Posted by
Emmett of the Unblinking Eye on Sunday, March 15, 2009 9:50:22 PM
Well, either you guessed or you didn't. Or guessed and didn't care, which I must admit is much more likely.
Remember the Bible? The Books of History? Kings? Well you should, but you wouldn't necessarily recognize it in the new NBC series "Kings". But it's worth a watch just to see how the talent has updated it.
The first two hours involve the story of a modern-day kingdom called Gilboa reuled by King Silas Benjamin (apparently Saul has too Jewish a tone for prime time), played interestingly by Ian McShane of Deadwood. At the same time the kingdom is opening its new capital city, Shiloh, it is at war with neighboring Gath, which has a gigantic tank called ... well, if you can't guess that, then I really don't know why you've read this far anyway. Into that fray steps young David Shepard (get it?), played unemotively by Christopher Egan of Eragon semi-fame, shortly after receiving a blessing from the Rev. Samuels for fixing a blown hose in his car. Yes, a blown hose.
Now I have always maintained that the story of Saul, David, Jonathan, et al., would make a grand soap opera, and Kings looks like it might have potential. But the updating of the story, which feels more than a little anachronistic, can be a little jarring. In fact, as others have noted, at times it's a little weird. I mean, how often do you actually hear positive references to God on a network TV series?
Should you see it? In my, any TV series based (no matter how loosely) on the Bible needs all the support it can get. Who knows? Once the networks try it, they may actually like it.