Justified: Foot Chase

"Is that why you called? Foot puns?"

Justified is always fun to watch, but this episode seemed to be all over the place.

Boyd has cleverly narrowed down the Drew Thompson search to thirteen guys, and Ava managed to wrangle an invitation to a party where they might be (I think). Boyd's lawyer Sonya, whom I am assuming is also working for Theo Tonin, took a more direct approach -- although she drew the line at using a blowtorch. That scene made me cringe. And I was disappointed that suddenly footless Josiah wasn't Drew Thompson, after all. I'm deeply fond of Gerald McRaney; I hope Josiah doesn't just disappear into a hospital for the rest of the season.

Sheriff Shelby has been hanging around the series for awhile, but until now, he hasn't had much (or really anything) to do with Raylan. For me, the best part of this episode was Timothy Olyphant and Jim Beaver spending so much of it together, making it a major Deadwood reunion and a joy to watch. It felt to me like Shelby was overreacting to Raylan's accusation that he was in Boyd's pocket, probably because he's in the process of extricating himself from Boyd. Good luck with that, Shelby.

The other highlight of this episode was Boyd's romantic proposal to Ava over a depressingly appropriate box full of money. They've come such a long way from their adversarial (with guns) in-law relationship in the pilot episode, and I was so pleased that Ava had a major attack of conscience about Ellen May. Do they really have a chance at a fairly normal marriage, kids, a nice house with a view? Pretty to think so, but probably not.

I also thought it was interesting that cousin Johnny had a couple of possibly positive scenes: going with Colton to beat up a guy who had hurt Teri, one of the girls at Audrey's (except that the guy didn't, but Johnny didn't know that), and telling Boyd in a sideways sort of way that Wynn Duffy was out to kill him. That second thing in particular could be taken a few different ways. An attack of conscience, like Ava's? Was Johnny just mocking Boyd, taking pleasure in his own betrayal? Bringing it up as cover? Hard to tell, but I hope it was his conscience. Maybe Johnny isn't so bad, after all.

Colton was sort of amusing and quirky before, but this episode graduated his status to despicable. We didn't know before that he was a junkie, and clearly, Boyd and Ava don't know, either. He is trying to find and (I assume) kill Ellen May, and he beat up Teri, one of her friends, for information. Then he lost it with that poor regular of Teri's that he knew very well had done nothing to Teri. I was sort of going, okay, he's awful, why so many scenes with him?

I thought the same about the Tim subplot. I like Tim, but mostly when he's backing up and/or reacting to Raylan. I have absolutely no interest in Tim's buddy Mark, the thief and drug addict.

And all Art got to do was make foot puns. At least they were really good foot puns.

Bits: (which always seems like a weird section title when an episode is about detached body parts)

-- Raylan said it had been awhile since he shot someone. It was last season, wasn't it? Not counting the bean bag rounds.

-- Apparently, Hunter would probably know who Drew Thompson is, so I am assuming that Brent Sexton is returning.

Quotes:

Raylan: "Tim tell you I wasn't coming in?"
Art: "Yes, he did. He said the game was afoot."

Roz: "I didn't have no goddam sex with Teddy."
Raylan: "No, I'm sure you and Rapes-With-a-Smile here were just talking."

Raylan: "I think Lynyrd Skynyrd's overrated. I know you're in Boyd's pocket."

Tim: "Hey, Boyd Crowder's ride."
Colton: "Hey, Marshal Givens's sidekick."

Boyd: "That's what assholes do, Raylan. They get old and die from being assholes."

Two out of four foot puns,

Billie
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Billie Doux loves good television and spends way too much time writing about it.

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