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shadowkatJustified Series Finale was good. Possibly amongst the best series and season finales that I've seen. As an aside, why is it that television series with excellent music and theme songs, generally speaking, tend to be better than television series that lack heavily in the music ability? (I liked Justified's music so much, I bought the album. Same with The Wire, and Buffy. Also have Sopranos.)
Anyhow...the series perfectly book-ended the first episode - concentrating on the Boyd, Raylin and Ava relationship until the end. It was directed by Adam Arkin. And written in part by Graham Yost, who created the series. Holding true to Elmore Leonard roots.
Jason Gedrick - I think - outdid Sam Elliot in the creepy villain department as "Boone",
the man who almost, but not quite, takes down Raylan Gibbons.
But what I loved was the last 35 minutes...the final shoot-outs unexpectedly take place at the half-way mark. The episode does not end in violence. Nor do the characters quite ride off happily ever after into the sunset. Instead the writers choose something in between, which is how it should be. Quiet like. Non-melodramatic. Quirky, yet sad.
In keeping with the tone and prose of late great Elmore Leonard, upon whose work the series was based. Leonard for those who have not read his work, excelled at the modern western turned crime novel. He didn't research - hired someone to do it, focusing his time instead on the craft. The series from start to finish stuck to his tone, wit, and character-driven plotting without fail.
It also ended just in time. A year after Leonard died. Not going on way past its prime as other shows have often done.
At the end, the final scene is not between Raylan Gibbons and Winona, who has finally moved on, or Ava, who has as well, but with Boyd Crowder. Crowder who refuses to have that final gunfight - telling him much earlier that he won't draw on him, but taunting Raylan to kill him - stating he'll get out some day and go after Ava and Raylin, if Raylan doesn't.
Now, four years later, after visiting Ava in California, and meeting her four year old son - clearly Boyd's. And upon her request not to tell Boyd about the boy. Raylan decides to visit his old coal digging buddy one last time - to convince him that Ava is dead. And he spins a worthy yarn, enough to convince the devil himself. From Boyd's point of view it's a closure of sorts, and a sentimental one, an admittance of Raylan's that he did care about Boyd - that there was a sort of respect between them. Yet, the audience knows, while that may be somewhat true, Raylan's really there to ensure Ava's boy is protected.
Boyd mentions the song..."you can't get out Harlan County alive", which the series ironically references on more than one occasion, misleading you into thinking that it takes such things literally. But nothing in Elmore Leonard's world is literal. It's a metaphorical landscape, examining the rough edges of home-spun violence, and the hollowness such violence leaves in its wake.
Neither Raylan nor Boyd are quite free of it. Boyd preaches a mean streak of lies in prison, repeating an old routine, while Raylan remains the tall lawman, in another office, the office he left, and an ex-wife and child he visits regularly, but doesn't quite reside with. Violence shades both mens lives, and they can't quite escape their histories.
The women do better, Ava on her ranch in California, scouring pumpkin patches, and raising baby Zacheriah. Or Winona stepping off with her husband Richard and her child; clearly having finally made her peace with letting Raylan go. Along with his violent life style.
Raylan manages to tow the county line. He manages to not cross it. And does bring in Boyd the right way. Without killing him. After five long years struggling to do so.
He completes his task. Ava asks him why, what did it prove, if anything? And Raylan shrugs, maybe nothing...except to himself. He'd come to Harlan as a bit of a trigger happy marshal, he's left Harlan slightly wiser..
The story doesn't quite tell us what will happen next or neatly wrap things up completely in a bow...in that respect at least it's a better ending than the far more melodramatic Breaking Bad.
I'll miss Justified, it was amongst the few well written series that did not have an anti-hero protagonist as the lead. Raylan Gibbons may have had his own code, but he wasn't quite the cold blooded killer that he often fought against, he did however wrestle with that part of himself. For Gibbons, to draw, it had to be "Justified", so we get that final gun shoot out in the street, but it's not between Raylan and Boyd, but rather Raylan and Boone - and both are so good - it appears they take each other out.
Except Raylan's shot in that last duel was the fatal one, while Boone's shot was just a graze to Raylan's skull - forever denting that white hat, which Raylan trades for a black one. (The show perhaps poking fun at that old conceit regarding "good guys wear white hats". Only in a literal black and white world they do.)
Well shot, well acted, well played.
Anyhow...the series perfectly book-ended the first episode - concentrating on the Boyd, Raylin and Ava relationship until the end. It was directed by Adam Arkin. And written in part by Graham Yost, who created the series. Holding true to Elmore Leonard roots.
Jason Gedrick - I think - outdid Sam Elliot in the creepy villain department as "Boone",
the man who almost, but not quite, takes down Raylan Gibbons.
But what I loved was the last 35 minutes...the final shoot-outs unexpectedly take place at the half-way mark. The episode does not end in violence. Nor do the characters quite ride off happily ever after into the sunset. Instead the writers choose something in between, which is how it should be. Quiet like. Non-melodramatic. Quirky, yet sad.
In keeping with the tone and prose of late great Elmore Leonard, upon whose work the series was based. Leonard for those who have not read his work, excelled at the modern western turned crime novel. He didn't research - hired someone to do it, focusing his time instead on the craft. The series from start to finish stuck to his tone, wit, and character-driven plotting without fail.
It also ended just in time. A year after Leonard died. Not going on way past its prime as other shows have often done.
At the end, the final scene is not between Raylan Gibbons and Winona, who has finally moved on, or Ava, who has as well, but with Boyd Crowder. Crowder who refuses to have that final gunfight - telling him much earlier that he won't draw on him, but taunting Raylan to kill him - stating he'll get out some day and go after Ava and Raylin, if Raylan doesn't.
Now, four years later, after visiting Ava in California, and meeting her four year old son - clearly Boyd's. And upon her request not to tell Boyd about the boy. Raylan decides to visit his old coal digging buddy one last time - to convince him that Ava is dead. And he spins a worthy yarn, enough to convince the devil himself. From Boyd's point of view it's a closure of sorts, and a sentimental one, an admittance of Raylan's that he did care about Boyd - that there was a sort of respect between them. Yet, the audience knows, while that may be somewhat true, Raylan's really there to ensure Ava's boy is protected.
Boyd mentions the song..."you can't get out Harlan County alive", which the series ironically references on more than one occasion, misleading you into thinking that it takes such things literally. But nothing in Elmore Leonard's world is literal. It's a metaphorical landscape, examining the rough edges of home-spun violence, and the hollowness such violence leaves in its wake.
Neither Raylan nor Boyd are quite free of it. Boyd preaches a mean streak of lies in prison, repeating an old routine, while Raylan remains the tall lawman, in another office, the office he left, and an ex-wife and child he visits regularly, but doesn't quite reside with. Violence shades both mens lives, and they can't quite escape their histories.
The women do better, Ava on her ranch in California, scouring pumpkin patches, and raising baby Zacheriah. Or Winona stepping off with her husband Richard and her child; clearly having finally made her peace with letting Raylan go. Along with his violent life style.
Raylan manages to tow the county line. He manages to not cross it. And does bring in Boyd the right way. Without killing him. After five long years struggling to do so.
He completes his task. Ava asks him why, what did it prove, if anything? And Raylan shrugs, maybe nothing...except to himself. He'd come to Harlan as a bit of a trigger happy marshal, he's left Harlan slightly wiser..
The story doesn't quite tell us what will happen next or neatly wrap things up completely in a bow...in that respect at least it's a better ending than the far more melodramatic Breaking Bad.
I'll miss Justified, it was amongst the few well written series that did not have an anti-hero protagonist as the lead. Raylan Gibbons may have had his own code, but he wasn't quite the cold blooded killer that he often fought against, he did however wrestle with that part of himself. For Gibbons, to draw, it had to be "Justified", so we get that final gun shoot out in the street, but it's not between Raylan and Boyd, but rather Raylan and Boone - and both are so good - it appears they take each other out.
Except Raylan's shot in that last duel was the fatal one, while Boone's shot was just a graze to Raylan's skull - forever denting that white hat, which Raylan trades for a black one. (The show perhaps poking fun at that old conceit regarding "good guys wear white hats". Only in a literal black and white world they do.)
Well shot, well acted, well played.