"Patriot": The best show nobody watched
Amazon Prime fuckin’ sucks at marketing its shows. Netflix also sucks, but at least once one of their shows becomes a hit, then they’ll put marketing dollars behind it (hi, Stranger Things). But Amazon Prime only really markets their shows when you’re already watching Amazon Prime, and even then it’ll be the seven millionth time you’ve seen the same promo for The Man In The High Castle. I’m not gonna watch that, Amazon! Take the hint!!
Basically, for people to watch an original show on Amazon, they have to see one of Amazon’s on-platform ads for it (and they only make promos for a few of them), someone they know has to have watched it already and told them about it, or the show has to have won some big awards. (Some are like me and read way too many TV criticism columns for their own good, but I do not encourage you to follow my example.)
And that’s why hardly anyone watched Patriot, one of the best TV shows I’ve ever seen.
It follows John (Michael Dorman), a non-official cover agent with the CIA — basically, they send him on off-the-books missions and if he gets caught, they’ll disavow all knowledge of him, so he’s pretty much on his own. As the show begins, he has to get a job with a Milwaukee pipe company in order to establish a cover that’ll allow him to enter Luxembourg, where he has to do a drop that’ll prevent Iran from going nuclear.
I should mention here that Patriot is really funny.
It’s a tense drama as well, don’t get me wrong, but the show has such a lovely sense of humour to it; many of characters are completely ridiculous, and many things happen during John’s mission that are laugh-out-loud hilarious. They’re often darkly funny — in the first episode, John tanks his interview at the pipe company where he needs to get a job, so he runs after the guy who is most likely to get him a job to ask for advice. After the guy happily gives it to him, John nonchalantly pushes him in front of a truck. (I did say it was darkly funny.)
And the show has real heart to it. Most spy shows focus on the missions and the danger and the excitement, but Patriot focuses on its characters first, which is one of the reasons why it succeeds so well. It’s established off the bat that John is extremely depressed about his life and his job, but also feels such duty to complete his mission that he sees no other option; he’s alone and nobody else can do it. But as the show progresses, you see that John actually builds deep connections with the people around him, who care about him and want to help him succeed. The fact that Dorman is able to give a haunting performance, a brilliant comedic performance, and a heartwarming performing all at once is incredible.
Patriot has a great cast, including Lost’s Terry Quinn as John’s dad and CIA handler, Kurtwood “Red Foreman” Smith as John’s boss who cannot stand him, Michael Chernis as John’s brother, and Chris Conrad as John’s coworker at the pipe company who thinks it’s really cool that John’s a spy. There are many others, but I won’t list them here.
I’ve told many, many people they watch Patriot, but as far as I know, none of them have taken me up on it — I think possibly because of the title, or because they think it’s just another spy show, or because Michael Dorman isn’t a big name. It’s too bad, because I think it’s one of the best TV shows to come out in the last decade, and it deserved a lot more attention and accolades than it got.
So, this is me telling you that you should watch Patriot. It’s on Amazon Prime, it’s only two seasons and 18 episodes total, and it has an ending that’s satisfying enough (although I wish it has kept going). It’s an amazing show and I like when people watch stuff that I like.
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