What Justified: City Primeval’s Final Reveal Means for the Series and Raylan Givens
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The post What Justified: City Primeval’s Final Reveal Means for the Series and Raylan Givens appeared first on Consequence.
[Editor’s note: The following contains spoilers through the finale of Justified: City Primeval, “The Question.”]
Raise your hand if you saw that coming. Justified: City Primeval did its best Lord of the Rings: Return of the King impression with not one but three endings: While each denouement has merit and puts the cherry on top of this delicious sundae, ending number three whets the appetite for more in a way few probably saw coming.
Boyd Crowder (Walton Goggins), not quite out on bail but undoubtedly fresh out of jail, is on the run and heading to Mexico.
But how did we get here? Glad you asked. City Primeval’s finale, “The Question,” paid off a conversation from Episode 5 between Raylan Givens (Timothy Olyphant) and Detective Raymond Cruz (Paul Calderón). Cruz, retired after too many years of seeing too many guys like Clement Mansell (Boyd Holbrook) slip through the cracks, finally has a heart-to-heart with Raylan about catching Mansell many moons ago.
Unfortunately for Raylan, Cruz offers little insight into Mansell. Still, he empathizes with the Deputy U.S. Marshal over working a case where the bad guy is seemingly ensconced in Teflon, and nothing sticks — to say nothing of the system that creates corrupt law enforcement officials literally at the drop of a dime.
The retired detective recalls a similar situation in his career where nothing added up, and the criminal kept provoking him. The guy even showed up at Cruz’s house. The bad guy went for what Cruz thought was a weapon, and Cruz shot him — it turns out that it wasn’t a gun but a bottle opener, because Cruz’s ultimate antagonist truly wanted a drink with the man he respected, in whom he saw his own jagged reflection.
Raylan, who flirted with engaging Mansel in a shootout multiple times throughout the series, always worries how that might sit on his conscience. After all, Raylan enjoys his sleep. But Cruz tells Raylan even though it was just a bottle opener, he sleeps like a baby.
Both Justified and City Primeval focus on Raylan’s concern over whether he’s genuinely a good guy with a badge, or just a bad guy playing pretend and using that shield to justify releasing his anger through bullets. The finale answers that question when Raylan finds himself in a similar situation to Cruz’s — but notably, despite playfully chiding Mansel about a showdown, Raylan does everything possible to avoid the inevitable. He discusses catching Clement “the right way” and flinches when anyone suggests a different avenue. In fact, the only reason he puts himself in this pseudo-showdown is because Mansel’s continued existence threatens Carolyn Wilder’s.
Carolyn (Aunjanue Ellis) isn’t Raylan’s first romantic relationship during the character’s television existence, but it is his most tender and mature one. No scene underscores this more than Raylan bathing Carolyn after the long and stressful day they both suffered through (when they thought Clement Mansel was only a memory).
Raylan obviously loved his ex-wife Winona Hawkins (Natalie Zea). He cared about Ava Crowder (Joelle Carter). But he never showed intimacy on that level with either woman. That’s why he calls Carolyn first when he realizes Mansel’s warpath ends at her doorstep and tells her to leave. It’s also why she goes back, even against her better judgment.
Carolyn returns and finds Clement, essentially the Joker to Raylan’s Batman, slumped over on her kitchen floor, leaking blood from a fatal bullet wound. Raylan put him down only because he saw Clement reach for something. What he thought was a gun was actually a cassette tape — Clement didn’t want to shoot the Marshal; he just wanted Raylan’s opinion of his music.
Carolyn looks relieved, but Raylan seems furious. Well, more furious than usual. And in that moment, he makes a decision that Winona begged him for years earlier. Three weeks later, in Miami, he makes it official:
Raylan Givens quits the U.S. Marshal Service.
Justified: City Primeval (FX)
We then get a glimpse at a domesticated Raylan, complete with an actual home this time instead of a motel, before his daughter, Willa (Vivian Olyphant), pulls up in a car with Winona in the passenger seat. Winona gets the show’s most subtle and powerful exchange when she asks Raylan why he chose this moment for retirement. Raylan’s answer says a lot with only a few words:
“The question I been asking myself: ‘Why I didn’t do it sooner?’”
Raylan found peace in his second act. He saw how the job exacerbated his anger issues and needed a change. Rather than devote more time to catching criminals dumber than a bag of hammers or so morally ambiguous that they see no boundaries, he chose himself and his family. There’s even a hint that Carolyn might join that future with him one day.
Suppose City Primeval ended with father and daughter sitting peacefully on a boat over tranquil Floridian waters. In that case, very few complaints might get thrown its way. Raylan grew, defeated the villain, and finally got that time with his daughter that he promised when the series began.
That’s why the episode’s quick shift from the blues of Miami blues to to the orange of Harlan, Kentucky means so much. It’s not just that Boyd escaped federal prison thanks to faking a life-threatening illness (or did he fake it?), with his correctional officer-turned-lover by his side. It’s that he did it at this moment in Raylan’s life.
Raylan looks at the Marshal Service alert on his phone but promptly tosses it aside. It’s never revealed just how much info that notification entailed, but he at least knows something happened in the same Kentucky federal prison he last locked eyes with Boyd. That this alert comes while conversing with his daughter makes it even more poetic; Raylan’s fight is on that boat in Miami, not some backroad in Harlan. And just as it did during City Primeval’s inciting incident, federal business seems obsessed with coming between him and his number one priority.
Justified: City Primeval (FX)
Boyd escaping and doing Boyd things again, either in Raylan’s hometown or abroad, replaces the period at the end of that statement about Raylan finding peace with a question mark. This thing with Boyd was always personal, and their relationship was complicated — the now-retired Deputy U.S. Marshal sacrificed time and emotional connections to put his old frenemy behind bars.
Raylan wondered how he might sleep if he killed Clement in cold blood; imagine how much melatonin he might need if he heard about Boyd’s usual tricks. And keeping in line with City Primeval and its proceeding series, Boyd’s mere presence tests the main character’s resolve and questions what makes him tick. Is it about stopping the bad guys, or is something else at play?
City Primeval ends with Boyd ecstatic over his newfound freedom, but still, essentially the same man he was the last time Raylan saw him. Meanwhile, Raylan, doing his best to show how his newfound growth, ignores the phone call from his old Kentucky office. Maybe he disregarded it because he genuinely doesn’t care anymore. Or possibly because he knows what happened and is so at peace that he feels it’s not his problem. Of course, there’s always the third and most compelling option:
Raylan didn’t answer because it doesn’t matter whether he knows what happened or doesn’t want to know; the minute he picks up that phone, he’s off that boat and back in Kentucky.
Unlike Michael Corleone in The Godfather Part III, it wouldn’t happen because some outside force “pulled him back in” either; Raylan winds up in Kentucky because no matter what he tells himself, he’s not at peace and can’t resist the chase. Especially one with Boyd, because it always go back to one thing with them that bonds them for life:
They dug coal together.
Justified: City Primeval is streaming now on FX.
What Justified: City Primeval’s Final Reveal Means for the Series and Raylan Givens
Marcus Shorter
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