• WHAT IT’S ABOUT: Shadow (Ricky Whittle) has been released from prison after three years only to learn that his wife, Laura (Emily Browning), was killed in a car accident. Bereaved, he meets the mysterious Wednesday (Ian McShane) on the way home from the funeral. Wednesday wants to hire him, but to do what? When Shadow gets home, a shocker: Laura had been having an affair with his pal, Robbie (Dane Cook) — also killed in the accident. Robbie’s wife, Audrey (Betty Gilpin) wants revenge, but on whom?
This much-anticipated, eight-episode series is based on Neil Gaiman’s 2001 cult classic about Old World gods who have taken up residence in America — and who are about to do battle with America’s new gods, representing TV, communications and so on. (The first four episodes were made available for review.)
• MY SAY: Seriously? Someone has made “American Gods” into a TV series? How is that even possible? Here’s how: Hire Michael Green (“Heroes”) and Bryan Fuller (“Hannibal”) as showrunners. Here’s another way: Get Ian McShane to play Wednesday, as perfect a match of actor to character as the Fuller/Green team is to the source novel.
Finally, do the book. Just damn the torpedoes and do it. The risk/reward ratio favors those who honor Gaiman’s psilocybin-inflected fever dream over those who want to do just another TV series that actually makes rational sense. Fans of the book will be pleased with this. Viewers who haven’t read the book will be lost at sea without a paddle. But have hope — some of those will come around in time. Green and Fuller have done a particularly fine job.
