If you haven’t started watching Barry, an HBO show that started airing in 2018 and has two complete seasons with the third on the way, you should seriously watch it. But before you do, you should probably watch the trailer (below) to see what you’re in for – because it’s a doozy.
The show stars Bill Hader, who is previously best known for his work on Saturday Night Live and lengthy roster of voice acting (Cloudy With A Chance of Meatballs, Angry Birds, Inside Out, Ralph Breaks the Internet), but more recently in the film It: Chapter Two. But Hader, who has proven time and time again that he is truly a renaissance man, is not simply the lead actor in this show: he co-created, directs, writes, and is executive producer of Barry.
The premise of the show follows Barry Berkman, played by Hader, who is an ex-marine-turned-hitman living in Ohio. When the series starts, it’s clear that this is not the life that Barry really wants – even though he is extremely, frighteningly good at it. He suffers from clear signs of depression, PTSD, and straight-up ennui. It’s not until he is assigned on a mission for a hit in Los Angeles that he happens upon a strange circumstance: Barry follows the man he is assigned to kill, as a good hitman does, but the man doesn’t go home as Barry thinks. Instead, he goes to an acting class – one that Barry mistakenly follows him into.
What happens next is bizarre and kind of incredible. The man, who sees the unfamiliar Barry and mistakes him for a new classmate, begs Barry to substitute in a scene for his usual acting partner. Barry, perplexed as to how to navigate this situation, goes along with it. And though Barry is seriously terrible at acting, he has a lightbulb moment while on stage: this life, this “normal” life, could be his life. Oh, and did I mention that the man leading the acting class is played by the one and only Henry Winkler? Winkler plays the eccentric yet skilled acting teacher Gene Cousineau, a man who emphasizes to his students that tapping into one’s real emotions is the ticket to good acting.
It’s the strangest series of events, but Barry has an oddly pure and naïve countenance despite his profession, which makes him endearing despite his many obvious flaws. There are many similarities to the way the show Dexter (a show I reference a lot in my posts) presents their complicated main characters and the question of morality. Much like with Dexter Morgan, we root for Barry to get what he wants: with Barry, we see a traumatized, slightly unhinged man who just wishes that he wasn’t so good at killing people. And it makes us ask – was Barry like this before the war? Was he always like this? Or was it the war that turned him into this? I think this is a question that Season 2 begins to answer, and perhaps is one that will be explored in further seasons.
Viewers see Barry’s journey as his morals continue to become more and more questionable. It’s funny, because he wants so badly not to be a hitman anymore, but at the same time, it’s all he knows. Being a hitman inherently makes life very difficult for Barry, as well as the ridiculous series of events that catch up to him and put him at risk of being caught. And though Barry manages to get through most situations by the skin of his teeth (and often in the most coincidental, unbelievably lucky ways), I guarantee that his life choices will eventually catch up to him, even if we have to wait a few seasons to see that unfold. Barry in his quest to achieve a normal life (which by all standards isn’t that normal, seeing as he wants to be an actor) results in many self-justifications. He convinces himself time and time again that he is a good person, and yet, makes a lot of not-so-good decisions.
Rather, Barry tries so hard to prove that he is good, and takes any validation that he can get. He lives a double life, so convincingly double that viewers really believe that he wouldn’t hurt a fly when he’s with Gene and his actor friends. And then, we’re in for a shock to see the usually quiet, calm and reserved Barry who in his day-to-day life suddenly flip the switch into the most ruthless and skilled killing machine when it comes to his hitman life. It’s a very odd dichotomy, one that might seem dissonant on paper, but Hader pulls it off believably. He truly makes us believe that deep down, Barry just wants to be a “normal” guy – one with a house, family, and white picket fence.
Shows like Barry make viewers ponder what being a “good” or “bad” person even means, and whether the concept should even exist in the black and white way we so often see it. And the most interesting thing is that there are no good or bad people in Barry. Barry is chock-full of characters with questionable personalities and morals: Sally is very transparently a self-involved person, Gene is a narcissist, Fuches is a follower trying to be a leader, and Barry is, well, Barry. Even the police officers in Barry are shown to have questionable morals. (But NoHo Hank is damn near perfect. Shoutout to Anthony Carrigan for his performance Hank, who is easily the funniest, wackiest, and most endearing character in the series).
Barry balances pure comedy with some of the darkest themes I’ve seen onscreen in a while. This balance is precisely what keeps this show from being a heavy drama, and yet, it still takes itself seriously. Despite its surrealness, it feels real. This perfect balance between dark and light likely stems a lot from Hader, who utilizes dark humour constantly and who has been open about his struggles with anxiety.
Hader’s performance is astonishingly good (he did, after all, win the Emmy Award for Best Actor two years in a row for this show), and I expect to see many more dynamic roles out of him in the future. Hader’s Barry is an immensely complicated man, one whose layers reveal themselves incrementally as the show progresses, each one of those layers equally as convincing.
Many know Hader as one of the best SNL comedians of our time, but more recently Hader has shown how impressive and vast his range really is. Though Trainwreck wasn’t a particularly great film, Hader was finally placed in the role of the love interest, one that he played excellently. In It: Chapter Two, he was easily the most notable performance and has been getting the most praise out of all the lead actors, which is saying a lot considering he was amidst big stars like James McAvoy and Jessica Chastain. He has sincerely surprised and impressed everyone with his multitude of talents, and I for one am ecstatic that he is finally getting the recognition he deserves.
If you haven’t already watched Season 1 and 2 of Barry, you should definitely go do so now. The subject matter is provocative, the drama enthralling, the comedy top-tier, and the acting sublime. The meta commentary of actors in L.A. coupled with the surreal hitman storyline is one that has never been done before, and as unlikely as it may seem, it makes for damn good television. Bill Hader makes sure of it.
~ Z ~
Photo by Rob Laughter on Unsplash
