Preacher, starring Dominic Cooper, made it’s debut on AMC last Sunday with an encore tonight! This supernatural series has us hooked from episode one, and we can’t wait for more!
OUTTER SPACE
We open the pilot episode of Preacher following a ball of energy (entity?) through outer space and down to AFRICA where it hits a pastor straight in the chest, flinging him backward into a wall and causing his congregation to proclaim it ‘a miracle’.
When the preacher wakes back up, he yells for them to be quiet then says he is the prophet before promptly exploding and coating his congregation in his blood.
The entity obviously decided this wasn’t the right person.
TEXAS
Jesse wakes up from a nightmare featuring his father demanding he promise him something. He gets dressed, passing by several empty bottles of alcohol before grabbing his sermon notes, dropping one then going to the church’s sign.
A few letters have been taken away to change the original message, and Jesse puts it all back together before making his way to the church in the distance.
Poor Jesse then stumbles his way through a message that obviously isn’t his. No one is paying any attention to him in the congregation, and it’s quite obvious the organist sees Jesse struggling so epically because the second-hand embarrassment is evident. When he gets to the ending he realizes he’s lost a page, Jesse throws in a quick, “Salvation will come to those…to be humble.” Cuts his sermon short and asks whoever is messing with the sign to stop, and the organ player quickly cuts in before he can go any further.
We cut to an outdoor picnic and a young boy picking up a beer and walking across the churchyard to Jesse. Unfortunately, Jesse is occupied with Ted, who has terrible problems with his mother who lives in Florida.
At this point, Jesse looks like he would rather slit his wrists that deal with this anymore. Still, he hands out a generic phrase, “Open your heart. Be honest with her.”
He uses the boy’s appearance as an opportunity to get rid of Ted and turn his attention elsewhere. The kid hands him the beer and Jesse takes a seat.
This is when the kid breaks down and tells Jesse what he really wants.
He wants Jesse to hurt his dad for hurting his mom.
The kid says, “He sins worse and he’s got it comin’.” Then alludes to Jesse’s past before he became a preacher.
Jesse launches in a monologue ending with, “Violence makes violence. It makes nothing much at all.”
He ends up telling the kid that he’ll help him out, but when he doesn’t give him a solid solution, the kid walks away.
The scene moves to city hall that night where the unveiling of the new town mascot is taking place. The Savages have been replaced by Pedro the Prairie Dog and as you can imagine, this doesn’t go over all that well with the town.
The sheriff approaches Jesse who’s drinking in his car (he acts like he doesn’t notice the alcohol) and strikes up conversation about how wrong it is to change the mascot—what a slippery slope it is. The whole time Pedro the Prairie Dog is getting beat down behind him while he does nothing to stop it.
They move on to speaking about the sheriff’s son, Eugene, who has left messages for Jesse and then ends up inviting him over there the following night.
When Jesse brings up the abuse allegations brought up by the kid from earlier, the sheriff gets defensive and says he won’t do anything until a formal complaint is made.
We get a bit of more Jesse’s past here when he pops off at the sheriff, and he responds by saying how people have thought Jesse has been too quiet since he got back home, but that’s how the sheriff likes it. The whole interaction is filled with Jesse grinding his teeth and trying to hold back anymore smart mouthed comments.
30,000 FEET UP
Here we meet our darling, Cassidy! He’s hosting a huge party on an airplane, getting everyone wasted. Then he goes to the bathroom and finds a Bible full of writing and realizes he’s on a plane with demon hunters….
Things seriously go downhill from here. After an amazing fight sequence where he completely destroys all of the men trying to kill him because he’s a vampire, he tears out one man’s throat and pours the blood of another into a bottle before he jumps out of the plan…with an umbrella.
I’m completely on board with Cassidy at this point.
BACK IN TEXAS
Ted is interrupting Jesse’s breakfast with his organ player and all her kids. We learn her name is Emily, and she’s pretty much holding it all down since the loss of her husband. It’s also pretty obvious that she’s carrying a torch for Jesse, too, but the Mayor is really interested in her. She mentions “Walter” not coming in for work, and Jesse says he’ll go and check on him later.
BACK IN AFRICA
Two super suspicious dudes who look like they stepped out of Jumanji are investigating the church from the beginning of the episode. With the way they walk and utter failure to blend in, I’m thinking these are the bad guys we’re looking for…
BACK IN TEXAS
Jesse is checking on Walter and finds him asleep on the couch. When he goes to get him a shirt, he notices a gun on the dresser and someone in the shower, singing. Immediately, he freaks out and leaves as quickly as he came.
A woman walks to the window and watches Jesse leave and keeps singing.
KANSAS, NOT THAT LONG AGO
This awesome flashback scene is where we get to know Tulip. She’s in a fight with a man in a car that’s speeding through a cornfield. After gaining control of the car, she yanks it to a stop then kills the man who took her map.
For the next few minutes, we get craft time with Tulip as she enlists the help of two small children to help her build a bazooka from tin cans to use against the men coming for her. She’s so good with them, and the scene is so hilariously different from what we’ve just seen from her.
She even gives some great advice on love. Watch out, Jesse!
“If you’re lucky enough to fall in love you have to fight even harder to keep it alive. Fight like a lion. So that on the day you love is weak enough or selfish enough or frickin’ stupid enough to fun away, you have the strength to track him down and eat him alive.”
When the threat arrives, she puts the kids in a storm shelter and tells them not to come out until the noises have stopped. After she kills everyone, Tulip tells them her name and leaves.
BACK IN TEXAS
Jesse is having another memory of his dad asking him to promise him something, but this time we see him take a bullet to the head at the end of it.
Then scene cuts to Cassidy who has crash-landed on a cow and then promptly eats another one.
It shifts back to Jesse at a slaughterhouse asking if there’s anyway he could get some money to fix the air conditioner in the church. It turns out the woman he’s talking to is the kid’s mom from before.
When Jesse talks to her about her husband hurting her, she acknowledges that Donnie is abusive. He beats her, bites, punches and hits her with a jump rope. Jesse then presses Betsy to tell the sheriff, but it turns out that Betsy actually likes what’s happening…
RUSSIA
The inconspicuous guys are back again, investigating the death of a Magister that happened the same way as the preacher from Africa…
BACK IN TEXAS
Jesse has his first run in with Tulip.
She thanks him for checking in on her uncle, Walter, and then propositions him with a job. It all has to do with the map she got back.
Tulip tries to get him join her, telling him that she’s heard he sucks at being a preacher and asks why he did it. She answers her own question by saying it’s to fill his daddy’s shoes, and more pieces fall into place for us.
She apologizes to Jesse and Jesse apologizes to her. When she accuses him of hating her he says,
“I don’t hate you, Tulip. I wouldn’t know how.”
“Don’t make me teach you then.”
There doesn’t seem to be any closure with their breakup, and we find out Jesse’s last name, Custer.
His initials are J.C. OKAY.
Next, Jesse shows up at the sheriff’s house to see Eugene, the sheriff’s son. He’s making a horrible smoothie for his son and his wife is basically catatonic in front of the T.V.
Eugene isn’t what you expect. He’s horribly scarred and his face is healed in such a way that his face pinched into a perfect circle for his mouth. He attempted suicide but was saved. His dad keeps him at home because of how he looks now.
He’s actually the first person to approach Jesse for advice that genuinely has a burden on their heart that needs to be relieved. (This scene was actually my favorite in this episode.)
After he leave their home, Jesse goes to a bar. On the T.V., we hear that the weird entity came around again, and this time it kills Tom Cruise. WELP.
While Jesse is having a beer, Cassidy shows up. He tries to make small talk with Jesse, but he brushes him off saying he can’t understand him, so he walks away.
That’s when Donnie comes in all hell breaks loose because Betsy told him about the preacher trying to get her to go to the sheriff with abuse claims. Jesse’s had a long day, though, and when Donnie threatens to hurt his own son for talking to the preacher, he fights back and shows them what he can do.
It involves Jesse beating the hell out of Donnie and his friends and ending with him breaking Donnie’s arm so that the bone is sticking out.
Cassidy joins in, too, and they both end up in jail.
“Jesus, what kinda preacher are you?”
That’s what starts off their in jail convo, and after a bit of a heart-to-heart, Jesse decides he’s leaving the preacher game. He can’t make good on the promise to his father.
Emily bails Jesse out and takes him back to the church, and that’s when Jesse tells her his revelation. He’s quitting, and then he puts the nail in the coffin by saying she’s an “asset” to the church. Emily sets him in his place, but she’s so upset that after he gets out of her van, she breaks her kid’s iPad against her dashboard.
Ted tries to call Jesse, but a banging at the church doors makes him hang up to see what’s going on up there. When he opens the doors and goes inside, the electricity if off and he walks down the aisle to sit in a pew.
He gets on his knees and begs God to speak to him again (like he told Eugene to do), but when he asks God to forgive him, he doesn’t hear anything. It remains quiet.
Jesse sits back and takes out a cigarette before kicking his feet up on the pew in front of him. That’s when the door to the church opens up behind him. He stands in the aisle and what used to be the green entity (it sounds like a baby’s heartbeat on a Doppler machine) slithers down the aisle and appears clear as it wavers before him. Then it slams into his chest, knocking him back into the altar.
Jesse’s has the dream about his father again, and this time we get the whole thing. His father made him promise to be one of the good guys because there are way too many of the bad ones in the world.
Emily is there when he wakes up and tells him that his fever has broken so they’re not worried about him anymore. Cassidy, however, has moved into the church attic and claims that he’s a friend of Jesse’s so it’s fine.
That’s when Jesse finds out he’s been out THREE DAYS and it’s a Sunday. I see you.
He gets dressed in a hurry and on the way to church, Ted runs up to him and complains about his mom again. This time when Jesse tells him to, “Be brave. Tell her the truth. Open your heart.” It’s in a very distorted voice, though, and Ted runs off seemingly having listened for the first time.
After a rousing rendition of ‘Amazing Grace’, Tulip shows up and has a seat and Cassidy sits up in the back pew. Instead of making the announcement that he’s leaving, Jesse takes the pulpit and apologizes for letting the church down.
He hasn’t done all that he could to help the people here, and he’s going to change now. He’s going to be the preacher they deserve. Jesse ends with a super dramatic speech, too, detailing what being a good preacher means doing.
Pray for the sinner.
Offer peace to the restless.
Avenge the innocent.
Cool the wrathful.
Welcome those who are lost.
And last but not least, speak forth the Word of God.
Cut to Ted on a plan, repeating Jesse’s words over and over again. Be brave. Tell her the truth. Open your heart.
He ends up in front of his mother at her nursing home, and after he tells her how badly she makes him feel, he takes a butter knife and cuts out his own heart and offers it to her.
For all this I am responsible.
I am that preacher.
This is my answer.
This is why I’ve come home. To save you.
Probably not what Jesse had planned to be honest. To end it, we have the inconspicuous twins again. This time with huge cowboy hats.
And someone has messed with the sign…again.
Theory:
I haven’t read any of the Preacher comics, but I noticed the first preacher is giving a sermon from Revelation, specifically about the Four Horsemen. What’s cool to notice in this episode is that the ball of energy hits and kills three other men before residing in Jesse, the fourth religious figure, or Fourth Horseman.
According the original text, the color of the Pale Rider’s horse was a pale green color…just like the entity that flew through this episode.
Does this make Jesse ‘Death’? Will he bring Hell with him? I mean, his initials are suspect and he did pass out and wake up on the third day. I’m really excited for the rest of this season!
Preacher airs on AMC, Sundays at 9ET, and is scheduled for a ten episode first season!
[Featured image courtesy Lewis Jacobs/Sony Pictures Telev]