Justified – Season 6, Episode 3 – Avery 1

It was not hard to expect, in retrospect, but there was an excellent character twist that bodes well for the rest of the show’s final season.

It was the scene at Ava’s, with crime boss Avery Markham having come to call. In the last episode, Markham – played by veteran character actor Sam Elliott – demonstrated a soft side, a man who enjoys his marijuana and treating underlings well. His role in a final season that promises to be dominated by Raylan, Boyd and Ava was a little unclear. But that got cleared up in this episode. He’s the Big Bad, and a memorable one. It was shrewd to make it clear that Ava was quite frightened and Boyd, after having been kidnapped and threatened with death by his underling Walker, was busy apologizing for trying to steal Avery’s money. Not that Avery is buying that, but Boyd is at a disadvantage and knows the sort of man with whom he is dealing. Justified shines when it has a strong villain, and in Avery Markham and Ty Walker, it has two excellent actors playing interesting, scary (but not insane) characters.

Avery, in particular, is chilling. While his apparent vulnerabilities seem a little obvious at the moment (untrustworthy girlfriend, a lot of money in a restaurant vault, Choo Choo as a low-level underling), Elliott makes it quite clear he is not a man with whom to trifle. Boyd knows it, not that it will stop him from trying to rob him anyway. But he wants answers from the girlfriend and Wynn Duffy first.

The weakness of the episode was on the law enforcement side. The “let’s threaten Ava with prison again” scenes have gotten old, and we all know Ava isn’t going behind bars again. Moreover, Raylan thought the hardball tactics were dumb. And what if Boyd checked out whether she really was going to work? She’s supposed to be undercover, literally, with Boyd, and you’re texting her bright in the morning? What if he had seen it? Why shouldn’t Boyd be suspicious, drunken frivolity and sexual come-ons notwithstanding? I found the marshal scenes dull. There’s only so many times Raylan can shoot off a one-liner after beating up on some local idiot, especially when the alternative is scenes with Wynn getting out of his tanning bed because Boyd is on the way, perhaps with cigarettes again.