Luke Owen takes a look at the pilot episode for From Dusk Till Dawn: The Series….
You know From Dusk Till Dawn? That 1996 movie with the vampires in the bar in Mexico? Well, you know the first ten or so minutes of that movie? Stretch that out over 45 and you have the pilot episode of Robert Rodriguez’s television adaptation of his own work, From Dusk Till Dawn: The Series.
After premiering last night on Rodriguez’s El Ray Network, From Dusk Till Dawn: The Series debuted on Netflix and Amazon today and shows off just what we can expect from the show. Rodriguez himself has said that the idea is to expand upon the characters from the movie by fleshing out their backstories with the infamous Titty Twister bar coming into play midway through the season. With that in mind, From Dusk Till Dawn: The Series is a rousing success, if a little unnecessary.
As aforementioned, the pilot is essentially a remake of the first ten minutes of the original movie as the Gecko Brothers hold up Benny’s World of Liquor while on their way to the Mexico border. Seth (D.J. Cotorona) remains the calmer of the two while Ritchie (Zane Holtz) is slightly more unhinged and added to his character this time round is the ability to “see what others can’t”. What this means he gets visions of their hostages as monsters rather than just them saying lewd things about what they’d like to do to him. In essense, this is perhaps to replace the lack of vampires that won’t show up until mid-season, but it’s an effective addition to his character. Furthermore, the expansion of time also allows Rodriguez to flesh out Sheriff Earl McGraw (Don Johnson) and introduce us to his partner Freddie Gonzalez (Jesse Garcia).
However, the backstory expansion for McGraw is really only relative to those who were fans of the movie in the first place. And, really, it’s only for those who cared enough to know more about him. His death isn’t anymore impactful here than it was in the movie. Plus, outside of some character additions, will this series really add anything new to a story we all saw nearly 20 years ago? It does raise the question of whether this show is just Robert Rodriguez stroking his own ego by making us watch something we can watch in 90 minutes spread out and expanded on a weekly basis.
There is something that does save the show from being a totally pointless exercise though: it’s awesome.
From Dusk Till Dawn: The Series is really, really great. This pilot is a wonderfully and masterfully put together show with excellent writing, beautiful camera work with some outstanding performances. Trying to replace George Clooney and Quentin Tarantino as the Gecko Brothers was not going to be an easy task, but both Cotorana and Holtz do impeccable jobs. The writing certainly helps, but Cotorana’s smooth and cool delivery of his lines is a joy to watch and Holtz plays Ritchie just as Tarantino did (by way of Crispin Glover) without being an out and out copy. The pair deserve high commendations for taking on these roles and never feeling overshadowed by the performances that came before them. The tension builds throughout and Robert Rodriguez never loses focus, even when dropping in nightmarish visions of monsters, with the final shootout of the episode is simply spectacular. There is a common conception at the moment that TV shows are becoming more entertaining and better made than some movies, and this is yet another example.
You could argue that From Dusk Till Dawn: The Series is a fruitless endeavour, and in part you might be right. But if the series can keep up this level of brilliance, then it will be a fantastic show. Perhaps Robert Rodriguez would have been better off telling a new story with new characters set within the familiar world (you know, like the sequels) but the fleshing out of pre-existing characters and clever additions might just make this a success. There isn’t just one element that made this pilot work, it was everything coming together. Let’s just hope they can keep up the pace.
Luke Owen is one of Flickering Myth’s co-editors and the host of the Flickering Myth Podcast. You can follow him on Twitter @LukeWritesStuff.
Originally published March 12, 2014. Updated November 9, 2019.
