That’s a great episode title for this week’s ‘Walker’, referring literally to what happens to Cordell and Julia when they confront Tommy, but also to the fact that just about everyone has some kind of blinders on that aren’t letting them see things entirely clearly.
Tonight is a new episode and then we take a little break, so let’s catch up to where we are with the Walker family and company…
Of Fathers and Sons
The Walker family continues to bicker, Bonham still cranky with Augie, both parents cranky with Liam when he tries to bring work for the horse rescue and therapy center to the table, and Cordell missing breakfast all together much to their annoyance.
On a Saturday.
Bonham calls a family meeting for both his sons to “sort things out” leaving Liam to tell his brother about it. I love the framing here, Liam and his father separated, in two different worlds right now.
Bonham also finally tells Abeline about his conversation with Cordell and asking him to move out. Bonham is worried that there’s too much stress around there for Abeline, admitting he’s scared but then projecting it all onto his sons. He says Cordell needs to fix his family.
Abeline: Fix his family? We are his family! I’m curious how you decided that abandoning our son when he needs us the most is best for my health!
Me: You tell him, Abeline!
She says he’s welcome to stay in the farmhouse as long as he wants, and demands that Bonham apologize (and also finish the dishes alone lol).
Strikingly, when Trey comes over to see Liam to get some legal advice, Bonham is the good dad to Trey with offers of coffee and words of inspiration and consolation. Trey says he feels like he belongs with the Rangers, and Bonham says he was born to do that job and the Captain and DPS, they see it too. He insists they’re not gonna let a man like him go.
Where is that for your own sons, Bonham??
To make Bonham even more cranky, neither of his sons show up for the family meeting. Angry, Bonham tells Abeline that their sons didn’t turn out to be the pretty picture he imagined it would be, and what? You have two awesome sons, Bonham, be grateful! (Also they make quite a pretty picture, just saying…)
Liam has a positive meeting with an accountant (that goes long so he misses the family meeting) and offers Stella a legal partnership in the horse rescue and therapy program since she’s 18.
This show is convinced that 18 year olds are all grown up adults, but having worked for a decade as a psychologist in a college counseling center? I am side-eyeing you, show.
Setting Boundaries
It’s a day of Saturday meetings being called, Captain James calling Trey, Cassie and Walker in too and immediately being cranky because they’re a few minutes late. He’s particularly hard on Trey, who was supposed to be on desk duty.
James: Do you have a thing for defying me?
Walker interrupts to defend Trey and James cuts him off.
James: I didn’t ask for your input.
Walker: Yessir.
Trey has to go up before DPS for insubordination, in fact. And while everyone assumes it will turn out fine – it doesn’t.
Trey is dismissed from being a Ranger.
Most of us are convinced that James needed Trey out of the Rangers so he can be recruited by Grey Flag and go undercover, but we’ll see. If not, James is just really cranky.
James also asks if there’s anything else Cassie and Cordell want to tell him about opening that case, which he knows because Cassie said the name ‘Grey Flag’ at Thanksgiving. The whole beeping inside the case thing sounds like quite a logical reason to open it to me, but James thinks it’s weird that they thought a bag of digital watches was a bomb – except they didn’t know what was in there!
He’s really pissed at them for lying to him, and tells them to speak up if there’s anything else. It looks like Cordell is going to, but at the last minute he says no, nothing more to report.
This is a very harsh episode, seriously.
Cassie and Kevin go on a date even though she’s in a bad mood after James chewed them out. Kevin does everything right on the date, including consulting with Ben to pick the perfect restaurant, and insisting he’s “an open book” so she can ask him anything, even though because he’s in politics he’s got a scrubbed social media history. I don’t know whether to be totally suspicious of Kevin or to find him adorable because after all, he is Jake Abel.
We do learn that he was close to his mother and his father died when he was ten though, which could turn out to be pivotal information if it’s fodder for a revenge plot, just sayin. If that turns out to be the case it’s too bad though, because Kevin and Cassie are cute together. They bond over being workaholics and over why their mom/abuela had to work multiple jobs.
Kevin oversteps the next day though, “fixing” it because he’s worried about the Mayor pinning medals on Rangers under disciplinary review, calling in a favor and putting a favorable spin on it. Cassie is pissed, saying she didn’t ask him to do that and wanted to keep personal and work life separate. He apologizes but she says this isn’t going to work.
Ouch.
Of New Partners and Old Brothers
Walker teams up with Julia, who is about as no nonsense as a reporter can get. She’s the antithesis of warm and fuzzy, but I actually like her – or liked her – for most of the first part of the episode. She and Cordell put their heads together to try to figure out who might have sent him that threatening box of drinks, Cordell reiterating that they’re trying to get him to join them which continues to not make sense to me at all. He’s shocked when Julia knows the name of the anarchist organization and just puts it right out there – Grey Flag.
Julia: I’m an investigative reporter, it’s my job to know things people aren’t supposed to know.
She warns him that it’s possible there might be moles at the Rangers and while he doesn’t entirely trust her, it’s enough to stir up some doubt in his mind.
I like their halting sort of friendship and how they push each other; she’s not afraid to tell him exactly what she’s thinking and she’s not lying when she says she has good instincts for figuring out what people are feeling. How she’s gonna use that? We don’t know yet.
They undertake this informal investigation off the books, which always leaves room for things to go off the rails. Julia says her sources say that they didn’t actually manage to shut down Grey Flag after all, telling Cordell to “calm down” which makes him bristle and that’s kinda adorable. She’s good at pissing him off, pushing him to “open his mind” but comes to a dead end when she admits she doesn’t have the names of the people running Grey Flag.
She’s got her own agenda for sure, and she understands what he maybe doesn’t want to – he’s their prime target. They’re also competitive, allowing them to eventually figure out that the specific energy drink sent to Cordell was a sort of private joke with his unit. Walker doesn’t want to consider that the person might be a fellow Marine, the five of them in his unit so close they were like brothers.
Julia: Cain and Abel were brothers too.
He gets so pissed at that, he walks out. She comes over the next day to apologize and he says he’s glad she’s there, though he’s having a lot of trouble wrapping his mind around it being one of his ‘brothers’.
Cordell shows Julia a photo of The Green Raiders, Raider Team 3, and together they brainstorm who it might be. Julia crosses out possibilities, starting with “Coop” who died – I sort of cringed when she markered over the photo though!
Julia surprisingly has access to a Pentagon database – what?? – and figures out that all but one of the five are dead, maybe under suspicious circumstances?
Tommy Adams, however, is still alive. Julia crosses out everyone but Tommy and suggests he may be the one behind Grey Flag, and they set out to find him.
Julia is so eager to confront Tommy that she refuses to wait for backup, pulling out a gun and stalking towards his house out in the middle of nowhere.
Cordell: This is not a good idea!
Julia: Who asked you? Don’t worry, I’m a big girl – with a gun. I’ll be fine.
She refuses to listen to him, and then all the floodlights come on and Tommy confronts them and Julia’s bravado disappears. Cordell orders him to stand down, but he gets jumped instead. We get to see Cordell fighting like a Marine would, ordering Tommy not to fight back and then letting him up.
But it seems like Tommy isn’t the guy, insisting he’s the one who sent the drinks to warn Walker. He assumed that a cryptic message would be responded to in kind, trying to stay out of the light of whoever is picking them off. He says the others were a professional hit – that they’re being hunted.
One by one.
It was either really hot in Austin when they filmed that, or Jared Padalecki is just that good at projecting strong emotion. How is it possible to look that good when dripping with sweat though??
I am not sure where this is going, and I really like that! This was a strong episode and it left me eager to find out what’s going to happen next week, which is exactly what every show wants to do. (I also watched an excellent episode of Walker Independence right after, which if you’re not watching, you should be – it managed to check off a whole bunch of fanfic bingo card spaces in one episode!)
New episodes of both Walker and Walker Independence this week before a mini hiatus!
Caps by raloria/spndeangirl
–Lynn
You can read chapters written by Jared
Padalecki and the rest of the Supernatural
cast in Family Don’t End With Blood,
about their experience on the show and
with the fans (and how they are fans too)!
Links and info at:
A lot of people on Facebook are guessing that Trey being let go means he’s going undercover. I’m not sure because he looked totally stunned when it was read out loud but maybe it’s good acting? The Captain definitely has a burr under his butt but I’m wondering if a family member is being threatened or something. He’s definitely under some kind of stress.
Bonham telling Cordell that he should move was out of left field so I’m not surprised at Mawline’s reaction but I’m thinking it’s mostly disappointment. Somewhere in his mind I think Bonham wanted Cordell to take over the ranch which is obviously not happening and after the stroke, cancer and everything else, he’s looking towards a future he’s not happy about. There’s a lot of thinking but not communicating going on with the Walker men.
At this point it’s more like Who ISNT out to get Cordell Walker? I don’t see how that guy has the wherewithal to get out of bed in the morning. Honestly it’s getting a tad silly.
Like the shot with the King and Queen of the chessboard lined up with Bonham and Abeline.
I was hoping the remaining unit member not crossed off would have been young Sam from Supernatural. I’m ashamed I can’t remember his name. Colin Ford?
That would have been cool. Tho now it doesn’t appear that the survivor is a big bad.
I wonder if it’s a bit of foreshadowing that Stella is literally sitting behind the 8-ball while talking with Liam about the horse charity. Look at the screen capture.
I have to wonder whether Kevin — who we already know has influence with the review board — did a 180 and told them to throw the book at Trey rather than go easy on him, just to take revenge on Cassie for dumping him.