Season One, Episode Six
Raylan’s relationship with Ava is continuing when Art shows up to take a little trip to Cincinnati. An art collector and rancher who is about to be indicted by the FBI is trying to sell assets and as they belong to the US Marshalls Service Art and Raylan will be present to take control of any proceeds received from the sale.
The cast was outstanding for this week’s episode. Besides the collector a Mr. Owen Carnes played by character actor Peter Jason, you had his wife Caryn played by Katherine LaNasa, the Stable Manager played by Greg Davis, the art collector played by Robert Picardo of Voyager fame, and finally the art expert played by Tony Hale. This is quite a collection of fine actors. Also I noticed for the first time that Gary Hawkins who is Raylan’s former wife’s husband is played by William Ragsdale who among other things played Herman on Herman’s Head back in the early nineties.
This episode was in a way more about Raylan’s powers of observation as much as his personal search for himself. The meetings with the always entertaining Boyd Crowder played by Walter Coggins addresses some of these issues. Also once again Raylan is not forced to shoot anyone even though he does talk someone out of shooting him. There was some very nice and subtle dialogue in this scene. It seems we are to have some sort of confrontation between Boyd and Raylan next week. It should be fun to see how that all works out.
This main character is an anomaly in that he seems so two dimensional, but is still so interesting at the same time. The character is sort of like Clint Eastwood’s man with no name from the Spaghetti Westerns of the late sixties and seventies. Raylan is a man’s man, wanted by the ladies, and feared by those who he would chase down. The interchange with the new Assistant District Attorney David Vasquez who was played by Rick Gomez was a little different as we got to see Raylan a little put off by someone when Vasquez surprised him with who he was.
In a way it was almost too easy for Raylan to pin this one down for what it was. The whole Hitler’s paintings scenario was a red herring as the deed was really about keeping the wealth intact that her husband had put together without losing it to the government. Criminals never seem that smart about things and let’s face it these people were leaving too many loose ends. I guess as the FBI was not concerned and local law enforcement was going to put it down as a suicide, Raylan’s hunch saved the government and a number of other people involved as well. I enjoyed Raylan’s reasoning about where was it all going to end. Interesting approach.
This was an enjoyable episode of Justified. A little on the lackluster side for the amount of action we usually see. One of the problems could have been the fact we knew who did what and why the whole time so there were really no surprises. I think they’ll make up for that next week. Overall a worthy episode but not near the top of the ones we’ve seen so far. Thanks for reading…
Jeffery Yarter
