“Burned” was pretty much peak Justified. It played like the southern-fried noir that this show is at its core, and had some wonderfully tense moments that show that if nothing else, Justified is determined to go out with a bang. This season’s Avery Markham plot might not pack the mystery-novel excitement of season four’s hunt for Drew Thompson, but it’s still appointment television.
The Marshals decide they need another CI in Boyd Crowder’s camp, so naturally they go to Wynn Duffy, who they convince to snitch after more or less locking him in his tanning bed. After Raylan punches him. I feel like it doesn’t get brought up enough, but Raylan is a good detective but a terrible cop. It turns out Wynn is well-suited to this job because he has some prior experience – he, not Katherine Hale or Avery Markham, is the one who ratted out Grady Hale. This information is tossed off so casually that it seems like Justified just wants to put the speculation to bed – good thing, too, because the show has been teasing us with “Avery or Katherine?” for so long that it would be a narrative letdown if it was either of them. Wynn isn’t as capable as Ava, though. He tells Boyd that Avery will move the money right after his party – that afternoon. Boyd sees right through it, but still reasons that the party is the best chance to get Avery’s money.
Elsewhere, we check in with Loretta Macready, everyone’s favorite teenage pot-growing landowner. A goofy asshole named Boon shows up to intimidate her into selling to Avery. Boon looks like Joseph Gordon-Levitt playing a retarded cowboy in an SNL skit, but he makes it clear that he’s a hell of a shot with a pistol, and the scene where he repeatedly pulls his weapon and points it at Loretta is so tense that it borders on genuinely frightening, thanks to the direction of Justified vet Don Kurt. Boon’s theatrics backfire, though, because Loretta is cold as ice. She goes to Boyd for muscle, and I would absolutely watch that spin-off. Their first order of business is to crash Markham’s party and basically call him a motherfucker in front of the whole town.
In the grand tradition of people trying to screw over Boyd Crowder and it blowing up in their faces (sometimes quite literally), Zachariah decides to give it a shot. When Boyd lights the fuse that will blow the ground under the vault, Zachariah hits him in the head and chains his ankle to a wall. Luckily Carl is able to intervene and get Boyd a rock hammer, and he escapes by the hair on his chinny-chin-balls.
This is the setup for what I think Justified‘s remaining episodes will be about: revenge, also known as the best part of any story set in the South. Boyd wants to get back at Zachariah, Avery wants to get back at Boyd, and Raylan is just kind of pissed off at everyone at this point. With the talent in front of and behind the camera, there is pretty much no chance that Justified won’t stick the landing.
A Few Thoughts
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Katherine shooting Sea Bass through her purse was pretty badass. And then calling someone and talking in French? I love this woman. I’m half convinced the writers just followed Mary Steenburgen around for a day and wrote down what she did and said
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I think “Pizza” has been said more this season than in the previous five combined
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Since I mentioned noir: Avery is the crooked businessman villain, Ava is the femme fatale, Boyd is the criminal with a heart of cold, Raylan the private dick
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