Justified

[Mr Sausage]

Teaser for new Justified series. Show premiers July 18th.

[Mr Sausage]

And now the full trailer.

[domino harvey]

I went out on a date last year with a woman who worked on this revival and learned of one big name in the cast that somehow hasn't been leaked yet (not someone who was on the original run of the series). I guess I can share it now since I doubt it could be traced back to her (or me!) at this point, but it seems like it's supposed to be a surprise (or they were cut from the final series) since they aren't in these trailers or any casting notices, so unspoiler at your own risk

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Keith David

[therewillbeblus]

I finished my final revisit of the sixth season today and hate to say it was a major disappointment. Aside from the last scene which is just terrific, this is on par with the first and threatens to beat it for the worst season. Either way, it’s miles away from the greatness of the four middle chapters.

Watching this so close together, it’s glaring how unearned the transformation of Boyd and Ava’s relationship is-

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going from star-eyed lovers to mistrustful, cold resentment, all because she was in prison and began to believe that he stopped putting her first? I do think that a seed of concern can turn into a cancer in a relationship, and the complexities in how each respond to the other are, at times, impressively conveying emotional confusion in each’s inner conflict. However, it’s mostly explored in a puzzling fashion, especially from Ava, but also Boyd embracing a fully-heartless/heartbroken killer persona, one that he’s shown shades of but never uniformly like this. The whole progression just feels 'off.'

The biggest flaw though (and it feels uncomfortably blasphemous to even write out) is that Raylan is the least interesting character this season, barely a shadow of the likeable hero we've grown to love (hell, we loved him from the first minute of the first episode).

Revisited this series again in anticipation for the revival and thankfully made a 180-degree turn on my impressions of season 6. The progression of Ava and Boyd's mistrust is earned, and every decision and act, minute and loud, is rich and insightfully textured to the inner-workings of complex relationship dynamics (though as much credit should go to the still-best season 5 as this one for crafting this descent). It may be dramatically labile, but that now feels appropriate rather than rushed.

Raylan's characterization is also well-drawn and well-written. His own descent into a fatalistic myopic mission of capturing his nemesis is right for his character, in deterring from making that final move of transitioning into the fear of banal 'life on life's terms' in Florida, and also committing to his goals and abiding by the code that guides him more than anything else. However, he's not actually simplified, nor does he move into complete tunnel-vision mode. He pauses to engage in ethical dilemmas around his CI, wrestles with the consequences of the moral ills he finds himself engrossed in, including distance from his peers. He can gain enough conscious space from his ultimate goal to consider others and himself and reflect on existential concerns throughout the season. The way he signs away his home and to who and when tells a whole lot about where he's at and what he's going through without holding our hand every step of the way. I dunno, even outside of the tense 4th and 5th season dramas occurring within him and between him and Art, this might be Raylan at his densest, even if the show admirably doesn't 'let us in' any more than Raylan lets himself in on his psychology. And there's a reason for that on both accounts.

Finally, I really appreciated the inter-office politics that go on in the back half of the season. It's executed in a convoluted fashion, both within the show and by the showrunners, who don't really care to spend too much time there, but that's part of why it works. Vasquez's hysterics at-odds with the various Marshal parties reflects the chaos that comes from the Western tropes when order must compromise on the spectrum of disorder without a unified front to get the job done - good guys fighting and the constructed moral systems breaking down, though not destroying the morality each holds relative to the other. Even Boyd's morals become clearer, as do Ava's, in their own messy way, driving them together and apart. Same with Mikey, Duffy, and Katherine, also in a completely tangled manner, culminating in one of the more scruffy set pieces in recent memory. It's a really interesting way to portray the havoc of contesting strong morals and strong emotions held in intimate relationships (be they hate or love), trying to get all their needs met.

This is still the second-worst season for many reasons (the villains aren’t compelling, several set pieces and narrative arcs feel half-cocked and forced for time, etc.) but it’s way better than 1

[therewillbeblus]

I went out on a date last year with a woman who worked on this revival and learned of one big name in the cast that somehow hasn't been leaked yet (not someone who was on the original run of the series). I guess I can share it now since I doubt it could be traced back to her (or me!) at this point, but it seems like it's supposed to be a surprise (or they were cut from the final series) since they aren't in these trailers or any casting notices, so unspoiler at your own risk

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Keith David

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His presence is short-lived, but I believe it's his voice that introduces the second episode with "Previously on Justified," so I suspect they half-hired him for the juicy vocals jumpstarting each chapter, long after his corporeal demise!

City Primeval is off to a promising start with its first two eps. Olyphant's daughter is a terrible actress, but otherwise the new cast is terrific. Holbrook's only the second true-sociopathic season villain (counting Daryl Crowe Jr. and Danny Crowe as one... being "family" and all) and a great strength of the series has been a keen sensitivity to the defective humanity bubbling under even the most dangerous and violent criminals (but without apologizing for them, just as Raylan won't for "putting people down"). So we'll see how his presence plays out in contrast to that welcome depth/evisceration of stoic villain myths. But as opposed to the Crowes, Holbrook is savvy enough to pick who to keep alive/around and how to pull their puppet-strings to stay safe and comfortable, and there's something eerie about the calm with which he punctures certain boundaries, in turn revealing expected vulnerable stakes for Raylan. Also, man, Detroit cops are apparently ruthless! It's kinda fun(..?) to watch Norbert Leo Butz go so totally bonkers abusing his power that even Raylan has to say Chill

[Mr Sausage]

You don't consider Quarles sociopathic?

[therewillbeblus]

You don't consider Quarles sociopathic?

Not in the traditional diagnostic sense where antisocial personality disorder would be a primary over trauma, though he certainly embodies enough qualities to make an argument. I talked about it more here, but while he's certainly delusional about the function of his brutality to the point of coming across as dispassionate at times, that's revealed to be a mask hiding deep-seated traumas and perpetual emotional dysregulation that seem to be the main causes of his behavior. He's a much more sensitively emotion-driven character than most of the villains in the series, and that doesn't fit so well with a sociopath. That's why I love the show so much - he'd be the most sociopathic character if they didn't give him more shading to subtly ask the question: Maybe he's the least?

I wrote up a longer piece on why Eldard's Colt is the most interesting character on the show, and I stand by it. He appears to be an underdeveloped one-note trainwreck but there are enough observations of a similar sensitivity hidden under addiction and desensitized war trauma that makes him rich. Even if that richness isn't spelled out and is mostly elided, the showrunners' curiosity is clear. Of course, in neither case, is that an argument that we should feel for these characters or weigh their actions differently or place them in a more favorable category to sociopaths. It's just a different psychological profile being explored.

A good comparison might be the misdiagnosis of children who present as oppositional. You can't diagnose a child with a personality disorder, so they can't be labeled antisocial (or "sociopaths"). But, you can diagnose them with ODD (Oppositional Defiance Disorder), one of the diagnostic precursors for sociopathy. It's a problematic diagnosis for a variety of reasons - it assumes the root cause of the behavior is a lack of empathy/controlled disobedience, a kind of 'throwing my hands up' approach to digging deeper into traumas/root anxieties, defaulting to fatalistic surrender to help beyond in-the-moment skills. It's also unsurprisingly overdiagnosed disproportionally with males of color, whereas white children presenting with similar symptoms will more typically carry a diagnosis of generalized anxiety, mood, or trauma. Both sets of kids have oppositional behaviors on the surface that need to be addressed, but the tip of the iceberg does not define the root. Most therapists I've come across in progressive metropolitan New England debunk the diagnosis and rarely use it anymore (it was more of a default in the 2000s-mid2010s up here), simply because there's usually something else as a primary, with antisocial personality disorders and oppositional defiance disorders a rarity. Similarly Quarles presents with all these sociopathic traits on the surface, but his root cause seems to be trauma (which can absolutely inform personality disorders) and he's heavily emotionally dysregulated in ways that don't fit the profile. But regardless, the surface level behaviors are similar, and they need to be addressed.

Holbrook seems to carry less-or-none of that 'human' emotional connect. The Crowes faked the emotional connect, but he doesn't really try. That 'smoothness' is often a red flag. But I don't want to pathologize with staggered categories of concern: people who are antisocial can present as social, can be smooth and savvy and manipulative and lie and not be able to feel for others and still be less dangerous or violent than someone whose primary is trauma or anxiety or whatever and engages in violent impulses. Just trying to differentiate the diagnostics.

[Mr Sausage]

Yeah, Olyphant's daughter can't act, and she sinks whatever scene she's in. She's not believable as a sad, angry kid who can haggle or break another girl's nose. She's so passive and soft spoken. I'm guessing Olyphant agreed to do the show on the condition his daughter got to be in it.

On the other hand, Aunjanue Ellis is the best thing about it, and her scenes with Raylan crackle. The rest of the cast is uniformly excellent.

So far this is not as verbal a show as its predecessor. It doesn't revel in its characters' speech patterns. Most interactions are to the point, with a minimum of conversation.

[therewillbeblus]

I think episode three begins to show more verbal density, especially in regards to the emotional consequences embedded in historical patterns of behavior. There's also a peripheral recognition of racial dynamics to this show that's interesting in a way the original barely touched with Limehouse's arc. Aunjanue Ellis' call-out of Raylan's egocentric way of doing things as a wielding of privilege (in several undefined senses of the word) in episode three carries an implicit but thankfully underplayed racial revelation to it. Agreed that she's great here.

[Mr Sausage]

Aunjanue Ellis' call-out of Raylan's egocentric way of doing things as a wielding of privilege (in several undefined senses of the word) in episode three carries an implicit but thankfully underplayed racial revelation to it.

That brief scene might be my favourite so far. Tho' I also liked the police woman describing her dream to Raylan, with her laconic explanation of how she makes her "perfect" family work. The writing and acting of the side characters is on point.

[Mr Sausage]

I think this last episode is the best one yet. Not just the wonderful character interactions or the twisty noirish way everything is tightening and people's ethics are slipping as things run towards some fatal end, but the increasing sense Raylan has that he doesn't understand Detroit, that something crazed and out of control is bubbling there that even he can't quite deal with. And that feeling is cemented by a wonderful monologue by Paul Calderon at the end. I understand the criticism that the revival doesn't inhabit Detroit city quite the way it did Harlan and environs--and that's true--but it is good fun nonetheless.

[therewillbeblus]

The criticisms don't hold water for me, for reasons you begin to outline well. We are engaging with Detroit in sync with Raylan. Not necessarily from his perspective, but alongside him, as tourists on a (literal) pitstop on a longer journey. This contrasts with Justified's return to a place like Harlan, that was enriched by that experience, trauma, and overall intimate relationship. It wasn't foreign terrain for him, so we were invited into all its intricate details and unique systems, revealed gradually as we needed to be (season four's dive into the lore is wonderful, in part because we're following a larger mystery, learning as much as Raylan in real time, but we're also being exposed to new groups and spaces he always knew were there and that now are unveiled to serve as resources in this expedition - so we get a double-mystery experience!)

From the very first episode of the revival, Raylan is puzzled by the impulsive behavior of the cops - not because he himself has never engaged in radical, reactive behavior - but because the way they do it is orbiting around a different kind of impulsive logic, one he doesn't understand and that the show doesn't pretend to either, and admirably doesn't even try... so we're kept at as much of a distance as Raylan is. That's also why the villain works here. I don't think he's some exceptionally formidable villain that sits equitably alongside the greats of the original series, but he does things differently enough - a bit like Daryl Crowe Jr. - where the friction destabilizes Raylan a bit. Like anyone, he's always has greater ease contending with the familiar (not necessarily success, i.e. Boyd, but a degree of comfort was always present between the two): Folks from his hometown with motives and behaviors he 'gets', organized crime syndicate agents who operated under a code and whose incentives were predictable and constant. Clement Mansell is a weird dude, whose motives and behaviors kinda-sorta fit the bill, but being unpredictable is a piece of his identity that he prioritizes. He's impulsive but also patient. His perceptiveness contains a skill where he becomes open-minded to whatever information enters his orbit, and then pivots or adapts from there, without ever adapting his 'self' or position of individuality. Hence how the entire plot of the series is jumpstarted by a tragic accident sparked by his impulsivity, that then leads to a long-term, feet-dug-in-sad determination and confidence. It's absurd, but it follows some kind of internal logic that seems to be build around antithetical characteristics converging in a personified force of concentrated chaos. A bit like Raylan trying to fit into this plot.

If we were allowed to inhabit Detroit the way we were Harlan, it wouldn't fit thematically into this series - and one could even argue would invalidate the thematic inhabitation of the original series.

[Mr Sausage]

One thing I like is how Raylan (and to some degree the police) can't move forward on this case precisely because they don't know how impulsive and meaningless the crime was. They keep trying to tie Mansell to something larger, piece out some motive, and the brick wall they keep running up against is wearing Raylan down.

That's why I love that monologue at the end of the episode: in Harlan, this kind of circling game would have an inevitable symbolic ending in a duel; but in Detroit, it's a pointless game that just goes on and one until you shoot the other guy because you can't bear not to, and the other guy doesn't even seem to notice you've shot him. You see Raylan's utter bafflement.

[therewillbeblus]

Yep. Also, Aunjanue Ellis' scene with her ex in his apt was some of the best TV acting I've seen in a while. Great episode

[therewillbeblus]

I don't know how consistently 'surprising' this season has been, but I thought it was painstakingly obvious

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that Maureen was a dirty cop after declaring Clem "clean" during the sting of episode 6 (which triggered an immediate assertion from Raylan that 'there's no way this guy can be this lucky').. So when Raylan handed off the luger to her, it was frustrating on two levels: one, a bit too much audience-handholding there; and two, if Raylan the character is a skeptic with strong instincts, who is no stranger to considering all angles (certainly not traditionally blinded by some cop-club allegiance), and he literally just said out loud that something is fishy after one of his teammates clears Clem, it seems to betray his character to then go and trust her (of all people) with the key piece of evidence. I know we've established that Detroit is abiding by a different internal logic than he's used to, but it's not like these inclinations are foreign to the worldview that was shaped during his upbringing in Harlan County and actively contributed to his success rate as a law enforcer there! Plus he's not family with these people, who are only slightly more than strangers, and he's demonstrated enough of a seasoned cynicism throughout almost seven seasons where this just makes no sense on any level. We're all fallible humans and let our guard down from time to time, but the combo of overstated "Who could it possibly be?!" rat-sniffing/full-tilt trust with the peripheral vehicle delivering the surprising news is baffling. Seems like a Constable Bob punchline.

I do like that Raylan has become gentler over time, but that shouldn't equate stupidity. I also laughed when it seemed like the show was having Clem posture at a Heath Ledger's 'Joker' embodiment with his background-storytelling shifting...

[Mr Sausage]

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It was a bit trite, too, the upright cop with the beautiful family is the dirty one and the rule-breaking, callous asshole has secret scruples.

Anyway, I assumed Raylan trusted her because she backed him so immediately on their secret play and (seemed to) run it so well, but if you give it a second look, no, it doesn't add up. Robinson's 'I don't want to hear it, I don't want to know it' attitude makes him far more likely to be on the level. Raylan may not deep down understand Detroit, but it's not like everyone's an alien; and he has good enough instincts about people to at least have had more caution.

Still enjoying the show, especially episode 6, but the trite reveals and plot contrivances weaken episode 7.

[therewillbeblus]

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I did enjoy the fatalism at the end, which compliments the more comprehensible contrived actions earlier on... Of course more chaos-theory variables are going to upend the pragmatic, prepared solution of the gun sealing Clem's fate - just as Clem's kickoff of the judge-murder plot was born from a similar type of chaos. I find it fun that there's a flip-flop between the predictable, practical incentives of crooked systems (with Clem intelligently playing them just right to keep himself safe) and the left-field impulsive mayhem that derails the plan but still manages to keep this villain safe.. like a WTF string of luck that has it both ways, just like his personality. It's this otherworldly, eerie element that validates why Clem's girlfriend would say she'd still hesitate to cross him, even if he was confirmed dead and buried.

I don't necessarily think the show handled it well - though I'm not sure what exactly they could've done differently - but there is one reading that affirms Raylan's instinct-breakdown here: He took so long to get out of his own worldview to acclimate to a case where luck was playing such a centralized role, so when he began to consider, 'Wait, no, there's a logical element to this that's actually familiar to me, and aligns with my instincts', he still had to adjust back to that and hold these two antithetical truths together. There's a weird spiritual component around how God seems to intervene to protect Clem when systemic-strategies fail, and it's even more stupefying (for Raylan, us, et al.) when Clem wears the same grin on his face either way, like he's in on a joke nobody else is, not even the creators or audience.

[Mr Sausage]

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I smiled like an idiot the moment Boyd Crowder was back on screen. And I couldn't be happier with that character's send off. In fact the ending of the season was perfect. I was worried, because the original series had such an amazing final scene; but this one, with Raylan on the boat once again forced to choose, was perfect in a quite different, more comic way.

I enjoyed this. If it were a season of the main series, I doubt I'd rate it near the top. But as a revival I was satisfied, far more satisfied than I've been by some others. It was nice to spend time with these characters, and in the end it was a good choice not to presume to 'solve' Detroit.

[Mr Sausage]

A nice interview with one of the creators, Michael Dinner. Among other things, he reveals how close Tarantino was to directing an episode (pretty close), and that Paul Calderon's character is the same he played in Out of Sight. In fact, Calderon's character was the original protagonist of the Leonard novel until it was adapted to be Raylan.

[therewillbeblus]

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I smiled like an idiot the moment Boyd Crowder was back on screen. And I couldn't be happier with that character's send off. In fact the ending of the season was perfect. I was worried, because the original series had such an amazing final scene; but this one, with Raylan on the boat once again forced to choose, was perfect in a quite different, more comic way.

I enjoyed this. If it were a season of the main series, I doubt I'd rate it near the top. But as a revival I was satisfied, far more satisfied than I've been by some others. It was nice to spend time with these characters, and in the end it was a good choice not to presume to 'solve' Detroit.

Agree in full. I was bothered by some of the contrivances in the Detroit tie-up:

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1) The handicapped nephew being ceremoniously left on his own to fend with a formidable villain to.. help him "be a man"(?!) at the risk of the tiger loose from his cage coming back to kill them all - sanctioned by a subordinate, no less. So the mores of providing opportunities for masculinity trump the mores of following the chain of command in a familial criminal organization? First time I've seen it! 2) The corrupt cop maniacally laughing off the moralizing - and moving from sensitive to cold sociopathy on a dime in front of her family... what a joke. 3) Clem's antisocial qualities marking his downfall - which might make more sense if he wasn't equally perceptive and would clearly know Raylan's move. He's not suicidal, and he's always been able to balance his opposites before, so it just made no sense that this is how he died, and that the logic was lost on him. I'd've preferred it if he was fatally wounded or something and forced Raylan to kill him to fuck with him a bit more by forcing an ethical dilemma - that would've been on brand with his existential amoral playfulness, and another hat-tip to Ledger's Joker, which we've already seen nods plagued throughout the season.

Otherwise, the second half was really strong - both on the homefront and the surprise narrative return. I'd be fine with this ending here, but I'd also be totally cool with another limited series where Raylan takes on a PI/bounty hunter role (flexible hours, independent choice on cases he takes on and when) either circling back to some familiar places or just going off on insulated adventures. That would be a lot of fun. Though I think we've exhausted the 'systems' engagement, with Detroit serving as a perfect closing chapter in that department, as an appropriately dark, noirish, simple rotten cherry on top of the original series' exhaustive examination.

[Mr Sausage]

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Yeah, the crippled Armenian thing was pure plot device, but it might be one right out of the source material for all I know. I can live with it.

I disagree about Mansell's death. Despite his posturing earlier at duels and shit, he doesn't seem to believe in them as a real thing, not the way Raylan does. In fact he rarely squares up with anyone on an equal footing--he mostly shoots or beats to death unarmed people. When he was acting all squirrel and chummy, a nervous attempt to disarm I guess, I think he really did not believe a U.S. Marshall would quick draw on him. He seemed to think he could have a Boyd Crowder kinda relationship with him or something. Offering a beer, sharing his backstory, giving Raylan his mixtape--whatever mindset he was in, it was far away from from the reality of the man in front of him. Maybe he's used to putting people on their back foot such that they don't know what to do with his unpredictable mood swings. But Mansell's entirely unware he's dealing with an anachronism: a southern man who's had honest-to-god duels with bandits in hats, a man who's already fixing to kill him and just waiting for the sign. The moment where, finally, a Detroit man is confused about Kentucky when up to that point the show had been the other way around. And it replays the story the Paul Calderon character tells Raylan at the bar. Works for me.

I want the hinted series of Raylan chasing Boyd to Mexico, unable to stay away.

[therewillbeblus]

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I disagree about Mansell's death. Despite his posturing earlier at duels and shit, he doesn't seem to believe in them as a real thing, not the way Raylan does. In fact he rarely squares up with anyone on an equal footing--he mostly shoots or beats to death unarmed people. When he was acting all squirrel and chummy, a nervous attempt to disarm I guess, I think he really did not believe a U.S. Marshall would quick draw on him. He seemed to think he could have a Boyd Crowder kinda relationship with him or something. Offering a beer, sharing his backstory, giving Raylan his mixtape--whatever mindset he was in, it was far away from from the reality of the man in front of him. Maybe he's used to putting people on their back foot such that they don't know what to do with his unpredictable mood swings.

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That's a good point. I think you're right that the realities didn't match up, and Mansell obviously didn't have the time or the awareness this time around to place himself in a favorable power differential to Raylan, so that makes me appreciate it more. Yet it still seems anticlimactic to his character. So... luck's run out, skills didn't work this time, but why this time? Shouldn't they have failed many times before? I dunno, I guess it doesn't matter. "Face it blus, it's Detroit." Unless... (more on this later)

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But Mansell's entirely unware he's dealing with an anachronism: a southern man who's had honest-to-god duels with bandits in hats, a man who's already fixing to kill him and just waiting for the sign. The moment where, finally, a Detroit man is confused about Kentucky when up to that point the show had been the other way around. And it replays the story the Paul Calderon character tells Raylan at the bar. Works for me.

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I think your theory about the Detroit/Southern Man logic holds to an extent, though it's worth fleshing out a bit differently. After all, Mansell is not a Detroiter - he's a drifter, known as "The Oklahoma Wildman" - from a southern town himself, who's been all over and found himself back in Detroit, or seems to keep gravitating back there. The question is: "Why?" and I think there's a good reason, finally sobered by the contrivances and luck and anticlimactic anti-showdown of the finale.

I don't think he fits in with the Detroit ethos either, which makes both he and Raylan outsiders. However, the difference is that Mansell is a wildman, a barely-skilled chameleon, and so he flocks to a place like Detroit because he can game it well. Up until now, he's displayed a keen sense of sizing up his opponent and placing himself in a position where he has an advantage. He's presented as impulsive and antisocial, but also skilled at self-preservation. But if anything, I think the ending works because it shows Mansell's true cards: He excels in places that are corrupt and where people are self-serving, solipsistic, blind, disempowered, desperate, and unskilled enough for him to use very weak, but slightly-elevated skills mixed with shock-behavior to manipulate them. Perhaps his 'acute perceptiveness' is actually not that special, and he's only thrived as long as he has with Raylan around because Raylan has had to contest with the muck in his own milieu to get to Mansell, like an army of algae he's trying to swim through. So when it's mano a mano, that house of cards falls, and Mansell is blindsided because he achieve a false sense of grandiosity that a kid with a magnifying glass might feel over the ants he's burning.

So maybe Mansell doesn't deserve anything more special than the death he gets. I just wish the show leaned a bit more into this sobriety, and Raylan's disengagement from a participant of a group task force to get there. On the one hand, I appreciate how understated it was, but it could've been more impactful in that first half of the episode. Still, interesting stuff to think about!

[Mr Sausage]

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Good points. And I’m embarrassed that in my haste to write that out and go to bed, I’d completely forgotten he was the Oklahoma wildman.

I’m not sure Mansell is all that good at reading people. He’s canny enough on a low level way, but he badly misreads Raylan from jump (any one of the old boys from Kentucky could’ve told him exactly how bad an idea it was to fuck with Raylan’s kid). And he consistently misreads the Albanian situation, which only fails to spiral out of control because of Mansell’s customary dumb luck. And he’s always blindsided whenever he alienates one of his friends. Hell, he alienates every single one of them, and it comes as a surprise every time. He doesn’t seem to to read the room that well, or assumes his charisma or pure fear will keep the status quo.

Mansell really does just get enormously lucky. It contributes to his carefree attitude—he always makes it through without much effort. And I think that’s why he was so cavalier with Raylan. He’s one of those guys who’s allowed a streak of luck to convince them they’re untouchable. So he goes and gets himself into a life or death situation luck can’t help him out of.

[tenia]

I think it's Raylan that early in the show wonders outloud if Mansell is indeed that good or just that lucky, and I tend to think this end tends to simply point towards one answer.

[therewillbeblus]

It’s also very fitting to the way the series has always treated its villains

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Mags wasn’t brilliant- she was savvy in some respects but she couldn’t (or wouldn’t) exercise any type of skilled intervention to control her boys even though it meant serious consequences time after time; but she did have status and land and legacy and used these things to instill a contextual fear into those in her community. When Raylan comes in (likewise Loretta) without myopic ties to perceiving that context and its “rules” as impenetrable, she loses.

Quarles acted ‘as if’ he was some suave business mastermind, but revealed himself to be a traumatized child hiding behind a forced grin pretty quickly, with little capacity to cope with defeat. Raylan isn’t the only one who bursts this bubble like Mags, but Boyd demonstrates a small-town hood with enough basic wit to render Quarles’ “skills” (asserting power against those with minimal wit or resources) impotent.

Tonin had all the stories about pulling an ear out of his pocket filtered through his henchmen to dress him up as the boogeyman, but he’s really just a dude with money hiding behind his cronies. His only face-to-face with the marshals is when they find him pathetically hiding in a crate. And I think the way he presents as he haggles with Quarles for how to stay alive by producing X finances in season three isn’t an act (and Quarles’ trust in even asking “what would it take” and then believing his answer - knowing him his whole life- supports this, along with Arkin’s thoughtful disposition in that scene) - which is a very rare example of a mafia head compromising and choosing not to kill off a person who poses a danger to him and his… not exactly fulfilling that menacing presence from the stories!

Daryl Crowe is a wild man too, but a more emotional one who manipulates family into serving his selfish will, and when that resource is taken away, he loses not only all his power but his literal manhood. It seems like he’s unstoppable for a while because he doesn’t play the the rules, but his own are makeshift and weak and all it takes is reverse manipulation to find his Achilles heel.

We were kept on a bit of a leash this time around, thinking “maybe this is (slightly) different” because Mansell doesn’t have a real ‘human’ side to latch onto, but I think that was more of a reflexive byproduct of Raylan’s own disorientation to Detroit’s milieu - so we’re alienated to diagnosing this guy as ‘a different breed of the same’ because Raylan is also just trying to find his balance in the nonsensical case and Detroit system itself. Ultimately the city is revealed to be a familiar kind of corrupt, and the baddie’s confounding presence is revealed to be a mask posing as a strength. He’s just another crazy guy who’s placed himself in positions of power against scared, weak, easy-to-tame people (including those in power who seek simple, predictable product for their acts of service) to reinforce a pleasurable grandiose delusion.

I suppose it’s my own issue that I wanted the show to give us something more to meditate on its structural approach (gag?) in arriving there, but it’s fine the way it is. I did like one detail a lot upon reflection:

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Mansell gifts Raylan the tape of his voice, while Sandy had to ask -desperately and hurt- why he never thought to share his recordings with her. He hadn't even thought to do it. Now, we know that Mansell used his recording with Sweety as a power-move, but that wasn't the same thing. This was a gift, an offering - perhaps a provocative one to see how Raylan would respond (though he didn't expect that response, I don't think he got much further than the 'let's see what happens' stage of that 'plan' or impulse), or as a gesture of respect, or both. Mansell's antisocial personality may not hold the capacity for love, but he does have the capacity to respect, and very few people have earned it, if ever. I do think there's a Western genre trope present here, at least posturing at Raylan being a 'perfect-match' for the villain, but mostly because Mansell's inability to figure him out coupled with Raylan's clear "cool" demeanor and self-assured attitude, are attractive to Mansell.

The characteristics are respectable because he sees them as similar to his own (doesn't he say a line calling them similar at one point, confusing but -hilariously, and appropriately at this stage of life- boring Raylan?) and Mansell's existential principles involve him getting off on figuring people out. Most people are easy, and he likes that to an extent, but he likes to play. Playing with Raylan has been fun. He hasn't yielded to Mansell's power yet, like Sandy probably did immediately out of fear and thus doesn't earn the tape - or doesn't even prompt the gesture (she's also just 'there', and doesn't stimulate him in the way he really craves), even if Mansell still thinks (delusionally, 'knows') he will eventually. But he's earned that intimate side of Mansell, which is really just an empty offering anyways because Mansell is going to kill him - though the gesture is still there.

Also, I thought the tape he played Sweety was Jack White singing.. I could be wrong, but that would be funny - not only because it would poke at Sweety's own grandiose stories of being close to the musical legends by not being able to discern the difference in vocal cords, but because it would propose that Mansell either isn't recording himself at all and just dreaming about it and believing it to be true. Maybe the tape's unknown contents represents the chaotic, unintelligible, but ultimately meaningless and unworthy-of-exploring nature of Mansell's psyche, and his small -rather than grandiose- place in the world.