Odenkirk plays a washed-up sheriff whose arrival in an eerily wholesome Minnesota town sets off a chain of violence, corruption and savage Ben Wheatley shootouts
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ob Odenkirk continues his new career as the everyguy action hero in this cynically bleak gonzo actionfest, co-written by Odenkirk himself with John Wick creator Derek Kolstad. The director is Ben Wheatley, who shows the same kind of gunplay that was exhibited in his single-location mayhem spectacular Free Fire from 2017.
The setting is a place of Fargo-esque wholesomeness: a little town in Minnesota called Normal where Ulysses, played by Odenkirk, shows up as the interim sheriff, a decent guy just filling in after the previous sheriff was found dead in the snow in strange circumstances. Ulysses is depressed and battling a drinking problem after an unexplained violent end to his last job, which caused him to separate from his wife.
Everywhere he looks, Ulysses sees goofy, quirky, small-town normality, with no crime to solve other than petty neighbour disputes. His deputy Mike (Billy MacLellan) is a smiley and supportive lawman who is thrilled that he and his boss have almost exactly the same moustache. The mayor (Henry Winkler) is smoothly satisfied with everything. Local bar owner Moira (Lena Headey) is spikier – but she too seems content with the bland all-American uneventfulness of the place.
