Over the years, we've seen countless characters wander into corrupt small towns and become entrapped by the locals. Usually, the mean face of these movies is the town sheriff. The best recent example: Don Johnson's crooked lawman in 2024's "Rebel Ridge." But in Ben Wheatley's "Normal," the good guy drifting into town IS the sheriff. Ulysses (Bob Odenkirk) has come to Normal, Minnesota, in the dead of winter to fill in for the town's recently deceased sheriff. Now, I don't think traveling substitute sheriffs are necessarily a real thing any more than police officers named after Homeric heroes. But "Normal," a hyperviolent Midwestern Western that cleverly inverts some genre standards, has a pleasingly loose hold on reality. It's a goofy, gory good time. And while it shares a lot of DNA with Odenkirk's two "Nobody" movies, "Normal" is the best and most convincing showcase for Odenkirk as a butt-kicking action hero yet. When Ulysses wakes up in a motel in Normal, a quaint town of 1,890, he seems to be doing only slightly better than Saul did at most points in "Better Call Saul." He leaves a message for his estranged wife (just like his namesake, they're separated) and greets an officer, Deputy Mike Nelson (Billy MacLellan), eager to show him around town. Odenkirk, a brilliant comic mind, has proven surprisingly adept at playing middle-aged washouts who maybe have a few moves left. His Sheriff Ulysses has given up trying too hard when it comes to upholding the peace. "Life's a lot easier when you care a little less," he says. His goal, he says, is to leave Normal the way he found it. But Normal tests his apathy. The town, set on a wintry tundra, seems to be doing well — too well, in fact. A banner by the town hall celebrates the raising of $16.8 million... Read More