Rewind: Justified S1 Review

For anybody who has seen this show, I'll state the obvious in saying Justified is a really good show.  I came into this show with pretty high expectations, although little idea of what the show would be like.  Needless to say, the show exceeded those expectations.  This just quickly established itself as one of my favorite shows of all time in fact.  It's that good.

There's no such thing as too much praise when it comes to talking about Timothy Olyphant as Deputy US Marshall Raylan Givens.  He's not the only reason this show is good, but he's the reason even subpar episodes are compelling.  I hadn't really watched Olyphant in much before this and now consider myself an unabashed fan of his.

Olyphant has a certain devilish charm that is probably every man's dream.  His delivery, combined with the excellent dialogue, could get me to voluntarily confess to a crime I didn't commit.  And I'd walk away feeling like he was doing me a favor.  I'm not trying to come across like he's an infallible superhero,  In fact, the facade of exterior toughness quickly reveals itself to be... well a facade.

Raylan's is a trigger-happy lawman whether he wants to admit it or not.  It may seem like he wants to resolve the conflict at hand without firing his weapon, but there's this sense that he really just wants to shoot to release his well-hidden anger.  He's a bit of a renegade, which means he connects more to criminals than his fellow cops.

One of those criminals is Boyd Crowder, a master manipulator, played by Walton Goggins.  Now I've never seen The Shield - lord knows I've heard enough about how good he was in that - but finally I get a taste of that praise.  In the first episode, he's a Neo Nazi leader, but he's a deeper character than that.  He seems more of an opportunistic criminal who has this masterful ability to lead impressionable, dumb rednecks.  This becomes more apparent as the season goes on, but really Goggins makes him interesting immediately.

Justified has probably the best dialogue of any show I've ever seen.  These characters speak in a completely different way than I've ever heard on television, and yet it's surprisingly realistic.  The way the characters choose their phrasing and weave their words together is utterly amazing.  This series is based off the short novel "Fire in the Hole" by Elmore Leonard.  They largely steal the pilot from that text, but it seems they found a way to capture his ability to parse words without seeming like a lesser imitator.

In case you're not sold on the show yet, another satisfying aspect of this show is the setting.  It's set in Lexington, Kentucky - a version that is not exactly flattering to the town.  It's basically Wild Wild West, may the best gunslinger win.  Somehow, it has that culture and applies it to modern life without seeming - well outrageously implausible.

If there's a weakness to this show, it's that the rest of Given's law enforcement team is remarkably forgettable.  The exception to this is Art Mullen's, Given's boss.  Played by Nick Searcy, he has to toe that line between friends and keeping Givens in line.  And he has to keep Givens in line a lot.  There's two other main characters, a white guy and a black girl.  They do have actual names, but really that's how I remember who they are.  I don't actually know their names.  (I could look it up and I did, but I wanted to illustrate just how forgettable they are)

But they are forgettable for a reason.  This show is incredible at casting.  There are an insane amount of great character actors whose name you can't place, but whose face you will surely recognize.  Chris Ellis, Raymond J. Berry, Brett Cullen, Ray McKinnon, M.C. Gainey, Jere Burns, W. Earl Brown, Stephen Root.  (That's not even mentioning Alan Ruck in his fantastic one episode stint or Tony Hale, who doesn't get much to do but BUSTER!)

The female characters could use some work too.  It's not that they are written badly, but there's a huge disconnect between the two main female leads on this show.... and just about every other man.  It's a bit alarming just because it's a hugely male-centric show, and the few female characters are underwhelming.

The majority of this season, with the exception of the last three episodes, was mostly procedural as well.  That's kind of a weakness, but really I can't blame them for initiating us into this world slowly.  I definitely liked the structure of this season more than Sons of Anarchy's structure, although SOA pretty much did the same thing the first season as well.  But its still worth mentioning for people who must have serialized storytelling.

Overall, if you want to watch badasses at work, there's not much shows that do it better than Justified.  If you like seeing the main protagonist take control of the situation and destroy the opponents in slick, smart ways, this show is definitely for you.

(Side note: For as good of a show as this is, the theme song to this is godawful.  It grows on you but I think that's just because I associate it with good television, not on its own merits.)

Playlist
1. "Dead Man Shoes" - The Virginmarys
2. "Stripes" - Brandy Clark (first country song I've ever had on this)
3. "Villuminati" - J. Cole
4. "Surrender" - Cheap Trick
5.  "My Iron Lung" - Radiohead