Metro, July 22
There’s a moment towards the end of the first episode of this taut, tense crime drama which will
probably have everyone watching nodding in agreement. Andrew Garfield’s devout, somewhat
gentle detective Jeb Pyre finally gets home after a long day where he’s seen the aftermath of a
brutal double murder, questioned a bloodied suspect and chased down another at gunpoint. His
elderly mother sits down at the kitchen table and wearily croaks: “Nothing’s right. It’s all so broken.”
Under The Banner Of Heaven is based on Jon Krakauer’s 2003 non fiction book of the same
name. That explored the murder of Brenda Lafferty and her infant daughter in the fractured Utah
Mormon community of the mid 1980s, after which one of the accused claimed to have had a divine
revelation. This adaptation places the fictional Pyre at the heart of the drama as a detective who is
a Mormon himself and slowly, painfully understands that elements of the Church he loves are not
the loving institution he thinks or wants them to be.
Less a whodunnit than a why-dunnit, Under The Banner Of Heaven becomes a complex
investigation into religious fundamentalism which leads people and institutions to justify terrible
violence. It achieves this by flashing back to the earlier life of Brenda Lafferty; Normal People’s
Daisy Edgar-Jones is really good as a sunny journalist who marries into a terrifyingly conservative
Utah Mormon family, catching simmering violence and resentment out of the corner of her eye.
Amid all this, Oscar-winning screenwriter Dustin Lance Black also takes us right back to the 19th
century and the nascent Mormon church under founder Joseph Smith. Such context, though,
simply isn’t necessary, the re-enactments hammy and possibly unfair given they tend to paint an
entire faith with the broadest of brush strokes.
In fact, it’s a relief to be back with Garfield and the lovely chemistry between Tyre and fellow, non-
religious, native American cop Bill Tab (Gil Birmingham). There’s something really powerful in
Tyre’s professional and private torture, his battle between faith in a religious institution and belief in
doing the right thing. In that sense, Under The Banner of Heaven is as frayed and messy as the
community it seeks to inhabit.
