THIS WEEK ON Justified: Loose Ends

After a long day of being accused of corruption and murder, Raylan likes to kick back, have a beer, and hide the weapon used to frame him.   All in a day’s work for our favorite US Marshal.

Raylan gets called into Art’s office and is told to lay off of Quarles until they have actual evidence to use against him.   It makes sense, the Marshal Service deals with witness security and federal fugitives.   Looks like Raylan might have to take this little project home with him.

Across town Delroy is throwing a costume and coke party in the back of a van with his three best working girls.   The girls are dressed like bank robbing Charlie’s Angels and Delroy is dressed like a scumbag hustler who preys on the weak to do his bidding while he exploits their situations for his personal gain.   Not the most creative costume, but at least he didn’t have to buy a new shirt to play the role.   Along for the ride in this little party on wheels is Ella May.  You might remember her from Tanner’s little shooting at Boyd’s oxy clinic.   Things get very interesting when the three girls roll out of the van armed to the teeth,

Who would have thought that robbing a check cashing joint in Kentucky would be beyond the skill set of three prostitutes with drug problems?   When the girls get back to the van then inform Delory that Chrystal may have shot someone while receiving a gut shot of her own.

Delroy is a man of action.   Not always a good action, be it morality of in the idea department, but he’s definitely a doer.   Chrystal expires in the back of the van as Delroy tries to go all Project Mayhem on the two other women.   After rolling the body into a slurry pit, Delroy shoots nameless girl #24 while Ella May makes a run for it.   Like I said, Delroy is a man of action.   Ella May might be the only one having a worse week than Raylan.

Ava shows up at Raylan’s house/bar.   He plants a big drunken kiss on her lips as a big “fuck you” to Winona.   Ava needs Raylan to visit Boyd in prison.   Boyd may have a line on Quarles if Raylan is willing to play along.   Once again Raylan is stuck doing the dirty work of Boyd Crowder.   Boyd gives up Tanner, however Raylan can’t go to Art on Boyd’s say-so, what with the corruption charges looming and all.   Cleverly he drops Trooper Bergen’s name as the source of information.   Raylan is back on the hunt.

Quarles takes a moment out of his busy schedule to visit his good buddy Limehouse.     After waxing philosophical about dessert, they get down to rigging an election.   Quarles assures that Napier has all but won the election.   Limehouse however is a man of caution.   He’s in it for the long haul and wants it done right.   He introduces Quarles to man who will turn the tide to their side of the ballot box without making it look like the election was rigged.

Ella May shows up at the Crowder bar looking like her friends were just shot and left in the woods while her former pimp/drug dealer tried to kill her.   In actuality, her friends were just shot and left in the woods while her former pimp/drug dealer tried to kill her.   Wait … didn’t I use that joke a few write ups ago?   I did huh.   I guess I’m an uncreative asshole.   Moving along.

Raylan shows up at Tanner’s mother’s house hoping to catch up with the man.   Mrs. Dodd attempts to deflect Raylan by going full on section 8.   Raylan sees through the ruse … well more like bludgeons through it and tells her that Tanner is in deep shit.   Mrs. Dodd doesn’t believe him and sends him on his way.

As Quarles is being bored with the day to day operations of rigging an election, Tanner receives a call from his mother informing him that Raylan is on his trail.   Tanner decides he has to go on the run.   Limehouse instructs Errol to accompany Tanner to ensure that nothing can blow back to Limehouse and his ilk.

Raylan goes to Sherriff Napier’s office looking for answers.   Presumably Boyd informed Raylan of the connection between Napier and Quarles.   Raylan does a song and dance about Tanner being in on the bombing and plants the seed that may cause Napier to act rashly.   Once outside we are let in on the joke as the ATF agent Raylan brought with him turns out to be your average everyday trucker.   Oh Raylan, you are a sly one.

As Ave attempts to give Ella May all the comforts of home, Johnny shows up.   He is concerned about the Ella May and Delroy dynamic.   Johnny is concerned about the business angle.   Delroy pays Boyd protection so Johnny wants to return Ella May.   Ava phones Delroy and arranges to sell Ella May back to Delroy for the low low price of $2,000.   Yep, not Ella May’s best week at all.

Tanner and Errol arrive at the shop of the man who made the bomb that was used on Napier’s car.   They are there to kill him anyway, so Errol has the bright idea to get Tanner’s money back.   At the same time, Napier calls and tells Tanner that he wants to meet to get his money.   Napier packs a shovel, a bag of lye and heads off with Raylan following close behind.   Tanner, in his fervor to get paid is tricked by the bomb maker into stepping on a land mine.   Ladies and gentlemen, we have a new contestant for worst week ever.

Errol is a squirrely one.   He knows deep down that Tanner has to be silence.   Seizing an opportunity, he pops the bomber in the back and leaves Tanner on the mine.   Is obvious that this isn’t Errol’s first choice, but hey, the man is an opportunist.   Errol offers to protect Tanner’s mother and give her the money as he walks out and leaves Tanner to his fate.

At this time, Napier is planning a little “Kill Tanner” party of his own.   Raylan receives a call from Bergen telling him where he can find Tanner.   Raylan can’t resist the urge to fuck with Napier one more time by driving by his intended murder scene with the message of “Sherriff, pretty certain he ain’t coming.”

Ava packages up Ella May for deliver to Delroy.   Even though I knew Ava would never give her up to Delroy, this scene still kinda creeped me out.   Sure enough, Ava waits for the money to hit the table before she shoots and kills Delroy.   Ella May, I hate to inform you that you have been eliminated from “worst week ever” contention, but look on the bright side, no one wants to kill you anymore.

Raylan and an ATF agent, a REAL ATF agent head into talk to Tanner and to scope out the device.   Raylan takes this time to try to coerce a statement out of Tanner.   He wants to know all sorts of fun stuff about Quarles.   Tanner drops his gun by accident shortly after, boom goes the dynamite.   I know we have about 10 minutes of episode left, but I’m going to go ahead and crown Tanner Dodd as Worst Week Ever champion.

Napier and Shelby are in the middle of a heated debate.   Seems like an uphill battle as the moderator is the man being paid by Quarles to fix the election.   Before things can get too ugly Boyd comes in and sets everyone straight.   I’ve been talking up Quarles’ silver tongue all season, but god damn I forgot how great a speaker Boyd was.   In one swift motion Boyd turned what was supposed to be a horrible defeat into a victory.   Before celebrations can get out of hand Ava pulls Boyd aside and tells him about Delroy.   Boyd isn’t fully behind the killing, but he supports Ava in her decision.   Ava also decides to make a pitch of her own.   She suggests that she herself take Delroy’s women under her wing.

Errol, true to his word drops off the bag of money to Tanner’s mother.   Raylan is sitting in the corner during the exchange.   I assume he’s going to put the pieces together.   Now I hate do it but I’m calling total bullshit on this scene.   The reason being the timeline.   Let’s assume Tanner waited at most 5 minutes to call the police to let them know where he was.   And let’s also assume it took him 10-15 minutes to explain his situation to them.   Another 10-20 minutes for the police and ATF to show up, and then another 10 minutes for Raylan to get there.   Raylan is there for 5 minutes until Tanner blows up.   Conservatively that’s around 45 minutes, but realistically I’d say it was probably around the two hour mark.   After the explosion Raylan has to drive to Mrs. Dodd’s house, explain to her that her son is dead, and hook up her TV.   Point is by the time Errol gets there with the money, its night.   Errol left Tanner to die or go to jail.   Either way there were going to be police there due to an explosion or a phone call.   It was in Errol’s best interest to drop the money off as soon as he could have to be rid of it and anything else that tied him to Tanner.   This scene was just a way of getting Raylan to connect Limehouse to Quarles.   This is the problem you have when you write too well and occasionally have to ham it up to make the pieces fit.   But let’s not fight, I still love you Justified.

So Raylan has his connection and starts to see how the pieces are moving a bit better.   He heads over to Limehouse’s place to learn more about Quarles.   Limehouse tries to get a rise out of Raylan by recounting the tale of beating Arlo.   Limehouse obviously doesn’t know the dynamic between Arlo and Raylan.   The mention of Raylan’s mother however is a touchier subject.   Raylan tells Limehouse that he’s going to put away Quarles (Exact quote being “I’m either going to put him in prison, or in the ground”) and he wants Limehouse to help.   Seems to me that the best play for Limehouse is to let Givens take down Quarles.   It will stop him from having to commit to both sides of the war and earn him a little of Raylan’s good graces.   However I’m sure that will ruin his reputation as an underworld kingpin, and for him to rely on his hog farms for business.   God damn the life of an organized crime family can be tough.