Early on in the first eight episodes of the series Outer Range, Josh Brolin’s Royal Abbott leads a prayer that serves as a messy thesis statement of sorts for the show. It begins as a desperate plea for help as the family has become caught up in a crisis that they are ill-equipped to handle. The longer it goes on, the more full of anger it is as Brolin imbues every line with a simmering rage that he only barely seems in control of. His family watches on silently, a mixture of fear and concern playing out across their faces with every passing moment. It leaves you feeling both entranced with Brolin’s mesmerizing performance and fearful about the sense that a looming, ominous force surrounds the family. Both you and they dread that their prayers will likely go unanswered, leaving the family to fend for themselves as their lives get completely upended with no end in sight.

This feeling is the enduring strength of a similarly messy show that helps it push through some of its middle where it struggles to find its footing. It is a peculiar but interesting genre mash-up, lifting storylines that feel like they came straight from the hit show Yellowstone. Only instead of just being about land disputes and family drama, there is also a supernatural force that feels like the early days of Stranger Things when it still had a sense of intrigue. No, it doesn’t feature a direct copy of "The Upside Down" world where monsters roam the streets. However, it echoes the way that show captured the struggles of an otherwise normal family living in a normal town who became swept up in something beyond their understanding. Over the eight episodes of the show’s first season shared with critics, it is at its most interesting in how it uncovers the haunting force of time and space seemingly folding in on itself.

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Image via Prime Video

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It all begins and ends with Royal, a Wyoming rancher who is struggling to keep hold of his family land. A flawed patriarch of the wounded Abbott family, he and those he loves have endured loss from which they have not recovered. Central to this is Royal’s son Perry, played by a committed Tom Pelphrey who still remains memorable from his turn as the tragic Ben in Ozark. Perry’s wife has disappeared and has been gone for some time now, leaving many to believe she is dead. While dealing with this lack of closure for his grief, Perry still has to care for his daughter Amy (Olive Abercrombie). He does get assistance from his mother Cecilia (Lili Taylor) and brother Rhett (Lewis Pullman) though it still is taking its toll on him. When Perry gets into an altercation with another man whose family is seeking to take the Abbotts' land, everything gets thrown into chaos as he does something he can’t take back.

Oh, did I mention the Abbott land has a giant hole in it that seems to lead to another dimension? This isn’t a spoiler as it is only part of the inciting incident and troubles that befall the family. When first discovered by Royal, he tests out what it is by throwing a rock into it and is unable to hear it hit the bottom. When he sticks his hand in it, he gets a glimpse of a different time and place that proves to be fortuitous. He decides to keep this discovery to himself and not tell his family, meaning he must bear the burden alone. Similarly, this review won’t go into detail about the nature of this mysterious void even as the show’s first season doesn’t provide a lot of answers either. That serves it well as the show is at its best when it is about the impact this cosmic anomaly seems to have on the family and the growing disruption of the universe that follows it. It is unnerving and enthralling, luring you into the dark delights of this world it has created with a confidence that is further helped by strong direction. In particular, the episodes directed by Amy Seimetz are among the best. Seimetz, whose brilliant film She Dies Tomorrow could itself be in conversation with this show, remains great at ensuring both the show’s visuals and characters live in harmony on the screen.

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Image via Prime Video

The narrative troubles that haunt the show come in some middle episodes when it gets caught up in plotlines that begin to drag. Even as there are many moments when it is able to put an interesting spin on the Western as a genre through a reimagining of key iconography, there are also many scenes that become too bogged down in tropes that aren’t fully developed. Still, this is all able to be forgiven when the last few episodes largely jettison these elements and pick up the pace. It makes it all feel like a misdirect to what the show was actually wanting to focus on with regard to themes of faith and family in a world gone haywire. It isn’t just the hole as there is a persistent feeling that something is off in ways big and small that get under your skin. When the show loses sight of this central element, it can feel mundane and meandering. Though this is perhaps the point as it sets up the more significant reveals that come later in the show to ensure they have a larger impact by comparison.

There also are strong performances from not just Brolin, who really hits a lot of interesting narrative beats in a multilayered performance, but the entire cast around him as well. In particular, both Imogen Poots as a drifter who shows up on the Abbott family land and Tamara Podemski as the local sheriff bring a lot to the table. While they don’t always get a lot of development, the reasons why this is becomes clear and both performers shine through anyway. All the various pieces and characters end up being integral to the show as it builds towards a conclusion that clearly hopes for more to come. One can only hope it gets further chances to explore as this poetic yet patient first season, with all its flaws, still has laid a solid foundation for a story that has a lot of potential ahead of it. For a show to embrace the strange elements of the cosmos and intertwine them with everyday life as well as Outer Range does is worth praising for that alone. It is both creative and cathartic, revealing much about the family at its center even as it finds splendor in the overwhelming awe of the unknown.

Rating: B+

You can watch the first two episodes of Outer Range on Amazon Prime on April 15. The remaining six episodes will be released weekly in pairs of two.