This True Crime Drama with Andrew Garfield is Your Next Watch if You Miss American Primeval
The high-rated show from 3 years ago is your perfect follow-up if you didn't have enough of American Primeval’s controversial storyline.
One of the most recent arrivals on Netflix, a Western drama American Primeval is among the streaming’s biggest hits, having caught all of the viewers’ attention for three weeks straight. Expanding the genre on a very precise historical ground, the series’ story unfolds during the Utah War while also giving a sneak peek into its time’s rising religious movements.
The whole matter might be quite a new thing for many viewers that will feel like the entire history of religion should be there to make the show’s themes connect with the audience. Luckily, there’s no need to spend hours scrolling down Wikipedia pages — a 2022 true crime drama show has already done the trick.
Under the Banner of Heaven Talked About the LDS Church Long Before American Primeval Came Around
Released back in 2022, Under the Banner of Heaven that stars Andrew Garfield as police detective Jeb Pyre came as an earlier and probably more precise story of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints Community.
Set in the 1980s, the show revolves around Pyre who embarks on an investigation of the murder of a Latter-day Saint mother and her baby daughter; his personal and seemingly firm beliefs are confronted and then shaken once he realises that the LDS Church has in fact something to do with the whole matter.
In its turn, American Primeval also focuses on the Church’s rise to power by 1857 when the show’s storyline takes place, yet Under the Banner of Heaven, set a whole century later, somehow manages to do it better.
American Primeval Lacks 1 Essential Element Under the Banner of Heaven Was Praised For
Despite setting its plot in the timeline which is actually quite close to the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints’ foundation (the movement’s origin goes back to 1830), American Primeval still doesn’t make many things clear about how exactly the Church was founded and what helped it gain popularity.
Surprisingly, this is what Under the Banner of Heaven succeeds in, intertwining its relatively modern timeline with flashbacks that show American religious leader Joseph Smith whose career path eventually leads him to becoming LDS Church’s founder.
Smith also shows up in American Primeval, but his story isn’t explored enough to give the viewers a full-scale view on the wide influence that the movement had back in the day.