Episode Report Card Couch Baron: A- | 25 USERS: A YOU GRADE IT I Am Altering the Deal
By Couch Baron | Season 5 | Episode 9 | Aired on 03.11.2014
In a hurry? Read the recaplet for a nutshell description! Finished? Click here to close.In Texas, as part of the apparent new plan, Carl, Danny and Dewey rendezvous with and collect their merch from some men presumably sent by Flores (in a truck via which they were able to transport the contraband); Carl then takes a tow truck (part of their new Hot Rod-provided cover) to head back to Kentucky with half the drugs while Dewey and Danny go in another with the other half. Meanwhile, Boyd, Jimmy and Darryl have already made it back to Harlan, and Boyd sends Jimmy out of the room so he can chat with Darryl alone – whereupon Darryl takes him by surprise by owning up to his double-cross with Hot Rod's men, saying he was just trying to increase his value to Boyd and "be part of the goddamn family." Of course, as I've mentioned before, Darryl hasn't met Wynn yet, and the man himself wonders to Boyd if he should find recent developments disturbing, while Picker is no more jazzed to hear the shipment is out of their control. Perhaps not surprisingly given that Dewey is involved, he and Danny get lost in a signal-free area on the way back to Harlan. Danny takes his frustration out on Dewey, but how will Dewey let out his bad feelings?
Raylan heads to Memphis to find out what's become of Hot Rod, given that some of his crew ended up dead in Mexico, and Raylan hooks up with a DEA agent named "Miller," an older tough who drinks while he practices at the shooting range and is played by Eric Roberts in almost-nerd glasses. They go to see Jay and Roscoe, with whom Miller is already familiar, who tell them they haven't seen Hot Rod in days, so Miller and Raylan leave a not-particularly-competent associate with the two criminals, who sees fit to blab the news about their crew having met their end in Mexico. Knowing that means the heroin's running loose, Jay and Roscoe subdue their captor – smartly not killing the federal agent, at least – and have a cohort beat Hot Rod up to try to get the heroin's current location. Hot Rod offers to draw him a map to Boyd's, but soon after, Raylan and Miller turn up to find the guy with a pencil stuck in his carotid artery and Hot Rod dying from a gutshot wound. He reminisces a bit with Miller – turns out Hot Rod was his CI for 15 years -- but passes on without giving up anything. For their part, Jay and Roscoe make it to Harlan and get the drop on Boyd's old miner friend who's watching the bar, and when Raylan and Miller subsequently arrive, the duct-taped miner tells them he sent them to Audrey's, where a summit meeting between Darryl, Boyd, Wynn, and Picker is in progress. Outside, Roscoe and Jay yet again get the better of the people on sentry duty – this time Jimmy and Mike – and when they get inside, Boyd has had just about enough of this day and invites everyone to have a firefight right there -- but Raylan and Miller's perfectly timed entrance defers that happening for the moment. Roscoe, proving that he only talks when he has something to say, rather amazingly quotes King Lear in requesting that Raylan allow he and Jay to finish their transaction and let them depart, but when he won't submit, Miller kills Roscoe, and it's only through supreme effort that Jay doesn't go to join his brother.
Boyd catches up with Ava, and she relays the cryptic message that he needs to take care of her friend the doctor; soon "Rowena" shows up to the bar (feels weird to call it "Johnny's" now) to tell Boyd he needs to give her a hundred grams of heroin once a week; she'll take a cut and pass the rest on. Boyd is startled that Ava is setting up to supply the prison, but the surprises aren't over, as Rowena tells Boyd she used to have a partner at the prison who was horribly murdered, and she wants him to exact vengeance on her behalf. Boyd dutifully goes to see the killer "Elmont Swain," who's in a nursing home but is still sufficiently with it to draw a gun; Boyd claims only to want to talk, so Swain tells him he killed the partner for supplying his inmate wife with the heroin that killed her. Despite being a dealer of such stuff himself, Boyd says he has no wish to kill an old man for perpetrating a righteous errand, so he offers to set him up for life someplace far away, only to turn around and have Jimmy kill him -- while in prison, Ava gets harassed by an addict starting to feel withdrawal -- but Judith grabs her, holds her blade up to her neck, and invites the woman to really cut her, which backs her down and impossibly elevates Judith's cred even higher. So when Rowena pulls a Darth Vader-esque "I am altering the deal" move and tells Ava she's also got to kill Judith, Ava's apprehension maybe is understandable?
Wrapping it up: Wendy promises Kendal that they'll be able to escape their kin as soon as she gets her cut of the Mexico operation. Darryl finds the money Raylan gave Kendal and repossesses it, and Wendy tells him they're leaving even as Darryl confesses he's planning to take Boyd, Wynn, and Picker out and take over the Kentucky business himself. With a case now open against Boyd and Wynn, Raylan officially postpones his vacation and goes into the office at night, catching only Art there. In rising frustration, Art tells Raylan his wife is right – Art's the crazy one if he thinks Raylan is ever going to change, so he's just going to ignore Raylan until his imminent retirement. And finally, on the way back to Memphis, Miller spies the tow truck with Hot Rod's name on it and makes a U-turn to chase Danny and Dewey, and Danny steps out and offers to try the twenty-one-foot rule out for real. Miller, maverick that he is, is game for the idea – but Dewey, stewing with a rage that's been building ever since he killed Wade, runs them both over with the truck. Miller's probably dead, but a bloody Danny watches menacingly as Dewey primal-screams his way up the highway and out of the episode. What now? I have no idea.
Want more? The full recap starts right below!Based on the chyron that reads "Somewhere in Texas near the Mexican border," we can conclude that Flores got Team Crowe-der safely across that dividing line and now -- after a customary shot of an armadillo in the foreground -- an eighteen-wheeler makes its way along a dirt road toward two tow trucks. Inside in one is Carl, while Danny and Dewey are in the other and get out to meet their delivery. Cut to Carl opening a crate in the back of the big truck with a crowbar and releasing a mess of fish -- chosen for their pungent smell, I'd imagine -- along with their bricks of heroin. Carl starts tossing them to the Crowes, and then we cut to the two of them hiding the drugs in the framework of the car attached to their truck as Danny complains that Dewey should really consider investing in some deodorant.
Dewey is chagrined to hear that he stinks, but Carl pops into frame to ask if "you girls" are ready. Danny: "About ready to kick your ass." I'm starting to think these two really should play some sex games to resolve this animosity. They finish putting the car's pieces back together, after which Carl sends the eighteen-wheeler's drivers on their way and then reminds the Crowes of their marching orders -- wait thirty minutes, then drive back to Harlan; no speeding, no highways, no drinking -- and if they get pulled over, they're just employees of "the HR Towing Company; you don't know shit about that cargo." So apparently they managed to hook up with Hot Rod's connection on this side of the border, which maybe doesn't seem like it should have been that easy with his guys on the Mexican side being dead at this crew's hands? Carl tells Dewey that his stinky ass can ride back to Kentucky with Danny, thanks, and after Carl hits the road, Danny's like, "Told you." For having started with him being awarded three hundred grand, this has not been the season for everything coming up Dewey, has it?
Back at the bar (as I said in the recaplet, it seems weird to call it "Johnny's" now, so "Boyd's" it is until further notice), Boyd pours shots for him and Darryl as Jimmy reports that Carl is on his way and the boys are close behind. Sitting on Boyd's desk, Darryl crows (sorry) about how it's going to be a great morning, but behind him, Boyd rolls his neck as well as his eyes in turning to Jimmy and saying he can take it from here. Knowing about Darryl's treachery, Jimmy hesitates but eventually withdraws, whereupon Darryl remarks that Jimmy's "a bit of a cold fish." That's not how the ladies at Audrey's tell it! Boyd corrects him that he's a tired fish, and stretches out to show his own weariness, which is not so strong that he doesn't think to surreptitiously draw his gun. Darryl, moving to the couch, tells Boyd he likes the way he handles himself, and he wants to come clean for the sake of their future relationship, but Boyd's like, I know this one -- Hot Rod's boys didn't actually pull. Darryl looks genuinely surprised, but Boyd goes on that it was awfully convenient that Darryl had a way over the border "all cocked and ready to go," and I give Boyd the benefit of the doubt that he was already suspicious, but isn't he going to give Jimmy credit for all that Rosetta Stone Spanish training he did?