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Jericho Commentary: Episode Six, "Sedition"

The title of Jericho's sixth episode this season, "Sedition," suggest that there will not yet be a rebellion.  Given the uncertainty about the show's future (I say uncertainty because I am an optimist), I suppose we have to settle for sedition instead of a full scale revolt.  Even something as flimsy as Condor's Cheyenne couldn't be dispensed with in eighty minutes, and that is all we have left.

I keep reading talk about the SciFi Channel continuing Jericho in some form, but until I see some real evidence, I am going to assume that this is another example of the internet's ability to transform wishful thinking into a rumor with legs.  I am still holding out hope that CBS might do something interesting, like recognize the nature of the audience for a show like Jericho and use it as an opportunity to breathe some life into their delivery methods and their business model. 

The networks, CBS included, are getting better about delivering programming on the internet, but until I can watch what I want when I want to watch it and in the format of my choosing, this will be half measures.  At the risk of repeating myself week after week, I submit that CBS ought to release the torrent themselves with some ads attached.  Then track the numbers.  It can't hurt, especially if they intend to cancel the show anyway.

OK, this is supposed to be about episode six.  Forgive my tangent.  Goetz has been executed by Stanley, Hawkins still has a nuclear bomb in his possession, and there are only two episodes left.  Episode six begins with Beck launching a major operation to collect what appears to be the entire main cast of the show.  They toss the bar, threatening to kick down the pantry door.  I thought the writers had gotten over their whole Iraq thing, but maybe not.  Cut to Jake, who is sitting on a table covered with guns, loading ammunition into magazines, probably because insurgents mostly sit around looking cool and loading magazines.

Stanley is starting to realize he just murdered a man in cold blood.  An evil, nasty, petulant, murderous man, but you can't be one of the good guys and shoot people wearing those plastic hand restraints.  It is fundamentally uncivilized, a behavior almost completely at odds with the general reaction in Jericho to the bombings.  Stanley wants to turn himself in for that very reason: he is fundamentally civilized.  Jake stops him, and Hawkins brings news that Beck is on the warpath and that things will only get worse until Beck knows who killed Goetz.

So Jake turns himself in.  He tells Beck that it was his fault because he was Sheriff and offers to surrender in exchange for amnesty for everyone else.  Beck promptly restrains him without offering anyone amnesty.  He even puts one of those torture hoods on Jake's head.  Beck knows Jake didn't kill Goetz.  In fact, he knows exactly what happened, down to the details.  Beck admits he has a "reliable source," who I think might be Hawkins (Hawkins is interested in bringing down the government, and sacrificing Stanley is short money to him).  Jake actually makes the argument that Goetz was evil and needed killing, an argument which might have carried the day if this show was set in Jericho, AL or GA.

Beck brings in Russell, one of Heather's New Bern Schoolbuddies, who looks even more strung out than normal (who says there's no meth after the End of the World).  Russell has also refused to give Stanley up, although I am not sure why he would know where Stanley was in the first place.  Perhaps he's being obstinate on principle.  Beck threatens Jake with the torture that supposedly isn't torture: sleep deprivation, exposure to bright lights, etc. 

Heather brings news to Eric and the others.  Eric says that the Rangers need leverage in order to negotiate with Beck.  Meanwhile, Chavez calls to tell Hawkins that Texas is on the verge of forming an alliance with Cheyenne, so its time to bring the bomb to Texas.  Personally, the notion that Texas, given the opportunity to be its own country again, would join up with anyone is so bizarre as to be Martian, but it gets the plot moving.  Apparently, moving a nuclear weapon to Texas hasn't gotten any easier since the End of the World.  There are checkpoints and such, and Hawkins implies that he has a plan.

Eric and the Rangers jack Beck's resupply convoy.  It was nice of them to be obliging and escalate things, as it's the next to last episode and all.  Beck tries to get Jake to write a letter repudiating this tactic, and I think Jake spit on the letter, but you can't really see it and he could have just been gurgling. Beck declares Jericho an open insurrection, which sounds quite serious, but there are still only eight or nine guys with guns, which really isn't that abnormal where I live.  Beck sees this as a contest of will that he can't lose because with it will go any hope of controlling the town. 

Mysterious Caller has already heard about the Cannonball Run to Texas.  He suggests that Hawkins bring the bomb to a secure location closer to home, instead of risking a border crossing.  Moment of truth in the Hawkins/Caller relationship.  Is he to be trusted?  Hawkins decides to head to Texas anyway, but shortly in to the trip, Mysterious Caller rings him to ask why he decided to go to Texas.  This is meant to be ominous, I think.  Mysterious Caller tells Beck that Hawkins is a terrorist and that he has a nuclear bomb.  There are lights in Hawkins' rearview mirror, then the sound of a helicopter overhead.  Hawkins is run off the road and takes off on foot.  He escapes, but the soldiers capture the bomb.

Jake is having a little trouble with sleeplessness.  He has a lengthy conversation with his grandfather, who isn't really there.  Grandpa gives sound advice: remember that people are depending on you.  Surprisingly, grandpa thinks that revolution is the ticket. 

Somehow, IRS Lady goes to see Stanley.  If Beck wasn't watching IRS Lady, then there's no need for revolution, as the Cheyenne government will collapse under the weight of its own incompetence in three episodes or less.  IRS Lady explains that finding Stanley saved her from the grief of the bombings.  Stanley has quite a bit of guilt about offing Goetz.

The Molotov Cocktails start getting hurled in downtown Jericho.  Meanwhile, Eric and the Rangers are planning to spring Jake from custody.  Their raid is unexciting and successful.

Hawkins begins to wonder how the soldiers knew exactly where he was.  He realizes that Mysterious Caller must have a tracking device in the bomb.  Mysterious Caller was the architect of the bombings.  He is even boastful about how the "last time [he] blew the whistle, [he] took out 23 American cities."  This is an irritating bit of Deus ex Machina.  The whole plot revolves around a character introduced three episodes ago who we haven't even seen.  Mysterious Caller claims that he did the bombings to sever the ties between the US Government and Jennings & Rall.  Turns out he intends to use the bomb to destroy Cheyenne since the government and J & R are now centralized on one city.  Mysterious Caller is certifiable.

Hawkins tells Jake that he lost the bomb.  Its bad enough when you have to tell a friend you lost his flash drive, but a nuclear bomb?  This is actually a brilliant way ti finish up the season.  You can't do a revolution in the remaining episode, but you can stop a single bomb.