Tune In Or Tune Out: ‘Parish’ Dampens Giancarlo Esposito’s Leading Debut With Stereotypical Banality
Upon first glance, AMC’s Parish offers Giancarlo Esposito a break from his well-known cold, calculating villain performances. His titular ‘Gus Fring’ schtick has followed him since the finales of Breaking Bad and Better Call Saul, and AMC’s adaption of The BBC’s The Driver tries desperately to give him a breath of fresh air. However, in attempting to create a distinctive blend of surreal imagery and tight action, Parish devolves into an asynchronous, inelegant mess that creates frustration.
Pushed to the edge by the death of his son, Gracian “Gray” Parish (Giancarlo Esposito) returns to a life of crime, only to find a more violent and discorded New Orleans waiting for him. Facing money troubles, inner family turmoil, and a rabbit hole of deception, Gray must overcome a cast of villains in order to find solace for his family and himself. At its best, the series is a lukewarm take on the “one last job” cliché of crime dramas. At its worst, it transforms Esposito’s ecstatic performance into an illogical caricature unable to escape the series’ contrived narrative.
Meet Gray
We open on Gray — a loving family man with a dark past as a getaway driver — waiting in his car as the police approach with their guns drawn. After a well-executed chase scene, we flashback one week, greeted with the real Gracian Parish. His car business is nearing bankruptcy. His marriage is slowly dissipating as the death of his son, Maddox (Caleb Baumann), leads him down a path of apathy, self-hatred, and isolation. To say he’s emotionally unstable is an understatement. “I don’t know how to be chill after what happened!” he cries to his daughter (Arica Himmel) during her first birthday without Maddox. Esposito carries such devastation in his voice that it’s impossible not to empathize with Gray’s deteriorating stability. After all, he is a grieving father without closure as his son’s killer remains at large. Following a visit from an old friend, he grudgingly agrees to assist a shady group tasked with trafficking Africans, hoping to find the identity of his son’s killer. As per usual, everything goes wrong, and Gray is not only caught between two brutal groups out to kill him, but also tasked with carrying the brunt of the series’ charm on his shoulders.
Despite the cast’s best efforts to make the series work, Parish is like a car left in neutral with no destination in mind. The series suffers from a severe lack of object permanence with its characters. Multiple backstories, setups, and side plots cease to exist when the series gets distracted by its violence, resulting in character arcs that are as abrupt as they are poorly maintained. Other than Gray, no one gets any sincere characterization, which is difficult to grasp considering the series hinges on its characters’ interpersonal relationships. The cast saves the series from becoming a complete disaster, but it isn’t enough to trudge through six episodes of unoriginal, rushed storytelling.
Was It Tune In Or Tune Out?
Credit where it’s due, the series is beautifully shot. The cinematography perfectly captures the tone of each scene through intense closeups and eerie wide angles. Visually, Parish is on par with its contemporaries, but it fails to capture the villainous landscape of its setting. Despite the series revolving around a criminal underground, it lacks any serious tension. Sure, there’s intense action towards the end of each episode, but there are never any high stakes that warrant emotional investment. However, Esposito treks through forgettable dialogue with immense passion and sincerity that makes the series slightly above average. The series is laced with middling action and miniscule emotional payoff that diminishes any intrigue it might have had. Parish plateaus after its first episode, and with its confusing surreal imagery, lackluster story, and the semi-ambiguous season finale, a second season is incredibly unlikely.
Despite opening with a fast-paced car chase, Parish isn’t quick enough to keep up with its rushed story. Clunky additional storylines stall the series from becoming the speedy crime-drama it tries to be. With an amazing cast and Esposito as executive producer, it’s unfortunate Parish is simply a meek, run-of-the-mill revenge story with an unsatisfying finale. The series is laced with disjointed, off-putting, and sometimes aggravating surreal imagery that derails each episode. Thankfully, the series’ attempt at cinematic artistry becomes less prevalent deeper into its six-episode run, but it fails to give audiences anything except narrative whiplash.
Who Will Like It?
If intense action and gritty drama is what you seek, Parish will barely suffice. It has its moments but never reaches its full potential. The story aches for a longer season, as its narrative arcs are exceedingly rushed, wasting the talent of its amazing cast. Despite an enticing first episode, Parish lacks cohesion and devolves into a derivative, visually confused series with no endgame. By no means is Parish a bad show, it just exists within a landscape of similar, and better executed, high-quality prestigious television. It’s an unseasoned crime drama lacking creative risks or a cohesive story to make it stand out. All six episodes of Parish can be streamed on AMC+.