Sylvester Stallone‘s Tulsa King is flipping the mafia storyline on its head in a way that reminds me of a cross between The Sopranos and Yellowstone. Cowboys and mob bosses? An inspired combo, IMO.
The show was created by Yellowstone’s Taylor Sheridan who brought on Sopranos alumni executive producer and writer Terence Winter. Their influence shines through with the fish-out-of-water story that sees a NY mobster try to adjust to a new life in Tulsa, Oklahoma.
If The Sopranos was your whole personality and you’ve been rewatching the show religiously since 2007, this new mob-themed series could help you shake things up. While The Sopranos was definitely a classic, Tulsa King has a much more modern take on the genre. TBH, this makes it feel a bit fresher and helps keep you on your toes.
If you’re not familiar with the Paramount+ show, the reason it feels so original is because Sylvester Stallone’s character Dwight Manfredi isn’t as powerful as previous mob bosses we’ve seen on screen before. The premise is simple: after spending 25 years in prison for murder, he expects to be welcomed back into his mob family for his loyalty. Instead, his boss has him shipped off to Tulsa, Oklahoma, where he has to build a new crew from scratch.
The character of Dwight has been compared to the character of Tony Soprano (James Gandolfini), and these comparisons are gonna stick around forever thanks to the nature of the genre.
Executive producer Winter recognises there are some basic similarities between the two, but claims Dwight could never be as mean and thuggish as Tony. While Tony is a traditional gangster, Dwight is a “good guy” who “wants to go straight”. Kinda makes things complicated, given the ~career~ path he’s chosen.
“I think Dwight, at heart, is a rational, reasonable guy. He’s not a bully. I mean, a lot of mob guys in real life are bulls in china shops. I think Dwight in general, will be respectful to people until he feels that they don’t deserve that, and then the other shoe drops,” Winter told ScreenRant.
“He’s had plenty of time in prison to reflect on his choices. And he’s incredibly well-read. He has a much broader base of knowledge about the world than most gangsters.”
Winter may be biased since he’s currently running the show, but he reckons this modern take on a mob story might just be more interesting than previous iterations that may have been a bit more generic. That’s a big call!
“What makes this show different is Dwight is surrounded by people you would never expect to see in the mob genre. Bodhi (Martin Starr), who’s this pacifist weed store owner, or Mitch (Garrett Hedlund), this former cowboy, or Tyson (Jay Will), this Black kid from the Midwest. When would you see a New York gangster ever get to spend time with these people? It’s pretty much never,” he told CBR.
“When you paint anybody in all their full colours, you get a real, true picture of human nature. He has a daughter that he loves, and he lost all those years with her, and a sister who he was estranged from for all those years, and grandchildren who he doesn’t really know.
“For me, that’s way more interesting than the generic mob stuff. We try not to make it generic, and certainly it’s not when you’ve got a New York mobster surrounded by a crew of Oklahoma misfits.”
Both seasons one and two have been released on Paramount+, so if you need a show to binge over the holiday period, you’re in luck. Season two recently broke streaming records meaning there’s officially going to be a season three, so you also don’t have to worry about any pesky cliffhangers going unanswered.
Tulsa King season two is now available to stream, only on Paramount+.
