Raw Deal - Justified

Justified
Episode 05-07
"Raw Deal"

Written by VJ Boyd who wrote the great "Get Drew" last season

Directed by Bill Johnson, of "Hatless" mentioned below

After a layoff for the Olympics, Justified returns.

As a general rule, when someone is sold religion, they have to be skeptical at first and then gradually buy into it or the organization.  House of Cards played on this in Season Two.  It's sort of like this.  Boyd went through a Christian revival after he got out of prison in Season One, and now Ava may fall under that umbrella as well.  If not for the religion, for the benefits of being with the group preaching it.

Skeptical > Curious/In need > Zealot > Lose faith again

Rachel is acting like Art's deputy chief deputy, and it's pretty clear she's the frontrunner again to be the new chief deputy following Art's mandatory retirement.  If nothing else, Art has made her a buffer zone between him and Raylan so they don't have to speak.  Not only that, but Art is giving him the least desirable assignments.  Apparently the marshals take walk ins*, like a police station.  I don't know if I could find the local marshal office to be honest, even though the marshals play a bit more prominently in the District, as there's no sheriff.  The end game is for Raylan to quit, or at minimum for Art to never deal with him again.  Essentially, Art put Raylan on McNulty's boat or in Lester's pawn shop.

* Hearken back to Art introducing Raylan to the office, explaining it's a small office so they all do all the marshal jobs (prisoner transport, witness security, etc).  If there is one thing Raylan is really good at, besides absurd accuracy when he's shooting people, is finding people.  Except when they are right in front of him, like in "The Gunfighter" or this episode.

Unfortunately, he's not the best at prison transport, whether on or off the clock., either.

Wendy makes the first savvy move in going to Allison's supervisor.  So often those in public positions want to take the path of least resistance (e.g. Vasquez), and that's what Allison's unseen boss does by suspending her.

The interaction between TJ and Raylan provided a lot of insight to Raylan's mood

Raylan goes down a LemonLyman rabbit hole responding to T.J's blog post.  Unfortunately he pokes the bear a bit and gets his bank accounts drained.  Raylan seems utterly unconcerned by this, which probably means he only has a few bucks in there.  Turns out he was on a date of sorts when the card was declined, as TJ hoped.  But the dude is so self assured his reaction is to follow up on locating TJ rather than betray a hint of embarrassment to Allison.  Contrast this with Wendy who so often immediately becomes defensive when opposed, probably due to insecurity and unrealized potential.

The hacker must have found his talent and enjoyment for hacking when he was confined to bed rest recovering from cancer at 14, the same age he mentions he started "freaking phones" at.

For maybe the first time, Raylan is impressed at a criminal, particularly TJ's one legged escape.

It does renew a sense of competitiveness in Raylan, trying to find a pressure point on the Crowes, even as he takes vacation time.  He does this via Wendy (Dylan, unrealized potential, drag on her life).  And the bonds are already weakened with the youngest Crowe, trying to find someone outside his immediate family circle to take him in.  The voice on the other end of the line, calling him "Kiddo" didn't seem to have an accent, at least not a thick one.  And the corny joke that he pre-empts seems like the kind a Little League coaching wholesome family patriarch may use.

Really, Raylan is annoyed and pissed off at the whole Art situation, and everything involving TJ cooks his grits even further, making Raylan look a bit smaller and more dickish than usual.  We probably haven't seen him in this state of mind since Season One's "Hatless".

Body Count
Champion backgammon player
RIP Johnny Crowder, who we thought was dead a whole bunch of times prior to him laughing his way to the great holler in the sky at Boyd's hand.

Odds & Ends
The marshals office is growing.  They have an IT guy, Chris, and another marshal (Nelson?)Most disturbing part of the episode was in retrospect the toothpaste that the 'nice' guard providedThe sort of things only Justfied does: One legged computer hacker,  online backgammon ring (instead of poker)I think the Richard Kimball reference is the sort of lousy joke marshals hear all the time and have to pretend to laugh at, or view with total contempt.  Like when Michael Scott refers Oscar as "Oscar the Grouch"  Anyone who works a service job with nametag feels this pain.Again, thinking Ava is going to bite it...not willing to do what it takes to survive and upsetting the status quo can't bode well for her seeing Season Six.  I think I would also like to see a totally unhinged Boyd for thirteen or fourteen episodes.One of the problems with Raylan implicating himself as an FYI to Art, but not enough for Art to be required to turn him in is that Art lacks the context which led Raylan to his decision.Art's great but I didn't appreciate his "own dime" reference to Raylan visiting Florida, considering Art was the one who pushed him to go to Florida and see them, while Raylan, albeit not for noble reasons of being a good steward of taxpayer funds, did all he could to avoid making that tripRaylan could be well suited for air marshal duty.  We know he would meet the firearms requirement.  And he wouldn't have to interact with people much anymore.  Further research indicateds air marshals fall under TSA, under DHS.  So, no.

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