‘Reservation Dogs’ is worth the hype and more

If you missed FX’s Reservation Dogs in the fall TV deluge, it’s time to fix that. The eight-episode comedy concluded its first season on Sept. 20, which means you can now stream every episode at your leisure — which, if you’re like us, probably means within a day.

Created by Sterlin Harjo and Taika Waititi, Reservation Dogs immerses you in the world of four Oklahoma teens with dreams of moving to California. There’s Bear (D’Pharaoh Woon-A-Tai), who considers himself leader; razor-sharp Elora Danan (Devery Jacobs), sweet-voiced but deadly Willie Jack (Paulina Alexis), and Cheese (Lane Factor), sweet Cheese. Almost the entire cast and creative team of the show are Indigenous Americans, a decision that pays off in every single frame.

Reservation Dogs wastes no time orienting the viewer to its world. We join the friends in a rollicking cold open where they steal a chip truck and deliver it for cash. Between a thumping soundtrack by The Stooges, a chorus of overlapping expletives, and just learning that someone here is named Cheese, it’s impossible to not be all in on this show from the jump. We get to know this town of oddballs over the course of the season, from tribal cop Big (Zahn McClarnon) to rap duo Mose and Mekko (Lil Mike and Funny Bone).

For eight episodes, it’s deftly paced, giving each character focused episodes sometimes entirely away from the group. Cinematographer Mark Schwartzbard captures the small-town feel with tight tracking shots and lush color. In a world that hasn’t had new episodes of Donald Glover’s Atlanta in three years, Reservation Dogs is a magnificent and worthy followup.

The Reservation Dogs commit petty crime to save up money for a trip to California.
Credit: shane brown / fx

For fans of Waititi, there’s a comforting cadence to the show’s humor. Reservation Dogs is self-assured, laugh-out-loud funny, and so much cooler than you can ever dream to be. “Fuck”s fly freely, peppered in with regional colloquialisms like “Skoden,” which this Midwesterner needed no help understanding. I was also not aware of the frequency and amount of variation with which one can say “Shit-ass,” and the knowledge has bettered me as a person.

Like so many comedies these days (and most of Waititi’s work), Reservation Dogs is also about loss. The four friends are like a family unit, but they mourn their missing friend Daniel (Dalton Cramer), who died one year earlier. It’s a loss that feels tangible from the very first episode, handled with the mix of humor and heartbreak that pervades senseless grief and informs the cadence of films like Hunt for the Wilderpeople, Thor: Ragnarok, and Jojo Rabbit.

By tapping into indigenous talent and actors who actually look the age they’re playing, Reservation Dogs gives us four unforgettable main characters. Woon-A-Tai, Jacobs, Alexis, and Factor have preternatural chemistry, the kind that forms after years of knowing each other. The same way these close friends don’t need to answer to each other, we need nothing more to understand their fierce love for each other and the familiarity of these bonds. All we want is for them to be okay — and maybe knock off another chip truck.

Reservation Dogs is now streaming with FX on Hulu.