Whilst the twin worlds of Better Call Saul and Breaking Bad might now be done and dusted, their stars, Bob Odenkirk and Giancarlo Esposito will return to AMC in two brand new shows. AMC has just officially revealed that Straight Man and Parish have both been given the green light to air sometime next year.
Giancarlo Esposito showed a quick teaser video along with AMC to coincide with the official announcements of the shows. The statement read: “Saul and Gus may be leaving, but Bob and Giancarlo aren’t going anywhere. Two new series. Straight Man starring Bob Odenkirk. Parish starring Giancarlo Esposito. Coming 2023.”
Straight Man is a series based on a novel of the same name by Richard Russo and will follow William Hentry Devereaux Jr. – played by Odenkirk – the head of an English department in a poorly underfunded college in Pennsylvania. The show has been adapted by Paul Lieberstein and Aaron Zelman, while Odenkirk will also be an executive producer.
Not an awful lot is known about Parish at the moment. The show will star Giancarlo Esposito, who had been scheduled to perform in another network show, The Driver.
That show was going to focus on Esposito’s taxi driver character, Vince, who agrees to ferry around ‘The Horse’, a Zimbabwean gangster based in New Orleans, who takes advantage of illegal immigrants in the U.S. port towns. However, it is unknown as of yet, whether the two shows are separate or have just changed names.
AMC has experienced tremendous success in recent years with The Walking Dead, Breaking Bad, and Better Call Saul, so there is much riding on the quality of their new shows. Hopefully, Parish and Straight Man are up to the task and will bring in some further high ratings for the network.