Recommended TV: The Outsiders
At RIOT, we’re avid TV watchers. We absolutely adore the ability to watch full seasons in one go while we work. The major problem with that is you end up running out of new shows to watch really quickly. It was a pleasure then to get a text this morning recommending WGN America’s new drama series “The Outsiders” that’s currently streaming on Hulu.
It’s akin to Game of Thrones or Vikings for it’s scruffy, burly, bearded men, but it’s set in the present, not the past or some mythical land. A similar modern day reference would be Sons of Anarchy, with The Outsiders sharing a cast member in Ryan Hurst who played Opie in SOA. He was was one of our favorite characters in that show who (#SpoilerAlert) ended up sacrificing his life for Sam Crow in an emotional, stomach churning prison battle.
The Farrell clan, (which sounds a lot like Feral, which we thought was their name until we looked it up) live in the Kentucky hills and are outcasts to the rest of the town. They have their own leadership, rules and they despise money. The basic storyline of series one revolves around the local coal company trying their hardest to take the Farrell land away from them. Add into the mix internal struggles for leadership and power within the Farrell clan, with Big Foster (David Morse) trying his utmost to dethrone his mother Lady Ray (Phyllis Somerville). The Farrell’s also have their own legendary moonshine that makes one local kid kill his father, claiming he saw him as the devil and, if that’s not fun enough, they speak their own language which we noticed to be a mixture of both Welsh and Gaelic.
Is it brilliant? No it’s not. Is it worth watching? Absolutely, particularly like us if you are suffering from a distinct lack of new shows towards the end of summer. You could call it great timing, but either way we’re going to be watching The Outsiders progress for the rest of this season and next, as Season 2 has already been confirmed. Check out the trailer above for a teaser of what to expect from The Outsiders 2016.