Boardwalk Empire: Everything That Happens Will Happen Today

After every episode of Boardwalk Empire this season, I've thought, "Should I write about it now?"  And the answer has always been no, because the show has been leading to something big, but until these last few episodes I had no idea what it was.  Maybe I should've waited a few more weeks until after the season finale, but the time finally felt right.  We found out where Nucky's path this season is taking him, and it looks pretty grim.  I've actually been working on this piece for a couple weeks now because most of my time has been consumed with applying to grad school, and then I had a personal tragedy that didn't inspire a desire to watch people get beat to death or shot to shit.  I'm still dealing with that loss, but this piece has been eating away at me and it's finally time to finish it.

I'm going to backtrack for just a second and explain my feelings about Boardwalk Empire previous to this season.  I've watched it since the beginning, and enjoyed the performances and the beautiful set design, costume design, direction, and cinematography enough to keep coming back to the show, but it wasn't until last season when I really began to FEEL for the characters.  Much of this has to do with my current favorite dramatic character, Richard Harrow AKA Sexy Richard Half-Face, but not all.  As the stakes became higher and important character information like Jimmy and Gillian's fucked-up history was revealed, the show became imminently more fascinating.  The season two finale proved that Terence Winter and the rest of the writers aren't afraid to make big sacrifices for the sake of valuable plot and character arcs.  Ok, I was trying to avoid it, but we're gonna get all sorts of spoilery up in here now.  Join me after the jump!

At Last! The Triumphant Return Of Mad Men

Mad Men! So incredibly great to have Mad Men back.  And such a fun episode!  I can't wait to see where the season goes from here.  We'll leave the heavy-handed textual analysis for others; here are my notes and quotes.

"It's an awful waste of a lot of good tablecloths"

Man, so that was actually an awesome episode of Boardwalk Empire. I mean, this is what they did last year - started out strong and then quickly got slow and boring and kind of lame. But the premiere episode opened up a lot of promising new storylines, and I'm actually excited to see where they take us, which is a nice surprise.

Let's tackle them one by one, shall we?

Well, Omar AKA Chalky got hit by the KKK (I know a call a lot of things The Worst on here, but let's face it, the KKK is actually THE WORST hands down), which appears to be orchestrated by Jimmy's dad (The Commodore? The Commander? Something like that.) This is the one piece that doesn't sit well with me because Chalky is my all-time fave on this show and this development seems to hint towards less Chalky and less of the black perspective in general, which is not good. More Chalky! Let my Chalky go! Anyway, this is part of Jimmy's dad's plan with Eli and Jimmy to edge out Nucky and take back Atlantic City. Good luck old man. There was a real creepy scene in his game room where he talks about how the bear thought he didn't have to be afraid of him and then he shot him in the stomach. Not a big stretch to realize that Nucky is the bear.

Jimmy married his baby mama and they are living in a creepy Oedipal house with Jimmy's mom, who admitted that she used to kiss his "winky" when she changed his diaper. (A) Gross, and (B) GROOOSSSSSSSSSSS. Jimmy's wife (Amelia or something? I can never remember these people's names) is understandably skeeved. I am rooting for Sexy Half-Face and her to get together; that scene of him gluing the pictures of families, lovers, and children into the bible was my favorite scene of the whole episode - so poignantly tragic and beautiful. That actor, whoever he is, is incredible. More Sexy Half-Face! Meanwhile, Jimmy continues to reject Nucky for reasons that aren't entirely clear, possibly because I kind of stopped paying attention to this show halfway through last season. Did Nucky try to kill him? Or is it just because he wouldn't give him enough responsibility? I've not no idea, but it doesn't really matter. Nucky is hurt because he pretty much raised Jimmy and cares for him, but Jimmy is selfish and also clearly has HUGE parental issues being that his mom is a creepy whore who is only 13 years older than him and his dad is The Worst. So Jimmy puts Nucky's gift of the statue of the man and the boy bonding over a dead deer in the closet and symbolically turns out the light.