Hell On Wheels...Back On...Wait For It...Track (Some Frontier Spoilers)

Hell on Wheels isn't great, but it is entertaining. It has a Deadwood vibe about it, without the uniformly great cast or complex characters. But, it does have Colm Meaney and a host of okay actors. Season One was good, setting up decent conflicts and providing a lot of story options. Season Two, however, was terrible. It was a lot of random violence, lack of motivation for actions, everyone behaving like borderline psychopaths and a terrible death for Lily (Dominique McElligott). It's like the writers decided what made Deadwood popular was mud and violence and went with that.

Season Three, which I watched on Netflix, is much better. Protagonist Bohanan (Anson Mount) has comprehensible motivation again. The entire season has a low-key, for a show called Hell on Wheels, but dramatically rich plot and there are not a lot of false moments for the characters. Subplots involving a missing baby, an angry Mormon and a bad end for one of the Brothers McGinnes are all well done. There are a few missteps. For example, I'm not certain what the purpose of new character, Louise Ellison (Jennifer Ferrin) a sort-of in-the-closet lesbian reporter from New York serves except to have, well, a sort-of in-the-closet lesbian reporter on the show. But, hey, maybe we'll get a lot of sweaty girl-on-girl action; come on, AMC, you can pander while trying to be late-Nineties edgy. Also, a certain character who is visibly pregnant at the end makes me wonder about the timeline for the whole season, which is not well defined. Also, she seems to become more pregnant with each scene, even one's that take place withing hours of each other. And, finally, were Mormons really a bunch of fanatical religious terrorists? Because that's kind of the impression given in the series.

Just to be clear, however, these are comparatively minor issues with an otherwise solid season of gritty Western entertainment. Check it out and see how a series can save itself from imploding by, surprise, telling good stories and creating well-rounded characters who have arcs.

Hope the show doesn't...derail...in Season Four.