“We’ll be ready for ’em. They won’t be here long.” – Jimmy O
Some shows use the midpoint of the season to reflect, to slow things down and allow the characters and writers to catch their collective breath in preparation for the homestretch (I’m looking at you Mad Men).
Sons of Anarchy is not one of these shows. “Widening Gyre” is a full-throttle thrill-ride that serves as a bridge between the early season arcs (Gemma on the run, Jax and Tara’s relationship, SAMCRO’s standing in Charming, tension between rival MCs, etc.) and the late season showdown in Belfast.
By no means was this a perfect episode. I find myself having a difficult time mustering any strong feelings one way or another for the Grim Bastards and a lot of the show’s momentum grinds to a halt when they show up. And I can still barely understand a word the Irish are saying, but all things considered, this was a hell of a way to start the second half of the season.
I guess we should start where we left off last week with Jax (Charlie Hunnam) knocking boots with Ima, “The Porn Slut.” It’s no surprise that Tara (Maggie Siff) walks in on them, or that Opie (Ryan Hurst) blames Lyla (Winter Ave Zoli) for bringing her skanky friends around the clubhouse. But I was pretty shocked when Lyla cold-cocks Ima (Kristen Renton) and screams, “You couldn’t help yourself, could you?!” I’m starting to kind of like Lyla. It took awhile, but she’s growing on me. Jax and Opie have a bit of a heart to heart, or as close to one as two tough guys can have without feeling fruity about it. Jax asks if Opie could do it over again, would he have tried to push Donna (Sprague Grayden) away. Opie said he tried, but she knew what she was getting into and stuck by him. He suspects it will take more than a dalliance with a porn star for Jax to scare off Tara. Unfortunately, he’s probably right.
The situation comes to a head later in the episode when Tara spills the beans about Ima to Gemma (Katie Sagal). (I just realized that all the female characters’ names end in the letter A, weird) “He’s been trying to push me away. It worked, we’re done,” she says. Ever the feminist, Gemma attempts to convince Tara to stay with Jax in spite of his infidelity. “He’s lost, baby. You have to be the constant. Ride it out.” To make matters worse, Tara is having second thoughts about keeping the baby. Gemma, once again proving why, aside from Agent Stahl (Ally Walker), she is the most conniving woman west of the Mississippi, promises to keep quiet about the pregnancy in exchange for a favor. More on that favor later.
Let’s talk about Ireland. There is a lot going on across the pond and SAMCRO desperately wants in on the action. The plan is to ride one of Oswald’s cargo planes to Manchester and then take a ferry to Belfast. Clay (Ron Perlman) knows that Liam (Arie Vareen), a member of the Belfast SOA, is working with Jimmy O (Titus Welliver), but assumes (wrongly it turns out) that he can trust McGee. Chibs (Tommy Flannagan) gets word from Fiona (Belina Logan), his ex-wife and Jimmy’s current wife, that Jimmy and Father Ashby (James Cosmo) are on the brink of war and the Belfast SOA is positioned somewhere in between the two IRA factions. The guys of SAMCRO aren’t sure what they are going up against in Ireland, but they know that Jimmy can’t know they are coming. Unfortunately for them, their “brothers”, Liam and McGee, are double-crossing them and feeding information about their arrival to Jimmy. “We’ll be ready for ’em. They won’t be here long.” Titus Welliver is one hell of a villain.
At the moment it seems like the only hope SAMCRO has of surviving lies in the hands of Kellan Ashby, the very man who knows just where Jax’s son is. Damn, are things going to be juicy in Ireland or what? I cannot wait!
The other important Irish development this week involves Gemma and Maureen Ashby (Paula Malcolmson) . Gemma calls Mo to give her a heads up that Clay and Jax are heading he way and to warn her that Jax “knows nothing about John and Belfast.” Maureen responds, “Nor does my Trinny.” But Gemma has no idea who Trinity is or that JT is her father. Ok, so this solves one mystery that we have been guessing about for awhile; John Teller is indeed the father of Maureen’s child. But if that is the case, and Gemma was unaware of it, then what is the big secret she has been referring to all these times when talking about JT in Belfast? What are all these stones that she is afraid Jax will overturn? In a previous review I took a guess that maybe Jax would find out that Gemma isn’t really his mother, but I don’t think that is very likely. Needless to say, I’m intrigued.
Obviously, Gemma is the glue that holds the club (and for that matter, the show in general) together. She knows this and it is the reason she tried so hard to keep that painful secret to herself last season. And because she is so important, Sons of Anarchy sometimes does some pretty silly things to keep her orbiting around the central story. Gemma blackmails Tara into helping her escape the hospital. Keep in mind that this is a woman who was arrested in a high profile, double-murder case. She slips out of custody using little more than a fake seizure and a stolen lab coat. But you know what, who cares? This is a television show, you have to suspend belief a little. And you know what, in this case, I’m sure it will be worth it because with Gemma tagging along with the club to Belfast, the next set of episodes are sure to be awesome!
Other thoughts on this week’s SOA:
- I left about a bunch of stuff from this episode for the sake of brevity. But if anyone wants to discuss Gemma’s harsh words (threats?) for Unser, the bathroom meeting of the MC minds, the inevitable revenge Salazar will take against Tara, the Molotov cocktail accident, Tara’s boss suddenly becoming an ally or anything else, we can certainly do that in the comments section.
- I don’t usually comment about shows’ musical selections, but for some reason the final scene struck a nerve with me. The screener I got was a rough cut, so I don’t know if this was changed for the episode that aired last night, but the version of “Travelin’ Band” that accompanied the ending made the whole thing feel really campy and borderline corny. I mean how many movies and shows have featured a scene where someone is driving really fast down the highway with that song playing. Dozens, right? Compare that with the finale scene of this season’s premiere. I can’t think of many other shows that feature of drive by set to Richard Thompson’s “Daddy’s Gonna Kill Me”. Sons of Anarchy doesn’t do all that well with classic rock selections, I remember not liking the version of “Gimme Shelter” on last season’s finale.
Some stats and info about Sons of Anarchy, “Widening Gyre”
TV SHOW – Sons of Anarchy
SEASON/EPISODE – Season 3, Episode 7
AIRED ON – October 19th, 2010
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.