With planned final seasons of television, there is the temptation to bring back old favorite characters. It’s not unjustified; you’ve got your last chance on checking up on these people and what they’re doing. The fans want to see it and I’m sure the writers and stars want to work with these people come. The problem comes when it’s not organic to the storytelling and is therefore just for the sake of it. So far, Justified has been judicious in bringing back old favorites, doing so in a way that makes sense and is relevant to the story that’s being told. I know unrestrained positivity can get just as irritating, if not more so, than unrestrained negativity, but this show gets television right. If you’d like to see me rail against incompetence and moronic bullshit, seek out my upcoming recaps of The Following and the return of Law & Ordocki. This episode, “The Trash and the Snake”, returns two characters from Justified‘s most acclaimed season and it’s welcome.
I don’t know what’s creepier: the domesticity Ava is faking with Boyd or the domesticity Shane and Mara Vendrell had on the run from the LAPD. Both are fucked up in their own ways; on Justified, Boyd is touching and grabbing Ava based on false (or false enough) consent that while legitimate in his eyes means he comes off like a fuckin’ predator. It’s also tension filled insofar as Ava thinks Boyd could realize the truth at any moment and hands on shoulders can become hands around the neck quickly. The Shield is eerie as you’ve got Shane, his wife and his kid as a family unit, squatting in an abandoned McMansion, acting like they’re on a blissful vacation while on the run for trying to kill two cops. In either you’ve got Walton Goggins as an increasingly desperate man who might lose at any time or with any provocation. Sometimes it’s difficult to come up with something different from “Jesus Christ I hope Ava isn’t found out and killed”.
Raylan’s basically Wolverine: he threatens to murder everyone, but it’s part of his charm!
That depressing notion aside, “The Trash and the Snake” is pretty fucking hilarious. Raylan and Tim are on the prowl again, connecting the dots between Calhoun’s real estate dealings and what Markham and his mercenaries are planning. Along the way we learn the couple Garret Dillahunt hassled met their end, and the wife was an English teacher Raylan hated. I gotta say, I can’t conceive of Raylan Givens in school, at any level. My idea was that he mostly learned things from wolves and some episodes of Gunsmoke. Anyway, any means with which Raylan and Tim can banter, furthering the plot or not, is fine by me. The zenith is them alternating trying to convince none other than Dickie Bennett (Jeremy Davies, Helter Skelter; seriously, he plays fucking Charles Manson) to give up the information they want to know. About Dickie. I hate Dickie. I’m aware he’s a fictional character and a well written and acted one at that. But he’s characterized as enough of a dumb, sniveling coward that contributes nothing to life that I enjoy seeing him humiliated and fucked over. In a wheelchair, whacked out of his gourd? Sure, thank you. He’s got nothing going for him beyond fucking with Raylan, and fuck with him he does, failing to offer any relevant information. Him being the idiot that he is, Dickie nonetheless was tricked into selling his family’s land to Loretta (Kaitlyn Dever, Last Man Standing). The look on his face upon his realization is delicious.
Helter Skelter!
Checking in with Loretta is always instructive and enjoyable and this occasion is no different. She’s one of several characters that reflects Raylan’s adolescence. Both had petty criminal fathers and passed away mothers and were forced to grow up faster than they should have. But Loretta never had an Aunt Helen who gave her money to leave Harlan and break with the past; instead she had a ‘mentor’ in Mags Bennett and a succession of lousy foster homes. Loretta’s a good way of showing Raylan had paternal instincts long before the birth of baby Willa. She has the same plan that Markham turns out to have of selling marijuana legally once Kentucky follows the changing tide of the country. But, as Raylan points out, she’s going to be in the weed business regardless of its legality. Kaitlyn Dever’s a fantastic actress unfortunately shackled to Tim Allen’s If This Restaurant Has A Vegan Menu I’m Taking Out My Handgun and it’s nice to see her reappear even if it’s not too different from her other post-Season 2 outings.
“Look, is this gonna be any longer? I’ve gotta be a deadpan reaction shot for Tim Allen shenanigans tomorrow.”
Only in Season 6 could we see Walker doing his sales pitch while Loretta isn’t having it. Walker doesn’t seem to be a skilled negotiator, despite his loquaciousness, which makes you wonder how many of Markham’s snatched up properties happened out of persuasion. I also love that pretty much every other character makes fun of him or doesn’t treat him with respect. When Loretta offered him a glass of apple pie, I thought “yeah, I could see Dillahunt being tricked by a little girl”. It’s a nice touch that Markham knows exactly what Loretta’s done with the glass and has the backgrounds of all the players in the Kentucky drug trade. You also have to love the delighted look on Raylan’s face when Markham says he doesn’t know of Arlo. Not only was Raylan’s dad a shithead criminal, he wasn’t a noteworthy shithead criminal.
You might say Jake Busey PAINTS THE TOWN RED.
I guess at some point Justified decided to become Eagleheart, which is the only way to explain Boyd and Wynn’s encounter with The Wiz (Jake Busey, Shasta McNasty…and yes, I’m happy that I’m able to use this parenthetical in ANYTHING). In another effort to find a way through a pizza place’s bank vault, Duffy enlists the help of an associate that reminds me of way too many burnouts I met during my college days. Jake Busey, who in real life has saved countless animals and once talked Demi Lovato out of suicide, is supremely annoying, a man with unearned self-confidence who chastises his cohorts for bringing their cell phones to the explosives test when in fact it’s his goddamn phone that’s ringing. I don’t care if it’s considered ‘blaming the victim': Jake Busey deserved death by explosion. He’s much better as the source of a classic Wynn and Boyd non-reaction than anything else. It’s a plot point that could’ve been addressed in dialogue (why not find someone else who could blow the door off the vault?) and the scenes are inessential, yet it’s why Justified is worth watching. I do need to know Wynn Duffy spent his boyhood surfing in Hawaii. Speaking of which, Dick Linklater, Boyhood: Wynn Duffy. Think about it.
Dickie’s kinda like Augustus Hill on Oz, only he’s got no insight into anyone or anything. So it’s mostly the wheelchair thing drawing the similarities.
Busey becoming a cloud of blood a la recipients of Chris Monsanto’s death punch aside, my favorite plotline would have to be Ava and Katherine Hale’s afternoon excursion. It can be boiled down to “an older girl uses peer pressure to get Ava to use recreational drugs and shoplift”. There’s more to it, though, as Katherine Hale becomes a character with her own discrete feelings and agenda, rather than Boyd’s boss. I also believe these scenes ensure the episode passes what is known as the Beck-Dell test (named after its creators, Glenn Beck and Alan Dell), which means two named women characters converse about something other than a man. Talking about cocaine is enough! Anyway. Not only is Hale out to take down the man she believes screwed over her husband, she’s tired of living a life she feels she doesn’t deserve. The scene at the jeweler’s is telling; she made Ava steal from him in part because the store no longer treats Hale with the status she once afforded. Like several other characters, Katherine wants things to go back the way they were: when she had power, respect and wealth. The changed landscape doesn’t matter.
Mary Steenburgen more than earns the Gardockustified Player of the Game award this time out. (I was tempted to give it to Duffy again solely for the line “A pizza place full of dough. Did you see what I did there?”) She doesn’t have to change her performance much to go from genial and personable to manipulative and ruthless. This subtle change can be seen when she, apropos of nothing, brings up the guard whose recanted story earned Ava her freedom. It’s there that the afternoon shoplifting party’s purpose becomes apparent: Hale is sizing Ava up and seeing who she is and whether she has what it takes to be, well, like her. Note how she opened up by praising Ava killing her abusive husband at the dinner table and expressing curiosity for what it felt like. Hale doesn’t necessarily know what’s up with the guard, but she knows Ava is a survivor and wants to see what happens when Ava is rattled. Not too surprisingly, Ava’s instinct is to run and I think that’s solidified when Boyd interrupts her packing with a “guess what honey I think if I kill Avery Markham I can run his scheme and everything will work out so all that talk of leaving Harlan well fuck it”. Boyd’s exhibiting Vendrellian level delusion.
goddamn Joelle Carter’s good at the whole acting thing
Plotlines are becoming less disparate and more connected, as by the end of “The Trash and the Snake” Raylan knows who Avery Markham is and that he’s behind everything happening in Harlan as of late. Hopefully he knows that he’s lying to himself a little bit with his “one last investigation”. Regarding the metaphor that gives this episode its title, Art notes there’s always gonna be snakes on the way to the trash, and killing just one is going to continue to escalate. Raylan started out looking to take down Boyd and now it’s expanded to Markham and his associates. One does wonder if a third approach is possible: live somewhere without snakes. When I take out the trash, there are no snakes, only raccoons, and they are too hilarious with their lil bandit masks and lil paws to kill. Setting up Mike O’Malley’s execution is one thing; offing those critters would be a feat beyond Raylan’s grasp.
How many people did Raylan shoot/kill?: 0, 0 for the season How many people did Boyd shoot/kill?: 0, 1 for the season
Gardockustified 6×04, “The Trash and the Snake”
With planned final seasons of television, there is the temptation to bring back old favorite characters. It’s not unjustified; you’ve got your last chance on checking up on these people and what they’re doing. The fans want to see it and I’m sure the writers and stars want to work with these people come. The problem comes when it’s not organic to the storytelling and is therefore just for the sake of it. So far, Justified has been judicious in bringing back old favorites, doing so in a way that makes sense and is relevant to the story that’s being told. I know unrestrained positivity can get just as irritating, if not more so, than unrestrained negativity, but this show gets television right. If you’d like to see me rail against incompetence and moronic bullshit, seek out my upcoming recaps of The Following and the return of Law & Ordocki. This episode, “The Trash and the Snake”, returns two characters from Justified‘s most acclaimed season and it’s welcome.
I don’t know what’s creepier: the domesticity Ava is faking with Boyd or the domesticity Shane and Mara Vendrell had on the run from the LAPD. Both are fucked up in their own ways; on Justified, Boyd is touching and grabbing Ava based on false (or false enough) consent that while legitimate in his eyes means he comes off like a fuckin’ predator. It’s also tension filled insofar as Ava thinks Boyd could realize the truth at any moment and hands on shoulders can become hands around the neck quickly. The Shield is eerie as you’ve got Shane, his wife and his kid as a family unit, squatting in an abandoned McMansion, acting like they’re on a blissful vacation while on the run for trying to kill two cops. In either you’ve got Walton Goggins as an increasingly desperate man who might lose at any time or with any provocation. Sometimes it’s difficult to come up with something different from “Jesus Christ I hope Ava isn’t found out and killed”.
Raylan’s basically Wolverine: he threatens to murder everyone, but it’s part of his charm!
That depressing notion aside, “The Trash and the Snake” is pretty fucking hilarious. Raylan and Tim are on the prowl again, connecting the dots between Calhoun’s real estate dealings and what Markham and his mercenaries are planning. Along the way we learn the couple Garret Dillahunt hassled met their end, and the wife was an English teacher Raylan hated. I gotta say, I can’t conceive of Raylan Givens in school, at any level. My idea was that he mostly learned things from wolves and some episodes of Gunsmoke. Anyway, any means with which Raylan and Tim can banter, furthering the plot or not, is fine by me. The zenith is them alternating trying to convince none other than Dickie Bennett (Jeremy Davies, Helter Skelter; seriously, he plays fucking Charles Manson) to give up the information they want to know. About Dickie. I hate Dickie. I’m aware he’s a fictional character and a well written and acted one at that. But he’s characterized as enough of a dumb, sniveling coward that contributes nothing to life that I enjoy seeing him humiliated and fucked over. In a wheelchair, whacked out of his gourd? Sure, thank you. He’s got nothing going for him beyond fucking with Raylan, and fuck with him he does, failing to offer any relevant information. Him being the idiot that he is, Dickie nonetheless was tricked into selling his family’s land to Loretta (Kaitlyn Dever, Last Man Standing). The look on his face upon his realization is delicious.
Helter Skelter!
Checking in with Loretta is always instructive and enjoyable and this occasion is no different. She’s one of several characters that reflects Raylan’s adolescence. Both had petty criminal fathers and passed away mothers and were forced to grow up faster than they should have. But Loretta never had an Aunt Helen who gave her money to leave Harlan and break with the past; instead she had a ‘mentor’ in Mags Bennett and a succession of lousy foster homes. Loretta’s a good way of showing Raylan had paternal instincts long before the birth of baby Willa. She has the same plan that Markham turns out to have of selling marijuana legally once Kentucky follows the changing tide of the country. But, as Raylan points out, she’s going to be in the weed business regardless of its legality. Kaitlyn Dever’s a fantastic actress unfortunately shackled to Tim Allen’s If This Restaurant Has A Vegan Menu I’m Taking Out My Handgun and it’s nice to see her reappear even if it’s not too different from her other post-Season 2 outings.
“Look, is this gonna be any longer? I’ve gotta be a deadpan reaction shot for Tim Allen shenanigans tomorrow.”
Only in Season 6 could we see Walker doing his sales pitch while Loretta isn’t having it. Walker doesn’t seem to be a skilled negotiator, despite his loquaciousness, which makes you wonder how many of Markham’s snatched up properties happened out of persuasion. I also love that pretty much every other character makes fun of him or doesn’t treat him with respect. When Loretta offered him a glass of apple pie, I thought “yeah, I could see Dillahunt being tricked by a little girl”. It’s a nice touch that Markham knows exactly what Loretta’s done with the glass and has the backgrounds of all the players in the Kentucky drug trade. You also have to love the delighted look on Raylan’s face when Markham says he doesn’t know of Arlo. Not only was Raylan’s dad a shithead criminal, he wasn’t a noteworthy shithead criminal.
You might say Jake Busey PAINTS THE TOWN RED.
I guess at some point Justified decided to become Eagleheart, which is the only way to explain Boyd and Wynn’s encounter with The Wiz (Jake Busey, Shasta McNasty…and yes, I’m happy that I’m able to use this parenthetical in ANYTHING). In another effort to find a way through a pizza place’s bank vault, Duffy enlists the help of an associate that reminds me of way too many burnouts I met during my college days. Jake Busey, who in real life has saved countless animals and once talked Demi Lovato out of suicide, is supremely annoying, a man with unearned self-confidence who chastises his cohorts for bringing their cell phones to the explosives test when in fact it’s his goddamn phone that’s ringing. I don’t care if it’s considered ‘blaming the victim': Jake Busey deserved death by explosion. He’s much better as the source of a classic Wynn and Boyd non-reaction than anything else. It’s a plot point that could’ve been addressed in dialogue (why not find someone else who could blow the door off the vault?) and the scenes are inessential, yet it’s why Justified is worth watching. I do need to know Wynn Duffy spent his boyhood surfing in Hawaii. Speaking of which, Dick Linklater, Boyhood: Wynn Duffy. Think about it.
Dickie’s kinda like Augustus Hill on Oz, only he’s got no insight into anyone or anything. So it’s mostly the wheelchair thing drawing the similarities.
Busey becoming a cloud of blood a la recipients of Chris Monsanto’s death punch aside, my favorite plotline would have to be Ava and Katherine Hale’s afternoon excursion. It can be boiled down to “an older girl uses peer pressure to get Ava to use recreational drugs and shoplift”. There’s more to it, though, as Katherine Hale becomes a character with her own discrete feelings and agenda, rather than Boyd’s boss. I also believe these scenes ensure the episode passes what is known as the Beck-Dell test (named after its creators, Glenn Beck and Alan Dell), which means two named women characters converse about something other than a man. Talking about cocaine is enough! Anyway. Not only is Hale out to take down the man she believes screwed over her husband, she’s tired of living a life she feels she doesn’t deserve. The scene at the jeweler’s is telling; she made Ava steal from him in part because the store no longer treats Hale with the status she once afforded. Like several other characters, Katherine wants things to go back the way they were: when she had power, respect and wealth. The changed landscape doesn’t matter.
Mary Steenburgen more than earns the Gardockustified Player of the Game award this time out. (I was tempted to give it to Duffy again solely for the line “A pizza place full of dough. Did you see what I did there?”) She doesn’t have to change her performance much to go from genial and personable to manipulative and ruthless. This subtle change can be seen when she, apropos of nothing, brings up the guard whose recanted story earned Ava her freedom. It’s there that the afternoon shoplifting party’s purpose becomes apparent: Hale is sizing Ava up and seeing who she is and whether she has what it takes to be, well, like her. Note how she opened up by praising Ava killing her abusive husband at the dinner table and expressing curiosity for what it felt like. Hale doesn’t necessarily know what’s up with the guard, but she knows Ava is a survivor and wants to see what happens when Ava is rattled. Not too surprisingly, Ava’s instinct is to run and I think that’s solidified when Boyd interrupts her packing with a “guess what honey I think if I kill Avery Markham I can run his scheme and everything will work out so all that talk of leaving Harlan well fuck it”. Boyd’s exhibiting Vendrellian level delusion.
goddamn Joelle Carter’s good at the whole acting thing
Plotlines are becoming less disparate and more connected, as by the end of “The Trash and the Snake” Raylan knows who Avery Markham is and that he’s behind everything happening in Harlan as of late. Hopefully he knows that he’s lying to himself a little bit with his “one last investigation”. Regarding the metaphor that gives this episode its title, Art notes there’s always gonna be snakes on the way to the trash, and killing just one is going to continue to escalate. Raylan started out looking to take down Boyd and now it’s expanded to Markham and his associates. One does wonder if a third approach is possible: live somewhere without snakes. When I take out the trash, there are no snakes, only raccoons, and they are too hilarious with their lil bandit masks and lil paws to kill. Setting up Mike O’Malley’s execution is one thing; offing those critters would be a feat beyond Raylan’s grasp.
How many people did Raylan shoot/kill?: 0, 0 for the season
How many people did Boyd shoot/kill?: 0, 1 for the season
Ronnie Gardocki
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