A tepid episode of Boardwalk Empire highlights the importance of the truth.
Regardless of whether or not the truth hurts or sets you free, the entirety of Boardwalk Empire’s “Ging Gang Goolie” is spent reminding us that honesty is a virtue.
Ain’t that a strange sentiment in gangland?
And since the episode has put me in such a sharing mood, I’m not hesitant to say that “Ging Gang Goolie” is exactly the kind of mid-season lull I was expecting — and dreading — after the last few weeks of dramatic chess moves in Boardwalk Empire’s mounting bootlegger wars.
These sorts of episodes tend to happen on great premium-channel shows such as this — I will never fault series creator Terrence Winter for taking his time with the story and letting Boardwalk Empire develop like the visual novel that it is, but I won’t deny that “Ging Gang Goolie” is the most boring episode of the season.
First and foremost, the episode focuses on Margaret, whose arc so far in season three has fallen far short of engrossing. That being said — and in keeping with season three’s penchant for arbitrarily resting plotlines from one week to the next — Margaret takes center-stage this week in a story entirely removed from her dull women’s health campaign.
Instead, we have smaller story, wherein she is dealing with living alone in Nucky’s house with only the children and occasional visits from Owen Sleater to keep her company. After a fire starts in the greenhouse, we once again return to the unnecessarily drawn-out subplot about young Teddy Thompson’s possible future as an arsonist.
Throughout the episode, Teddy denies starting the fires, blaming it on a “Gpysy man” (clearly a mispronunciation of Gyp Rossetti) and Margaret shames the boy because she does not trust him after having started fires in the past.
As the episode drags on, Teddy’s lack of a steady father figure becomes the obvious impetus for his actions, including a disturbing scene where he shows a blade he’s found to his young sister.
Margaret punishes Teddy, but not before making it obvious to the audience that her chastisement for dishonesty is a projection of her own feelings, namely, her perpetual lust for Owen (which, notably, appears mutual).
By the episode’s end, Margaret chooses honesty, despite the cost, finally leaping onto Owen in a moment of greenhouse passion. Hopefully, this love affair is a signal that all of Margaret’s time at the women’s hospital was merely an emotional build-up to her finally making the choice to be honest with herself, thereby becoming a stronger woman and all that jazz.
With any luck, Margaret will return to her role as a functional piece of the Boardwalk Empire puzzle, but somehow, I suspect we’ll be right back in that hospital next week.
Framed against Margaret’s story is Nucky’s tale, which demonstrates some of the consequences of dishonesty.
With Gyp Rossetti taking a week off to lick his wounds (and he is very sorely missed), Nucky finds himself waltzing into his old and most dishonest territory: Politics. He may not be the Atlantic City treasurer anymore, but gangster Nucky still understands the quiet war of backroom dealings, where lies are made and enemies are broken.
After Gaston Means’s assertion last week that US Attorney General Harry Daugherty must take down a bootlegger in order to save his own ass, Daugherty is already making moves towards Nucky.
Daugherty’s lies, and the consequences of them, form the base of the episode, most notably in the scene with Daugherty and Means at a boy scout’s banquet, listening to the troop leaders talk about honesty. Daugherty’s right-hand lackey is freaking out because he can’t handle the fact that he is dishonest and Daugherty and Means have to run the man out of the room as he starts crying.
Clearly, the lack of honesty is affecting the men and their business, Daugherty, finding himself in a corner, is ready to put Nucky in a corner of his own. Nucky sees this coming, however — and shrewd as ever, marches into Daugherty’s office and makes sure that the attorney general knows they’ll both go down if Nucky is indicted.
Daugherty responds by having Nucky thrown in jail for the night for possession of a pint of alcohol, just to show Nucky who’s boss.
In court the next day, Nucky’s judge makes it clear to everyone in the courtroom that he thinks prohibition is a waste of time and lets everyone go with a five dollar fine.
As is Nucky’s luck, the prosecutor working in the courtroom that day is Esther Randolph, the lady lawyer who almost took Nucky down for murder and extortion in season two. After Nucky escapes with a five dollar fine, he finds Esther and begins to make his play against Daugherty.
In a way, Nucky is just giving Esther the honest truth — her work as a prohibition prosecutor is a fruitless, bottomless endeavor, but, if she gets in league with Nucky, the two of them together could prosecute Ohio bootlegger George Remus instead of Nucky and bring Daugherty’s empire of lies down around him.
By the end of the episode, Nucky seems to have found himself a way out and Gaston Means seems poised to help them, even though the man’s motivations still aren’t clear.
Elsewhere, we find Gillian Darmody dealing with the slow downfall of her brothel in the worst way possible. Gillian is still unable to admit to herself that Jimmy is dead and her delusions about Jimmy are driving her ever more towards madness.
Still needing a way to control his estate (the brothel), Gillian runs off and finds a young man named Roger (who looks a bit like Jimmy) and brings him back with her. For Gillian, the lies are only getting bigger — instead of moving on from Jimmy, Gillian is slowly turning Roger into the new Jimmy.
Sure, it’s weird, but perhaps even creepier is that fact that her affair with Roger is also practical — if she won’t sign a death certificate, then having a fake Jimmy walking around will give Gillian control over the brothel, turning it into the upscale place she wants it to be, despite Luciano’s heroin-infused wishes.
Beyond this, the episode doesn’t offer much more — there’s set-up for Richard Harrow to possibly go find his sister, but really, his plotline seemed like filler in an episode that was already little more than mid-season filler.
Every stirring climax has to start somewhere, though, and if the last two seasons have been any indication, episode six was merely a jumping off point for the bigger and better storylines to come in the next half of the season.
Will Gyp get his revenge? Wil Nucky defeat Daugherty? Why is Gaston Means so creepy?
I honestly can’t wait to find out.
diversions@umdbk.com
