''God Save Texas'' is a 2024 American documentary series, directed by

Richard Linklater Richard Stuart Linklater (; born July 30, 1960) is an American film director, producer, and screenwriter. He is known for films that revolve mainly around suburban culture and the effects of the passage of time. His films include the comedies '' ...

Alex Stapleton Alex Stapleton is an American director, showrunner, and executive producer of documentary feature films and unscripted television. Career Stapleton's directorial debut was the 2011 feature documentary, '' Corman's World: Exploits of a Holly ...

, and Iliana Sosa. It is inspired by the book ''God Save Texas: A Journey Into the Soul of the Lone Star State'' by Lawrence Wright. The series explores the past, present, and future of Texas. It had its world premiere at the

2024 Sundance Film Festival The 2024 Sundance Film Festival will take place from January 18 to 28, 2024. The first lineup of competition films was announced on December 6, 2023. Official Sections U.S. Dramatic Competition World Cinema Dramatic Competition U.S. ...

on January 23, 2024. It premiered February 27, 2024, on

HBO Home Box Office (HBO) is an American premium television network, which is the flagship property of namesake parent subsidiary Home Box Office, Inc., itself a unit owned by Warner Bros. Discovery. The overall Home Box Office business unit is ba ...

Premise

Chronicling the past, present, and future of Texas, from the perspective of three directors. Following the

prison industrial complex A prison, also known as a jail, gaol (dated, standard English, Australian, and historically in Canada), penitentiary (American English and Canadian English), detention center (or detention centre outside the US), correction center, correcti ...

in Huntsville, the energy industry in Houston, and the humanity and healing following the

2019 El Paso shooting On August 3, 2019, a mass shooting occurred at a Walmart store in El Paso, Texas, United States. In the terrorist attack, a far-right individual killed 23 people and injured 23 others. The Federal Bureau of Investigation is investigating the sh ...

in El Paso.

Episodes

Production

In June 2014, it was announced ''God Save Texas'' was in development at

, with Lawrence Wright set to write, based upon his play ''Sonny’s Last Shot'', and Lauren Shuler Donner set to executive produce. In March 2022, it was announced the project was instead a documentary-series with

set to direct an episode, with Wright still attached as executive producer, and

Alex Gibney Philip Alexander Gibney (; born October 23, 1953) is an American documentary film director and producer. In 2010, ''Esquire'' magazine said Gibney "is becoming the most important documentarian of our time". Gibney's works as director include '' ...

set to executive produce. While directing the episode, Linklater went on a process of search and discovery, determining an excessive amount of his high school football teammates ended up incarcerated by the

in Texas.

Reception

The review aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes reported an 100% approval rating based on 5 critic reviews. On Metacritic, the series has a weighted average score of 84 out of 100, based on 4 critics, indicating "universal acclaim".

References

External links

* {{HBONetwork Shows HBO original programming HBO documentary films 2024 American television series debuts 2020s American documentary television series