Camera Girl and I have polished off the first four seasons of Justified and only have seasons 5 and 6 left. Although a sort of pattern has emerged vis-à-vis the season finale we remain extremely satisfied with the quality of the show and the progression of the story line. Over the course of the first four seasons we’ve really gotten to know Raylin Givens and his friends and family and enemies and their families. We’ve seen some major characters come and go (mostly to the great beyond courtesy of Raylin’s pistol) and we’ve seen Raylin’s personal life undergo several painful dislocations.
And we’ve watched Boyd and Ava Crowder move steadily to the dark side. When I say this, I don’t mean that the shows have gotten a lot more more violent. It’s already at intermittent gang war levels. But what the show is doing is chronicling Boyd’s ascent from small-time gangster to Appalachian mob-boss. Along the way his scruples and humanity are peeled away crime by crime. At each step he’s only doing what he has to to avoid the law or his rivals but eventually you see that nothing good remains. Now I think this is similar to what was done in the series “Breaking Bad.” There a man was driven by circumstance to adopt crime to help his family and finds himself and those around him consumed. The difference being Boyd’s family already was criminal and his only attempt at honest life is pretty much extinguished in season two. The Good/Evil dynamic is more represented by Boyd’s earlier friendship with Raylin. As I mentioned in an earlier post, Raylin and Boyd are two sides of a coin flip. Either might have ended as the other. Probably the show itself is a meditation on why they’ve so far ended up on opposite sides of that very narrow line.
And I don’t want to claim any dramatic depth to the show. It’s entertainment pure and simple. But the characters are engaging and the mixture of action, drama, comedy and suspense is very nicely prepared. What I’m not sure about is whether Raylin Givens will end the show better, worse or the same as he started. He straddles a lot of lines and he seems to be willing to cross those lines when he thinks he has to. I can see that may bring him to a bad end. It’ll be interesting to see where the arc of this story lands him.
For my part I’m interested to see where the relationship between Art and Raylin heads. Art is sort of a surrogate father figure for Raylin. But whether he’ll end up a stern old testament type father who has to sacrifice his son on the altar of the law or the father of the prodigal who is able to welcome him back into the fold, I don’t know. But either way I do hope he gets more time in front of the camera. He’s been limited lately and I want to see him assert some order over the wild west atmosphere of the Harlan County Marshall’s office.
Oh, and for the record, although Raylin has an assortment of fine looking women jumping into bed with him, he certainly has no instinct for avoiding criminals. Then again maybe he isn’t trying. Maybe he thinks they’re more fun and he can always arrest or shoot them if he has to.
Currently we’ve received the first two DVDs for season five. We usually restrict ourselves to two episodes at a sitting. But we’ve been waiting for these disks for several days now and I suspect we’ll binge through both disks by Saturday. Patience is definitely not a virtue when Justified is in your DVD player.
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