to really listen to G*d and get down on his knees, are almost self-reflective. But Custer cant even look at Eugene as he talks about G*d a clear sign that Custer is having his own doubts about what he preaches.Eugenes overwhelming happiness at the fact that G*d is willing to forgivefurther oust Custer as a particularly troubled man of the cloth. Custer doesnt feel that same happiness. Eugene thanks Custer with a hug and afinal slurp because, you know, his mouth doesnt close all that well and Custer heads out.
Word has gotten out to Betsy Schencks husband, Donnie, that Custer tried to check up on her about what appeared to be domestic violence turns out Betsy likes it. Either way, Donnie isnttoo happy about the preachers meddlingand meets up with Custer at a bar to lay hands on him in a not particularly healing way.But Custer has the final laugh when Donnie gets too cocky. Custer piquesDonnies interest promisingthat Donniesgoing to be hearing a bunny in a beartrap noise coming from his own mouth. Custer proceeds to beat him and his cronies up, locking Donnies arm into an unholy position that, in fact, ends up eliciting that high-pitched bunny squeal from Donnie.
Custer so far has had a jam-packed schedule. After quite an eventful few days back in Annville, he is thinking of quitting the church. But in one last attempt to regain his faith, Custer heads over to his church and, just like he had told Eugene to do, gets on his knees and prays but instead demands an answer from G*d.
G*d, please forgive me, he says. Yet, still no answer. But when the doors to the church open Custer feels a sliver of hope. But his hope may be misplaced asan invisible force enters, just like with the preachers in Russia and Africa, knocking pews aside as it approaches Custer until it finally enters him and knocks him out. To be fair, he fared better than the other two holy men.
Custer wakes up after three days to find Emily, his church assistant who has major hots for him, and Cassidy, his new vampire friend, at home with him. Preacher isup just in time for the Sunday sermon where hes planning to tell his flock hes peacing out.
On his way to church, however, hes intercepted by oneof his pesky congregants, who has been whiningabout his mother to Custer since he arrived back in Annville. When Custer tells him for the umpteenth timeto be honest and open his heart to her he takes it all too literally and flies to Florida to see his aging mother and tell her the truth. But, to match the gory precedent, he also cuts out his heart with a butcher knife and hands it to his mother.
Back in Texas, Custerlooks upon his congregation and Eugene and realizes he cant leave them. Hes going to avenge the innocent and cool the wrathful and welcome those who are lost and speak the word of G*d This is why Ive come home, to save you.
Just then, it looks like the mysterious DeBlanc and Fiore, who may or may not have a penchant for eating teabags, have arrived in Texas on the trail of the mystery force, ominously stating, Its here. Dun-dun-dun.
It looks like our Preacher has a newfound power, although hes at the moment unaware of it. People do what he tells them to do, so what is the extent of his power? When will he find out he has it? And perhaps most importantly, why Jesse Custer? The show is taking a break and repeating its first episode next Sunday for Memorial Day, so well have to wait until June 5 to find out.
What did you think of the Preacher premiere? Weigh in below.
Source: http://variety.com/2016/tv/news/preacher-recap-premiere-season-1-episode-1-pilot-dominic-cooper-1201779096/
