Justified 4.11 - Decoy

Cafe Society
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I don’t think we had a thread last week, and seeing as we’re coming up fast on season’s end, I thought we should remedy that this week.

Boyd gets tuned up at the beginning, loses a tooth and some blood in one close-up, but looked remarkably bruise free & remained eloquent as ever. I feel like someone dropped the ball on that.

The IED scene was somewhat inspired. They didn’t go for the obvious blow everyone up tactic, and they had to think their way out of it. Wonder what explosive they used. The cars blew up after the Molotov, but dynamite and C-4 just burn in a fire. I supposed a blasting cap could have gone off in the fire, detonating any dynamite. The ones that are triggered with a fuse would have certainly, but I don’t know about blasting caps that are triggered by an electrical charge. I think I’ll file that under the category of “fuck it” and move on to the rest of the story.

Colt killed one of the Detroit guys. So far, Boyd hasn’t crossed them. Don’t know that Colt’s murdering ways are going to endear him to anyone.

Once Constable Bob got into the house alive, I was pretty sure he was going to make it out. All that over-preparedness was gonna finally pay off for ole Bob, and now Detroit knows that people underestimate Bob at their peril. Very nice to see they went with the femoral artery kill to switch things up. In TV-land, a leg wound is usually code for flesh wound, or go on without me.

We found out why Johnny’s so pissed off: Boyd’s got the family business AND the girl. I think everyone but Nick knew he was gonna get a snifter full of brandy in the face. Guess he doesn’t watch the same movies we do. Annnd now, Johnny’s little secret is out of the bag. I’d say things look bleak for his life-expectancy, but Boyd has no recognizable backup on the show besides Johnny & Colt, and I figure Colt’s gotta die. They have to leave Boyd with one recognizable face to back him up next season(besides Ava, I mean). Hell, they had to import Colt from Boyd’s past this season. They need to populate the Crowder coalition a little better next year, mix in a couple more faces. Might want to add a couple faces at the Marshal’s office as well. Someone might need to die in the service of the story, and I’d hate to lose Art, Rachael or Tim.

Drew’s off to some other portion of the state. Wonder how the final two episodes will wind up. Maybe we’ll see how Ellen Mae’s doing over in Limehouse-land. Johnny’s got to get back into Boyd’s good graces, Colt still has to die, and Boyd & Ava need to deal with Detroit.

And I’d like to finish up by saying what a JOY it is to watch TV of this quality. Walton Goggins is fun every single minute he’s on-screen and Timothy Oliphant just excels at this kind of laid-back, calm bad-ass, but it’s just as much fun watching him get annoyed at people as seeing him face down a hit-man in police uniform. Hell, I’m not gonna list every actor. There are no real weak links.

A side note: in the course of writing this, I used Google to check whether C4 or dynamite burns, double-checked the location of the femoral artery, and finally, used it to check the spelling of Molotov. I should probably not do that in the future - at least not all together like that. :eek:

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Yeah, I was bothered by how non-beat-up Boyd looked too. I mean, in previous episodes, Raylan carried the bruises of a beating over from one episode to the next but Boyd didn’t even have a bruise.
I was also very bothered that Ava didn’t just shoot Augustine when she had the chance. Hell, why didn’t Johnny shoot him? He could always have blamed Ava should the need have arised.

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I found the detroit guy endlessly amusing. And i bust out laughing when Rayland called the dead henchman “yoohoo”.

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Other than that, was anybody else wondering why they didn’t just go off road to get around the VBIEDs and out of the ambush?

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Speaking of unanswered questions, why didn’t Raylan and Bob escape on the train as well?

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Me too. Considering the Batman-style whumps he was taking, his whole face should’ve been swelling up like a Nerf football. Maybe Goggins has a “never the FACE!” contract rider.

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To serve as a diversionary tactic. And can I just say right now how much I really like where they are going with Tim’s character? His whole conversation with Colton had me cracking up (As did Eldard’s line about looking like Gerard D. – He does!) and wishing for me. He’s a far cry from the goofball nerd he played in EuroTrip.

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Oh, and Bob is one badass motherfucker. Glad he’s got more redeeming qualities than just driving a Gremlin. :wink: :stuck_out_tongue:

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How much time did that buy them? Two or three minutes? There was only a minute or so of plea ding on Boyd’s part before Raylan allowed them inside. I imagine there would’ve been just as much hesitation from Boyd had they gotten to the door and heard only silence from the other side. Tonin’s men may have even spent additional time clearing the school one they busted into the principal’s office and found it empty, thinking perhaps they were hiding Drew elsewhere.

If Raylan’s support hasn’t arrived at that precise moment it seems likely both him and Bob would’ve been killed. And for what, to buy Drew and Rachel an extra couple of minutes they would’ve had in any case?

I’m nitpicking, though. I thought the episode was fantastic, but that scene just seemed like a lazy way to explain Drew’s getaway to the audience.

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Tim shot the gas tank with his rifle to get gasoline to spill/puddle on the ground underneath the car. Once gasoline is dumped onto a flat surface, it vaporizes rapidly. Liquid gasoline will burn, but gasoline vapor is very explosive. The molotov was used as the ignition device for the vapor that was filling the air around the car. If there were additional explosives in the car (and I’m assuming that there were) that initial vapor explosion may have been enough to cause the secondary explosion that really lifted the car off its suspension.

Would that explanation stand up to MythBusters? I don’t know, but it was enough for me to be able to continue to suspend my disbelief.

I will echo the comments upthread regarding Tim’s growing relationship with Colton. It’s as though they lived in the same barracks for an entire deployment, busting each others balls daily just to break up the boredom of a tour.

In regard to Colton killing the Detroit shooter, my interpretation is that once Tim circled the wagons, Colton started to get nervous. When Tim blew the car to create cover, Colt knew that he had been outplayed, and that he was very possibly tactically and strategically outclassed. He feared that Shelby was going to get away, and that Tonin’s men would begin housekeeping in Harlan before driving back North. He knew he was going to end up facing off against the shooter anyway, so Colt took him out of the equation preemptively.

Augustine is a magnificent character. His exchanges with Boyd were almost as entertaining as the interplay between Tim and Colt.

I also felt very warm and satisfied when Raylan complimented Bob in front of Picker and Boyd. Who wouldn’t swell up a little bit if a guy like Raylan characterized you as “a tough son of a bitch.”

Fantastic episode. I loved it.

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Yep, Boyd actually healed in less than 45 minutes, like Wolverine. And I know Bob was pretty beat up but he should have been even worse after the beating he took. I can only guess that Yankees don’t hit very hard.

Otherwise the show was great. I predict Boyd has a plan to kill off all the Detroit guys, as we’ve seen Colt start. Johnny may be in on it, which is how he will redeem himself to Boyd. You heard it here first.

I’m new to series this season and can’t wait to do it all from the beginning. I’m looking up who wrote the dialogue because I want more. Plus, I have secret man crushes on both Boyd and Raylan. There, I said it. I may even walk with a slight swagger now and use more four dollar words than before, in imitation.

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Agreed. If there’s cooler dialogue on television, I don’t know where.

I assume it’s still strongly influenced by Elmore Leonard (haven’t actually read the novella that spawned the series) but whoever’s carrying the torch is doing a phenomenal job.

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Pretty rough ground, one side had (what looked like) a barbed-wire fence, and the other was a hillside that looked traversable or not depending on the shot, so perhaps that side was bad where they were. The wire wouldn’t have been much of a problem, I guess, unless it took out the tires. The fence-posts looked pretty solid, but probably far enough apart to drive between.

I didn’t really get a good look at it, so I’ll assume I was meant to think it was not possible.

I don’t think Bob was in any shape to jump a train, and I don’t think they got the train to stop for them. Too much time to get them to stop & start back up, even if you think the train would stop for anything short an impact. Even if they started braking, they’d start accelerating again once they passed and didn’t hit anyone. Don’t think they’d stop for someone with a badge standing in the middle of nowhere. Can’t really see the badge at that speed & distance. Pretty sure they took the hobo express. If anyone took issue with that once they were on-board, then the badge would help.

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I can’t agree with the love for this ep. It seemed like an hour-long gabfest, with little resolution. The bad guys didn’t scare me, which means they’re b-list actors. Leaving Raylan and his partner alone with the object of the search made no sense. Seems they were able to move around freely, but they chose to hole up in a school? I totally agree that keeping Boyd unmarked was a mistake, particularly since he was bloodied up pretty well. Also, Ava throws her brandy in the thug’s face and he barely blinks; and a lighter isn’t going to ignite brandy on somebody’s face. The whole episode seemed contrived to me.

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Well, Bob might not be a bad-ass, but he is one tough son of a bitch as evidenced by the beating he took without talking. And never assume that you’ve disarmed a preparedness nut like Bob.

I had thought that Ava was going to kill Augustine from the moment she started gabbing at him. I figured Boyd whispered in her ear when he kissed her goodbye. I was very surprised she didn’t light his face on fire, grab the gun and shoot him. No way Johnny would have shot Ava.

I presume that Colt was under orders to kill the rifleman. No way he’d want to cross Boyd again. Colt is a very dangerous man, with or without the heroin addiction.

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As long as we’re second guessing stuff, the scene with Bob made me realize something that never occurred to me before about other ‘being beaten for information’ scenarios.

After a few good shots, why not just pretend to pass out? God knows, people pass out with single punches left and right in other scenarios - why not when it could spare you more beatings and give you an excuse not to talk?!

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I was okay with Boyd’s face not being marked up. It looked like he was punched on the side of the head instead of on his face, and that third shot was an uppercut. I did see a tooth hit the floor, and in one scene it looked one was missing – upper right, not in front though.

As for Raylan not jumping on the train, I think Bob was the main reason. But do you think that maybe Raylan wasn’t averse to taking out some of the Detroit thugs, if they hadn’t backed down at the school?

Loved circling the wagons.

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One thing I noticed is that after Yolo drove up to the house, we next saw Bob sitting in the chair. He didn’t look wounded or bruised at all, so I assumed he was tied down. Later, though, the camera panned around to his left side, where we could see that he had been beaten. I fully expected him to do something to Yolo sooner or later. I was actually surprised that he didn’t act earlier.

And have we ever seen Theo Tonin (the head of the Detroit mob)? I don’t think we have.

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It was last season. Adam Arkin.

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I recognize they guy playing “Yolo” from somewhere, but I didn’t get the credits on the DVR and his character name is essentially un-Googleable. Anybody catch who he is?