Hillerman

With “Dark Winds,” even though Tony Hillerman was a white guy, we’ve recontextualized his books with a Native writers’ room, Native consultants, Native actors, Native directors.

Created by Graham Roland, the AMC and AMC+ crime thriller is based on the “Leaphorn & Chee” novel series by Tony Hillerman.

My advantage: I am a full-blooded and fluent-speaking Navajo, born and raised on the reservation alongside eight siblings in the 1970s — the time period in which “Dark Winds,” based on the series of novels by Tony Hillerman, is set.

The first season of AMC and AMC+’s “Dark Winds,” a gritty crime drama based on Tony Hillerman’s Leaphorn & Chee books and set on a Navajo reservation, covers heavy topics such as murder, cultural genocide and kidnapping.

The show also starred John Hillerman as the stuffy British army veteran Higgins, who manages the estate that Magnum uses as his base.