The sixth episode of the second season was an eventful one, featuring a confrontation with the Saint of Killers and some unexpected soul-searching for Jesse.
Previously, on PREACHER…
The Saint of Killers has been hunting Jesse Custer, Tulip O’Hare and their Irish vampire friend Cassidy for the whole of the season so far, and the man from Ratwater, Texas finally catches up to the trio, but not before he searched other apartments in the New Orleans complex and killed the residents there.
Initially, Jesse urges everyone to escape after one of the Saint’s bullets comes through the walls and stops in a Greek yogurt container inside the fridge, but they come back to save Denis, the owner of the apartment when he walks in to his house while the Saint is there. Jesse then offers the Saint a deal: He’ll get the Saint into Heaven using Genesis, because God is missing and neither he nor the angels will honor an agreement to allow the cowboy into Heaven.
Because the Saint is soulless, though, Jesse goes on a search for a soul to give the Saint. Apparently, this is not a weird thing to Jesse, as he runs to a soul shop. Unfortunately, all the stores in New Orleans that specialize in souls are being run out of business by a Japanese company called Tamashii Ureshii Iku Iku, which apparently translates into “Soul Happy Go Go.” So Jesse tries to pull off a heist, fails miserably and then uses Genesis to get cops to help him get a soul.
Unfortunately, none of the souls on the armored car are a match for the Saint. But Jesse’s is, so he extracts one percent of his soul to give to the cowboy. And then promptly double-crosses him. Now, with a soul, The Saint is susceptible to Genesis, so Jesse uses that to shove him in the armored car, drives him to a swamp and ditches him in marshy water.
This may have been the best episode that Preacher has produced thus far. Between the tension in Jesse’s mission to get a soul, the weird but terrific acting by the soul technician (played by James Kyson, who was Ando on Heroes) and the other subplots that advanced the story of the show, the episode was wall-to-wall amazing. If the back half of season two is more like this episode, we’ll have a near-classic season on our hands.
Quick Shots
• When Jesse walks into the soul shop, and the clerk questions how he knew what to look for, he calls himself Jesse L’Angelle – his mother’s maiden name. Later, Tulip asks Jesse how he knew how to get a soul, and he responded by saying, “Family business.” I really can’t wait til this show takes a trip to Angelville to see Jesse’s Gran’ma.
• After a few episodes of hinting at the relationship between Cassidy and Denis, the old man who owns the apartment where Jesse, Tulip and Cassidy are staying in New Orleans, we get our answer here. Denis is Cassidy’s son! After a bit of an asthma attack and the trauma of nearly dying at the hands of the Saint, Cassidy tries to be a good da’ and gets his son a new flat screen TV, DVD player and a Playstation.
• The trio goes to the library to research the Saint of Killers. As Tulip listens to episode 57 of American Psychopaths (episode 58 – Dick Cheney), the music cue is the same Bach piece that Morgan Freeman listens to while at the library to research the seven deadly sins in Se7en. Really nice touch.
• During the library montage, we get glimpses at some of the art from the comic book.
Next time, on Preacher…
https://youtu.be/DU1D5lN0Lm8