There’s a joke in the animated series Adventure Time, where the young hero, Finn, praises the biscuits cooked by his sidekick Jake, a talking, shapeshifting dog. “Finn,” says an exasperatedly honest Jake in response, “I made those biscuits with so much butter! You were just responding to the butter!” This is worth thinking about when you watch TV. (Other than Adventure Time, I mean.) How often are we responding favorably to a show because all the parts work in sync to create a whole that’s more than their sum, or because we just like a bunch of the parts a lot? When are we responding to the biscuits, and when are we just responding to the butter? The Old Man’s butter supply is in no danger of running out anytime soon. It comes in the form of the show’s two stars, the gifted and widely beloved actors Jeff Bridges and John Lithgow. They star, respectively, as Dan “Johnny” Chase, a rogue CIA operative who went underground years ago after having an affair with an Afghan warlord’s wife and running off with her and her kidnapped baby; and Harold Harper, an FBI bigwig who has a past with Chase. Harper’s current mentor-mentee relationship with Chase’s “daughter,” known to Harper as Angela and to Chase as Emily (Alia Shawkat), leads him into a partnership with Chase, the man he spent much of Season 1 trying to kill in order to wrap up loose ends from the Afghan war. Currently, this odd couple is sneaking into Afghanistan to rescue Angela/Emily from the aforementioned warlord, Faraz Hamzad (Navid Negahaban), who had her abducted for a forced family reunion. The government’s ties to Hamzad, Hamzad’s own new ties to his arch-rivals the Taliban, and the massive lithium deposits that make his region a potential cash cow further complicate things. So does Angela/Emily’s dual identity as an FBI agent who’s secretly the daughter of one of America’s most wanted, Harper’s current rogue status, and Chase’s tendency to shoot first and ask questions later. And that’s pretty much the size of it. Beyond that, Harper has tense phone calls with his influential and dangerous ex-wife (Janet McTeer) and his concerned current wife (Jessica Harper). Chase (Dan to his friends, Johnny to his old friends) has a knife fight with Omar (Artur Zai Barrera) an undercover Taliban spy who’d been serving as their guide. He also has some flashbacks to his wife, Belour/Abbey (Lee Lubany), making him promise never to tell their daughter the truth about her parentage. He also dreams of a young Hamzad (Pet Vahdat) sneaking into the cave safehouse where he and Harper have hidden for shelter — only to wake up and find the very real current-day Hamzad standing there. A gunshot goes off, echoing through the mountains. Good thing we can roll right into the next episode thanks to the two-part premiere without hanging from this cliff too long! There’s nothing objectionable in this episode of The Old Man, written by series co-creator and showrunner Jonathan E. Steinberg. (The show is based on novel of the same name by Thomas Perry.) Considering how Johnny/Chase is often referred to as a monstrous psycho willing to do anything for the cause, which he demonstrates by biting his enemy’s face to free himself from captivity, I think the show casts a gimlet eye on the work of its secret-agent protagonists and the intelligence business in general. I actually admire its scrupulous unwillingness to lecture us about the right or wrong of American involvement in the Soviet-Afghan War, which is what got everyone into the mess the show chronicles; it trusts the audience to be smart enough to figure that stuff out for ourselves. The charisma and watchability of the two leads is beyond question. Lithgow has one of the greatest voices in Hollywood, an aggrieved bark or flustered squawk depending on the needs of the moment; it’s an incredible instrument, and one he’s used brilliantly for decades. Bridges is fantastic as Chase, allowing his gravelly voice and lined face to do much of the salesmanship for the idea that he’s a hardened killer of killers. Both men understand that understatement is key to drawing us into these two aged cold warriors’ lives. Unfortunately for the show, it’s a victim of its own success. I remember the dynamite pilot, with its long-take post-car-accident battle and Chase’s white-knuckle attempts to flee the suburbs of D.C. without getting killed. I remember the Season 1 finale, too, which had some rollicking ambushes and chase sequences. There’s nothing on that level here, and moreover there’s nothing that attempts to be. The fight scene with the double agent is fun for sure, but that’s thin gruel for a show like this one. As a story, and as an action-adventure piece, it’s just kind of there this outing. Ah well, there’s still an hour to go in the show’s double-sized season premiere. Perhaps our luck will improve — which means, alas for them, that Chase and Harper’s luck will hopefully run out. That tends to be when things get exciting. Sean T. Collins (@theseantcollins) writes about TV for Rolling Stone, Vulture, The New York Times, and anyplace that will have him, really. He and his family live on Long Island.
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