We’re used to seeing action legend Sylvester Stallone on the big screen, but he’s no stranger to TV as well—for our money his guest spot on The Muppet Show is an all-timer. But he’s never starred in a scripted television drama before…until now. Fans of the Rocky and Rambo actor best strap in, because Tulsa King is now streaming on Paramount+.
Additionally, our mates at Paramount+ have let us know that for a limited time, the full first episode of Tulsa King can be watched outside of the paywall. If you’d like to give the show a taste test, make sure to check out the pilot for free before it leaves on December 4.
Brought to us by Taylor Sheridan, the Oscar-nominated actor-turned-creator behind the deathlessly popular Yellowstone franchise, Tulsa King sees Sly as mob capo Dwight “The General” Manfredi, who we meet when he’s getting out of prison after serving a 25 year stretch. Expecting to be richly rewarded for his silence by his Long Island crime family, he’s instead dispatched to Tulsa, Oklahoma to set up Mafia operations there—effectively being promoted and demoted at the same time.
But Dwight is a man with a work ethic and he commits to the bit with gusto, recruiting an Uber driver, Tyson (Jay Will) as his chauffeur and right hand man, strong-arming a weed dispensary owner, Bohdi (Martin Starr) into paying protection over the latter’s protests that marijuana is legal now, and generally behaving like an urbane but ruthless bad-ass.
Tulsa King’s secret weapon is that it’s very funny. There are action beats (Sly punches a lot of people) but the real fun is in the fish-out-of-water shenanigans as the manly mafioso struggles to adapt not just to cowboy country Tulsa, but to the 21st century in general. Stallone isn’t afraid to poke fun at his age, either; one early scene has a casual hook-up react with absolute horror at the realisation that the 50ish-looking Dwight is actually in his 70s. He can still crack skulls when he needs to, though, and we’re betting that skill will come in particularly handy as Tulsa King progresses.
