Netflix sets release date of May 27 as hit series releases on DVD.
It’s been a long wait since the first season of ‘Bloodline‘ appeared on Netflix — a year to be exact — but today fans finally have a release date for Bloodline Season 2. On May 27, we pick up where the Rayburn family left off: Danny’s dead, and his siblings all have blood on their hands.
According to Netflix, 10-episode season 2 begins with the family trying to conceal their crime. Mysterious strangers from Danny’s past arrive with hidden agendas, and law enforcement starts closing in on the truth about Danny’s death. The tight-knit family’s relationship begins to unravel amid paranoia and mistrust, as lies mount and alliances are betrayed. With their backs against the wall, this once-good family may again have to do some very bad things.
We decided to re-watch the first episode of season 1 of the hit series to prepare for Bloodline Season 2. Knowing what we now know after watching the first season, some things appear much more ominous, while others were evident from the very beginning. The show’s opening storm clouds foreshadow this family’s stormy relationship with brother Danny (Ben Mendelsohn) and set the tone for a theme of darkness vs. light. Indiewire appropriately described the genre as “family noir,” and we couldn’t agree more.
The picturesque setting of the Florida Keys is established via an aerial shot of the Overseas Highway, as Danny travels by bus from Miami to his family’s home in Islamorada. We then see Sissy Spacek as mom Sally Rayburn tending to the beachside Rayburn House inn (The Moorings Village & Spa in real-life according to On Location Vacations) the family owns. “I’ll feel a whole lot better when all my children are together in one place,” she says. How many times have we heard enabling mothers utter these words without considering the cost?
Danny, who is portrayed as the black sheep, is the oldest sibling, but it’s brother John (Kyle Chandler) who takes the role of rescuer or savior. Danny’s lowlife friend even refers to him as “the pope” when he gets a call from John. Flash-forward scenes of the two brothers in seersucker suits in the rain show John carrying Danny and trying to save him from drowning, or is he?
When Danny finally shows up for the big family gathering at the hotel, younger brother Kevin (Norbert Leo Butz) tells him, “This is not going to be the fucking Danny show this weekend.” We get the sense that this family’s life has been about the “Danny show” for a while, and everyone except his ever-hopeful mother is worn out. Dad Robert (Sam Shepard) references “some trouble” in the family’s past during his speech at dinner and refers to Danny as the “one who got away but always finds a reason to come back even if it is to ask for money.”
The crux of all the drama in ‘Bloodline’ is about whether to allow Danny to come home and potentially harm the family name and legacy they’ve built with Rayburn House. Danny asks John to talk to their father about allowing him to come home and help with the business, but Robert leaves the decision to the siblings.
“A man’s supposed to look out for brother. That’s what family is all about,” John says in the episode’s narration. As the protector, it’s his job to keep this family together and protect the family name, but what’s a brother to do when the enemy is coming from the inside?
Kevin — who is sort of a loose cannon but says what no one else wants to say — predicts no good will come from Danny returning home, and he’s right. Sister Meg (Linda Cardellini) thinks people can change, but she eventually sees Danny’s true colors. John feels indebted to Danny because of things that happened in their childhood. More about these events is revealed throughout the season, shedding light on Sally’s real motive for wanting Danny home: guilt.
After Danny is found passed out naked on the dock in front of the hotel, John reconsiders his homecoming. The episode ends with John telling Danny their father doesn’t want him to return. It’s a lie and one the other siblings aren’t yet aware of, but one that shows just how conflicted John is about his brother.
“What we did to our brother, we had to do,” John tells the audience. “Please don’t judge us.”
But how could we judge them? Every family has that black sheep, that sibling or member we wish would just go away. We’ve all thought about how the dynamics would be different if that person disappeared or bought a one-way ticket out of town; we just haven’t all considered murder.
Not much else has been released about the second season, but we do know that most of the actors are returning, and John Leguizamo has been added to the cast as Ozzy Delvecchio, a man from Danny’s past, in six episodes of Bloodline Season 2. There’s still plenty of time to binge watch the first season on Netflix before May. Cinematographer Jaime Reynoso has said he never saw ‘Bloodline’ as a TV show and used more of a documentary-style film concept, so watching all at once means no break in the gorgeous Florida setting or the high drama.
