Season One
The remarkable first season of Deadwood represents one of those
periodic, wholesale reinventions of the Western that is as
different from, say, Lonesome Dove as that miniseries is from
Howard Hawks's Rio Bravo or the latter is from Anthony Mann's The
Naked Spur. In many ways, Deadwood embraces the Western's
unambiguous morality during the cinema's silent era through the
1930s while also blazing trails through a post-NYPD Blue,
post-The West Wing television age exalting dense and customized
dialogue. On top of that, Deadwood has managed an original look
and texture for a familiar genre: gritty, chaotic, and surging
with both dark and hopeful energy. Yet the show's creator,
erstwhile NYPD Blue head writer David Milch, never ridicules or
condescends to his more grasping, futile characters or overstates
the virtues of his heroic ones. Set in an ungoverned stretch of
South Dakota soon after the 1876 Custer massacre, Deadwood
concerns a lawless, evolving town attracting fortune-seekers,
drifters, tyrants, and burned-out adventurers searching for a
card game and a place to die. Others, particularly women trapped
in prostitution, sundry do-gooders, and hangers-on have nowhere
else to go. Into this pool of aspiration and nightmare arrive
former Montana lawman Seth Bullock (Timothy Olyphant) and his
friend Sol Starr (John Hawkes), determined to open a lucrative
hardware business. Over time, their paths cross with a weary but
still formidable Wild Bill Hickok (Keith Carradine) and his
doting companion, the coarse angel Calamity Jane (Robin Weigert);
an aristocratic, drug-addicted widow (Molly Parker) trying to
salvage a gold mining cl; and a despondent hooker (Paula
Malcomson) who cares, briefly, for an orphaned girl. Casting a
giant shadow over all is a blood-soaked king, Gem Saloon owner Al
Swearengen (Ian McShane), possibly the best, most complex, and
mesmerizing villain seen on TV in years. Over 12 episodes, each
of these characters, and many others, will forge alliances and
feuds, cope with disasters (such as smallpox), and move--almost
invisibly but inexorably--toward some semblance of order and
common cause. Making it all worthwhile is Milch's masterful
dialogue--often profane, sometimes courtly and civilized, never
perfunctory--and the brilliant acting of the aforementioned
performers plus Brad Dourif, Leon Rippy, Powers Boothe, and Kim
Dickens. --Tom Keogh
Season Two
Deadwood: The Complete Second Season continues the Shakespearean
brilliance of the landmark first season, created by NYPD Blue
head writer David Milch. Milch either wrote or supervised the
writing of each of the 12 episodes in this stunning follow-up,
which contains more than a few surprises for anyone who thought
they knew the myriad characters in the late 19th century town of
Deadwood--a mucky, ungoverned, exceptionally violent development
in South Dakota. As with the first season, Deadwood continues to
be about many things--survival, loyalty, alliances, duty--but all
of them are happening against a titanic battle between several
parties to consolidate power and real wealth in the territory.
Despite his cutthroat ethics, astonishing profanity, and bursts
of cruelty, it's hard not to side in this bid for a piece of
America's future with saloon owner Al Swearengen (a magnificent
performance by Ian McShane), a visionary monster who is
nevertheless more recognisably human than his rivals. Entering an
uneasy partnership with Al is Seth Bullock (Timothy Olyphant).
Seth begins the second season by teaching Al a few lessons in
chivalry, and their brief but bloody feud commences physical
ailments for Al that become increasingly shocking to behold. Yet
Al's difficulties have the practical effect of sidelining him for
a couple of episodes while the story sets up more complex power
struggles. Al takes on Deadwood's other saloon-brothel owner, the
unstable Cy Tolliver (Powers Boothe), as well as an off-screen
millionaire who is intent on owning all the gold-mining interests
by buying out weary prospectors' cls. Meanwhile, Seth's wife
and son (actually, his late brother's widow and child) arrive, an
unsettling development for Seth's lover, the widow Alma Garret
(Molly Parker), who soon reveals herself to be a more complicated
person than in the first season. The prostitute Trixie (Paula
Malcomson) begins thinking about her future and asserts
independence from Al by having sex with Seth's friend, Sol Star
(John Hawkes). Best of all, Calamity Jane (Robin Weigert) is back
and more endearingly uncivilized than ever. Special features
include actor commentaries on select episodes, the best of which
finds Olyphant and McShane cracking each other up while watching
the season premiere. --Tom Keogh
Season Three
The final complete season of HBO's remarkable Deadwood series is
full of surprises and devastating experiences as the nascent,
dangerous town prepares to join Dakota territory in 1877. As in
the previous two seasons, the question of who will control the
town's resources, assets, and people drives much of the drama,
affecting all manner of relationships and alliances, often
between the most unlikely people. The dominant storyline in
Deadwood Season 3 concerns upcoming elections for mayor and
sheriff of the mucky, gold-mining town. The real juice, however,
is not so much between the individuals running for office as
between two power brokers each trying to steer the results toward
their own purposes. Saloon owner and Deadwood's puppetmaster, Al
Swearengen (Ian McShane sustaining his brilliant peformance in
the previous two seasons), works closely with incumbent lawman
Seth Bullock (Timothy Olyphant) on retaining the latter's seat.
But Bullock himself has difficulty surrendering his penchant for
taking unambiguous action and relying on few words, especially
when he has to act like a politician and deal with people such as
George Hearst (Gerald McRaney, playing the real-life her of
William Randolph Hearst).Swearengen's rival, Hearst--a self-made
industrialist who gained his fortune through mining--has every
intention of overtaking Deadwood, with his eye particularly on
the lucrative mine owned by Bullock's former lover, Alma (Molly
Parker). (The violence Hearst employs to get to Alma's cl will
stun many Deadwood fans.) Meanwhile, Bullock's old friend, Sol
Starr (John Hawkes), runs for mayor against the feckless E.B.
Farnum (William Sanderson), and tries to navigate through his
difficult relationship with Trixie (Paula Malcomson) as she grows
enraged by former lover Swearengen's manipulation of her and
everyone else. Calamity Jane (Robin Weigert) is encouraged to
become a public speaker, telling of her misadventures with
General George Custer, and she commences a lesbian relationship
with Joanie (Kim Dickens), the saloon owner who is becoming
increasingly despondent and suicidal. Bullock's relationship with
his wife, Martha (Anna n) continues to deepen and become more
of an influence on him, Wyatt Earp comes for a visit, and a
newcomer to town, Jack Langrishe (Brian Cox), an old friend of
Swearengen, attempts to open a theatre. As expected, the season
finale concludes with the long-awaited election, but HBO's
decision to bring Deadwood to an end required creator David Milch
to wrap everything up in a pair of two-hour movies. Still, The
Complete Third Season is very satisfying on every level, and will
always be, along with the rest of the series, a television
landmark. --Tom Keogh