Pirates vs Preachers: The Righteous Gemstones and Our Flag Means Death

I finally made my way through two seasons of The Righteous Gemstones and a season of Our Flag Means Death. Get that HBO subscription because you are in for a treat.

The Righteous Gemstones: Oh where to begin? This is a show about a family that runs a megachurch, led by the patriarch, Eli Gemstone (John Goodman), with the eldest son Jesse (Danny McBride, who also created the show) waiting in the wings to take over alongside his driven wife, Amber (Cassidy Freeman). Jesse is  constantly squabbling with his siblings, including the ambitious Judy (Edi Patterson), who never gets to take the stage because she’s just a lowly woman, and Kelvin (Adam DeVine) who is a buff youth minister who hasn't quite come to terms with his sexuality.

The show is joke dense and utterly bonkers. In both seasons, major scandals are brewing and there are long story arcs involving mysteries and murders and all manner of shenanigans that have to be addressed so the Gemstones can maintain their reputation. For a show about a religious family, it contains some of the filthiest jokes ever, reams of scatological dialogue that would be heralded as absolute poetry if they weren’t so utterly profane. And this show is also single-handedly redressing HBO’s penchant for female nudity by giving us more male full frontal nudity than your eyes can handle. Seriously, scrotums seem to pop into frame for no earthly reason at an alarming rate.

This is a devastatingly funny and well-plotted show. The characters are intriguing and all unique weirdos in their own special way, and each season thwarts and/or builds on their ambitions in ludicrous fashion. Don’t expect any realism, but go into this for an over-the-top comedy that will make you laugh out loud and groan with horror when someone gets poked in the eye with a penis. Don’t say I didn’t warn you.

Our Flag Means Death: This is a great show, but perhaps one to dole out to yourself as a weekly treat rather than binge in one sitting. Set in the early 18th century, we follow the crew of the Revenge, a pirate ship captained by Stede Bonnet (Rhys Darby), an English gentleman who decided to abandon his wife and kids and take up a life of piracy because that seemed more exciting than gentle living (in writing this blog post, I have just discovered this is based on a real-life gentleman pirate named Stede Bonnet. Mind blown.) He doesn’t really know what he’s doing, of course, but that’s where the show excels, portraying a man who earnestly lectures his crew on self-care and improving themselves with literature instead of giving into the toxic masculinity of the pirate life. 

As the show progresses, the famed Captain Blackbeard (Taika Waititi) arrives, and though he initially meant to plunder the ship and kill all the crew, he unexpectedly finds himself beguiled by Steve and a friendship blossoms between the two. Well, I say friendship, but this is an exceedingly queer show where the crew have no qualms about hooking up with each other, and Leslie Jones has a cameo as a polyandrous mercenary on one of the islands, so that relationship eventually does blossom in other ways.

This show boasts an epic costume and production design budget - I have never wanted to live on a pirate ship more than when I first saw Stede’s remarkable library built into his private quarters. The actors are all swashbuckling about and having a grand ol’ time and there is a lot of fun to be had with the conceit of pirates who are less into bloody pillaging and more into fine silks. So give it a try. Your mileage may vary, but it’s well worth taking a quick cruise around the islands with this crew.