TV Review: Justified – “Whistle Past The Graveyard”
By: Brandon Wolfe
When we left off last week, Raylan was planning on embarking on a trip to Florida to visit his family, and that is still on his docket this week, but he’s set on killing two birds and also having the trip double as a romantic getaway with Alison, his oddly extraneous-feeling love interest, played by Amy Smart. The conflicting purposes of this trip are not lost on the man, but he’s going to run with it anyway and see how it goes, yet before he can hit the road, he receives a call from Wendy Crowe, requesting a favor. Her young brother Kendal has reached out to his Uncle Jack (as if ‘Breaking Bad’ hadn’t already taught the world that reaching out to an Uncle Jack never goes well) as a means of escape from the horrors of his family. But Uncle Jack turns out to be no prize himself. He’s a spineless weasel who has conned the wrong man and now finds himself hunted. Wendy has a deal for Raylan: Help her get Kendal back and she will tell him all about her brother Darryl’s present exploits south of the border.
Speaking of Darryl’s time in Mexico, he, Boyd and the rest of the crew are being detained by cartel cronies for the pile of corpses they’ve created on Mexican soil. Mr. Yoon has given the order that this transgression means the deal Boyd made is now forfeited, but Boyd manages to talk his way into reviving the deal in exchange for agreeing to transport the dead bodies back to the U.S., the means of which he hasn’t yet figured out. But Darryl knows a guy and sets up a plan to transport the cargo, drugs in addition to the bodies, via boat. The plan becomes even simpler when Boyd manages to dupe corrupt Mexican police into taking the bodies, but not the drugs, off their hands. But when Boyd meets Darryl’s contact, he sniffs out a scam and realizes that the Crowes have a secret agenda to take the heroin for themselves. What Boyd intends to do about this is a matter for next Tuesday.
Finally, back in prison, Ava manages to find a means to bring heroin into the prison through a nurse, whose acquaintance she makes when she intentionally dislocates her shoulder. But in doing so, she makes a deliberate effort to downgrade previous heroin ringleader Judith to a secondary player in her own operation. And that’s what’s happening with Ava this week, in what must be everyone’s favorite subplot this year, yes?
The key problem this season of ‘Justified’ is facing is becoming clearer each week. All of these threads are so disconnected from each other that nothing is adding up to a whole, and week after week, they seem to delve deeper into each of their respective bubbles. You can detect the thin strings that will draw them together eventually, but the show isn’t in any great hurry to pull those strings tighter and the effect has been detrimental. Boyd has been in Mexico for only two episodes, but it feels like he’s been there for ages. Ava, of course, HAS been in prison for ages, but her storyline by definition cannot advance until Boyd reenters the picture, since he is the one with the drugs she needs for her plan to work, and there’s no indication that he is going to have any time (or maybe even drugs) to drop by during visiting hours any time soon.
This issue probably applies to Raylan the most. For starters, he’s still talking about that vacation, and for a vacation to even be viable as a concept to him this deep into a ‘Justified’ season is problematic. His desire to take down the Crowes is still a priority to him, but after his rescue of Kendal (another largely inconsequential mission for him) finds Wendy giving him none of the information she promised him in return, he’s still completely uninvolved with and unaware of anything that’s happening in every other corner of the season. The worst part of this is that he’s had virtually zero contact with Boyd this year, and their relationship is the beating heart of ‘Justified.’
If this sounds like I’m saying “Whistle Past The Graveyard,” or even Season 5 altogether, is a dud, I can assure you that this is not the case. The show still sparkles with wit, humor and fantastic character moments. It’s as entertaining as ever, yet the storytelling this year isn’t gathering the steam or the cohesion that ‘Justified’ always has around this point. Last year, the Drew Thompson case was a locomotive eight episodes in. There are only five episodes left this year and the show needs to pull its pieces together soon if it intends to amount to solid whole. I don’t want to hear about Raylan’s damn vacation again until the finale.
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