AMC’s Parish Aims to Live Up to TV’s Great Crime Dramas, But Can’t Quite Get There

There might come a time when we grow tired of watching Giancarlo Esposito playing cool badasses and memorable villains, but we aren’t there just yet. And while AMC’s latest crime drama Parish doesn’t offer much beyond the classic genre tropes—which isn’t that surprising, given that the 6-episode show is based on the 2014 British miniseries, The Driver—it has an intriguing cast led by a solid Esposito, a fresh-enough vibe, and a lived-in atmosphere that puts it slightly above average. If you think Your Honor, Ozark, and Ray Donovan mixed together (but on a much lower scale), you’re not far off on what to expect here.

Gracian “Gray” Parish (Esposito) is a family man with a buttload of financial (and a few personal) problems: his black-car limousine service company is struggling, the bank denied his latest loan, and he’s about to lose his family home that’s filled with wonderful memories. On top of that, he’s still grieving his teenage son, who was tragically killed almost a year ago—a devastating loss he can’t seem to process or move on from, understandably. Enter Colin (Skeet Ulrich playing another deadbeat loser, as usual), an old friend from Gray’s murky past when he was a professional driver working for notorious criminals, who desperately needs his help. Though our hero has left the crime life long ago, he can’t refuse to give a hand to the man who spent 17 years in prison protecting and staying loyal to him.

Colin has a debt toward a Zimbabwean crime lord called Horse (Zackary Momoh), the head of an infamous human trafficking ring in New Orleans, which needs to be settled. Gray agrees to take a job for him that requires his specific skills and discretion, but as expected, things quickly go sideways, and before he knows it, he’s in his garage dismembering a white man to drop his body parts into a nearby swamp for the gators. That’s only the beginning of a downward spiral that will put him and his beloved family in grave danger as new and old mobsters start coming out of the woodwork.

As you might have guessed by now, the plot isn’t the most original aspect of Parish. There aren’t many twists here that fans of the genre wouldn’t see coming from a mile away. Yet, the effort put into building tension and a constantly threatening atmosphere filled with violence, gore, and a few intense action scenes make the show a pretty enjoyable ride. 

In addition, the Zimbabwean crime family serves more here than simply being two-dimensional gangsters. They provide a much-welcome cultural flavor with their distinctive traditions, language, and worldview that often feel more captivating than the protagonist’s journey. It’s simply refreshing to see bad guys with multiple layers and an entirely different background than what we usually get (Italian, Colombian, Irish, etc.) in these types of crime stories.

Unfortunately, when it comes to Gray and his family dynamics, the writing and the acting tend to overwhelm with a typical melodrama that often turns the series far too heavy for its own good. There are moments when Parish shamelessly indulges in the emotional suffering to a degree when it becomes over-the-top and counterproductive, alienating the viewer instead of making us relate. Its overdone portrayal of sorrow often squeezes the power out of the emotions by overplaying them.

That said, Esposito is undeniably a master of his craft, and you’ll never question the dedication and effort he puts into playing these types of characters, even at 65. He gives it his all, whether portraying heartbroken men or cunning villains, and that goes a long way, regardless of how the final product turns out. He isn’t the only one, though. Momoh’s Horse and Ivan Mbakop’s Zenzo, the vicious and quick-tempered brother, are also terrific as they constantly butt heads with each other about how to run their crime empire. And Bradley Whitford playing another sophisticated scumbag will never get old, either.

But there’s no escaping that Parish becomes strained as it continuously takes on more than it can handle. Running multiple subplots and bringing in new characters halfway through that connect to Gray’s past and the New Orleans underworld feel too big of a task to tackle in only six episodes, most of which run well under an hour. As a result, the various plot points start to turn tonally uneven, showing us fast-paced car chases at one moment and a father’s devastating internal breakdown over his murdered son the next. As much as it’s a genre piece, Parish seems to have an identity crisis about what it wants to be, trying to encapsulate a heart-breaking family drama and an epic gangster tale simultaneously, while truly succeeding at neither. No doubt, it’s ambitious, but the writing and the execution aren’t there to support it all the way through.

Overall, you can’t help but feel that there’s a limitation (by the runtime, budget, and structure) the series can’t overcome, even if it dies trying. Its characters aren’t nuanced enough, its action scenes look more old-school and dated than they want to be, and its drama feels more manufactured than free-flowing. The show lacks that essential quality that makes viewers engaged to a point where they desperately want to see what happens next. This isn’t that kind of show, but undeniably aspires to be.

In today’s television landscape, however, series like Parish can easily co-exist and find their target audience who live for this kind of stuff. For what it’s worth, I know my dad will love it, and perhaps that’s enough to justify its existence and a potential follow-up the finale evidently prepares in case AMC decides to renew it for another year. But if you’re used to such high-standard crime dramas as Breaking Bad, Your Honor, or Ozark, there’s a chance you’ll find it a little lacking the same way I did.

Parish premieres Sunday, March 31st on AMC, streaming on AMC+.

Akos Peterbencze is an entertainment writer based in London. He covers film and TV regularly on Looper, and his work has also been published in Humungus, Slant Magazine, and Certified Forgotten. Akos is a Rustin Cohle aficionado and believes that the first season of True Detective is a masterpiece. You can find him talk about all-things pop culture on Twitter (@akospeterbencze) and Substack (@akospeterbencze).

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