If you haven’t read Preacher in the past, then AMC’s new adaptation may be a… bit hard to keep up with.

The first episode alone was a brutal, blasphemous affair that introduced us to washed-out preacher Jesse, his ex, the nail-bomb-building Tulip and of course, drunken Irish vampire Cassidy.

Here’s a complete guide to the comic book…

Wait, what? There’s a preacher and he hangs out with a vampire? And beats people up in bars? And he’s possessed by the holy ghost? Whaaaaa?

See? It all gets a bit much. Which is why we’ve put together a very quick primer to help you get over the slightly* weirder ideas and get into the swing of things.

(*Extraordinarily.)

So… what’s it all about?

Basically, an angel and a demon decide to get it on. And then they have a kid, called Genesis. And this kid has no will of it’s own, but it is made of something purely good, and something purely evil. With me so far?

Not really. What’s this got to do with a washed-out southern preacher?

Well, genesis is ridiculously powerful, but it hasn’t got a form of it’s own. It’s basically a cloud of energy floating about the place, so it comes to Earth looking for a physical body.

AHA! And then it blows Tom Cruise up!

You got it. It’s not mentioned in the comic, but in the TV version, Genesis tries entering a bunch of different clergy from various religions first. Trouble is, they’re far too self-interested, so they get blown to smithereens. Including a certain leading Scientologist.

So why is Jesse safe?

Probably because he’s not full of shite. The series is pretty non-complementary about the major religions. If you hadn’t noticed that already, then you sure will. Genesis bonds with Jesse, giving him the power to use the literal ‘WORD of God’. If he tells you to do something, then you absolutely have to follow through.

OK great, so who’s this Tulip lady?

We’d lose our blogging license if we didn’t say ‘Oh, she use ta be Jesse’s Girl’ at this point.

And she did, but there’s a lot more to her than that. Raised as a son by her father, Tulip is an excellent marksman and career criminal who fell for Jesse hard. When he tried to go straight, he left her, and she’s real mad about it. Oh, and after the big break up, it led to her taking a whole bunch of drugs and getting involved with… another character.

Gotcha – and what about this vampire?

Ah, that’ll be young Proinsias Cassidy. Well, not that young. He was part of the Easter rising in Ireland in 1916 after all. During which he somehow got himself bitten by a swamp hag, and found himself with a lust for blood and an aversion to sunlight.

He fled to America, and gained a few drug problems along the way. He has a habit of using women to supply him with drugs and blood, and basically fucking up the lives of anyone who meets him.

Wow, that’s pretty dark. So these are the bad guys right?

Nuh-uh.

What? Who could be worse than a Preacher who robs you of your free will, a drug-addled bloodsucker and a bomb-making maniac?

Ah, that’ll be the organisation known as ‘The Grail’.

Go on…

Basically, you can’t have an extraordinarily powerful creature that proves the existence of God roaming around on Earth without some religious nutcases taking an interest. The Grail is an ancient order dedicated to preserving the bloodline of Jesus. By… uh… an inbreeding program that’s been going on for 2000 years. We’ll see the results later in the series. Let’s just say the descendent of Jesus isn’t particularly smart or pretty.

The Grail’s main agent is Herr Starr, a disfigured, egotistical loon with a penchant for perversity (Including at one point, sticking a Swordfish up his rectum. He want’s to use Jesse to further his own plans, and depose his boss, a bulimic, 500lb pope-analogue known as Allfther D’Aronique.

What a fat bastard.

Geez, they sound pretty awful.

They do don’t they. And we haven’t even gotten to Jesse’s own evil, inbred family, or The Saint of Killers.

Wait, who (And also why so much inbreeding?)?

Yeah I know man, way too much inbreeding. And also sex with a stack of raw hams at one point. Where was I? Oh yes, The Saint of Killers.

So there’s this guy right. Old West type. He’s the meanest guy there is. Until he meets the love of his life, settles down and has a kid. Happiness ensues. But then the family get sick, so he goes for medicine. He’s caught in a blizzard, and hunted by outlaws which delay him. He kills ‘em all, but runs out of bullets before he can get the leader. He gets shot, never makes it home, and the wife and child die.

Well that sucks.

Sure does, especially for The Saint, who ends up in perdition for his sins. And he’s so incredibly mad about it that he causes Hell to quite literally freeze over. So the Devil gives him a pair of guns that never miss, and tells The Saint he can head back to Earth, as long as he acts as the Angel of Death while he’s there. The first person The Saint shoots? Yep, it’s the Devil.

Wow, I am dying to see how they pull this off on TV!

I know, and we haven’t even talked about God yet!

Wait, is God in this?

Yep, but not until later. He’s kinda gone fishin’ for a while.

Holy shit! This sounds great!

It does doesn’t it – Episode two is live on June 6th on AMC, or via Amazon in the UK (or if you can’t bear the wait, head on over to Amazon and read up).

Will do! Oh shit, I forgot to ask about Arseface?!

Sorry buddy, too late for now…

Check out more in-depth and slightly wayward small-screen analysis in our Television section, including everything you need to know about the Stranger Things soundtrack.