I was recommended Justified: City Primeval (2023). a "neo-Western crime drama" that shoves countrified U.S. Marshall Raylan (Timothy Olyphant) into Detroit. But I haven't seen the original Justified (2010-2015), with Raylan as a marshall in Harlan County, Kentucky.
Scene 1: A rooftop-pool party full of guys cruising bikini babes. Rylan gave Thomas Buckley, who is an old friend (they ate crab cakes in Managua) until 2:15 to leave the state (Florida does have banishment as a judicial sentence, but I don't think Rylan is a judge). Big Bad refuses to go, so Rylan shoots him.
Scene 2: As the coroner takes away the body, Rylan's boss wonders about the legality of shooting Thomas Buckely. "I gave him a chance to leave. He didn't take it." Rylan has been shooting a lot of guys, but this one was rich and white, so there's going to be scrutiny.
Cut to a Department of Justice Inquest. "Is it true that you shot a rich white man?" Rylan, who is now named Dan, shrugs. "He drew his gun on me. Self-defense. Besides, he deserved to die. He was evil."
Dan's punishment: Being re-assigned to the wilderness of Eastern Kentucky. "But I'm from there! I finally escaped! Please, anything but that!" Dude, why the cowboy hat? Kentucky is Appalachia, You want Montana, 150 years ago.
Scene 3: Dan, who is now named Raylan, arrives in Lexington, a big city with glitz and culture rivaling that of...um, Dayton. But all we see is the inside of the police station.. The Chief, who is an old friend, has Western movie posters all over his office. He notes that the Love of Raylan's Life also works here. So this guy is old friends with everybody?
Raylan is assigned the case of Boyd Crowther, an old friend who has turned evil. They're trying to get enough evidence to arrest him -- but no shooting! It's a small town. People talk."
Scene 4: Boyd Crother (Walton Goggins) and his Boyfriend (Ryan O'Nan, left) discuss a Date Night activity. Boyfriend wants to blow a federal building under construction. Boyd dismisses it as unfeasible. Instead he blows up a church in a black neighborhood -- without even checking to see if it is empty. Boyfriend protests.
Cut to Raylan explainng Boyd's back story to the Chief. Wait -- he's been working on the case for years. Shouldn't he know everything already? Back when they were coal miners, Boyd was an explosives expert. He would yell "Fire in the hole!" to warn them of an explosion coming. Then he got involved with the white supremacy movement.
Scene 5: Back to Date Night. The guys are parked on a narrow country bridge (weird pkace to make out). Boyd wonders if Boyfriend chose a federal building because it would rile the feds enough to arrest him. And why did he protest blowing up the black church. "I don't see any white supremacy tattoos. Are you even a racist?". Boyfriend tells him to call his buds in Oklahoma to verify his racism. His goons are calling Boyfriend's references, but Boyd is tired of waiting and shoots him. I hate it when Date Night ends like that.
When Boyd calls headquarters (a trailer full of redneck dudes), they say that the references checked out; Boyfriend is a big racist. "So, how was Date Night?" "Um...er...um...we broke up." "Was it because he wasn't racist enough, or was his dick too big?" "Um...er...a little of both."
Scene 6: Raylan wakes up (chest shot) and goes to court to gaze at the typing hands of the Love of His Life, working as a court reporter. She pauses to touch her hair. Whoa, that's one of his fetishes! But before he can orgasm, he's called to investigate Boyfriend's body. The police have already found a cap that goes to the rocket launcher used to blow up the black church!
Cut to the site of the bombed church. A lady pulls her man out of the way of the police. 75% of black parents instruct their kids on how to avoid being killed by the police when they're stopped for "driving while black."
By the way, the church run by the Ethiopian/Jamaican Fandi (Doug E. Doug, left, old photo). He uses marijuana as a sacrament (so he's Rastafarian? Why not just say so?).
Scene 7: At the supremacist compound, a goon bursts in to tell Boyd that his brother has been killed! His wife got tired of his abuse and shot him. Uh-oh, now Boyd will be gunning for her..
Cut to the police station, with Raylan hearing about the murder. The Widow is an old friend, of course, so he drives out to talk to her -- and smooch. She explains that she's wanted to have sex with him since she was 12 years old, and now that she finally managed to kill her husband, she's free! Isn't she going on trial for murder?
Great, but first he asks about her dead husband. They married right out of high school. As soon as he realized that he was never going to escape Harlan, Kentucky, he started to beat her. So in crime dramas, small towns are horrible places to escape from, and in romcoms, they're wondrous places to escape to. I'm getting mixed signals here.
Uh-oh, while the Widow is in the shower, preparing for sex, a goon (Damon Herriman) walks in the open door. "Let me see your chest," Raylan orders. At least buy him dinner first.
He's actually checking for white supremacist tattoos: yep, Goon has them. And he wants to see the Widow -- he must be a hit man! Raylan disarms him. assaults him, and sends him back to arrange a meeting with his "old friend" Boyd.
Scene 8: Boyd and his New Boyfriend (Kevin Rankin) in a truck, discussing the Widow. Big Reveal: he doesn't want to kill her, because he knows how his brother "could get." He wants to take care of her, and give her a son, because the Bible says that if your brother dies childless, you have to impregnate his widow. Their buds finish a bank robbery, and they zoom off, war-whooping.
Meanwhile, the Widow finally informs Raylan that she's in no danger. Girl, you were playing him! If he wants to see Boyd, she can arrange a meeting.
Scene 9: The meeting, at Boyd's church hangout. Boyd and Raylan hug and complement each other's outfits -- no kissing because New Boyfriend is standing right there -- but Boyd tells him to get lost.
They ask about each other's daddies, discuss how fracking is destroying the environment, and finally get around to white supremacy. Boyd goes over the basic ideology: according to the Bible, Cain fornicated with some mud people (born without souls), and his descendants became the Jews, dedicated to destroying white civilization. Hate groups almost always target three groups: Jews, racial minorities, and gays. Boyd has never mentioned gays; I guess they don't exist, even as a target.
Big reveal: Raylan figures out that Boyd isn't dumb enough to be a racist. He's just pretending so his militia will commit ordinary crimes for him. The black church: a front for a drug dealing gang! A rival gang paid him to blow it up!
Beefcake: Raylan and some of the supremacists shirtless.
Local Scenery: Several shots of Harlan.
Heterosexism: "Girls! We shoud investigate -- Girls! -- this murder -- Girls! Do you have -- Girls! -- any leads -- Girls!"
Gay Characters: No. Boyd and Raylan have a gay-subtext romance. Note: Boyd was supposed to die at the end of the first episode, but everyone liked the subtext so much that he becaome a regular. Goggins insisted on dropping the white supremacy plotline: it promoted a negative stereotype about Southerners.
My Grade: The plot twists were unexpected, some of the dialogue was witty, and there were some interesting references to structural racism and the economic decline of Appalachia. But I still don't care for crime dramas. C.
Lots of thug dicks on RG Beefcake and Boyfriends
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