In the past, I've praised Banshee for successfully shepherding stories through distinctive trajectories. The ability to juggle a range of different arcs—some beginning, some still developing, some ramping up to a big conclusion—all at once, oftentimes in a single episode, is the hallmark of a great show, and Banshee has only grown more skilled at that over time. But even the greats occasionally produce and hour that feels overstuffed or a little jarring, because so many things are happening simultaneously, and at their own pace. The penultimate episode of Banshee's truly wonderful third season, "Even God Doesn't Know What to Make of You," felt that way to me.
Still, it wasn't a BAD episode of Banshee. I'm not sure bad episodes of Banshee even exist, particularly at this stage in the game. Nonetheless, even though it had a substantial amount of maneuvering to do to set up what will surely be a great finale, it was my least favorite installment of the season, and by a comfortable margin. Penultimate episodes can be tricky for serialized TV shows, and maybe some of that trickiness bogged this one down a little, but there was also simply a lot of stuff going on, some of it more immediately relevant than the rest, and the episode wasn't quite as well-balanced as the rest of Season 3.
Looking at "Even God Doesn't Know What to Make of You" from a vacuum, I can minimize my complaints to some degree. The "main events"—Proctor's personal and professional crises and the crew's showdown with Stowe—were given their just due, and many of the scenes were as sturdy and exciting as we've all grown to expect from Banshee these days.
In particular, I thought the extended sequence near the end of the episode—wherein Stowe and his crew of mercs (and the tech nerd) rounded up Sugar, Job, and Carrie in hopes of identifying the elusive fourth member of the heist, was pretty awesome—and it was a perfect way to build anticipation for next week's finale. "Even God Doesn't Know What to Make of You" did a nice job of creating individual moments of capture for Sugar, Job, and Carrie, giving each actor something to play with and really making something out of the different ways in which Stowe & Co. had to account for them. Sugar played it coy and then immediately went for the firepower, and that didn't work. Job was distracted by other things—namely, his dissolving relationship with Hood—and it caused him to stumble into being caught, almost literally. Stowe brought a mini battalion down on Carrie and while she surrendered relatively quickly, she was willing to weather the physical punishment necessary to keep Hood's identity a secret from her former lover.
And the hour made some fine moves to arrive at those moments, too! Sugar and Job have had their time in the sun over the past couple of weeks, but "Even God Doesn't Know What to Make of You" extended the ongoing tension between Job and Hood, complete with some decent flashbacks that featured an amazing hairdo on Job; it was especially fun to see more of each character's backstory and how they met. In fact, this episode was generally packed with little nuggets about Job—including just how important the CIA has deemed catching him. All that made for a great mini-showcase for Hoon Lee, who was unsurprisingly up for the challenge. Meanwhile, the communication breakdown between Hood and Job yielded a compelling scene in the bar, and then made Hood's discovery that his friends had been apprehended a bit more powerful.
For Carrie, being kidnapped came soon after her realization that she wants to keep the Hopewell family together for a while longer. Gordon showed up with divorce papers, but the two of them decided, probably rightfully, that while their relationship is far from a normal or functional, it's still an important one to both of them. Of course, while Gordon might be well aware of and willing to forgive parts of Carrie's past, he's not, as we saw at the very end of this episode, going to be thrilled to learn of her role in the heist—or the methods she used to get the proper intel from Stowe. The situation is a prime example of one of those great Banshee tics where the show's "normal" people start accepting the lead characters' crazy criminal behavior, and yet there's always another level of criminal and crazy that makes those normal folks hit pause and say, "Hold up, what?"
In general, this is where we expected the show to go, and now we're there, with Stowe, Hood, and everyone else. And I enjoyed most of the "en route" scenes on their own. Yet, I also could've also used some additional set-up from time to time, particularly with Job and Hood in the present. The flashback stuff was totally fine, but it wasn't essential in the way I feel like some of the present-day squabbling has become. It's a minor quibble, I know.
The Proctor stuff was more successful, especially because of what it meant for the character's season-long arc. Having been tortured and nearly burned to death by the Black Beards to atone for some of Rebecca's crimes, Proctor snapped out of his more recent "emotionally open" mindset and back into the vengeful, murderous SOB that many of us know and love. That included biting a dude's nose off, burning one alive, ditching Emily (to Rebecca's unbelievable delight), and destroying his own mini-chapel in a fit of rage.
One of the fun things about watching serialized television is that you can often gauge where the story might be headed, only for the ultimate destination to be even more satisfying than you originally hoped (although the opposite can happen, too). For much of this arc, I wondered what it would be like to see Kai as a fully changed man, and how that might impact his relationships with Rebecca and Hood. While exploring that story and characterization for an extended period of time certainly would've been cool, it was surprisingly awesome to watch Kai turn off his emotions off and retreat back into the man we already know. His monologue about how this temporary change was all a response to his mother's death was built on a beautifully dark sentiment about the impact of loss on even the most corrupt of individuals, and it was really nicely delivered by Ulrich Thomsen. Kai knows what kind of man he has to be to defeat the Black Beards, but I'm still curious as to how this shift will influence his relationship with Rebecca, which is more than fraught at this stage. However, it was another instance where I could've used just one more scene to flesh out that tension a bit more.
Elsewhere, some of the tertiary stuff illustrated that it's not always easy to make time for supporting characters, especially so late in the season. Brock's issues with Emily are boiling over, and that's all fine. We can see where that's going, even if I feel like maybe that plot missed a beat somewhere along the way. Similarly, while I think Bunker has so much potential as a character in this world, Episode 9 is an odd place to start seriously diving into his past, some of the dudes he used to run with, and how all of that affects his day-to-day in the present. And Banshee typically does solid stuff with Deva and her response to the effed-up situations she finds herself in, but getting arrested to smoking pot by the recovered Billy Raven? Meh.
As I'm writing this, I'm realizing that I enjoyed "Even God Doesn't Know What to Make of You" a little more than I originally thought, but that's partially because I know in my mind that there's a big, probably bloody, finale up ahead. And with more than a few pieces to position on the proverbial chess board, the decision to toss in some flashbacks and a couple of lesser C- and D-level plots produced a somewhat bumpy final product. All in all, the episode was just a little too busy for me. But next week? OH MAN. You just knowthat's going to be tremendous.
NOTES
– Great job by the location-scouting team in finding that high school gym, and bravo to director Loni Peristere for the way in which she filmed the sequences that took place there with Kai and the Black Beards. The overhead shot with Kai strapped to the chair in the middle of the court? Awesome.
– Someone needs to inform Bunker of all the messed-up crap happening between the mayor, the sheriff, and the beautiful waitress from across the parking lot, huh?
– Maybe I'm misremembering something, but I found it a bit weird that no one asked Hood and Brock where they've been, and that Amy didn't make an appearance asking about Chayton.
– Job's hair in the flashback: MY. LORD. Quite the look.
What's your take on "Even God Doesn't Know What to Make of You?" What are you expecting to see in next week's finale?