Critic’s Rating: 3.75 / 5.0
3.75
That wasn’t The Righteous Gemstones season premiere I expected, but it’s what I got.
After waiting 18 months following The Righteous Gemstones Season 3, which was the perfect place to end the series, The Righteous Gemstones took us to the late 1800s to expand the Gemstone family lore.
I went into The Righteous Gemstones Season 4 without watching trailers or reading anything about the season because this show thrives on the element of surprise, so it’s always best to buckle up and enjoy the ride.
Josh McDermitt‘s performance as the morally questionable Abel was a thrilling addition to the final season premiere.
That said, the last thing I expected was Bradley Cooper’s Elijah Gemstone to take him out before the story started.
I think HBO’s desire to keep Cooper’s casting under wraps is the reason we don’t have any photos from the season premiere.
Elijah brutally gunned down Abel in the name of making a quick buck, showcasing just how ruthless he was. But it wasn’t until he bashed the minister’s face to smithereens that Elijah wouldn’t become a better man.
He was opportunistic and knew how to manipulate people into working with him, only to kill them off when they least expected it.
Cooper turned in a riveting performance as this man who got too many chances to become a good person and continued to make dumb, self-serving decisions that went against everything the Bible stood for.
After watching him scheme his way into a well-paying gig and further scheme to evade being killed in a firing line alongside a group of honorable men, it’s a bitter pill to swallow that he finally found the meaning of God at the end of the episode.
If the first three seasons of The Righteous Gemstone have proven anything, it’s that everything happens on the series for a reason.
So, my best guess is that the family will be experiencing an existential crisis throughout the final season, making them consider their past, their ancestors, and what they can do to move boldly into the next phase of their existence.
Aside from that, there’s no indication where the series is headed because the premiere spent its entirety in the 1800s and seemingly set the stage for things to get darker before the Gemstones take one last bow.
The church will have to play a massive part in the final episodes.
I have a sneaking suspicion that the buzz around the safe return of Jesse, Judy, and Kelvin following their kidnapping and ransom ordeal will have quite literally been buzzed away by the locusts that stormed the church and left a wealth of destruction in their wake.
It’s a real shame that we never got a taste of that on The Righteous Gemstones Season 4 Episode 1 because these are the characters we’ve watched the show for throughout its run.
While it was a bit short-sighted to leave the present-day timeline out of the premiere entirely, there’s every reason to believe these bloody events will shine through the last chapter like a halo effect.
There’s always been an element of forgiveness on the show, with people forgiving the ones who wronged them the most, but this doesn’t always work out, and hopefully, the series will tackle that head-on.
Look what stunts May-May, Peter, Chuck, and Carl pulled on The Righteous Gemstones Season 3.
Everything pointed to their grisly deaths or being put in the slammer, but somehow, they managed to find peace, happiness, and unity with the Gemstones.
There’s so much we don’t know about Elijah’s story, but it seems that his literal brush with death set him on the course to doing good and perhaps a better job than he originally was when he stole the minister’s job.
Having food, board, $50 a month, and only having to preach one day a week was a cushy job, so why didn’t he embrace it?
Are we to assume that he wanted to take, take, take as much as he could until he reached a breakthrough?
It’s murky and open to interpretation, but there should be another couple of flashbacks peppered throughout the season to offer some context as to what became of him and how his existence filtered down to the rest of the family.
The Righteous Gemstones tends to take hard left turns, narratively speaking, so there’s even a chance we won’t hear Elijah’s name again, and we’ll have to take what we got.
Standalone episodes are good, but the season premiere lacked the pizazz of other episodes, with little-to-no laughs, which isn’t what we’ve come to expect with this show.
Even when things get tough, there’s always some comedy relief, and frankly, it was a bit jarring that it was completely MIA from the episode.
Hopefully, the coming episodes bring some more light-hearted humor back because it’s such a crucial element of the show’s success.
Over to you, The Righteous Gemstones Fanatics! What did you think of Bradley Cooper’s stunt casting? Do you think he nailed the role of Elijah?
What’s your take on spending the entire episode in the 1800s and not checking in on the present-day Gemstones?
Do you think this episode was a sign of the storm brewing and the hardships the family is about to face to keep the church intact?
Let’s convene in the comments section to dissect everything, TV Fanatics!
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