Season 3 of SoA is shaping up to be pretty damned interesting, this week’s episode threw a few curveballs while staying true to the formula we know and love. There’s not too much I can say here without spoilers so hit the jump to see my recap…
So, we follow on directly from last week’s episode and the Sons are trying to figure out what the hell just happened. Jax is in a police cell after trying to make puree out of some guy’s head and Gemma is still struggling with the reality of her father’s dementia.
Clay is desperate to know why Half-Sack’s wake was so unceremoniously shot up at the end of last week’s episode and heads to the hospital, where the guy Jax beat into the ground is being cared for. After Chuck distracts the guard outside his room they rather rough-handedly discover that the shooter is a member of a crew they’ve not encountered before, one related to rival Charming crew, The Mayans. After a little brainstorming session they figure that last night’s shooting was an initiation and that The Mayans are patching-over this new crew, in other words they’re merging and the smaller crew members have to prove their worth in order to be included. I’ve got to say I like this direction, I said in my last recap that I don’t want to see the Irish situation taking over the whole season and The Mayans have always been good adversaries, here we see them growing stronger and providing yet another huge problem for Jax and Clay. And they’ve only just got rid of the neo-nazis…
Meanwhile Gemma and Tig have stayed the night at her Dad’s place and Tig’s taking a liking to the help, he probably wants to marry her, have kids and set up a home, right? No, he wants to try out a new position on her in Gemma’s Dad’s old room. He gets a bullet in the shoulder for his troubles as Nate assumes that Tig is having his way with his dead wife (not necrophilia you understand, he’s delusional not impractical). This drives home, rather unsubtly, the extent of Nate’s condition, I reckon we’re going to see Gemma making some tough decisions next episode. We’re seeing a completely different side of Gemma in this storyline, which is obviously the point, up until now she’s been, from necessity, the hard-ass, doesn’t take shit from anyone, Queen Bitch of SAMCRO. Its interesting to see her softer, more feminine and emotional side, and it gives the excellent Katey Segal a chance to really shine. She shows why she got that Emmy nomination in these scenes and, in my opinion, she shows why should have won it.
While everything else is going on, Jax is, understandably, still determined to find his son. The Sons track down Bobby’s ex, who’s none to happy to see him and now living with a bounty hunter. They strike up a deal involving them busting some guy in a jerk booth in exchange for Boba Fett tracking down some info on Abel. Another good storyline, I enjoyed seeing Bobby’s ex and his funny attempts to quiet her down for Jax’s sake were a bit of humour in a bleak episode. It also gave us the first payoff of the season regarding Abel, apparently Cameron’s headed north with him, to Vancouver… A bit off there considering the fact that, at this point, he’s lying dead in a Belfast church.
Which leads us on to the Irish story in the episode, first things first, the UK is not monochrome, as most US productions seem to want to drive home at every opportunity. There were so few flashes of colour in these sequences that it got quite depressing to think I live only a couple of hundred miles from where the scenes are set. Perhaps that was the point, but it struck me as one of the weaker aspects of the episode. I enjoyed the Belfast chunk of story though, everything about it was leading up to Cameron’s death at the end and its really the only way the story would make sense. He blew everything by getting the wrong end of the stick and kidnapping Abel and he knows this even as he’s taking confession at the start of the episode. I don’t think the payoff to this story is going to be as explosive as we might have thought at the close of last season, the Sons will head to Belfast at some point and stern words will be had with the Priest but that’s about it I think. I can see the finale of this season being much more concerned with the new and improved Mayans.
That brings us neatly back to the meat of the episode, using information gained from Jax’s punching bag, Clay and Co pick up the leader of the smaller crew being patched-over and decide to extract some intel from him in a rather inventive manner. They bury him up to his head on a dirt road and drive bikes at full speed past his head, missing him by inches. This scene actually put me at some unease, and well it should, it was an excellent, darkly funny scene and (along with Bobby’s ex and Chuck’s distraction in the hospital) the first sign of light-heartedness in the season so far. Its more than welcome what with all the baby stealing and wake shootings.
A decent episode then, but pretty much still set up for what’s to come. We now seem to have the main themes of the season set in place and hopefully next week we’ll start to see some proper progression. Even at its weakest SoA is still one of the better shows on TV though and this episode is testament to that.
7/10
