As the first episode of The Outlaws begins, Rani Rekowski (Rhianne Barreto) goes shopping with her mother Shanthi. Rani likes an outfit although her mom doesn’t think she’ll ever have time to wear it since she never goes out. They agree to meet at the car so Shanthi can get her husband’s foot powder. Once Rani leaves, she is stopped by a security guard who asks to look in her bag. Instead of cooperating, Rani throws her bag at the guy and makes a break for it. After a long chase through the mall, Rani finds herself trapped by the security guards. To make matters worse, her mother arrives just in time to find out what is going on. After the intro, Margaret (Dolly Wells) tells her kids that grandpa is coming to visit and he is a lying, thieving bastard. The young girl repeats Margaret’s claims while Frank (Christopher Walken) is released from prison. Once he arrives, we learn Frank has been in prison for eight years.

He talks to Tom (Guillermo Bedward), Holly (Isla Gie), and Margie before the person in charge of his parole arrives and equips him with an ankle monitor. Once she is gone, Tom asks why grandpa was in prison. Frank says it was a misunderstanding while Margie says he misunderstood that you can’t forge signatures on checks. Seconds later, John Halloran (Darren Boyd) has to go through a metal detector with Christian Taylor (Gamba Cole) behind him. After a few hiccups and bigoted jokes, John is finally allowed to continue on his way and Christian follows him. Rani arrives with her parents Shanthi and Jerzy (Gyuri Sarossy). Christian seems happy to see her, so he hands Rani her backpack. As they walk through the door, we see a sign that says Avon Valley Probation Service.

Rani finds a seat. Then, Gregory Dillard (Stephen Merchant) enters and jokes about his height and length, but nobody laughs. Frank joins them and tells the women they’re beautiful. John is surprised when Myrna Okeke (Clare Perkins) tells him he can’t give them a verdict regarding their appearance. Diane Pemberley (Jessica Gunning) enters, introduces herself as their supervisor, and explains they’ll be working the hours mandated by their court. She tells them she can be a good guy or a mean bastard and it is their choice. That ultimately leads to an argument between her and Greg after he reminds her that she said it was their choice. Diane gets a headcount before the group is shipped to a nearby building which they’re going to transform into a community center during their mandated 100 hours of community service.

They’ll work four hours at a time and Diane has to approve of their work before the hours get logged. They’re told not to pick up dead animals over 10 kilos although they can pick up dogs, cats, and vermin. As for human feces, they should leave it be, but they can take feces from other species. When the work begins, Myrna asks John why he is there. He explains he runs a successful business yet they have a criminal justice system that kowtows to the right-on leftie liberal brigade. Myrna identifies as a leftie liberal but John says you can’t be one unless you’re a disabled, transgender, vegan today. She asks if he is reading that directly off the Daily Mail website before he warns her that the lefties love nothing more than eating their own. Christian tells Rani she is working too hard, and it is making him look back. Then, he learns about Rani stealing stuff and the fact that she got into Oxford University.

Diane interrupts to tell them to get back to work. While Rani says she wasn’t flirting, Christian admits he was. Several cars pull and paparazzi jump out to get pictures as Lady Gabriella Penrose-Howe (Eleanor Tomlinson) arrives and gets out of her vehicle. Greg knows her from the No Service reality show in which posh people gave up their mobile phones and assistants. Lady Gabby introduces herself and says her preferred pronouns are she, her, and herself. Diane gives her a vest, but Gabby insults it and jokes about calling the fashion police. Diane docks her two hours and orders her to put the vest on. Greg approaches Christian and throws up the Star Trek sign thinking it is a gang sign. Diane gets Rani to come inside with her to ask about her scholarship to Oxford University.

Diane reveals she wants to go to school so she’ll have a better chance of becoming a police officer. She is attending an online college that Rani knows about because their emails are always in her spam folder. Rani knows Oxford is thinking about revoking her scholarship unless she gets three As and a letter of commendation from her supervisor. Diane wants her to work hard, show remorse, and squeal on the others. Ultimately, she reluctantly accepts her offer. In a flashback, Shanthi forces her daughter to tell the security officer about her full scholarship to Oxford while arguing she isn’t a thief. Her mother is shown CCTV footage of Rani stealing though. When she claims this is the first time she took something without paying, the man shows her more video of her stealing other items. They return home and find Rani’s big box of stolen stuff. Before court, her mother calls it humiliating. As for her father, he says there will be no place for her in this family if she lies, cheats, or steals again.

She is warned she’ll be dead to them if she so much as gets a parking ticket from this point forward. Next, Lady Gabby asks Myrna to take a picture of her for Instagram. Myrna compares her to Jesus, but Gabby says he had 12 follows and she has 1.2 million. John talks about business on the phone and promises several times that the Chinese will sign. Diane eventually takes the phone and tells him to return to work, but he says the call was work and this is only detention. Frank asks John if he has ever had Chinese wine. He explains drinking with the Chinese makes them feel that they can trust you and they call it guanxi. Frank goes on to talk about drinking with a Chinaman before Myrna tells him they can’t stay that word anymore. She argues if they think something might be offensive, there is a good chance that is it. Spider (James Nelson-Joyce) and his friends prepare for something in the distance. He offers to do it now, but the others believe it would be best to wait.

Rani finds Lady Gabby lighting a joint before learning about the Festival of Peace and Light and how it convinced Gabby to organize a festival of her own. Initially, Christian turns down Gabby’s offer but eventually takes a hit just as Myrna and John walk around the corner. John claims he is performing community services because of Christian’s sort before getting physical while trying to take the joint away from him. Lady Gabby films the fight for her social media page. Mr. Wilder (Sam Troughton) arrives with Diane, breaks it up, and threatens to give everyone five more hours if someone doesn’t own up to the joint. Although they don’t think he can do that, Diane admits he can since he is a senior officer. John blames Christian until Rani is asked what she knows. She panics, stutters, and tries to avoid answering the question until she is saved by Christian who pretends the joint belongs to him.

When Lady Gabby confesses, she is given five more hours along with Christian. Mr. Wilder reminds them that there working here instead of being in jail and he’ll make sure they spend the rest of their hours behind bars if they get out of line. Then, the working day comes to an end. Diane catches up with Wilder to say she had everything in control, but he doesn’t believe that. Rani thanks Christian for speaking up and getting her out of that. While the others head home, Myrna goes to the cemetery and kneels near a tombstone that reads, “In Loving Memory Of Colin Dension Police Constable”. Meanwhile, John prepares the wine for his meeting with the Chinese and chats with his kids beforehand. Christian finds Esme (Aiyana Goodfellow) using a virtual reality headset and hanging out with Spider and Malaki (Charles Babalola). Christian removes the headset from her and tries to get her to leave. She is handed money which Christian makes her return as he drags her away.

John Halloran Senior (Ian McElhinney) watches as his son gives the Chinese a tour of the manufacturing facility. John is asked if there is anything about him or his father that could bring the Chinese company into disrepute. After saying there is nothing, John is asked why they should trust his company with their money. John begins talking about family and how his father built the company from nothing. When his father retired, he had four bidders begging to buy the business, but John Senior decided to give the business to his son. He tells Chairman Yang that his father trusted family and it is a family business. If Yang places his trust in John, he will become a part of that family, and John never lets his family down. John is told to prepare the contracts for review so they can sign them tomorrow. Then, John grabs the bottle of wine and encourages the others to take a drink too.

Christian tells his sister he met a girl today and wants to talk to her about school. He changes the conversation to Esme hanging out with the troublemakers and reminds her they’re family. Esme insults her brother and likes what Spider and his friends are doing instead. Rani’s parents ask her about her day at community service, the others, and whether she did what was asked of her. Shanthi wants to know if this is something they did. Although Rani says it is not, her mother believes they were too easy on her and shouldn’t have removed the Netflix parental controls so quickly. Rani admits it isn’t their fault before promising this is going to be the end of it. Frank tries to help Margie with a current home improvement project, but she doesn’t want his help. He admits he thought about all the people he messed around before prison and Margie is at the top of his life. He swears on his life he wants to make it right, but Margie has heard it before and doesn’t believe it this time.

She is only going to let Frank stay until the ankle bracelet comes off. Then, she wants him out of her and her children’s lives. Next, John tells everyone at community service that he is hungover due to the Chinese wine. He apologizes to Diane for getting loud with her yesterday and tries to convince her to let him leave a little early so he can finalize the deal. She refuses to let him leave early. Christian asks Rani what she thinks about their little gang to which she responds everyone is a type. She explains they have a right-wing blowhard, left-wing militant, celebutante, shifty old-timer, and whatever Greg is. When Christian asks what he is, she says the bad boy and she is the studious Asian good girl. He wonders why the good girl is shoplifting so she explains her dad never let her go to parties or hang out in a bus shelter with friends. She excuses her father because he grew up under communism in Poland. Christian asks her for a favorite because his sister got her GCSEs soon, but he can’t make her study.

She offers to do it if he thinks it’ll help. Spider’s friends drive by and Christian sees his sister in the vehicle with them. Christian walks over and Rani goes inside while Greg distracts Diane with a dead badger. Rani eavesdrops on the conversation as Christian is told some men from London are running their lines into ends. Esme offered to help and they don’t want to turn her down, but Christian is adamant she isn’t going to work for them. He is told someone is doing work tonight and it is either Christian or his little sister. When he asks what needs to be done, he is told about a trap house in Lawrence Hill, and they need him to get the phone. Spider wants to give him a gun although Christian tells him to put it away. He is given the address 32 Rossmore Avenue. Christian negotiates by saying Esme won’t hang with them anymore if he does this before taking the handgun.

Rani watches as Christian hides the gun in his backpack while Diane calls the council to deal with the badger. When the day ends, Diane stuns Rani by asking about the heat gun which has gone missing. As she goes through Greg’s bag, Gabby learns he broke up with someone last year and she has gone through a breakup as well. After Christian lies about the backpack not being his, John gets into an argument with Myrna about the term person of color. Once John and Rani confirm it is Christian’s bag, Diane searches it but doesn’t find the gun. Gabby and Frank complain about Rani snitching on Christian although John doesn’t understand the code among criminals considering they murder people.

He also makes it clear that there is no “we” at the community service group. Once they return, John tries to rush through the metal detector while Rani tells Christian she needs to speak to him because she has the handgun. Diane forces Christian to go through the checkpoint before telling Rani she did the right thing today. Wilder arrives and learns about the heat gun before Greg pushes past Rani and goes through the metal detector. Rani grabs a stapler and puts it in Greg’s pocket so she can escape. Rani stops her parents to tell them Christian asked if she could read his sister’s course work and they okay that. She gives him the gun, confirms she is willing to help his sister, and pleads with him not to do whatever they want him to do. John gets a call from his father who complains about him being late and possibly screwing this up. At home, Rani’s father quizzes her before yelling at the loud kids outside for bothering his daughter while she studies.

John finally makes it to the factory and finds Chairman Yang still waiting for him. They do not look eager to sign the paperwork. Yang’s daughter shows him the video Gabby uploaded of him fighting with Christian. He is left alone after the Chinese refuse to sign the paperwork. Frank tries to help Margaret again and reveals he took the heat gun so he could remove the paint easier. Christian grabs the gun, covers his face, and prepares to go inside the house in question. He manages to convince them to open the door before holding the man at gunpoint. He sits both men down and demands to know where the phone is. They tell him it is under the rug. He retrieves a heavy bag before two men return to the house. They warn Christian that he is robbing the wrong people and he doesn’t want to walk out the door with that bag. The two men are blinded by bright lights from a van nearby as Christian runs out of the other door.

He is shocked to find Rani waiting for him outside. He tells her to go while one of the men takes pictures of her van. Rani drives off and Christian runs away. When John makes it home, he lies about the Chinese signing so she thinks they’re out of the woods now. He checks on his kids while Christian gets the phone from the big bag of money. Frank helps Margaret remove the paint from the door. Christian hides the money in the community center. At the police station, Lucy is shown the CCTV footage of Rina and Christian outside the house in Lawrence Hill. Rani celebrates at home.

 

The Outlaws Review

Going into The Outlaws, I wasn’t sure what to expect from the new series, but I figured it’d be a quirky comedy. It is too early to judge the series since we’ve only watched one episode of six with another season already confirmed. Regardless, someone must’ve predicted the series would do well considering they were confident enough to greenlight a second season so early. Ultimately, I liked many aspects of The Outlaws while being underwhelmed and disappointed with others.

The realism of the characters is nowhere near tangible because they’re too far one way or the other. Perhaps the biggest problem is the befuddling dialogue which is unbelievably cringy at times. The comedy was a low point for me since everything felt forced and unconvincing. Some of the politically incorrect lines could’ve been humorous but the execution just wasn’t skillful enough to make them work.

Surprisingly, the drama side of The Outlaws could be the high point of the first episode because I feel there is real potential for some of the side stories of the main characters including John’s. Christian’s dilemma and subsequent actions were intriguing as well. I am not sold on The Outlaws yet, but it has enough intrigue to convince me to return for a few more episodes. I just wish the humor was tightened up a bit and the cringe was downsized.

The opening episode scores a 6.5 out of 10. All recaps of The Outlaws will eventually be available on Reel Mockery here.