JJ Abrams and Jordan Peele’s HBO series Lovecraft Country couldn’t be more timely if it tried. When the world is being torn apart by racism, the show takes the very-real fear black people have of whites and throws in a bunch of supernatural shit for them to deal with, too. This is going to be one Helluva ride.
Abrams and Peele serve as exec-producers, but the showrunner is Misha Green, best known for co-creating WGN series Underground. Jonathan Majors, great in The Last Black Man in San Francisco, leads a terrific cast that includes Birds of Prey‘s Jurnee Smollett-Bell, Michael K. Williams, Courtney B. Vance, Wunmi Mosaku (Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them), Aunjanue Ellis (When They See Us), Jamie Harris (Kingdom), Abbey Lee (Mad Max: Fury Road); Jamie Chung (The Man with the Iron Fists), and Jordan Patrick Smith (Vikings).
Yann Demange (White Boy Rick, ‘71) directs the pilot and serves as exec-producer. Victoria Mahoney, first woman of color to act as second unit director on a big-screen Star Wars movie, takes the helm of a latter episode.
SYNOPSIS: Based on Matt Ruff’s novel of the same name, Lovecraft Country follows Atticus Freeman (Jonathan Majors) as he meets up with his friend Letitia (Jurnee Smollett) and his Uncle George (Courtney B. Vance) to embark on a road trip across 1950s Jim Crow America in search of his missing father (Michael Kenneth Williams). This begins a struggle to survive and overcome both the racist terrors of white America and the terrifying monsters that could be ripped from a Lovecraft paperback.
HBO debuts Lovecraft Country in August.
