“Dark Winds” is the best show you’re probably not watching. The first season dropped in a crowded Summer 2022 on the less-than-massive AMC+ and didn’t get enough attention, but the second season might have the power to change. Everything about this already-strong program has only grown more confident in its sophomore outing. Each season consists of six episodes, telling a largely standalone story with themes and a few plot details that carry from year to year but also a satisfying, self-contained narrative. They’re like great Summer books, something to read on a sunny day that keeps the pages turning. Blending elements of noir, the supernatural, Indigenous belief systems, and old-fashioned thriller, “Dark Winds” is captivating television. One of the best performers on the show gets a little short shrift this season, which is disappointing, but that’s the only thing holding back a show that increasingly looks like it could run for years, if we’re lucky.
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Executive produced by powerhouses that include George R.R. Martin and Robert Redford, “Dark Winds” adapts novels by Tony Hillerman, a mainstay in stories of the Southwest from the ‘70s through the ’00s. The first season was largely based on 1978’s “Listening Woman,” introducing TV versions of two of the author’s most beloved characters: Joe Leaphorn and Jim Chee. The two lawmen have appeared in over a dozen Hillerman novels, giving the creators of “Dark Winds” plenty of material to use as inspiration.
Leaphorn, a Navajo police lieutenant in Kayenta, Arizona in the 1970s, is played by the phenomenal Zahn McClarnon, who imbues the character with a fantastic blend of vulnerability and moral righteousness. The first season paired Leaphorn with a new partner in Chee (Kiowa Gordon), who was revealed to be an undercover FBI agent. At the start of season two, Chee is working as a private investigator when he gets caught up in something called the People of Darkness after being hired to find a missing lockbox by a rich woman played by Jeri Ryan. Chee’s case will take him into the worlds of the powerfully corrupt, the people who use Native American culture as a way to profit or justify their own amorality.
At the same time, Leaphorn encounters a relentless sociopath played with icy determination by Nicholas Logan. There’s a centerpiece sequence in episode three in which Logan’s amoral killer hunts his prey through a hospital soaked in red light that is one of the most thrilling in recent television. This guy is the opposite of Leaphorn—a man who acts without remorse. It gives the season some of the flavor of “No Country for Old Men” in its presentation of a villain who seems to challenge old-fashioned structures of right and wrong. He even challenges Leaphorn’s moral center when the lieutenant discovers he has a personal connection to him that may inspire vengeance. McClarnon’s “Longmire” co-star A Martinez is effective as a County Sheriff who works with Leaphorn to stop the killer.
Of course, Chee and Leaphorn’s cases intersect in a way that brings the show together again, although it should be noted that the excellent Jessica Matten as Sergeant Manuelito is kind of left holding less narrative this year than she deserves. Matten gets her richest material in delicate, character-driven scenes with McClarnon and Gordon, emphasizing the fact that “Dark Winds” is just as good, arguably even better, when it’s not focused on plot. McClarnon isn’t just a charismatic lead—he’s a wonderful scene partner, and not only with Matten. His scenes with Deanna Allison as his wife Emma or his father Henry, played by Joseph Runningfox, make both characters richer. McClarnon grounds Leaphorn through his relationships, conveying so much in the way he holds his wife’s hand or shoots a supportive look to Matten. It’s a truly fantastic performance.
Once again this year, the writers of “Dark Winds” weave strong commentary through their six episodes, pushing forward again the story of forced sterilization of Indigenous women and taking the arc of season one’s new mother Sally Growing Thunder (Elva Guerra) to unexpected places. This is a show that really trusts its viewers to handle intertwining cases, themes, and character studies. So much modern television feels bloated by too little plot in too many episodes, but “Dark Winds” makes the most of its limited time. If anything, it sometimes feels a bit rushed, and, again, Matten deserved a bit more narrative this season, but these are minor complaints for a show that’s remarkably confident in its seasonal design.
It’s also neat to see the writers this year playing with elements of the supernatural and the mystic even more than in season one. This is a show that embraces the idea that there are things in this world we don’t fully understand, whether that’s seeking guidance from lost loved ones or an evil sociopath that seems to come straight from Hell. So many detective shows center people trying to make absolute sense of the world, whereas “Dark Winds” is more about accepting the fact that things don’t always add up, justice is always complicated, and sometimes evil can’t be explained away.
What’s most exhilarating about the second season of “Dark Winds” is the complete lack of desperation. This isn’t a show that needs to pander or betray its characters for ratings. It’s only two seasons in, but these characters and the world they inhabit feel fully realized and rich with stories to tell. Let’s hope the powers that be at AMC are willing to tell them every single summer. [A-]
“Dark Winds” Season 2 debuts on AMC on July 30.