American Gods Season Finale Plot Summary:
Shadow (Ricky Whittle) and Mr. Wednesday (Ian McShane) visit the goddess Ostara’s (Kristin Chenoweth) Easter party in the hopes of recruiting her. Laura (Emily Browning) and Mad Sweeney (Pablo Schreiber) arrive at the same party, where Laura learns the true cause behind her death.
Looking back on this debut season of American Gods, I can’t help but feel a little conflicted.
The conclusion is suitably grandiose, setting the stage for the long-hinted war that Mr. Wednesday has been itching for, and letting the gods show off their power. But, in retrospect, the journey that has taken us here has been more than a little meandering. Part of that is to be expected, given the almost god-of-the-week style set-up of this season. But what really makes it feel so meandering is that much of the show doesn’t really effectively build to this conclusion. After Shadow’s recruitment, the show lost a certain sense of narrative propulsion, becoming more a series of vignettes. That’s not bad, necessarily, but it does rob a conclusion of some of its power.
The problem underlying this is that Shadow’s character arc is simply too basic to fill the airtime it’s given. As is obvious from the neat little bow it gets wrapped up with in the final minutes, his arc has been about learning to have faith. And that moment of embracing his faith is powerful, given the theatrics that Ostara and Wednesday (finally revealed as Odin) put on. But why is this the moment that finally convinces him? It’s of a slightly bigger scale, but is it really that much more convincing than being kidnapped into an extradimensional limo, seeing his dead wife returned to the world of the living, or being attacked by a monstrous tree creature?
The truth is that Shadow’s journey has been full of so much wheel-spinning, so many instances of a confused Shadow asking what’s going on only to receive a cryptic response and blithely solider on regardless, that when he finally moves on it just doesn’t feel interesting. All of this conspires to rob Shadow’s final moment of much of its power.
And yet, the mind then turns to the top of the episode, when Mr. Nancy (Orlando Jones) interrupts the work he’s doing for Wednesday to tell the pair a story. His grandstanding is both entertaining and highly revealing of his character; the story he tells about Bilquis (Yetide Badaki) provides a compelling backstory for a character who has been lurking in the background all season. The season has been full of these moments, asides and scenes and monologues that give minor, even largely unrelated points the space they need to breathe and become something more resonant.
And that’s to say nothing of the lavish visual design that has gone into every episode: one look at Ostara’s Easter party, with its vibrant pastels and elaborate centerpieces of roasted rabbit, is more than enough to capture your interest. Plus, what other show would be audacious enough to have a party filled with all manner of Jesuses, complete with heavenly halo and beatific smile? It’s in the moments like these that American Gods really thrives, and none of it would be possible without a little meandering.
Besides, while Shadow’s portion of the conclusion may not quite work, there’s another part that definitely does.
Laura has undergone a radical transformation from book to screen, going from an underdeveloped accessory to Shadow to the most fascinating character in the show. Her hard-edged, uncompromising attitude as she pursues Shadow and muses on what she has gained and lost from death provides the growth and nuance that is missing from Shadow’s arc. Her team-up with Mad Sweeney, another very minor character from the novel, has proven not only fun to watch but surprisingly deep. The sight of Laura, now aware that Wednesday had arranged for her death and the ruination of Shadow’s life, appearing on the balcony ready to throw a wrench into Wednesday’s plans, is a much stronger ending than we get from Shadow. Combined with the chilling stinger of Bilquis, on a mission from Technical Boy (Bruce Langley) to the House on the Rock, it just might be the case that it’s the show’s deviations from the book that are set to be its most intriguing aspects.
Despite feeling somewhat conflicted about the show, there is no denying that American Gods has been a spectacle worth watching. Even if Laura and Mad Sweeney were not there to provide a compelling arc to make up for Shadow’s, the visual flair, shorter vignettes within the episodes, and some truly incredible guest stars (Peter Stormare, Kristin Chenoweth, and especially Gillian Anderson…the list goes on) would be well worth the trouble. These nagging problems drag it down from the heights of true greatness, but they’re far from intractable. With a fresh start and a seeming commitment to strike out on a new path away from strict adherence to its source, there’s no telling what season two of American Gods might bring. But it will almost certainly be a fun watch.
Rating: 8 out of 10
