FX’s Sex Pistols Miniseries ‘Pistol’ Will Rock Your Face Off
Energizing, explosive content with intense form, Oscar-winning director Danny Boyle brings scuzzy verve to Pistol, FX’s miniseries (May 31) about the blitzkrieg rise and fall of Britain’s iconic punks, the Sex Pistols. Shot and edited with pedal-to-the-metal speed and face-punching ferocity, this six-part endeavor about the four-piece’s 1970s heyday captivatingly conveys the band’s rebellious aim to upend the status quo and spit in the face of the establishment—both literally and figuratively. Revisiting an era and a movement marked by a combination of radical dissent and callous opportunism, it’s a multifaceted snapshot of the anarchy that the Pistols wrought first in the U.K., and then throughout the world.
Created and written by Baz Luhrmann’s favorite screenwriter Craig Pearce, Pistol is coated by Boyle in a sheen of ‘70s grunge and injected with an attitude to match, his style all jagged juxtapositions, spikey montages, off-kilter visual compositions, buzzsaw pacing, and whiplash cutaways to flashbacks (often in order to silently comment on the action proper). There’s electric flair to Boyle’s stewardship, and it’s always in tune with the material at hand, which—as befitting a project based on Steve Jones’ memoir Lonely Boy: Tales from a Sex Pistol—pivots around Jones (a charismatic Toby Wallace), who’s first introduced sneaking into the Hammersmith Odeon to pilfer David Bowie’s gear. Shortly thereafter, he falls in with Vivienne Westwood (Talulah Riley) and Malcolm McLaren (Thomas Brodie-Sangster) at the couple’s downtown SEX store, whose sole other employee is a young Chrissie Hynde (Sydney Chandler), future leader of The Pretenders. Jones is a thief with frontman dreams, and his brazenness strikes a chord with McLaren, who—fresh off a stint managing The New York Dolls—views Jones as a potential vessel via which he can riotously shake up the British music industry and sociopolitical landscape.
Though originally dubbed The Swankers and, then, QT Jones and the Sex Pistols, Jones’ band—rounded out by drummer Paul Cook (Jacob Slater) and bassist Glen Matlock (Christian lees)—hits the skids when Jones flees his maiden gig due to nerves rooted in his miserable childhood with a horrid stepfather and callous mother. Ever the indefatigable entrepreneur, McLaren pivots by hiring John Lydon (Anson Boon) to be the band’s new singer, and the soon-to-be Mr. Rotten swiftly abbreviates the group’s name and gives it a dose of unbridled volatility. Jones, meanwhile, is ordered to learn the guitar, a feat he accomplishes during a five-day speed-fueled bender. Pistol itself moves as if it were on amphetamines, and before long, takes its act on the road alongside its protagonists, whose early shows are met with enthusiasm from against-the-grain kids and disgust from just about everyone else, be it aspiring bands or the media who look aghast at the antics of these rude, filthy rabble-rousers.