Just fails to bond

Demon and devil! Is there a difference? In Christian theology, a demon refers to a category of evil spirits, while devil is a specific individual, the leader of these demons. In this Thor Freudenthal, Sanaa Hamri, Catriona McKenzie and Lauren Wolkstein-directorial, it’s the fight between erring demons and a devil’s advocate (literally).

It opens with bounty hunter Hub Halloran (Kevin Bacon) knocking on the door of a house in the fictional town of Landry, Georgia. Before we come to know whether he is the good guy or the bad guy, his throat is slit from ear to ear by henchmen commissioned by a local mafia leader named Lucky (Damon Herriman).

Lucky is the current partner of Hub’s ex-wife Maryanne (Jennifer Nettles), the potential stepfather of his son Cade (Maxwell Jenkins). Hub dies but is resurrected immediately. He tapes his wound to stop the blood flow and the cigarette smoke that escapes through it!

By the time he reaches home, his wound is healed and he gets to know the reason behind his second coming from an unexpected guest, Midge (Jolene Purdy). He’s now a bondsman for the devil, a satanic corporate. His job profile includes hunting down demons who escape from hell. You got the picture!

Each fax message he receives gives him the details of the demon and we are treated to all sorts of demons, made from different elements — air, water, fire. As they kill their victims and possess their bodies, limbs fly, skulls crack, blood flows, intestines splatter. Too much of gore, repetitiveness and sub-standard CGI, and the result is a video-game-like viewing experience.

We don’t care about the number of casualties, nor the demons, nor even about Hub, who goes about eliminating the demons with a shotgun in episode after episode, with a fixed scowl on his face.

Hub has too much going for him. Trying to woo his wife and son back, keeping his ‘sin’ which threatens to surface at every opportunity a secret, and reclaiming his love for country music (yes, he is a singer too), while slaying demons. If that does not give a man a permanent scowl, then we don’t know what would!

But then, his scowl has an impact on our mood too. If the repetitiveness is irritating, the dialogues at times are cringe-worthy. Here’s a sample. “Is it his brain?” asks Hub’s mother Kitty (Beth Grant) in one of the scenes when she accompanies him to a demon-demolishing assignment. “Well, it ain’t pizza,” he replies.

Kitty is fun as a trigger-happy, church-going grandma, but sadly we don’t know much about her. Even the character of Maryanne is half-baked. All we know is that she sings. Lucky, the mortal enemy of Hub, is also under-written. The only character that has a backstory is Hub’s handler Midge, still not compelling enough to see us through the eight yawn-inducing episodes.

Multiple directors directing separate episodes may be the norm when it comes to web shows, but ‘The Bondsman’ is a classic case of too many cooks spoiling the broth. In a bid to outdo one another in the gore quotient, they forgot to create the right atmosphere for the chill factor to creep in. In fact, they seem clueless about what they want to convey.

Is it a man’s second chance at atonement or a treatise on devil and demons? Anyway, we are beyond care!

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