Brady’s back
‘Mr. Mercedes’ villain is even scarier in season two
Pittsburgh Post-Gazette
The pop culture landscape is crowded with creepy imaginings of Stephen King — from Hulu’s “Castle Rock” to a recent announcement that “The Tommyknockers” will be made into a feature film.
Crowded, yes, but it would be downright scary if viewers overlooked season two of “Mr. Mercedes.” It returns 8 p.m. Wednesday onAT&T Audience Network.
Speaking to the Television Critics Association last month, director and executive producer Jack Bender described the trick of introducing the supernatural into a previously scary-but-realistic crime story.
“I think we walked the tightrope season two because we kept it grounded in character,” he said.
“Mr. Mercedes” is about a former cop, Bill Hodges (played with shaggy aplomb by Brendan Gleeson), who takes down serial killer Brady Hartsfield (Harry Treadaway). He’s helped by a sheltered young woman, Holly (Justine Lupe), and soon-to-be Harvard man Jerome (Jharrel Jerome).
It was a thrilling spin through what Mr. Bender called the “Stephen Kingdom.” Season one, which closely followed the novel of the same name, was sadly overlooked in the Emmy nominations.
Season two finds Brady in a coma and on life support, one year after events of the finale. He’s there because Holly whacked him on the head with a heavy preventing another mass killing.
Brady is visited often by Hodges, who just can’t seem to get over the cat-and-mouse game played out over the first series. Others who survived season one are dealing with pain in their own ways. Brady’s former friend, Lou (Breeda Wool), is in physical therapy after being stabbed. She’s obsessed in her own way, and it’s ruining her life.
Holly has teamed up with Bill to create Finders Keepers, a detective agency. She is worried, both for him and herself, that her partner won’t snap out of his obsessive behavior. It was Hodges who helped Holly escape a stifling relationship with her mother in the first season, and she’s both grateful and somewhat needy.
What will become of her if he somehow goes away?
Holland Taylor plays Ida, Hodges’ next-door neighbor and not-quite love interest. While reminding Holly, “You do NOT need anyone to survive,” she nonetheless worries about Bill, too. Seems the detective suspects Brady is somehow faking his condition — how crazy is that?
No one yet realizes Hodges’ intuition is on the money. Brady might be in a coma, but he’s very much alive inside. His neurologist has been tinkering with a controversial experimental drug, and while this psychopath cannot even breathe on his own, he’s got big plans.
The killer’s ego is as inflated as ever. As he ponders a makeshift memorial to the victims he once mowed down in a stolen Mercedes, Brady muses, “They died because I lived. Not many people can say they had that kind of impact on the world.”
Mr. Bender, showrunner/ writer/executive producer David E. Kelley and writer/producer Dennis Lehane do an effective job in creating Brady’s mind-world. It is, fittingly, a representation of that basement lair from season one, with multiple computer screens and some tombstones of those he killed.
It’s where the killer “lives” now. The “ghosts” of the dead drop by, sometimes to comic effect. Brady’s old boss at the electronics store offers to microwave them some Hot Pockets.