Warning: This story references happenings from Homecoming S1 but tries to avoid any major spoilers for FX's Devs and the new second season of Homecoming.
Sometimes Hollywood at large seems to embrace the infamous Google strategy: make two of everything and see what sticks. Who recently asked for twin dog-as-best-friend-but-end-of-life tearjerkers? And did audiences need dual "Nikola Tesla races to make electricity" biopics starring beloved heartthrobs? (In a world where The Prestige already exists, probably not.)
This spring, streaming TV got in on this strategy, too. A pair of shows centered on secretive, shady startups—companies doing almost otherworldly things that piqued government interest but really complicated an employee's life—each arrived with star-boasting casts and filmmaking pedigrees behind the camera. Like a dutiful TV reviewer, I watched the first four episodes of both series. Despite each having oodles of style, one felt opaque and unnecessarily complex, like piecing together a puzzle without knowing what the full picture was at the start.
And the other is Amazon's Homecoming, which hits Prime with seven new episodes this weekend. (Apologies to FX's Devs, which I'll likely never finish.)
Still stylish
Though Homecoming lost some high profile talent ahead of S2—Julia Roberts' character doesn't appear and Sam Esmail did not direct any of these episodes—you wouldn't call this show depleted after watching this new run of episodes. In her first starring TV role, Janelle Monáe is as captivating as ever. She plays a woman named Jackie who is struggling to remember how precisely she ended up alone and passed out on a boat in the middle of a remote lake. And instead of Bobby Cannavale representing our main corporate cog for the Geist behemoth, Hong Chau (the actor behind Lady Trieu of Watchmen) reprises her role as Audrey. Her corporate exec of few words was last seen as a pseudo-big bad at the very end of S1, but she gets fleshed out quite a bit here.
Jackie's journey and the dynamic between Jackie and Audrey might be the most thrilling parts of these new episodes, similar to how the conversations between Roberts and Stephan James as Walter ended up as S1's most riveting part. The only disadvantage for Chau and Monáe comes from circumstance: Roberts and James had the benefit of Geist's overall product and scheme being a mystery that our two main characters learned and navigated together with the audience. This time around, audiences have a lot more info, taking away a bit of the show's intrigue and tension. If story felt secondary at times to the performances for you in S1, that dynamic will be amplified here.
The chemistry between its leads, of course, was only half of Homecoming's initial appeal. Mr. Robot creator Sam Email had generously applied his small screen cinematic lens, using different aspect ratios, lens filters, and a robust palette of '70s film homages. New director Kyle Patrick Alvarez did previous work on Starz' visually inventive Counterpart, so he appears to have the chops to carry over some of S1's same visual language (with the emphasis on "some," given how inventive Esmail has always been). For Alvarez, S2's premier in particular feels delightfully Hitchcock-ian, as Jackie at times seems engulfed by large pines or encased in a spooky motel straight out of Twin Peaks.
As for the story unfolding in these episodes, well, that's where Devs comes in.
Janelle Monáe stars as a mysterious woman who wakes up in a rowboat on a lake with no memory of who she is. YouTube/Amazon Prime Geist Emergent Group, the company behind the Homecoming Initiative, might be involved. YouTube/Amazon Prime Stephan James reprises his S1 role as Walter Cruz. YouTube/Amazon Prime Also back: S1's Audrey (Hong Chau), an assistant at Geist Emergent Group. YouTube/Amazon Prime Remember that S1 post-credits scene? It's relevant to S2. YouTube/Amazon Prime The memory-erasing drug is gearing up for mass production, it seems. YouTube/Amazon Prime Chris Cooper plays Leonard Geist, who begins to have doubts about his company's business. YouTube/Amazon Prime
Prestige isnt the point
Understanding the plot of Homecoming S2 absolutely requires a "previously on" montage. Rather than Shea Wigham detectiving into a new case (sidebar: nothing ever improves by losing Shea Wigham), these episodes revolve around the same basic happenings—just from new perspectives. We're again watching the Geist signature product being cultivated and applied, the government still contracts with them to do unsavory things, Walter Cruz still endures some less-than-ideal circumstances.
As such, any mysteries (like, why is Janelle Monáe left out to sea again?) are a bit narrower in comparison to S1. We're not watching plot gain momentum toward a grand conclusion; we're largely learning about more of the plot's mechanics, the stuff Read More – Source
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