Kevin Bacon's Upcoming Horror Show Is The Perfect Replacement For This Show With 99% On RT That Got Cancelled Way Too Soon

Kevin Bacon's upcoming action-horror show, The Bondsman, looks like a lot of fun – and also a great replacement for anyone still missing Ash vs. Evil Dead. Created by Grainger David, the eight-episode season hits Prime Video on April 3. Along with Kevin Bacon, The Bondsman also stars Damon Herriman, Jolene Purdy, Jennifer Nettles, Beth Grant, Maxwell Jenkins, and Ren Hamani.

Prime Video just dropped the first trailer for The Bondsman, and it finds Bacon's bounty hunter, Hub Halloran, being killed, and his body left in a forest before he's mysteriously resurrected. Hub sees it as a new lease on life, giving him an opportunity to do something completely different and take up a music career and maybe find romance – until he learns he was resurrected on the Devil's orders, and he's now bound to keep bounty hunting for the ruler of Hell.

Kevin Bacon's New Show The Bondsman Has Strong Ash Vs. Evil Dead Vibes

There's Even A Chainsaw

With so many supernatural shows on air in the past few years, it's inevitable that a show like The Bondsman would draw some comparisons to other shows that came before. In this case, there are a few, but the one that immediately comes to mind is Ash vs. Evil Dead, and The Bondsman looks like it will fill the Bruce Campbell fighting Deadites-shaped hole in our hearts. Of course, the fact that Bacon's Hub hunts down and fights demons is the clearest line to be drawn to Ash vs. Evil Dead. The action-horror blend is distinct in both series.

More than that, though,The Bondsman's trailer hints at plenty of dark humor throughout the show, which is also something that Ash vs. Evil Dead, and the whole Evil Dead franchise, has done so well. The one-man-army mowing down supernatural baddies while still keeping his sardonic sense of humor is a thread that both Bacon's Hub and Campbell's Ash share, and though it remains to be seen just how darkly humorous The Bondsman will get, the influences of Evil Dead are clear.

Though it remains to be seen just how darkly humorous The Bondsman will get, the influences of Evil Dead are clear.

Heck, there's one scene in the trailer where Hub even uses a chainsaw to mow a demon right through the skull. Anyone who is even remotely familiar with horror knows that the chainsaw is forever associated with Ash Williams. Whether that was an intentional wink to the earlier franchise created by Sam Raimi isn't clear, but it sure feels like it. Horror has always done a good job of paying homage to what has come before, so it will be interesting to see if The Bondsman includes any other little Easter eggs and references to other supernatural horror franchises.

The Bondsman Would Also Be A Perfect Complement To Wynonna Earp & Constantine

It Has Similar Elements Of Both

Ash vs. Evil Dead isn't the only show (or movie) that I thought of when I watched The Bondsman trailer: Wynonna Earp and the Constantine movie also came to mind. For the former, The Bondsman's rugged country soul really reminds me of the setting of Wynonna Earp. It's not clear where The Bondsman is set, but Hub's accent and the focus on country music certainly suggest it's set in the South. And though Wynonna Earp is set in the fictional town of Purgatory, Purgatory is located in the Canadian province of Alberta, known as cowboy country. Despite being set in very different locations, both shows have a similar vibe, though The Bondsman is a little more country and Wynonna Earp is a little more cowboy.

Either way, both Hub and John Constantine are damned.

Of course, the similarities to Constantine are more than clear: two men who died and whose souls went to Hell are resurrected – but at a price. Both are now bound to Hell in their own way. Though Constantine becomes an exorcist in order to absolve himself of the "sin" of dying by suicide, his soul still belongs to the underworld. In that way, every exorcism he performs and demon he sends back to Hell is his way of expunging his record, an unofficial contract. Hub, of course, doesn't have a choice - he wakes up and finds he's now the Devil's personal bounty hunter whether he likes it or not. Either way, both men are damned.

It's Great To See Kevin Bacon In A New Leading TV Role

Bacon Is No Stranger To Horror

Regardless of what TV show or movie The Bondsman might remind one of, it's just great to see Kevin Bacon back in a leading TV role. Kevin Bacon has plenty of horror movies under his belt, but his television roles have been much less frequent. To date, he's only had three big ones: I Love Dick, which only ran for a short eight episodes, the excellent cop drama City on a Hill, and, of course, his first ever TV series, The Following, which saw Bacon nominated for a Golden Globe for his work in the psychological thriller.

Kevin Bacon as Val smiling cheekily and a graboid flying out of the ground in Tremors

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The Bondsman looks like it will give Bacon a chance to flex his action and dark comedy chops, which is fantastic considering Bacon's planned Tremors TV show was unceremoniously canceled by SyFy. With The Following being the only one of his TV shows that touched upon horror, I'm eager to see the veteran actor work in the genre on the small screen.