'Task' Is the Show of the Year

I knew I was 100% locked in on Task by the middle of its second episode. Up until that point, the series—starring Mark Ruffalo and Tom Pelphrey as cop and robber, with a vicious motorcycle gang in the middle—had the hallmarks of a solid and promising show, but was not quite unlike things we haven’t seen before, especially on HBO. All the standard checkmarks were there: Pensive protagonist, haunted by personal trauma, played by an A-list veteran. Likable criminals woefully in over their heads. Meditative scenes of characters chilling and having Deep Talks. A seemingly innocuous crime that goes heinously wrong at the end of the first hour to set the events in motion. A setting in an underrepresented region of America to give things a little flavor. All well executed, but familiar.