Preacher S02E11 "Backdoors" Recap

The episode opens on grim flashbacks of Jesse being submerged in a pond while locked in a coffin. He's just a teenager and his grandmother L'Angelle is ordering this shocking treatment in order to break his will.

In the present day plot, there are divers that have worked to draw the armored truck from the swamp under the orders of Jesse and Tulip. Tulip is furious that Jesse didn't kill him and also lied about it. There's still tensions between the two from all the baggage in their relationships. Jesse assures Tulip that the Saint can't get out but when he opens the truck, he finds that the Saint has disappeared. This only further escalates the animosity between the two.

Lara Featherstone reports back to Herr Starr about what has just transpired between Jesse and Tulip. Herr Starr reveals to his agents about his plan to replace the mentally handicapped Messiah with Jesse. He believes this will bring real order and control to the world.

Jesse gets into an argument with Tulip and Cassidy but the conversation is interrupted when he begins to intuitively realise that the man in the dog costume that he briefly encountered at the beginning of his search for God in New Orleans is possibly God himself. Tulip and Cassidy won't go with him, so Jesse must follow this lead on his own.

Eugene decides to try to team up with Hitler and Tyler to try to escape Hell. Eugene and Tyler go with Hitler to relive his worst memory, which is of his last day as a good person. He had tried to pitch his art to an art dealer but his work was insulted. He then had an opportunity to stand up for himself when some men came in and attacked the restaurant he was in but he maintained his demure approach. Things escalate further when the woman he is with leaves him for his lack of drive and aggression, and the last piece of plum cake he had ordered went to a Jewish man that arrived after Hitler had already ordered.

Tulip wants to have all of the Saint's weapons melted down but they are indestructible by any regular mortal methods so she opts to send mail them to Brazil instead. Out of sight, out of mind.

Jesse is unable to find the man in the dog suit and visit Herr Starr to demand answers. Starr didn't know about God, and Jesse now blames himself for not having realised right then that it was God. When Starr plays a recording of Jesse's prayers as a teenager, he is heard to be begging for his father's death and being sent to Hell. Once again Starr offers Jesse the opportunity to take over the vacancy God has left but Jesse declines it again, even going so far as to command Starr to shove the tapes of his prayers up his bum. This leads to the reveal that the Grail had been behind swapping out the truck in the swamp and the Saint of Killers is released under Starr's order.

Back in Hell, Eugene reaffirms his commitment to escaping, teaming up with Hitler in the process, and the pair enter the "Hole" in pursuit of a backdoor out.

Preacher airs on Mondays on AMC at 9/8c.