'Wynonna Earp' Preview: How Syfy's New Western Heroine Is 'Perfect In Her Imperfection' [VIDEO]
It's time for your father's old Westerns to lower their guns. Wynonna Earp is here, and the titular lawman legacy is ready to put her demons down. Literally.
Syfy's newest original show, which premieres tonight, is a modern day supernatural Western powered by witty one-liners and the hero mythology long ascribed to the dusty climes of the 19th century. Deeply etched with slow-burning mystery and carefully plotted mythos, the comic book adaptation boasts a take-charge female lead, an old school (and undead) western throwback, and characters that you'll instantly fall in love with.
So here's the deal: Over a century after Wyatt Earp exited the O.K. Corral a hero, the modern day Earp clan is still paying the price. Somehow, the famous lawman's descendants were cursed by the legendary shootout, and every time the heir to the surname turns 27, they're faced with the insurmountable task of sending the remnant demons of all the outlaws Wyatt put down in his lifetime back to hell. Sounds easy, right? Well, for Wynonna (played by Melanie Scrofano) and her younger sister Waveryly (Dominique Provost-Chalkley), it's anything but.
Plagued by the trauma of her father's death and her elder sister's disappearance, the series opens with Wynonna returning to her hometown of Purgatory for her uncle's funeral. Little does she know her quick trip out West will take a turn for the worse when her 27 birthday strikes and she is plunged headfirst into a battle against Hell's most insidious outlaws. Armed with Wyatt's gun and backed by the government's demon-fighting Black Badge Division, Wynonna is out to break the curse and uncover the dark truth about the her ancestor's past.
As showrunner Emily Andras (who also worked on the fan favorite Syfy series Lost Girl), explains it, Wynonna's mistakes and flaws are what makes her so appealing as a hero.
"She's not perfect, but perfect in her imperfection. That's, I think, what Wynonna is," Andras told Enstars. "Hopefully she makes everybody go, 'you know what? I'm not perfect. I screwed up and I'm just going to keep forging ahead, trying to be better and make things right. I'm probably going to fall on my face a few times along the way, and so be it."
But if you're a fan of the original gunslinger style and feel like you're being left out, don't worry. Doc Holliday (Tim Rozon) looms large in old West mythology, and while the history books claim Wyatt's best friend succumbed to tuberculosis in 1887, Wynonna Earp tells a very different tale. In the show, Holliday looks as fresh and virulent as he did that fateful day in Tombstone, and the morally gray character will have you grinning as you try to puzzle out which side the apparent immortal is really on.
Another Candian production brought across the border for Syfy viewers (like Lost Girl, Bitten, Dark Matter and KillJoys), Wynonna Earp brings just the right amount of humor and gore to the cable channel's 10 P.M. slot. No one is on a pedestal in the series, and the grit and relateability of its heroes will leave you biting your nails through the 13-episode run.
Dive into the mystery when Wynonna Earp premiere's tonight at 10 p.m. ET on Syfy.