Taylor Davis

Our Flag is something quite special. On a personal level, I really empathize with a character who wants to leave their entire life to find adventure. I was a massive fan of Pippi Longstocking as a kid, all I ever wanted was for my dad to be a pirate and to live alone with my friends, pet monkey and horse spending pirate gold. As a queer adult, I am always happy and suprised to find a series like this that embraces queer relationships so fully. It really is a beautiful marriage of so many concepts and types of people-- indigenous tribes, Maori, Samoan, Black, White, Asian, Hispanic, and in a way that just feels natural. I can only hope this becomes the norm going foward. Rhys Darby is our leading man as Stede Bonnet, who does leave it all behind to become a pirate captain. The character is loosely based on the real Stede Bonnet, who did also leave his family behind, commission a pirate ship and actually paid his crew! Fortunately the similarities pretty well end with Stede meeting Blackbeard. (Real pirates were not very nice people, believe it or not) Rhys is fantastic in this role, as a veteran comic and actor he really shines as Stede, where he is able to incorporate his signature physical comedy and improv chops with the rest of the cast to incredible results. Stede's counterpart for the series, Blackbeard, is played by none other than Taika Watiti. And this just goes again to show the dude can do anything. He has been quoted as saying being in this series has reinvigorated his love of acting, and he really does a lovely job. The friendship that Rhys and Taika have really shows up for this show in a great way, when they share scenes together the chemistry is incredible and a joy to watch. As for the rest of the crew? Where to even begin! Con O'Neil has to be first mentioned, the man took his role and handed it back to us on a silver platter, he is horrible, he is hilarious, he is a world class swordsman-- he is our new unicorn. Kristian Nairn and Joel Fry should be familiar suspects to all GoT fans, it is so nice to hear Kristian say more than one word in his role, and Joel plays an incredible musician/con man. Vico Ortiz is the reason I found this series to begin with, and they are incredible as Jim, without spoiling anything about that character. Samson Kayo and Nathan Foad, both incredible writers in their own series, Bloods and Newark Newark, show up here and kill their roles. Ewen Bremmer, Samba Schutte, Matthew Maher, Nat Faxon, David Fane, Rory Kinnear, Leslie Jones (again barely scratching the full cast my word) all also slay their roles and all have some of the most incredible scenes in this show. Without a doubt, this show is not a thing like other pirate shows and movies we've seen up to Our Flag's creation. The level of care put into this show, on every level, is so obvious even from the first episode. The writers, the directors, costume designers, really everyone involved deserve multiple awards. If you haven't been aboard yet, there is no better time to set sail.