Mark your calendars, ladies and gentlemen – Crossbones, season one, episode six, “A Hole in the Head,” the main character finally showed a flaw!
I was surprised too. But it turns out that Thomas Lowe has a very loose definition of “loyalty,” as he betrayed William Jagger to Blackbeard, betrayed Blackbeard to William Jagger, and not only carries on an affair with a married woman, but tries to get her to leave her husband. Finally, some dimension!
“A Hole in the Head” was a surprisingly good episode of Crossbones, probably because it raised the stakes, finally. The show has been in stasis, more or less, since its second episode, so this is a good way of giving it some narrative momentum. The episode also started to tie up some problematic loose ends, the most problematic of which was the Rose/Nenna extortion subplot, which ended pretty abruptly, with Nenna slicing Rose’s throat and burying her in a box on the beach. Good thing, too, because for the last few weeks we’ve had to deal with variations on this conversation:
Nenna: Here’s some gold.
Rose: I want more.
Nenna: There isn’t any more.
Rose: Bullshit, get me more or I’ll tell on you to Blackbeard for reasons that Trevor no longer remembers.
We also get some more backstory on Antoinette, the woman in Blackbeard’s visions. Turns out she’s his estranged wife, and currently locked up in a cell by William Jagger, who taunts her with pictures of Selima. Jagger is losing my interest, because Crossbones has made it clear that there’s no way he’ll ever pull one over on Blackbeard – and he definitely won’t pull one over on Thomas Lowe.
The scenes with Jagger and Antoinette do give an interesting dimension to Blackbeard’s madness and his ambition, as it’s revealed that he’s tried this island experiment once before, in Nassau, and it failed spectacularly. They also show us that Lauren Shaw, who plays Antoinette, is a crazy over-actor.
Back at Santa Campana, we get to hear more of Charlie and Selima telling Blackbeard not to trust Thomas, which Jesus Christ, are you trying to make a drinking game out of this, Crossbones? Every fucking episode since the damn pilot we’ve had to hear Charlie and Selima squawking about this like sexy parrots. Thomas Lowe might be on Santa Campana under false auspices, sure, but you don’t know that! And he’s given Blackbeard approximately ZERO reasons to mistrust him.
Anyway, Thomas stupidly admits to Kate that he came to the island as an agent of England, and I don’t understand why that’s a surprise. Wasn’t he taken as a captive of the Petral? And wasn’t that a British ship? James overhears his confession and promptly narcs to Selima, who puts out a manhunt for Thomas and Fletch. Thomas has stolen away to the wild man’s cave to confront Blackbeard. They fight, and for once Thomas gets his ass kicked. But Blackbeard lets him live so he can perform surgery with the trephine – which, it turns out, was unnecessary. Hooray, another flaw! Congratulations, Crossbones, your main character has as many flaws in six episodes as most side characters have in half an hour.
“A Hole in the Head” wasn’t a perfect hour of television, and this show still has a ways to go if it wants to become great. But it’s encouraging to see Crossbones making the effort to fix itself.
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