‘Mayans’ picks up on the anarchy
FX’s “Sons” spinoff keeps on the throttle.
“Mayans M.C.” roars onto TV screens Tuesday blasting through all sorts of plot speed limits.
In just the first two episodes of FX’s “Sons of Anarchy” spinoff (10 EDT/ PDT), the Mayans biker club navigates the hazards of its business partner, a ruthless Mexican drug cartel; a group of underground rebel children orphaned by cartels; and the Drug Enforcement Administration.
Like its predecessor, “Mayans” breaks – and shoots – things. Viewers should put on their helmets.
“I’m a big believer that if you have a good story, never save it,” executive producer and co-creator Kurt Sutter says. “I love the fact that more (stuff ) happens in an episode of TV for me than a lot of times in an entire series.”
“Mayans” shares essential “Sons” DNA, focusing on the brotherhood of an outlaw biker club, but the action shifts a few hundred miles south, to fictional Santo Padre, California, on the Mexican border. And Latino riders make up the membership.
Central character Ezekiel “EZ” Reyes (J.D. Pardo) is a Mayans probie still under scrutiny for membership, unlike club royalty and heir apparent Jax Teller of “Sons.” EZ had a bright past that darkened considerably after a prison term for a homicide, a crime shrouded in mystery in early episodes.
“EZ was the golden boy in his hometown, going to Stanford, extremely intelligent, just a gifted young man who had the world in his hands,” Pardo says. “Tragic events happen … and now he’s a man who’s hit rock bottom and is trying to pick himself up and survive.”
EZ has family support: His brother, Angel (Clayton Cardenas), a full member of the Mayans, and his father, Felipe (Edward James Olmos), a local butcher. He shares a past with Emily (Sarah Bolger), a woman who’s now directly tied to the cartel.
“Mayans,” set about four years after the conclusion of “Sons,” includes familiar faces from the past. Marcus Alvarez (Emilio Rivera), the head of Oakland’s Mayans chapter, featured in “Sons,” is a recurring character. Jax’s mother, Gemma (Katey Sagal), biker crew chief Les Packer (Robert Patrick) and others make cameos. But don’t expect to see Jax in a “Mayans” flashback.
“With Jax and the main members of that club, I want that mythology to live on in people’s minds. Chances are you’ll never see those main characters,” Sutter says.
He feels responsible for maintaining core elements of “Sons,” the mostwatched show in FX’s history, while creating a different series that isn’t just a high-revving knockoff.
“I want to honor the (“Sons”) mythology and fan base and introduce them to a show that feels original and new, so it doesn’t feel derivative or like a brown version of ‘Sons,’ ” Sutter says. “How do I balance that sense of familiar and yet have it be new and compelling and honor a completely different culture and world?”
To that end, Sutter, who is white, says he has populated the “Mayans” writers room with a mix of men and women and people of different races and ethnic backgrounds. Some of the actors are familiar with life on the margins. “I have a cast – I joke about it – that most of them have more jail time than screen time.”
“Mayans” co-creator Elgin James, who’s black, Latino, Native American and Irish-American, was part of a gang that fought neo-Nazi skinheads and ended up serving time.
“When we started working on this, I was only a few years out of prison. So, working on the EZ Reyes character, assimilating back into the world, I was going through the same thing,” he says.
Olmos (“Battlestar Galactica” “American Family”) says “Mayans” is “excellent” with regard to representation. He says there has been improvement in casting diversity in entertainment.
“It’s just not quick enough and strong enough,” he says, adding that Latino representation still significantly lags population trends. “Someday soon, I hope we’ll be more balanced but, as of now, we’re still not there.”