“Mule-ing and dealing are the same goddamn thing.” – Bobby
One of the coolest things about Sons of Anarchy is feeling like you’re learning about an interesting sub-culture when you watch it. I always like when the show introduces us to a new MC or an SOA Chapter from another city. It’s fun to try to pick out the little nuances that differentiate the groups: the patches on their cuts, the demographic make-up of their club, etc.
Needless to say, I was pretty excited when I found out that we were going to meet the Sons Of Anarchy charter from Tucson. (They are referred to as SAMTAZ, which I assume stands for Sons of Anarchy Motorcycle Club Tucson AZ). Unfortunately, “Una Venta” failed to live up to the hype I had created for it in my mind. The sensation actually reminded me of the way I felt last season when SAMCRO finally made it Belfast. I was so pumped to get to meet the guys of SAMBEL, but alas, the show was more interested in pushing a silly story line forward than letting us chill with the new guys.
The reason the SAMCRO fellas make the trip down south is to meet up with Romeo (Danny Trejo), drop off their gun delivery, and pick up a load of cocaine to mule back north for the cartel. Things get complicated when Clay (Ron Perlman) discovers that his brothers from Arizona have been trying their hand at the meth business. “We don’t deal. That’s always been the message,” he chastises the SAMTAZ president. Bobby (Mark Boone Jr.) recognizes the hypocrisy. “Mule-ing and dealing are the same goddamn thing.”
The plot thickens when Jax (Charlie Hunnam) uncovers a conspiracy within the SAMTAZ ranks. The specific details of this conspiracy are pretty confusing and the show does an unusually poor job explaining exactly what the audience is watching. Actually, this also reminded me of the Belfast episodes in the sense that a lot of stuff is being said, but not much of it is sinking in – only this time you can’t blame the bad Irish accents.
Here’s the gist of the SAMTAZ conspiracy: Just before the club was scheduled to vote on whether or not to get into the meth business, one of the members was unceremoniously kicked out of the group and another was mysteriously murdered. Also, someone banged someone else’s wife. But again, the details of this affair are pretty cloudy.
Meanwhile, back in Charming Piney (William Lucking) and Tara (Maggie Siff) have a sit down to discuss the John Teller letters. Piney believes that he can use information gleaned from the correspondence to help convince the other members of SAMCRO to get out of the drug business. Tara tells him that before he was killed, JT set up a meeting in Ireland to try to get the Sons out of the gun-running racket. This juxtaposition between JT and the guns and SAMTAZ and the meth is by far the most thoughtful element of an otherwise sub-par episode.
Some stats and info about Sons of Anarchy, “Una Venta”
TV SHOW – Sons of Anarchy
SEASON/EPISODE – Season 4, Episode 4
AIRED ON – September 11th, 2011
NETWORK/STREAMING SERVICE – FX
GENRE – Drama, Crime Dramas
CREATED BY – Kurt Sutter
CAST – Charlie Hunnam, Katey Sagal, Mark Boone Junior, Kim Coates, Tommy Flanagan, Theo Rossi, Dayton Callie, Maggie Siff, Ron Perlman, David Labrava, Jimmy Smits, Drea de Matteo
This review originally appeared on TV Geek Army.