'Justified' Postmortem: Graham Yost on the Dungeon, Death, and Real Harlan DJ

Spoiler alert! If you haven’t watched the March 10 episode of Justified — “Dark as a Dungeon,” written by Chris Provenzano and VJ Boyd and directed by Gwyneth Horder-Payton — stop reading now. As he’ll do throughout the season, showrunner Graham Yost takes Yahoo TV inside the writers’ room to break down key scenes and tease what’s next.

Let’s start with Arlo’s dungeon and the notion that Raylan had always been afraid of what was inside it. We saw him talk to a vision of Arlo, which is something the show hasn’t done before. How did that scene come about?
Coming off of [episode] seven, we knew that we wanted Raylan to really show that he was going to wrap things up in Harlan. He had made this 51/49 commitment to Winona, they’re obviously in love, they’ve got the kid — it’s time to ignore all the other stuff that has been keeping him from leaving and go.

The idea of the “dungeon,” as it were… maybe it came up in the room. We were sort of debating it, not entirely landing on it, and as is the usual on this show, we have to just keep going.… So Chris and VJ finished the script and sent it to [executive producers Fred Golan and Dave Andron] and me, and we didn’t know that Arlo Givens was going to reappear in the story. Chris hadn’t asked us. He hadn’t mentioned it. He just did it, and we were all frankly blown away, first of all by the audacity of him not even running this by us [laughs], but then more than that, it was, as Fred said, “I don’t know that I would’ve done that, and I’m really glad that you did.”

Related: Graham Yost on Winona’s Return, Ava’s Camping Trip

It was a real swing for the fences, and there is that sense in our final year that we’re going to do things that we haven’t done before because what the hell — they’re not going to cancel the show, and we think it’s right. So like last week, to have an episode that was primarily about the relationships of Boyd and Ava and Raylan and Winona, we can do that. We can show Raylan with the baby. And this week, to have that scene in the dungeon with Arlo and just have Raylan’s realization that so much of Arlo is a creature that he created himself in his mind. And [earlier in the episode] seeing Arlo’s box full of stuff is just stuff — it’s just someone’s life. Raylan being Raylan has zero sentimentality, specifically because it’s Arlo, but I also think in general he’s just not a sentimental guy. He just burns it but keeps that key [that eventually opens the dungeon].

So Arlo was a surprise to us, and then Gwyneth Horder-Payton just shot the hell out of it. We went back and forth in the editing as to how much we would see of Arlo and in what way, and we really kind of went for the whole notion of not ever explaining it or addressing it and just letting it be. It’s not a ghost. It’s a figment of his imagination. But it’s just something that we did and hope people respond.

The takeaway that I got from it was that Raylan realized Arlo wasn’t the Big Bad that he thought he was, so Arlo and his childhood are things that Raylan can recover from and move past.
Yes. This was the closest that we could come to Raylan putting that monster to bed and being free of Arlo, just realizing there’s nothing there. You got to let it go.

And we saw that with his decision with the graves.
At the end of the episode, Raylan says, “I changed my mind. I’m going to let [Frances and Arlo] be where they are,” but he digs up his own tombstone. The guy says, “Where do you want to put it?” And he says, “Your guess is as good as mine.” The past is a statement. The future is a question mark. It’s about him moving forward. It’s not about him wrestling with the past any further.

Related: 'Justified' Star Garret Dillahunt: There's Only 1 Place Left for Ty Walker to Go

Walker’s death is another huge moment in the episode. Was that character tough to let go of?
Yes and no. It wasn’t that tough because that’s what we planned. Garret [Dillahunt] had to leave after the break after Christmas to go back to [Amazon Prime’s] Hand of God, so we knew we only had him for a certain amount of time, and so that then became a parameter that we had to tell the story within.

Walker’s dying words to Raylan (who shot him as he was fleeing Ava’s) was that this wasn’t just all for the money. What was it for?
I think that he takes that secret to the grave with him. He was in the military, and I think that that’s a small hint to him having been a Ronin — you know, that term for samurai who had no leader anymore — and that he was someone who had a particular set of skills and no one to work for, except for someone like Markham. So there was a certain sense of duty and honor, and it ended up being perverted and he ended up doing horrible things and all of that, but it wasn’t just the money. It was that camaraderie, that brotherhood. That would be my guess.

With some fans half expecting Raylan and Boyd to work together to get Markham, that scene with Raylan going to Markham asking for help getting Walker, and therefore Boyd, was a nice twist.
You know, it’s funny that people would think that because that’s been our pattern: The Big Bad comes in and causes problems for Raylan and Boyd, and so they end up working together to a degree. But this season, that was never really our intent. The two things that just sort of popped up in the room when we were breaking the episode were, how do you get Walker, and that Raylan is focused on getting Boyd while everyone’s saying, “Yeah, but Raylan, the job at hand is getting this guy who engaged in a gunfight with U.S. marshals and is injured and on the run.” And we just liked the idea of Raylan saying, “You want to get him? I’ll get him for you,” and going to Markam and offering a reward knowing that that would be the quickest, fastest way to get him. I’m going to tell you the full story. Are you ready for this?

Go.
It was originally scripted that we would just hear people talking to a DJ on the radio, and the director said, “No, let’s shoot it. Let’s actually have [Markham] in a radio studio talking to a radio personality.” And so Chris and VJ write the scene, and we get actors on our casting website to look at, and I think, “Yeah, these guys, they’re fine, but they’re not actual DJs. Why don’t we get Jackie Cornett, who does the morning show in Harlan?” He does this show called “Crow in the Morning,” and I’ve spoken to Jackie twice a year since the series started pretty much. We do the season opener and then we do the season finale.

We didn’t know how to get in touch with him, so my assistant, Sonja, just calls the radio station. They were in the middle of a fundraising drive, and this call comes in, and Jackie’s doing whatever, and someone says, “Yeah, there’s someone from Justified on the line.” He says, “Yeah, right.” He was just thinking that someone was goofing on him. So he answered the phone saying, “Yeah, this is Boyd Crowder.” And Sonja said, “Is this Jackie? I work for Graham Yost, and he’d like to talk to you.” Then I said, “Listen, we’ve got this part. Would you be interested in doing it? Could you do it?” And he said, “Absolutely.”

So Jackie got on an airplane and flew out to L.A., spent a couple nights, and got to do a scene with Sam Elliott. He said he was freaking out, but Sam was utterly kind and helpful and calmed him down, and he was just like Jackie is on the radio show — just played himself. He did a great job, and the next day, he came and hung out with us in the writers’ room, had lunch, and then got on a plane, and flew home. But it was really something that we all got a kick out of. It was really fun to have a real Harlan man on the show. His radio nom de air is Jackie Crow, and that far pre-dated him knowing that we were going to do a show that had a lot of people named Crowe in it.

Related: Graham Yost on the Death (and Easter Egg) in ‘Alive Day’

I love that. Let’s talk about Raylan showing up at Ava’s after Markham offered the reward.
We just liked the idea that Boyd doesn’t know that there’s money for the head of Walker, and Boyd finds out and just says, “Yeah, he’s in the back.” [Laughs.] It’s just Boyd making a very quick calculation. At that point, he didn’t know how much money was in the safe. He was thinking maybe $3 million, which is still a s—tload of money, but he wasn’t sure what it was going to be. So bird in the hand, take the hundred grand.

Raylan and Boyd’s confrontation outside the house was one of my favorite scenes of the episode (along with the classic-Raylan fight with Zachariah). Raylan admitted he’s going to miss bantering with Boyd.
"Some small part of me is going to miss this when it’s over." We used that in the gag reel, and it’s not a gag. It’s an actual line from the show. You know, listen, wrapping up a show like this, there is a part of you that’s just glad to be done because it’s always a struggle. There’s no show in the history of television that hasn’t been a struggle. And then you start just weeping at the idea of no longer getting to do it. So that line sort of summed it up.

Raylan also admitted he was there because he was getting impatient, which we know from his talk with Art at the start of the season could be dangerous.
Well, yes. I mean, it gets back to impatient Raylan just doing it the old Raylan way, which is back Boyd into a corner and make him pull, and that is fraught with danger.

So Raylan ultimately took Boyd to the Pizza Portal so Markham could give him the $100,000 reward, and Boyd saw what he estimated to be $10 million sitting in that safe. He’s taking the bait and going for it. Ava had to report in to Raylan and told him which mine Boyd was using, but we saw Raylan tell Rachel that Ava’s been burned.
Raylan just could sense it. He and Ava know each other too well. It’s Ava doing her best to just scramble and stay alive and stay out of jail. So she had to give Raylan something, and now Boyd knows that she’s a snitch, and so she’s got to manage that, but it’s a very difficult line for her to walk. She does give Boyd the chance, right? She does say, “We could just go now,” and he doesn’t take that. And we’ll see how things go because of that.

Related: Graham Yost on the Kiss and the Cattle Prod in ‘Sounding’

We should also discuss Katherine calling Art over to give him Wynn’s file on the Markham henchman Wynn thinks killed the U.S. attorney. What did you like about bringing those two together now?
Well, it was just fun to have Nick [Searcy] and Mary [Steenburgen] working together, and it was the idea of Art just poking away at this thing. He’s talked to Markham, and now he’s talking to Katherine, and he’s just trying to figure out what happened 14 years ago. You will see in the next episode that he has figured it out.

And finally: Are we going to meet that guy Grubes, who Boyd and Ava said lives in the mountains and could’ve gotten Walker out of Harlan if their deal with Ty to get into the safe had gone through?
Yes. It’s interesting that you would pick up on that. And that’s the last good spoiler I’m going to ever give you.

Justified airs Tuesdays at 10 p.m. on FX.