'Barry' Season 2 Trailer: Bill Hader's Hitman-Turned-Actor Is Back For Another Job
The first season of Barry had no right being as magnificent as it was. HBO's pitch-black comedy about a hitman who gets bitten by the acting bug was the perfect blend of silly and tragic, a character-driven farce with a dark, Breaking Bad-esque heart, all powered by Bill Hader and Henry Winkler doing career-best work.
Now, the full trailer for the new season has arrived and it looks bigger, brasher, and yes, somehow even darker. Check it out below.
Barry Season 2 Trailer
The first season of the show ended with Barry making his bleakest and most horrifying choice yet, a decision that lingers over the new trailer like a disease. The title character may be capable of monstrous things, but he's still a human being and the guilt over the blood on his hands has begun to rot his soul. It also seems to have the added side effect of actually improving his acting, which is the kind of bleak comedic choice this show can pull off like no other.
Although Hader and Winkler won well-deserved Emmys for their work in season 1, this trailer promises that the entire supporting cast is back and ready to do what they do best: bring these simultaneously silly and dangerous characters to life. Anthony Carrigan's Noho Hank continues to be one of the great comedic creations of recent years, but I'm also happy to see Stephen Root's sleazy Fuches and Sarah Goldberg's self-absorbed Sally back in the picture. These characters, buffoonish and terribly sad and so damn funny, form the core of a world I want to revisit again and again, even when it hurts.
As viewers know, the first season went to exceedingly dark places, especially in its back half. Comparisons were rightfully made to Breaking Bad at points – the filmmaking itself avoids the point-and-shoot style associated with most television comedies, aiming for a harsh and often painfully realistic style that makes the violence on screen hurt. Barry's murders aren't treated as jokes and even the silliest characters can be uncompromising monsters. It's a tightrope Hader and co-creator Alec Berg walk with a deftness that blows me away.
Barry returns on March 31, 2019 on HBO. Between this, the final season of Veep, and the final season of Game of Thrones, HBO's Sunday nights just became as compelling as they have ever been. And that's saying a lot.