NO PREVIOUS KNOWLEDGE - BANSHEE

LUCAS HOOD: CRIMINAL SHERIFF

Since this show premiered in January 2013, I’ve been going on and on [and on] about how great and underrated it is. With Dexter and Breaking Bad ending last year, I think Banshee will be part of the next generation of great cable [and online] edgy dramas along with The Americans, Masters of Sex and House of Cards.

Season 2 of Banshee premieres tomorrow (Friday January 10^th) on CINEMAX.

If you missed Season 1 and don’t have time to catch up… fret not… I’ll try to explain everything you need to know in order to watch the Season 2 premiere. So, without further ado… here is the QUICK NO PREVIOUS KNOWLEDGE GUIDE into the [crazy] world of Banshee

THE PREMISE

An ex-con gets out of jail and moves to small town in the middle of Amish country where he witnesses the murder of the new town sheriff and subsequently steals his identity.

CARRIE (AKA ANASTASIA): DEADLY HOUSEWIFE

Season 1 of Banshee opens with our hero [or more precisely anti-hero with some hero moments] getting out of jail after 15 years. We never get his real name, so we just call him Lucas Hood. So… Lucas gets is released, barely escapes the UKRAINIAN MOB DEAD SQUAD and heads to “Banshee”, a small town in the middle of Amish country? Why? We’ll get to that later.

SUGAR: FORMER FIGHTER AND CON TURNED
BAR OWNER

First thing Lucas does in Banshee is stalk a nice suburban family (the Hopewells), but later he decides to stop by the local bar for a drink. The bar is run by SUGAR, a former champion fighter with a criminal past of his own. The bar is completely empty except for Lucas, Sugar and one other patron: the new Banshee sheriff (the REAL Lucas Hood). And here is where the real story starts. Two thugs enter the bar, guns in hand. The new sheriff clearly believes that putting on a cowboy hat makes him Raylan Givens from Justified or something and decides to try to quick draw and kill the thugs. Long story short, the sheriff is murdered, but Lucas manages to kill the thugs and save his life as well as Sugar’s. They are alive but in Sugar’s words: “Two cons, three corpses, one of them a cop…” not good math at all! Lucas helps Sugar bury the bodies in the middle of the woods and that’s when he gets the brilliant idea of stealing the sheriff’s identity… yes it sounds like an awful idea for someone who just got out of jail… but he has a reason… which brings us to...

DEVA: LUCAS'S DAUGHTER (shhh she doesn't know)

Lucas got arrested after a DIAMOND HEIST gone wrong. He took the hit to save the love of his life [and partner in crime] Ana. However, Ana never visited the man who sacrificed everything for her [she also had a very good reason, but he didn’t know that]. After getting out of jail, Lucas finds out that Ana has changed her identity and is now leading a suburban quiet life in Banshee as Carrie Hopewell wife of D.A. GORDON HOPEWELL and mother of two kids: Max and DEVA. It’s not confirmed right away, but we start suspecting very early on that Deva is in fact Lucas’s daughter [interested yet?]. So, now we know the reason Lucas went to Banshee… to find the love of his life [and his daughter]… and possibly get the diamonds they stole [but the money is secondary for him].

JOB: INTERNATIONAL MASTER OF COOLNESS
(and Tech Support)

So how are Lucas and Ana/Carrie pulling off all these “complicated-identity-changes-and-hiding-from-Ukrainian-mobsters” schemes? With the help of a tech-savvy-Asian-cross dresser, of course. Every show about criminals and fugitives needs a techie and they are usually very interesting characters… but Job took cool to a whole new level. All we really know about Job is that he is very good with computers, he goes way back with Lucas and that he can out-sass anyone.

RABBIT: UKRAINIAN PSYCHOPATH

But WHY go through all this trouble? Well… Ana wasn't just any regular rebellious girl who decided to flirt with criminal life… Oh no… she is actually the daughter of a ruthless Ukrainian mobster known as RABBIT. Remember the DIAMOND HEIST gone wrong? Well… it went wrong because Ana and Lucas were in the midst of betraying Rabbit. Now, Rabbit hates Lucas for driving his only daughter away [and there is also some weird substitute father thing going on there]. In summary, Rabbit is a psychopath and he will stop at nothing to find and kill Lucas and do God knows what to Ana and her family. Season one ended with Rabbit finally arriving in Banshee and capturing Hood. Carrie/Ana risks her life and exposes herself [as a comic-book/video game-super-heroine type] to her family to save Lucas's life… but Rabbit mysteriously disappears [after being shot like 20 times] so we know he will pop back up eventually… and probably be extra psychotic…     

Kai Proctor- the formerly Amish psychopath

KAI: FORMER AMISH PSYCHOPATH

So… Lucas is pretending to be a Sheriff, Ana is pretending to be a housewife, Job occasionally pretends to be female and they should all be scared of the UKRAINIAN MOB. What else can we throw into the mix? Well… what about a local psychopath in the form of KAI PROCTOR; former Amish and now criminal mastermind of Banshee. As Sugar explains: “What he doesn't own, he runs and what he doesn't run, he burns to the ground”. During S1, Lucas and Kai seemed to reach an understanding, but we know that won’t last … partially because Lucas was inadvertently banging Kai's Amish [now shunned] niece REBECCA. There is also a tribe of Native Americans [led by the gorgeous Odette Anabelle] that won’t go down without a fight… so there is a lot to look forward in Season 2.

Who should watch Banshee?

Banshee’s executive producer is Alan Ball, former show-runner of that little crazy vampire show True Blood. Before that, he wrote and produced another HBO critically acclaimed show: Six Feet Under; or you may also know him from his Oscar winning movie American Beauty. The other executive producer is Greg Yaitanes who has worked on shows like Lost, Prison Break, Alias and House M.D. (for which he won an Emmy). So… as you can see… the show is in good hands.

Needless to say, True Blood, Six Feet Under fans would enjoy Banshee; but I also think fans of other gritty dramas would love it. I think Banshee is suited for SOA, Justified, The Bridge, The Killing and Game of Thrones fans. So… if you watch and love any of those shows, I suggest you start watching Banshee ASAP!!!

I think this it is the type of show men would particularly enjoy. It has the perfect combination of action and shocking violence [and sex] that guys seem to love so much. But I am a girl and I love it as well! So it has a little bit of everything for everyone… And ladies... if you have eyes, you will appreciate Antony Starr [my second favorite kiwi actor]... that's for sure. Yes, be warned, it is pretty darn violent; but the action is fun, the stories are intriguing, characters are compelling and it has an intense and romantic story at the core. 

Finally, you know what else is awesome about Banshee? ONLINE GOODIES! There is an entire series of origin prequels and a graphic novel! Go to www.welcometobanshee.com for more!