Season 3, Episode 11
“I'll clean that up.”
It's quite obvious that Raylan has a knack for stirring shit up, often for little regards to how this affects those around him. This makes him self-centered, but is that enough to make him a “bad” person? That's up for you to decided. However, acknowledging this fact is key in understanding how the show has gone about depicting Raylan's actions this season. Now, Raylan's actions have always been impetus for plot points – him shooting Tommy Buck was what landed him in Harlan in the first place, he antagonized Mags into a lot of her decisions last season, etc. - but it feels like the show has doubled down on that effect here in the third season.
To that end, Raylan's relentless attacks on Quarles have driven a lot of the action in this season, as every time Raylan has kept Quarles from his illegal activity, the latter has reacted in increasingly outrageous and harmful ways to the whomever happens to be close by. Obviously Quarles puts the highest priority on getting revenge directly against Raylan over any other option, but in a pinch he'll go after Boyd, or Lindsay, or a local drug dealer, or some random gay team. There's a lot of anger behind Quarles insanely blue eyes, but he was more or less able to control it before he came to Harlan, and before he met Raylan. It's Raylan's relentless pursuit of justice – be it from a sense of morality or through a compulsion to give his own anger tangible action – that has pushed Quarles this far, and it's Raylan who deserves the blame, regardless of his intentions.
It's Raylan's quest for justice that actually sets up a chain of events in Harlan county, and practically sets the criminal world a fire, as Quarles' reactions affect a good portion of the criminal underworld, and Raylan does his own part to keep the chain of events rolling forward. Other than Raylan, Quarles' biggest foe is Boyd, the true criminal opposition to his attempts to build a new oxy trade in Harlan, and it's Boyd that Quarles goes after when he can't get to Raylan – or when he has his ass handed to him like last week. To that end, this week he goes after one of the drug dealers in Boyd's newly formed empire, and kills them to prove a point, to egg on Boyd in their ongoing pissing contest. This is a move that ultimately fails, as Boyd takes out his own revenge as sets a trap for Quarles, capturing him and attempting to use him as a hostage to gain leverage.
Over whom? Well, that's a bit complicated. You see, Theo Tonin (played with aplomb by Adam Arkin, a casting move that gives me all sorts of ideas for Justified/Sons of Anarchy crossover), Quarles' adoptive father, wants him dead for how badly he screwed up business in Harlan (and secondly, because he put a gun in in his actual son's face), and sends two hit men to come and kill Quarles. That Raylan was convinced they were sent to help Quarles and actually stops them from killing them makes for some good character drama – he did the right thing in stopping them, even if he didn't know that's what he was doing, and it was antithetical to his ultimate goals – but I'm not sure that I buy Raylan not picking up on their true intentions. Obviously, I knew their intentions from the summary provided by Time Warner Cable for this episode, but even without it, I though their conversation with Raylan in the bar made it fairly clear, and it sort of robbed the reveal of the power it was obviously meant to pack.
Anyways, while Raylan is helping Quarles out, Wyn, who actually figured out what's going on, is turning against Quarles, and making deals with both Theo and Boyd, in order to win back both his money and his independence in criminal dealings. It's a plot development that plays into the season's central thesis of of the the shifting sands of power, while also setting up the action to come. We've seen a lot of various criminal alliances on this show over the years, and a Wyn/Boyd pairing, which is the epitome of the high-class/low-class criminal pairing, will just be a beautiful thing to watch.
But that's of course assuming that Dickie doesn't once again screw things up first. His own freedom is the product of another mess that Raylan has made when he refused to testify against Dickie in court. Now that's he's on the hunt for his family's money, a hunt that's apparently going to take the skills of Boyd Crowder to reach, things are going to get uglier elsewhere, especially since Boyd's still upset by the fact that Dickie shot Ava. Now, if Raylan had not been such a cocky jackass in the courtroom, and had given the testimony to keep Dickie in jail, then that would be one less problem he would have to deal with.
Often times, and when he had to have Art lie for him about the dust-up in the bar, but sometimes Raylan's actions come back to bite his own ass, and while those times don't make us question our protagonist's morality, they do point the way to a more flawed human being. And sometimes, that's a move that more interesting for us to watch, and more damaging for the one we're watching.
Quotes and Other Thoughts:
“I think your going to apologize for not telling me every account of your life before I selflessly gave you the gift of my feminine virtue.”
“Good, see? There's going to be another time.”
“What do you think is in the cooler?” “Probably not a human head.” “That'd be cool.”
“Some asshole threatened to kill one of my deputies. I'm the only one who gets to do that.”
“Yeah, yeah, it's a human ear.”
“What happened? Lose your edge, or just realize that you weren't that good to begin with?” “A little of both.”
To that end, Raylan's relentless attacks on Quarles have driven a lot of the action in this season, as every time Raylan has kept Quarles from his illegal activity, the latter has reacted in increasingly outrageous and harmful ways to the whomever happens to be close by. Obviously Quarles puts the highest priority on getting revenge directly against Raylan over any other option, but in a pinch he'll go after Boyd, or Lindsay, or a local drug dealer, or some random gay team. There's a lot of anger behind Quarles insanely blue eyes, but he was more or less able to control it before he came to Harlan, and before he met Raylan. It's Raylan's relentless pursuit of justice – be it from a sense of morality or through a compulsion to give his own anger tangible action – that has pushed Quarles this far, and it's Raylan who deserves the blame, regardless of his intentions.
It's Raylan's quest for justice that actually sets up a chain of events in Harlan county, and practically sets the criminal world a fire, as Quarles' reactions affect a good portion of the criminal underworld, and Raylan does his own part to keep the chain of events rolling forward. Other than Raylan, Quarles' biggest foe is Boyd, the true criminal opposition to his attempts to build a new oxy trade in Harlan, and it's Boyd that Quarles goes after when he can't get to Raylan – or when he has his ass handed to him like last week. To that end, this week he goes after one of the drug dealers in Boyd's newly formed empire, and kills them to prove a point, to egg on Boyd in their ongoing pissing contest. This is a move that ultimately fails, as Boyd takes out his own revenge as sets a trap for Quarles, capturing him and attempting to use him as a hostage to gain leverage.
Over whom? Well, that's a bit complicated. You see, Theo Tonin (played with aplomb by Adam Arkin, a casting move that gives me all sorts of ideas for Justified/Sons of Anarchy crossover), Quarles' adoptive father, wants him dead for how badly he screwed up business in Harlan (and secondly, because he put a gun in in his actual son's face), and sends two hit men to come and kill Quarles. That Raylan was convinced they were sent to help Quarles and actually stops them from killing them makes for some good character drama – he did the right thing in stopping them, even if he didn't know that's what he was doing, and it was antithetical to his ultimate goals – but I'm not sure that I buy Raylan not picking up on their true intentions. Obviously, I knew their intentions from the summary provided by Time Warner Cable for this episode, but even without it, I though their conversation with Raylan in the bar made it fairly clear, and it sort of robbed the reveal of the power it was obviously meant to pack.
Anyways, while Raylan is helping Quarles out, Wyn, who actually figured out what's going on, is turning against Quarles, and making deals with both Theo and Boyd, in order to win back both his money and his independence in criminal dealings. It's a plot development that plays into the season's central thesis of of the the shifting sands of power, while also setting up the action to come. We've seen a lot of various criminal alliances on this show over the years, and a Wyn/Boyd pairing, which is the epitome of the high-class/low-class criminal pairing, will just be a beautiful thing to watch.
But that's of course assuming that Dickie doesn't once again screw things up first. His own freedom is the product of another mess that Raylan has made when he refused to testify against Dickie in court. Now that's he's on the hunt for his family's money, a hunt that's apparently going to take the skills of Boyd Crowder to reach, things are going to get uglier elsewhere, especially since Boyd's still upset by the fact that Dickie shot Ava. Now, if Raylan had not been such a cocky jackass in the courtroom, and had given the testimony to keep Dickie in jail, then that would be one less problem he would have to deal with.
Often times, and when he had to have Art lie for him about the dust-up in the bar, but sometimes Raylan's actions come back to bite his own ass, and while those times don't make us question our protagonist's morality, they do point the way to a more flawed human being. And sometimes, that's a move that more interesting for us to watch, and more damaging for the one we're watching.
Quotes and Other Thoughts:
“I think your going to apologize for not telling me every account of your life before I selflessly gave you the gift of my feminine virtue.”
“Good, see? There's going to be another time.”
“What do you think is in the cooler?” “Probably not a human head.” “That'd be cool.”
“Some asshole threatened to kill one of my deputies. I'm the only one who gets to do that.”
“Yeah, yeah, it's a human ear.”
“What happened? Lose your edge, or just realize that you weren't that good to begin with?” “A little of both.”
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