Even by the insane standards of the HBO comedy?s inaugural season, Sunday?s Vice Principals season finale was, well, very insane. Over the course of nine polarizing episodes, in which co-creators Jody Hill and Danny McBride walked the razor?s edge between pitch-black comedy and disquieting psychological drama, Vice Principals followed the efforts of school administrators Neal Gamby (Danny McBride) and Lee Russell (Walton Goggins) to overthrow their new boss, Belinda Brown (Kimberly Hebert). Along the way, there were some extremely uncomfortable moments, including an act of arson at Brown?s home and a horrifying night of destruction prompted by a bottle of gin.
And then there was Sunday?s episode, in which [SPOILERS AHEAD] Gamby and Russell finally succeed in getting rid of Brown. Better yet, they?re appointed co-principals of the school. But just when everything appears to have worked out for the show?s protagonists/villains, Gamby is gunned down in the school?s parking lot by a mysterious masked figure, and apparently left for dead.
Vice Principals ended its first season as it began ? uneven, erratic, and yet also thrillingly unpredictable and unique. It wasn?t perfect, but Vice Principals was a welcome oddity amid an increasingly conformist television landscape. As the conventions of ?Good TV? are codified and reduced to formula ? with an established set of clearly defined storytelling perspectives and moral objectives ? Vice Principals stubbornly went against the grain, never letting the audience off the hook by telling it how to feel about its deeply flawed characters.
Initially conceived as an 18-episode limited-run series, Vice Principals already has its second and final season in the can. ?Everyone could watch it now if HBO would just release it. It?s ready. It?s there for you to see,? McBride told us Monday in a phone interview.
