Sons Of Anarchy - S01E01: Seeds

Hooray! "Sons Of Anarchy" turned out to be more than an amateur beat-off to "The Sopranos" - I'm afraid I can't say the same for "Brotherhood".

Creator Kurt Sutter (The Shield) pens the pilot episode which just premiered on FX. Allen Coulter (The Sopranos) directs the episode masterfully, already defining the shows own look. 'Seeds' drew in an impressive 1.5 million viewers - in comparison to The Shields season opener which pulled 1.1 million.

At first glance the biggest strength for the show seems to be the cast. We have Charlie Hunnam (Undeclared), Ron Perlman (Hellboy, The City Of Lost Children), Katey Sagal (Married With Children, Futurama), Maggie Stiff (Mad Men) and Mitch Pileggi (The X-Files) and Drea de Matteo (The Sopranos). I was always critical of Charlie Hunnam, especially in Undeclared, until this pilot where I think he matured as an actor and has become great. What we have seen of Ron Perlman has been good, but we will have to wait a little longer to see how he really plays the character - he was in the pilot a fair amount of the time, but wasn't given any really great scenes.

The motorcycle club basically own the town of Charming in California - they are desperate and will do anything to keep drugs and developers out of their town to keep their way of life in tact. A white supremacy group are trying to push their drug trade into Charming, but the club will not let that happen, and the white supremacy group The Nords, will not give up that easily - I see this power struggle being a prominent theme in the season. The club are also involved in various illegal operations, including selling guns to other gangs. Jax (Charlie Hunnam) is the vice-president of the club and son of the tough family matriarch Gemma (Katey Segal), who is with Clay (Ron Perlman), the club president, and is somewhat of a step-dad to Jax. Jax's father used to be the president of the club, but was killed. Jax finds some of his fathers old documents that describe a very different motorcycle club which was more about freedom and peace than the current club. When Jax speaks to his mother of them, she tells Clay and they decide they must not let him slip away from the club. Out on a job, Clay tries to make Jax finish off a rival who is on the ground, to help secure Jax to the club even more. Jax's junkie ex-wife played by Drea de Matteo is pregnant with his baby, she overdoses while pregnant and the baby needs to be pre-maturely taken out of the womb. When Jax finds out about this he is pissed and goes looking for whoever supplied her with the gear. When Gemma finds out, things get much nastier than expected, as she takes a visit to see ex-daughter in law. The doctor who is looking after Jax's ex-wife is his old high school sweetheart Tara, who left Charming and evidently her old lifestyle behind for something better, "I'm not the same girl I was ten years ago", Gemma replies with "I am", and lifts up Tara's shirt to find a tattoo on her lower back, "I guess there's some things you can't change". Tara is now back as a resident at the hospital. Perhaps it is no coincidence she is back - it will be fun to see how her, Jax, and Gemma interact. Katey Sagal is so great in this role, I'm glad she has found a way to break free once and for all from Peggy and Leela, not that there is anything wrong with those characters, or her performance of them - good shows.

There are so many Shakespeare allusions in this script, mainly Hamlet, if the series continues to go down a few of these we are going to get some hugely gratifying endings. The series is very character-driven, but the story with The Nords and keeping Charming the way it is, should be promising too. One of my only problems with Sons of Anarchy are the first 'Seeds' that have been planted for the storyline with the guy out of jail who wants to go legit, but needs the money, and can't leave his family again. I know it could be dealt with nicely, but I have seen it a lot in "The Sopranos" and other films. Pretty weak criticism, eh?

I look forward to next week's episode - oh, and did anybody notice Tommy Flanagan from Braveheart, his facial scar gave it away for my girlfriend, but I only knew once I heard the Scottish accent. Am I slipping in my old age? Tune in next week to find out.