Not every TV show has to reinvent the wheel, send critics into a tizzy, or achieve some extraordinary artistic height. It takes all sorts to make the streaming world go round; sometimes, all I want is a bit of mindless, good old-fashioned escapism. Nothing too dumbed-down, just a show that doesn’t take itself too seriously and that doesn’t take me for granted.
I say all that because it explains why my current TV guilty pleasure happens to be Sylvester Stallone’s — the gangster comedy from producer Taylor Sheridan and showrunner Terence Winter ( ). , which has just returned for Season 2, stars Stallone as Dwight “The General” Manfredi. His character is a wisecracking old-school mafioso, dispatched (banished, really) to Tulsa to set up a criminal operation there that kicks money back up to the “family.
” Notwithstanding the mafia connection, though, it’s important to point out that is not some dark, HBO-style mafia drama with sickening violence, brooding villains, and the kind of shocking twists and turns that send the Internet into an uproar. The show is actually grade-A Dad TV. It’s the streaming equivalent of a burger and fries.
There’s nothing original or revelatory about it, but it’s packed with plenty of old-school action and straddles the line between cheesiness and fun. I mean, come on, it’s hard to dislike a show where Stallone gets to ham it up as a tough guy with a heart of gold who wears expensive suits and growls lines like: “When I play .