The Continental has opened for business. You want a room?

The very first episode of this three-part miniseries that fell on Peacock is literally called “Brothers in Arms.” The basic premise, for those of you who came in late, is that this takes place in the 1970s. Specifically, it follows the rise of Winston Scott, the character Ian McShane played in the John Wick franchise, and it centers around the Continental. The guy who’s running it currently is Mel Gibson’s own Cormac, and I tell you what, there’s such an interesting storyline happening here.

It’s 90 minutes. The first episode drops this week, the next one drops next week, the last one the week after that, and we’re going to cover all of them. If you haven’t had the opportunity to get caught up yet on the Continental and the world of John Wick, do yourself a big favor and go watch it first.

The Action Carries Over, the City Feels Like a Set

Action, check, and it does very well. The directors have been quoted as saying they were trying their best to carry over the sense and feel of the John Wick films into this television experience, and I think in that respect they did a good job.

Aspects of the city feel like a set or a sound stage, though. There’s a part where they go into Chinatown in 1970s New York, and it felt like a set a little bit. Maybe it’s just how clean everything was. Not clean, but it looked purposeful. I know most of this was shot in Budapest, because obviously there’s very similar construction and architecture from that era.

1955, Then New Year’s Eve

The story starts with the Continental on New Year’s Eve 1970. Actually, the story starts in 1955, and you get black and white of Winston and his brother Frankie as children. Frankie takes the blame. You see them through the two-way glass of an interrogation room, and Frankie’s literally telling his brother, hey, just shut up, the cops are going to try to get you to talk, don’t forget, you didn’t do anything wrong, I’m the one who did it. He keeps saying that to him.

That was 1955. Now we flash to 1970 and it’s a very different game. We find Frankie all tattoos, played by Ben Robson, who was in Vikings, and he’s doing an amazing job playing this really awesome badass. He goes in the back way, he has some witty repartee, and he walks through the main ballroom of the Continental where the party’s happening and runs into Mel Gibson’s Cormac. Cormac gets up, introduces him around, and they share a drink. He’s like, I brought him in when he was this big, this and that, and you get the feel and sense that Frankie didn’t really want to be there. He walks away, and Mel Gibson’s giving him the stink eye as he leaves.

Ultimately, Frankie steals something out of the vault, and it’s this really interesting moment. He uses a train. Through the subway he has a hook, the train grabs the hook, and it yanks the locking mechanism off the vault. Very, very brilliant. What he steals is a coin press. I can only assume it’s for the gold coins that are used as currency within the walls of the Continental. That’s the predominant plot.

Winston in London, a Detective at the Front Door

There are several other subplots at work here. Winston’s in London doing some shady business deals with this one lady, helping her husband rip off this guy for millions of dollars. He’s building parking garages for all these big skyscrapers. It’s a money-making scheme, whatever. Then he gets kidnapped by these masked individuals who’ve been sent to come find him.

In New York there’s what I guess we’ll call a B plot. There’s this police officer, a female police officer, who’s screwing her boss, and she’s tracking down this arms deal, this gun running that’s going on. It’s Frankie she’s tracking, and the tracking takes her to the very front doors of the Continental. Her superior, the guy she’s screwing, is like, are you crazy, absolutely not. He stops her and he literally tells her, don’t ever go in that building. She’s the first female detective, so at first she thinks it’s about that, that he’s trying to protect her. He’s like, just trust me. He clearly knows something about what’s going down, and she doesn’t want to listen.

So again, tough broad, and I love the way they’re characterizing her. I’m very into the mood, by the way. I’m very into the 70s feel of this whole thing.

Later on she walks into the Continental anyway. Doesn’t want to listen to nothing. She goes to the bar, she buys a drink, she tries to give the guy cash, and the guy looks over at somebody else nearby, a guy with some shades on. I don’t know what role that guy plays. She tries to get a room and they say it’s full. She notices people passing gold coins, and she leaves. She doesn’t know what she’s getting into, but it’s about to go down with her, and we don’t see much more of this in part one.

Twenty Some Odd Years Without a Word

Winston wakes up at the actual Continental, in front of Cormac, with Cormac having just made a guy jump out the window for failing to find the press.

Apparently, after the 1955 incident we saw at the very beginning, Frankie and Winston parted ways and haven’t talked in like 20 some odd years. Eventually Frankie got in bed with Cormac, working for him, and Cormac is apparently the very reason their dad was killed, or their dad died. It’s a very shady situation, and I don’t know what the whole backstory is.

You also get to see a young Charon, which is awesome. I love the young man who’s playing him. I really feel like he’s embodying a lot of that energy that came from the previous actor, and I’m enjoying seeing that particular role being carried out. Plus they all seem to be just relishing being in this 1970s nostalgia world.

After a few words with Mel Gibson, it comes out flat that Winston has no idea where his brother is. They haven’t talked in forever. So Cormac’s like, all right, let him go, and the idea is of course he’s going to follow him.

Chekhov’s Dojo

So what does Winston do? Winston’s Winston. He goes out looking for his brother. He goes back to some folks, he borrows a car, a Shelby GT Mustang, and he goes searching. He hears the rumor that Frankie used to hang out in Chinatown, so he goes to Chinatown and meets up with this crew of people.

These guys are straight up Chekhov’s gun, in my opinion. They’re like, we ran guns, we worked with Frankie, Frankie abandoned us, we don’t want anything to do with him. It’s these very Black Power looking, very Black Panther type folks. Dude’s got the afro, the black turtleneck, the leather jacket, and his sister owns their parents’ old kung fu place. I find it totally ironic, and very much a nod to that era of blaxploitation, that the martial arts dojo is owned by Black folks. I’m like, yes. So great, so cool.

And they’ve got a whole downstairs full of guns. Try and think that ain’t going to come back.

Frankie, Yen, and the Roof

Winston eventually gets the idea to go by some place they used to go as children, and there he finds his brother Frankie and Frankie’s wife, Yen. Yen’s a regular badass on her own. She’s on the martial arts, kicking butt, and she’s amazing, but she doesn’t trust anybody and she’s only looking out for Frankie, her husband. There’s genuine love there, and I really appreciated that relationship for what it was.

Then it’s, we’ve got to go, we’ve got to escape tonight. The brothers have this moment where they talk, and that’s where you get that whole backstory about them. They try to leave, they go back to the same guy who helped with the car, and one of them turns them in. That’s when all of Cormac’s people come rushing in, and it’s literally an all-out, balls to the wall fight to try to get away.

They make it to the roof of this one building, to the helicopter that’s waiting for them. But Cormac brought in some hired help. You’re not going to get the Continental and not have the hired help. He calls them the weirdos. “Give me the weirdos.” They literally call them the Twins, and they are rough. They’re both working as snipers, taking people out.

Frankie makes a decision. He’s like, look, you saved my wife. Then he takes the box with the press, jumps down, and sacrifices himself. It’s sad and it’s rough.

Cormac gets the thing back, he opens up the box, and it’s a little monkey doll giving him the middle finger. I feel like that says everything that needs to be said right there.

We end the episode with Winston arriving back at the dojo, in the scene you’ve seen in the trailer: “I need guns. Lots of guns.” And I’m just like, bro.

How Does Winston Get From Here to There?

I feel like if you’re going to do this kind of thing, the story needs to be bigger, and I feel like they went real small.

Also, apparently Winston has little to no knowledge of the Continental, the High Table, any of those things. The High Table, quote unquote, makes a brief appearance in terms of being mentioned, and the lady with the mask is very interesting to see. But I always imagined Winston was already privy to all of this. I kind of always imagined Winston came up like a John, or, if you remember Halle Berry’s character in John Wick 3, where she’s already a proprietor, a hotel owner, at the place in the desert.

He’s a savvy business guy. He clearly knows how to control himself and maneuver himself, and he knows how to be shady. I always envisioned he came up through this world, but apparently he didn’t. He’s only being introduced to it by his brother. So I find myself wondering how you go from knowing nothing to suddenly being a full-on proprietor of one of the Continentals. That’s a question they’re going to have to answer, and it’s going to have to be a believable, working answer.

The Verdict

The Continental Night 1, “Brothers in Arms,” is a seven and a half on the Know-It-All Index, and it’s a well-earned seven and a half.

I really dug this. A lot of the acting is there, and everyone’s feeling very comfortable. I don’t think they achieved what they were trying to do in terms of giving it a hugely cinematic look. The color grading is awesome, but I still felt like I was watching a made-for-TV movie. In that context, all of the stunts are amazing, and all those pieces come together real good.

Mel Gibson’s clearly having a good time. He’s having such a great time it’s ridiculous, he’s absolutely loving what he’s doing, and I’m here for it, because you can tell he loves being a bad guy. Ironic or not.

I think the episode does a great job of setting up a lot of things. Right out of the gate you see the rules in play, and you see all these elements we recognize as the beginnings of what’s coming. At one point Cormac has someone showing him a suit and explaining the different ways the suit can help. It isn’t a full-on bulletproof suit, because we can’t go straight to that technology yet, but it’s enough that you can see the beginnings of what’s eventually going to become the Continental we know. And if you look at Winston, I can absolutely see the guy he’s going to one day become.

There are two more parts, and I can’t wait to see them.

If you haven’t checked it out, check it out for yourself. I think you’re going to like it. Then let me know what you thought in the comments on the video above.