“Congratulations. You can Google and use a digital camera. What do you want?” – Hank
First, an apology for tardiness: I have DISH Network and they recently cut FX from their package, a move that emotionally crippled this frequent FX viewer. I had to bite the bullet and actually pay the $3 on iTunes in order to download the most recent episode. It’s huge monetary sacrifices like these that I must make for you all, loyal readers. Luckily, FX sent me screeners for the next four episodes after this one, so I probably wont have to file for bankruptcy in the near future. Probably.
“Manifest Destiny” begins pretty much directly where “Fustercluck” left off. Hank and Britt (or as I’m learning to lovingly call them, Brank) are brought in for questioning in regard to the Lindus kidnapping. Hank comes clean to Mark about everything that he and Britt did up until they nabbed Lindus, including the office building heist. Mark has nothing to really hold them on, so he lets them go, but warns Hank to help close his case or else he won’t be there to reluctantly defend him in the future.
Our heroes return to Hank’s house to find that Crazy Sister Stephanie has stripped the corpse and sunk it in a bathtub full of ice. They quickly dress him and after Britt steals one of Lindus’ cars, they take the corpse to a secluded area in the woods. Lindus is popped into the driver’s seat and driven off a cliff in order to make it look like an accident. Right before they send the car flying, though, a mysterious voice calls Lindus’ phone (inconveniently still hooked up to the car’s Bluetooth system) and demands that the soil report be returned.
Unsure of what to do next, they approach Lindus’ wife to claim that the kidnapping was all an act set up by Lindus himself to try and protect his family from the bad dudes who are after him. But Mrs. Lindus dismisses these threats with little worry because she gave the gangsters Hank and Britt’s names. In a rush to protect their loved ones, Britt sends Katie to hide out at a friends house while Hank has Stephanie bunk with Gretchen and Jason.
Knowing they have to take the heat off of themselves, Brank decides to make it seem like Lindus is still alive by attempting to use his cancelled credit card to rent a hotel room. After they mess up the room enough to make it look lived in, they hide out in the parking lot until the tan-suited man shows up to take a look around. Finding the room empty, Tan Suit takes a ride over to a high-rise office building downtown, with Hank and Britt in hot pursuit.
Following Tan Suit (who we later learn is named Mr. Burke) up to one of the offices, Hank is met by a lawyer named Ben Zeitlin (played with just enough menace by Michael Gaston, who recently showed up on AMC’s excellent Rubicon) who apparently knows everything about Hank and Britt, as well as their loved ones. Zeitlin makes himself fairly clear: return the soil report or pay the price. But as Hank’s lawyer Mags (who had her baby that very morning) reminds them, they’ll probably be paying the price anyway.
And all of this is before Hank and Britt even find out what the soil report means. When coming to check on Stephanie, Gretchen and Jason (an architect, mind you) explain that the report signifies that there is an extremely toxic amount of benzene in the soil where the Montague Resort is under construction, and this is apparently what Zeitlin wants to cover up. Without any other options, they decide to let the one man in town who isn’t afraid to release the document to the public release it to the public. Returning to the ravine where they crashed Lindus’ car, Britt places the document in the dead man’s jacket and Hank makes an anonymous call to the police reporting the crash.
And bada bing bada boom, every one lives happily ever after. Lindus is found. Drunk driving is the presumed cause of death. The document is released without the blame being placed on Hank or Britt. Construction ceases at the Montague. Except as we have quickly learned in the short lifespan that Terriers has been on the air, it’s never that easy.
After getting picked up by Hank from Gretchen’s house, Stephanie casually mentions that the amount of benzene supposedly found at the Montague property is impossible in nature. When Hank drives out to the now abandoned construction site and find Mr. Burke and a few lackeys bringing various boxes inside. Hank and Stephanie realize that the report was actually forged to keep people away for some reason.
But what’s that reason? And will we ever find out? Hank doesn’t seem all that content to let sleeping dogs lie as he had planned to do earlier (and you can’t really blame him considering he still didn’t really get closure regarding Mickey’s murder, despite clocking Burke in the nose). But the fact of the matter is, he and his loved ones are all relatively safe. Why dig deeper into something that’s only going to put him in more danger?
The curious cat inside me is dying to know what’s really going on at the Montague construction site, but I would have a great deal of respect for the creative team if they ultimately let that sleeping dog lie as it takes real chutzpah to leave the audience hanging like that. No matter what, though, for the time being, the Lindus arc appears to be closed.
More thoughts on “Manifest Destiny”:
- Britt knows proper maternity ward etiquette. Always bring the new mother a gift.
- I don’t know what kind of awards love Terriers will get when that time comes, but Donal Logue should submit this episode for consideration. His confrontation with Zeitlin in the conference room was particularly tense and well-acted.
- Sure, things maybe wrapped up a little too nicely for everyone involved, but that final twist made it all worthwhile.
- I used to sell t-shirts outside of Wrigley Field in Chicago and one of our friendly competitors was this guy nicknamed Cry who was a recovering alcoholic who had been on the wagon for years. He was so strict, he wouldn’t even eat a steak cooked in a bourbon sauce, knowing full well that the alcohol would dissipate during the grilling process. Yet despite this, he would often drink non-alcoholic beer, even though it still contains alcohol, albeit a very tiny amount. Hank drinking his “unleaded” beer reminded me of that.
- “I got to skip my final.” – Steph
- “If you were on the run for your life, what would you listen to? I don’t know, smooth jazz?” – Hank
- “Done thinking?” – Britt
- “Is it designed for people to live in or just to shoot perfume ads?” – Hank
- “Who brings money to a kickboxing class?” – Hank
- “Mark, what are you doing here? You do not like social gathering places?” – Hank
- “My folks used to say she got the brains in the family; I got the facial hair.” – Hank
Some stats and info about Terriers, “Manifest Destinty”
TV SHOW – Terriers
SEASON/EPISODE – Season 1, Episode 5
AIRED ON – October 6th, 2010
NETWORK/STREAMING SERVICE – FX
GENRE – Drama, Comedy, Crime Dramas
CREATED BY – Ted Griffin
CAST – Donal Logue, Michael Raymond-James, Laura Allen, Kimberly Quinn, Jamie Denbo, Rockmond Dunbar
This review originally appeared on TV Geek Army.