Turn: Washington's Spies Season 2 Premiere Review: Give This Show Another Shot

Turn: Washington's Spies S02E01 & S02E02: "Thoughts of a Free Man" & "Hard Boiled"

I must confess to high treason, y'all. When the Season 2 premiere of AMC's recently renamed spy drama Turn: Washington's Spies landed on my desk, I wanted to check it out but hadn't watched Season 1. So I planned to wing it by doing as little research as possible; I figured I'd skim through a few early episodes with liberal fast-forwarding, read a few Wikipedia entries to learn just who in the hell characters like Abe Woodhull, Anna Strong, and John Graves Simcoe were, and then pay some high school kids on the website Craigslist.com to teach me about the American Revolution.

However, not only did I end up watching the entire first season, in fact I went from viewer to fan to patriot in the process. I watched 'em all, guys. Look, I know this show probably isn't for everyone. History buffs might get mad because Jamie Bell's coat looks like it was purchased on Melrose Avenue, while casual viewers of television might find the topic of our forefathers' hard-won freedom too... specialized (boring). But in my opinion the show makes history fun, and its double-hitter of a Season 2 premiere, "Thoughts of a Free Man" and "Hard Boiled," wrangled everything that's good about Turn: Washington's Spies into a solid two-parter.

A bunch of stuff happened in the show's return to Setauke. For example, King George III threw a tantrum, Robert Townsend and Benedict Arnold stepped onto the scene, and Caleb chucked a flaming axe. But the most important takeaway is that Simcoe is still pure nuts. I honestly think he's the best villain on television today; his highfalutin nasally voice, foppish soldier's garb, and ridiculous love for violence creates the perfect storm of insanity for our heroes to battle. Dude always looks like he's about to snap. I bet even when he's fast asleep he looks like he is about to snap. The only thing the man loves more than composing poetry is war itself, as evidenced by the way he rushed right out of his desk job like a kid who'd just been told he could go play with his friends. I cackled at the way he grabbed his weapons, shoved open the gate and joined rank. Simcoe, you crazy monster brat.

His story of reintroduction played out in similar ways with other characters throughout the two episodes, as both focused on catching us up with what the fair citizens of Setauket and beyond. Abe proposed to study law in New York to continue his spy duties, while John Andre's braid grew a good foot longer. Ha, I am just loving that braid. In a lot of ways, Turn is really the braid's story. But I digress. Andre's pretty great because he's all nice to Abigail, he's super cultured, and he thinks Simcoe is detestable. It looks like the major's main goal this season will be to turn Benedict Arnold, and we all know how that "turned" out. (One must be careful when googling the character names on this show because the results contain spoilers for days. History is the ultimate spoiler.)

Anyway, his first step toward gaining access to Arnold (The Mentalist's Owain Yeoman) involved socialite Peggy Shippen (Lost Girl's Ksenia Solo), an effort that played out in the world of rich folk. One thing that's great about this show is the way it juxtaposes salt-of-the earth farmers and militias working the land and camping out with wealthy Loyalists having dances and sipping from increasingly tiny glasses. I'm into it. I'm also into Andre as a character and not just a stock bad guy. Turn: Washington's Spies is the first piece of fiction on the American Revolution that humanizes the enemies (that I've seen, at least; I'm perilously underexposed to this kind of stuff). Yes, you get the cuckoo birds like Simcoe and George III having fits and being vile to the core, but then you also get the polite lobster-back soldiers living respectfully in the homes of colonial citizens, and the major being kind of endearing in his aloofness. Aww, look at the little Oyster General...

Unfortunately we didn't see much of my second favorite character (first being Simcoe), Robert Rogers, in the premiere. But what we did see was still pretty cool. He had gussied himself up enough to request council with the king, and ended up walking away with a spy mission to track down a bust with some secret messages inside it. I'll take it, so long as I get to hear his Scottish drawl and measure those woeful, calculating peepers. I'm also down with how his former militia is now under the command of Simcoe. I like what you do gentlemen, please do it more this season.

I mean at the end of the day, screw the British for the overall jerks they were being to us back then, but I appreciate the care Turn is taking to show how a war is made up of people with varying degrees of heroism and evilness. A big part of Ben Tallmadge's story going into Season 2 is the dissension in the ranks of Washington's army. Hey, not every soldier on every side cares that much about what they're fighting for. Some of them just want some damn responsibility—a personalized reason to donate time and energy. That's why Setauket works as a setting for this story. We get to see tavern maidens like Anna Strong lose taverns due to war politics, or mere farmers like Abe have love triangles with said tavern maidens while ALSO maintaining a marriage with a Loyalist-leaning wife. Sure, the American Revolution was about a freedom and liberty and all those buzzwords, but mainly it was about drama. And boiled spy-eggs.

What did you think of Turn's Season 2 premiere?