It was fascinating and engrossing how American Gods Season 2 Episode 4 opened with a god origin story that was the hallmark of many of the episodes on American Gods Season 1. Here we see Technical Boy manifest through the worship, and attention of a boy who falls in love with Pong then progresses through his Gameboy years to become a programmer who realizes the potential of technology to change the world. I translated all of Bach's cantatas into a database that wrote a program that segmented the notes into digital objects the way that Bach statistically attended to... But everything it created was mechanical, artificial. The real insight was in programming violations to predictable variations. I gave it permission to shatter the rules. Son Permalink: I translated all of Bach's cantatas into a database that wrote a program that segmented the... Permalink: I translated all of Bach's cantatas into a database that wrote a program that segmented the... Inspired by Bach and his father's own worship of music, he writes a program which can compose new Bach-like music. Through that act of creation and devotion, Technical Boy is born. Related: Get Starz via Prime Video Channels for Addictive Dramas, Hilarious Comedies & Hit Movies! Considering the many changes in the show's production team, I appreciate that they're trying to create a sense of continuity through these two very different seasons. Of course, seeing his beginnings means that we mourn a bit when he gets "retired" by Mr. World and replaced by New Media. Don't get me wrong. Technical Boy was super annoying especially when he was initially introduced on American Gods Season 1 Episode 1. However, it's indicative of Mr. World's approach to war preparations that he has no loyalty to those who are no longer useful. Specifically, Technical Boy let Laura kill Argus on American Gods Season 2 Episode 3, so it was obvious there would be repercussions for that. Wednesday: I'm going to win this one. People like me more than they like you. World: I prefer to be feared. Permalink: I prefer to be feared. Permalink: I prefer to be feared. And, considering how that left New Media in that awkward state just short of her fait accompli with the dextrously-tentacled Argus, she was probably gunning for his downfall secretly while offering to scratch his back. There's an innate sense of injustice in the Upgrade Trope. Technical Boy was a New God, but he was first-generation. He and Classic Media evolved together, hand in hand even, anthropomorphically-speaking. With the arrival of New Media, it's very clear who is Mr. World's current pet. And she's even more annoying than Technical Boy was at the start. For Technical Boy's CEO worshipper to jump deity ships so quickly was a harsh and sudden reality check for the God of Entitlement. He just didn't have the glamor to retain that attention anymore. Although Mr. World refers to Technical Boy as "retired" it looks more like he's gotten "archived" and that means he could come back into play. If Media was upgradable, it seems reasonable that his skills could serve a future purpose with some retraining. From the New to the Old, this narrative spans the spectrum. Bilquis' pursuit of Shadow brings her into conference with Mr. Ibis and Mr. Nancy. It is hella-fertile ground for some powerful speeches. Mr. Nancy's impassioned lecture on the dangers of passivism and neutrality in these troubling times gets undercut by the calm of Mr. Ibis's big picture perspective of history. Mr. Nancy: Egyptians told tales of the sacred Book of Thoth which contained the secrets of the gods and brings misery and pain and suffering to anyone who reads it. Mr. Ibis: And grants a birds-eye view to he who writes it. Permalink: And grants a birds-eye view to he who writes it. Permalink: And grants a birds-eye view to he who writes it. Meanwhile, Bilquis' interaction with Ruby, the grieving mortal granddaughter of one of Mr. Ibis' clients, is itself alternative form of religion. She preaches the spirit of revolution that Jesus fostered in his original followers, the disruption he caused by his teaching, the powers he overturned through his presence. She takes direction from that memory and resolves to be a part of the movement so that her worshippers will not settle for "contentment" the way Ruby's grandmother did. A woman's heart should never be so hidden in God that she cannot hear her own truth. Bilquis Permalink: A woman's heart should never be so hidden in God that she cannot hear her own truth. Permalink: A woman's heart should never be so hidden in God that she cannot hear her own truth. The underlying message here -- for both Bilquis and Technical Boy -- is that there needs to be both give and take between gods and their congregation. Technical Boy's failure can get blamed partly on how he approached the CEO, demanding action and servitude without considering the CEO's desire for delight and joy. Related: American Gods Season 2 -- It's All About Faith Bilquis learns from Ruby. Listens to her needs and regrets as well as her dreams and why she clings to a faith that gives back so little. Where Technical Boy's freedom comes to an end because he cannot grow with his worshipper, Bilquis finds the spark to spur her to action when she understands Ruby and the plight of those she would serve. And that brings us to Shadow and Wednesday. Shadow's gotta be more discombobulated than usual after his dream healing sex with the cat goddess, Bast. Yeah, that. At least he's moving easier despite the scratches on his back. Their mission in St. Louis? To get Money to throw in with the Old Gods. Money. The most influential god in America. Untouchable asshole but his stock never falls. Wednesday Permalink: Money. The most influential god in America. Untouchable asshole but his stock never falls. Permalink: Money. The most influential god in America. Untouchable asshole but his stock never falls. I totally and completely LURVE the casting of this show. The predictable thing would've had some stuffy, upper-crust pseudo-European old white man playing the role of Money. Who do they cast instead? Yeah, sure, he's still an old white man, but it's William "This-is-my-brother-Larry-and-this-is-my-other-brother-Larry" Sanderson. Absolutely brilliant. And the idea that Money isn't just what Americans worship WITH (by buying and donating), it's WHAT they worship is such a meta-concept, my mind needs a little Bilquis-style contorting to accommodate it. He may be credited only as The Bookkeeper, but Sanderson's every nuanced reaction to Wednesday and World conveys the authority Money commands. After all, how DO you coerce Money? With what can you threaten it? For what (or whom) does it care? Money: Okay, enough. I'm honored to have the big dogs and the god gang begging at my table but Money doesn't make emotional investments or invest in emotional entities. Too much risk in such ventures. Not enough opportunity. Wednesday: You could always hedge your bets. Permalink: You could always hedge your bets. Permalink: You could always hedge your bets. Mr. Wednesday's ability to roll with the setbacks is admirable. I mean, he's got to be getting used to it by now. However, I'm not as convinced by his negging of Shadow, trying to convince him that he got chosen because he's worthless. Kudos to Shadow for not buying it either. In a clever parallel to Wednesday's parable of the dollar bill, Shadow knows that Wednesday believes there is value in him, just as people's trust in Money makes pieces of paper valuable. I have a piece of paper. But I want this salt shaker. You have the salt shaker but you're willing to take my piece of paper for your salt shaker. Now, why would you do that? Because this isn't actually a piece of paper. It's a story. And the story you've heard over and over and over again is to convince you that this is worth something, this is of value. No matter what country or culture or religion. The whole world loves money. The greatest story ever told. Wednesday Permalink: I have a piece of paper. But I want this salt shaker. You have the salt shaker but you're... Permalink: I have a piece of paper. But I want this salt shaker. You have the salt shaker but you're... Can we talk about how creepy it was for Money's heralds to be a trio of Girl Scout-esque candy hockers? Hockers. I said, HOCKERS. And how hilarious was Wednesday's reaction to their entrance? Mind you, I don't believe for an instant that he was so distracted that he missed hearing Mama-Ji's warning. Related: Book to TV Adaptations -- The Good, The Bad, and the WTH were They Thinking? When dealing with tricky alliances, it's probably wise to ignore some things. Odin knows this well. So, where to next? We'll need to check in on Laura and how her new heartbeat is treating her. Mr. World is due for another team meeting although Team New Gods seem to be shrinking in numbers by the episode. I'm curious as to what Bilquis and Messrs. Ibis and Nancy are up to while they "have a drink." And, of course, Salim and The Jinn have Gungnir in hand. What is the plan for Odin's mighty spear? As with American Gods Season 1, it's a pleasure to watch American Gods online a couple of times if you have the chance for its visuals, style, and effects. Watching Orlando Jones make his pitch to Ibis and Bilquis alone is worth revisiting this episode. Related: Enjoy UNLIMITED access to thousands of Movies and TV shows with Amazon Prime Video. WATCH ANYWHERE. CANCEL ANYTIME! American Gods premieres on Starz each Sunday in the U.S. and new episodes become available the day after the U.S. broadcast in Canada and internationally on Amazon Prime Video. Diana Keng is a staff writer for TV Fanatic. Follow her on Twitter.<doc-sep>When the late, great critic Gene Siskel hated a movie, he’d say he wished the filmmakers had asked themselves, “Is my film more interesting than a documentary of the same actors having lunch together?” This question applies neatly to television as well. I’ve often sat through hilarious cast press conferences for sitcoms that had failed to make me so much as smile, and wondered how that energy couldn’t be properly harnessed when the cameras rolled. A show as visually flashy and bug-nuts crazy as Starz’s American Gods (Sundays at 8 p.m.) should never fail Siskel’s test. Somehow, though, it has. The second season (I’ve seen the first three episodes) is utter tedium. But I’d be riveted to witness a lunch where Ian McShane, Orlando Jones, Emily Browning and Crispin Glover talked about the mess the series has become since Season One. Since the show’s been away for nearly two years — and has been through a lot of backstage turmoil over that time — let me refresh your memory. American Gods is based on Neil Gaiman’s fantasy novel where ancient deities like Norse ruler Odin (a.k.a. McShane’s Mr. Wednesday) and African trickster Anansi (a.k.a. Jones’ Mr. Nancy) wander the earth, surviving on power derived from just a scant few remaining believers and fending off challenges from modern gods that rule over things like technology (Bruce Langley as Technical Boy) and pop culture (Gillian Anderson as Media in the first season, Kahyun Kim now). Caught in the middle of this war between old gods and new are ex-con Shadow Moon (Ricky Whittle) and his recently deceased wife Laura (Emily Browning), who comes back to life, kind of, in a decaying body that’s now superstrong. Season One was run by Bryan Fuller (Hannibal) and Michael Green (Logan), two of the most imaginative writers working in television at the moment. They packed it with indelible imagery, from Media channeling David Bowie circa Ziggy Stardust to Laura literally exploding a bad guy with a forceful kick to the groin. Blood splatter has rarely looked as dramatic, or pretty, as it did on a show where mortals and gods tended to die in the most graphic fashion possible. Fuller and Green were let go after the first season wrapped production. According to this exhaustive Hollywood Reporter story (which is also more interesting to read than the new episodes are to watch), production company Freemantle Media had two major concerns with the duo. First, the episodes cost a fortune, even for premium cable in the Peak TV era, and Fuller and Green apparently wanted even more money for the new season. Second, Gaiman didn’t appreciate the show’s deviations from his book, and wanted Fuller and Green replaced with someone who would do a more faithful, straightforward adaptation. Money is money, but most of what was exciting about American Gods in that uneven first season came from Fuller and Green, or from actors like Anderson and Kristin Chenoweth who left in solidarity with their ousted bosses. In particular, there were two first-season episodes that borrowed almost nothing from the book: one about the life of Laura Moon, the other the story of an Irish immigrant (also played by Emily Browning) who crossed paths with leprechaun Mad Sweeney (Pablo Schreiber). These were far and away the season’s two best hours, where everything else was a slow and deliberately confusing meandering across America as Wednesday recruited Shadow Moon to help him assemble an army of old gods. It didn’t help that Whittle was so underwhelming as Shadow, but even the gloriously charismatic McShane seemed wasted as a character who played things close to the vest for the purpose of elongating the story. Jesse Alexander was hired to replace Fuller and Green, and to stick to the original text as much as possible. It didn’t go well, per the THR report, to the point where McShane and the other actors began improvising their own dialogue and Jones (who’s also a member of the Writers Guild) had to be given a writing credit to avoid violating guild rules. (Rewrites and reshoots sent the budget skyrocketing, ironically.) Eventually, Alexander was sent home. And as of last month, a replacement showrunner still hadn’t been found, complicating any attempt to order a third season. So, yes, McShane and company would have much to talk about if someone were to film them having lunch and being candid about the circumstances behind the making of the new season. And it would have to be more exciting than the actual episodes, which offer all of Season One’s rambling and very little of its inventiveness. It continues to feel as if the show, like its characters, is traveling in circles, never quite clear on its destination or means of getting there. Though the second episode gives him a backstory, Shadow in the show’s present remains a frustrating blank, there to look perpetually slack-jawed with awe and confusion like he’s Harry Potter getting his first peek at the Hogwarts dining hall. The show at least seems to recognize that he’s a drag, separating him from the old gods for a couple of episodes so Wednesday can have some livelier traveling companions like Laura or Mr. Nancy. Neither new pairing lasts long, unfortunately, and Whittle is still onscreen far more often than his performance warrants, regardless of Shadow’s prominence in the book. For a series whose characters persist on ancestral memory, American Gods seems built not to stick in the minds of people watching. Two years is an eternity to remember details in this TV landscape, but even the new episodes seemed to slide out of my brain after I watched them, or sometimes while I was in the middle of them. And the imagery feels much less inspired than in Season One, making the long and opaque stretches of plot even tougher to sit through. Gaiman’s a hell of a writer. Even with Anderson and Chenoweth gone, this is still a striking and deep ensemble. But the whole thing is hollow and dull. Fuller and Green’s vision of American Gods was far from perfect throughout, but it could be stunning in isolated moments or episodes, where the new season offers very little to believe in.<doc-sep>
Spoiler warning: This review reveals major plot points from season 1 of American Gods, and lays out season 2 storylines. Neil Gaiman’s 2001 novel American Gods tells the story of awesome, magical beings brought low by the loss of faith and the cold realities of the modern age. Now the same tragic fate has struck Starz’s American Gods TV adaptation, which returned for season 2 on March 10th. Conflicts about the show’s budget and adherence to Gaiman’s story led showrunners Bryan Fuller and Michael Green to leave after season 1, which led to the loss of standout cast members Gillian Anderson and Kristin Chenoweth. Gaiman chose Jesse Alexander to take over as showrunner, but he was “exiled” from the show last fall, and Starz still hasn’t named a successor. “I’m not what I once was,” the goddess Bilquis (played by Yetide Badaki) says in season 1, and the same can be said about the American Gods show. The first three episodes of season 2’s eight-episode run try to pick up where season 1 left off while navigating around the departed actors. Season 1 ended dramatically with Chenoweth’s Ostara, (aka Easter) choosing to side with Ian McShane’s Mr. Wednesday (aka Odin) in his coming war against the New Gods by causing a blight meant to force people to pray to her for the return of spring. Aside from a brief background news piece, this action has no clear impact on the world, and Easter has apparently turned her back on Wednesday because he ran over some of her bunnies. Meanwhile, the New God Media, who Anderson played with an overabundance of confidence as she threatened and cajoled heroes and villains alike, was apparently so shaken by Wednesday’s display of power that she’s gone into hiding to reinvent herself. New Media (Kahyun Kim) emerges in the episode “Muninn,” wishing herself a happy birthday with a Snapchat-filter version of Anderson’s sultry turn as Marilyn Monroe from season 1. “How is this an upgrade?” shouts her fellow New God Technical Boy (Bruce Langley). The obvious answer is that it isn’t. Gaiman seems to have gotten his wish for a more direct adaptation. He co-wrote the season 2 premiere “House on the Rock,” which includes a Wednesday monologue about the creation of roadside attractions as an act of religious devotion that’s almost a verbatim transcript of a passage from the book. The trip “backstage,” where Wednesday’s hired mortal agent Shadow Moon (Ricky Whittle) sees the gods in their true forms, is also taken directly from the book. But the decision to depict them with the same distracting superimposed glowing used on the Greek pantheon in 2010’s Clash of the Titans doesn’t help produce the intended sense of wonder. Season 2 really goes off the rails as the writers continue the work of embellishing Gaiman’s story to stretch it into a multi-season show. The episode “The Beguiling Man” is almost entirely devoted to a brief section of the book where Shadow is captured by the New Gods agent Mr. Town (Dean Winters, without any of the humor he brought to 30 Rock or Brooklyn Nine-Nine). The episode combines seemingly pointless torture with flashbacks that give Shadow an even more unnecessary backstory, complete with the broadest of heroic clichés: he doesn’t know who his father is, he was bullied but determined to fight bullies, his mother tragically died of cancer. Shadow worked in both the novel and the show’s first season as a cypher, a stand-in for the reader / viewer, and in a broad sense, for all of humanity — an example of how a man can lose everything, and then find faith. The attempt to add depth to the character actually makes him feel shallower. This isn’t the only time when season 2’s writers seem not to understand what American Gods is about, and what makes it good storytelling. Season 1 delivered fierce political messages through powerful scenes like Mexican Jesus dying trying to protect a group of illegal immigrants, or the West African trickster god Anansi (aka Mr. Nancy, played by Orlando Jones) telling the prisoners on a slave ship what’s in store for them and generations of their descendants. Season 2 just delivers a series of dry monologues about being black in America, and the mistreatment of Native Americans. Season 2 also woefully squanders good ideas like having Hera’s many-eyed servant Argus become the god of surveillance.