On the day that Shadow Moon (Ricky Whittle) is released from prison, he discovers that his wife Laura (Emily Browning) was killed in a car accident. On the plane ride back to his home, he meets Mr. Wednesday (Ian McShane), who hires Shadow as his personal bodyguard. As Shadow and Wednesday travel across America, Shadow discovers a new world while they meet up with a number of Wednesday's associates, who he seeks to recruit into a war with forces that threaten to destroy them.
Neil Gaiman is one of my favourite authors, due to his ability to create such vivid, unique, and stylistically driven worlds in his work. Paired with the showrunner of Hannibal, Bryan Fuller - who oversaw the execution some of the most beautiful sequences I've ever seen on TV - there was no way that I couldn't be overwhelmingly excited for this series. Hannibal being one of the greatest shows of all time only increased that excitement. Gaiman's work has a very specific voice, so the most important - and challenging - goal for this series was to take the bonkers source material and transform it into something new.
American Gods definitely manages to capture Gaiman's voice, in particular his sense of humour. The dry, very dark comedy serves the over-the-top, quirky world that the characters inhabit perfectly. The show doesn't demand to be taken seriously, but rather embraces its fantastical elements and dives headfirst into goofiness. The story incorporates mythology from across the globe and across time, but manages to bring it all together into a cohesive universe. Even the small, seemingly inconsequential non-sequiturs from the book are brought back and made into a larger part of the story.
In terms of an adaptation, the show skillfully balances the representation of the original material, and also manages to expand it, thanks to the increased time frame it has. Just like most of Gaiman's work, the story doesn't pause to explain things or flesh out the world. Rather, it just throws the protagonist - and, by extension, the audience - right into the strange, eclectic world that Wednesday inhabits. Having read the book, I knew the real answer behind everything, but the show takes it time to reveal what's really going on, which builds a sense of mystery around everything.
The style is the stand-out aspect of the series. It's very comparable to Hannibal, with a very slow, methodical approach to how it tells its story, and there's a real beauty to the violence and action. If you have any interest in cinematography or visual effects, I highly recommend American Gods. There's no effort made to ground the action in any sense of realism, but the overall heightened nature of the show helps to make the more ridiculous aspects not feel stupid. The show is certainly an acquired taste, and if you appreciate some good ol' weirdness, you'll definitely have fun.
The show also manages to capture the somewhat disjointed aspects of Gaiman's book. Because the book is rooted in so many different kinds of mythology, it goes off into tangents and build up the world in ways that don't directly connect to Shadow's story. I was worried that if the show attempted this, it would feel jarring, or like they were wasting time. But the show managed to expand on these vignettes and use them to flesh out the story and character even more so than in the book. On the other hand, it has been quite a while since I've read the book, so maybe those connections were always there, but the overall cohesion of the story made it all the more satisfying.
American Gods isn't a show for everyone, but it definitely clicked with me in the right ways. The characters, the world, the action, the humour, and especially the style made for a very impressive season, and the beginning of a story that I can't wait to see continue. It's not even a show I can say much about, because so much of it just has to be seen to be truly understood. It's certainly the most unique show on TV right now, and if you've been looking for a show that can transport you to a new world, American Gods can accomplish that. Just be ready for some graphic imagery. A lot of graphic imagery.
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