To be fair, I was a little hesitant about AMC’s new comic book adaptation for “Preacher”. Knowing that DC Comics’ alternative genre imprint Vertigo hasn’t really translated well on the small screen in way of the cancelled “Constantine” and current CW shows “Lucifer” and “iZombie” not hooking me in, something felt a bit weary in putting my faith in this adaptation. But hey, I’m at SXSW and I hear that Seth Rogan has executive produced this new episodic small screen wonder, so why not queue up for a few hours to check out the pilot episode? How bad could it really be?

What I witnessed in the pilot episode for “Preacher” at SXSW went way beyond my expectations. Having only been slightly familiar with the general storyline and characters, my expectations weren’t sky-high. I was hoping the show would sit well next to current AMC smash-hit “The Walking Dead” and well, expectations were certainly exceeded here. My mind was absolutely blown away by this amazing first pilot and for 45 minutes, I was absolutely enthralled by every minute of this weird, dusty and eyebrow raising little tale of this tough preacher named Jesse Custer who moves to a small Texas town who befriends a bad-ass vampire named Cassidy and one bad bitch named Tulip who could literally clobber a helicopter out from the sky.

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What Seth Rogan and team have done with “Preacher” is quite extraordinary. I didn’t quite realise that “Preacher” was a labour of love for him over the years. Seth gleefully proclaimed at the SXSW screening that “as soon as I got any power in Hollywood, we set out to make Preacher a reality”. The fans seemed to appreciate what Seth has done as well and were dying to ask questions during the Q&A and didn’t seem to mind little liberties taken in the pilot episode – like changing Tulip’s race from a blonde white chick to one ass-kicking black female powerhouse. We even got to see the shocking debut of controversial character Arseface whose appearance in the pilot episode shocked the audience.

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All-in-all, I can’t wait for “Preacher” to make it’s episodic debut on AMC. I left the pilot screening wanting way more, longing to learn more about this world of intrigue that was created by writer Garth Ennis and brought to television life by a creative team whose vision was flawlessly executed in the pilot – if you ask me.

You can literally feel the passion that went into “Preacher” and I have a feeling it’s going to be another runaway hit for AMC, with potential to be as big, if not bigger than “The Walking Dead”.