Comedy
Mythic Quest
This AppleTV+ show is an accurate depiction of gaming culture—including everything wrong with it.
For 15 years, it’s been Xavier Collins’ job to watch his surroundings, to observe and analyze everyone in the vicinity, neutralizing any potential threats. And to keep his mouth shut about what he sees and hears.
He’s an agent for the Secret Service, and he’s done a good job. In fact, he managed to save the president, Cal Bradford, from an assassin’s bullet. But Xavier’s growing weary of watching Cal’s surroundings and keeping his mouth shut about what he sees and hears the president doing.
However, Xavier may not have to do so much longer.
Bradford is dead. Xavier was off duty when it happened. But however angry Xavier may have been with the president, Cal’s death bodes ill for the country … or at least what’s left of it.
A couple of years ago, not long after Xavier saved Cal’s life, he was cleared by the president to receive top-secret information. The world is going to end, he was told. It’s inevitable. And the only hope humanity has is to dig the biggest hole it can and get in.
Dig they did, deep within the mountains of Colorado. Inside, they built a city, Paradise, capable of withstanding the calamity that was coming but only capable of housing 25,000 citizens. Xavier was going to be one of those citizens—along with his wife and two children—serving as Cal’s head of security.
Only things didn’t go quite as planned.
Xavier’s wife, Teri, was out of state when the evacuation orders came. And Cal failed to get her on a plane to Paradise.
Xavier never forgave him. He still protects the president, but he doesn’t sleep at night, mourning the loss of his wife and the rest of humanity.
“I’ll forgive you when I can sleep again,” Xavier tells Cal. “And I’ll sleep again when you’re dead.”
But as much as he wanted Cal dead, Xavier didn’t want the man to die like this—murdered by an unseen assassin inside his top-security home in a city where weapons are forbidden.
Just who killed the president? And why? As Xavier digs for answers, more questions are unearthed: What will happen to Paradise now that Cal is gone? What are Paradise’s leaders—particularly Samantha Redmond, its creator—keeping secret? And will Xavier be able to put a stop to whatever nefarious plots are afoot before someone else winds up in a body bag?
Hulu’s Paradise is a sort of dystopian murder mystery. Each episode unveils more clues, keeping viewers engaged as they try to solve the mystery. Unfortunately, that means we also encounter a lot of harsh content.
Language is pretty rough, with multiple uses of the f-word and s-word, not to mention abuses of Jesus’ name. There are some sex scenes where we see lots of movement and skin, including a man’s bare rear, though strategically placed limbs and camera angles hide other critical anatomy. Some extramarital affairs also take place.
And, being a murder mystery, violence is also prominent in the story. When Xavier discovers Cal’s body, it’s surrounded by a pool of blood. Flashbacks show us how Xavier got shot saving Cal’s life. And bit by bit, we begin to see the horrible disaster that wiped humanity from the face of the earth.
We also face some unique spiritual challenges in Paradise. While the city is still being built, a psychiatrist is hired to choose the 25,000 people who will be allowed to survive; she handles it the best she can, but it’s clear that playing God in this way weighs heavily on her.
Additionally, a child on his deathbed asks his mother if he’s going to heaven. She answers yes, telling him that heaven will be whatever he wants it to be. He says he hopes it will be a lot like Earth, just with more mechanical horses, like the kind you see outside grocery stores. In response to this, his mother (the lead architect of Paradise) designs Paradise to reflect his image of heaven. She tries to make the underground city resemble a real one on the surface, only with more of the kiddie rides he requested.
The storyline here has far greater stakes than your typical whodunnit. But the amount of content takes it to an even greater level of concern for would-be viewers. And certainly, nobody who watches this series will think it’s paradise.
(Editor’s Note: Plugged In is rarely able to watch every episode of a given series for review. As such, there’s always a chance that you might see a problem that we didn’t. If you notice content that you feel should be included in our review, send us an email at [email protected], or contact us via Facebook or Instagram, and be sure to let us know the episode number, title and season so that we can check it out.)
When Xavier discovers the president has been murdered, he delays calling it in, knowing that he’ll be pulled off the investigation due to tensions between the two. But as he searches for clues, he begins to suspect far greater repercussions than just burying a friend.
We learn that Cal and his wife are separated but still married for political reasons. (He has drawn devil’s horns on her head in a picture of their family.) And we hear he is sleeping with one of his female security agents. We see a man in his underwear as he changes clothes. Two men make crude jokes about genital size. Elsewhere, a woman makes a similar crude reference.
A dead man lies face down in a pool of his own blood. In the past, we see an assassin try to shoot the president. Xavier spots the man and throws himself on top of Cal, taking the bullet and saving Cal’s life while other agents tackle the shooter to the ground. Later, we see Xavier bandaged in the hospital. And some time after that, we see he has a scar from the wound.
We’re briefly told that the world ended due to some natural disaster, and that the only people who survived were those in the bunker city of Paradise. Xavier clearly blames Cal for this calamity, as well as the death of his wife, though we don’t know why.
In a flashback, Cal asks Xavier if he would like an alcoholic beverage. Xavier declines, and Cal approves, informing Xavier it was a test to see if he would drink on the job. Cal then pours himself a drink, even though he’s also technically working.
Cal drinks and smokes cigarettes frequently. Xavier often reminds Cal that the cigarettes are bad for his health.
A guy crudely complains that he needs to use the bathroom. Later, we see his exposed thighs as he sits on the toilet.
Flashbacks show us that Cal wasn’t the most serious president—though he did appear to be sincere. He notes that when he leaves office, he wants to buy the biggest mansion he can and fill it with booze and prized art. He says he fired his former head of security because the man was “boring and old,” and he hopes Xavier will be more entertaining. He also admits that hiring Xavier, who is Black, will help his political standings—though that’s not the reason he picked Xavier, he says.
A guy makes a sexist joke. The president had a strained relationship with his son because of his and his wife’s separation. Xavier and his children are close. His teenage daughter helps him keep the household running, but she worries about her dad, knowing he doesn’t sleep much at night. Someone secretly removes evidence from a crime scene. It’s revealed a member of Cal’s security team was sleeping on the job when Cal was murdered.
There are four uses of the f-word and seven of the s-word. We also hear “a–,” “a–hole,” “d–n,” “d–k” and “h—.” God’s name is abused once, paired with “d–mit,” and Jesus’s name is abused four times as well.
Emily studied film and writing when she was in college. And when she isn’t being way too competitive while playing board games, she enjoys food, sleep, and geeking out with her husband indulging in their “nerdoms,” which is the collective fan cultures of everything they love, such as Star Wars, Star Trek, Stargate and Lord of the Rings.
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