Justified: City Primeval

Justified: City Primeval may at times leave you longing for the dingy folksiness and familiar faces of Harlan County. But it’s a welcome, tightly wound, eight-episode reunion with Raylan Givens nonetheless.

“City Primeval” doesn’t merely justify its existence, it makes one wish that FX could find a way to insert Raylan Givens into other Elmore Leonard books in the future. He’s that rich and complex a character. “Justified” may not officially be back, but let’s hope that Raylan sticks around for a while.

Raylan Givens, perhaps the 21st century's coolest TV hero, came back to us at exactly the perfect time. I'd like to think that will continue to hold true moving forward.

The one word that summarizes Justified: City Primeval is “satisfied.” Showrunners David Andron, Michael Dinner, and many others from the original Justified team did the impossible — they continued their hit show without betraying its legacy and, more importantly, told a compelling story that felt necessary for the characters and the audience.

Terrific. [24 Jul - 13 Aug 2023, p.4]

The idea to situate him in a new world—one derived from a Leonard novel in which Raylan isn’t even a character—keeps him interesting and surprising. .... There’s something moving, and maybe rare, about watching two actors in their 50s [Ellis and Olyphant] and with decades of experience find that crackle together.

There is only one man to play this Marshal, and that's Olyphant. The series surrounding him is quite good and solidly expanded upon, but it lives or dies on his shoulders. Thankfully, with each ensuing hour, Timothy Olyphant goes out of his way to remind us how much we've missed him in this world.

The best ones [reboots and sequel series] take what’s great about the original and layer in something new. That’s just what FX’s “Justified: City Primeval” delivers.

Justified: City Primeval works as both the satisfying return of an old favorite series and a fresh take on a familiar character. The miniseries format suits it well, too, keeping the narrative tight without losing space for the characters to breathe.

While I’d be lying if I said there’s not a Goggins-sized gap in “City Primeval,” Olyphant remains reason enough to watch. Able to convey a flood of emotions with a single squint, the gray in his stubble suits him, as does the moody noir he finds in Motown.

The show is an overall engrossing endeavor; an eight-episode season that stands on its own, with obvious potential to continue further—fingers crossed. There’s enough to keep audiences old and new on tenterhooks.

It may not match Justified at its prime, but this fresh exploration of Marshal Givens works on a level that will serve to keep veteran viewers happy indeed. And yes, the mane is still intact.

Scripted by Dave Andron and Michael Dinner, two Justified writers, it retains the original’s noir-ish sensibility and sly dialogue, even if the pithy putdowns don’t have the hit-rate of the original.

Justified: City Primeval will satisfy both fans of the original series and people who are just looking for a well-written, sometimes-funny cop drama to watch.

It is diner food, perfectly executed, seasoned with flair, a dish steeped in memory you are happy to eat again. Not exactly comfort food, given how much of what happens is discomfiting, but deeply satisfying.

Sometimes the villain impresses, sometimes they are just there. Mansell is caught in some kind of no man’s land that is neither believable nor terrifying. .... Still, we have Olyphant’s Givens in middle age, and that’s more than enough. .... There’s enough false endings and misdirection in “Justified: City Primeval” to suggest we’ll never know if Raylan Givens gets a happy ending. And that seems like justice.

The few [TV revivals] that work (like The Conners) do so because they acknowledge how the passage of time has changed the people onscreen, and those of us watching them. City Primeval very smartly does this, finding ways to recontextualize Raylan’s behavior, while still managing to tell an entertaining yarn about him and a colorful collection of supporting characters.

Most of my criticisms of City Primeval are real, but minor. More frequently, City Primeval achieves the near-impossible: It takes a story that was concluded impeccably and reopens that world with confidence, standing alone and yet honoring what came before.

Just seeing Timothy Olyphant locked and loaded again as Raylan Givens will probably be enough for fans of “Justified,” but the FX revival subtitled “City Primeval” more than justifies the encore. Featuring an older Givens with more to lose facing off against a truly nasty bad guy, the eight-part series overcomes a few clunkier elements to deliver the expected shoot-from-the-hip charms.

City Primeval may fall short of enough material to fill eight episodes, and a father-daughter pairing of Olyphants falters, but it nevertheless does justice to its enduring protagonist.

It turns out there was more to say about Raylan Givens, specifically about who he is as a father, so even if the crime element wasn’t the show at its best, there is still a purpose to City Primeval. And that’s more than can be said about some of the other revivals Hollywood has trotted out over the last decade.

The story shambles at first, then picks up but never quite enough to place this among the better seasons of "Justified."

It’s a mixed bag, always enjoyable but never outstanding.

Yes, Olyphant slips back into character as if not a day has gone by, and new castmember Aunjanue Ellis is a scenery-chewing delight, but something about the revival never quite clicks into place. It's hollow, almost soulless in moments, slapping the veneer of a Leonard crime novel on the surface and hoping that the audience won't notice the cheap foundation underneath. But we can see it. And it's not angering, it's just disappointing.