‘Sons Of Anarchy’ Recoil: The Destruction Of ‘The Mad King’
Wow.
So anyone who hasn’t seen the latest episode of Sons of Anarchy, entitled “The Mad King,” is better off stopping here to remain spoiler-free. After this point, it’s all Sons of Anarchy, all the time.
The latest Sons episode is emotionally jarring on so many levels. In it we learn Marshall Lee Torric’s death at the hands of Otto Delaney will make Tara’s legal problems that much worse. After the death of two Sons—Filthy Phil and a prospect—at the hands of the Irish, Jax is churning for revenge. But despite the setbacks stemming from him him running the club solo, he’s still keeping Chibs and the rest of the Sons of Anarchy table in the dark.
His latest effort: after the club stakes out the Irish’s haunts and corner their men, Jackie-boy reaches out to the Irish Kings on the Sons’ behalf, offering them August Marks—Damon Pope’s lieutenant—as a replacement pipeline for the Irish gun distribution. As Chibs later tells him, a simple consultation with his VP, a former member of the IRA (and character with his own Facebook fan page), and Jax would have known that the racist Irish Kings would never have accepted a deal with a black man representing black interests. The Kings tell Jax he’ll get a call on one of the burner phones back at the Sons’ clubhouse at 8 p.m. (oddly specific, no?).
Suddenly, Gemma gets a call from Stockton, saying Clay wants to set up a conjugal visit. Now, she’s still hot and heavy with Nero, so there’s no way she needs some loving from the former Sons of Anarchy president. But a conjugal visit is also the only place where a meeting won’t be recorded, and it’s Clay’s only way to get info back to the club on the sly. He tells Gemma that the Irish have reached out to him to run the gun business, making it pretty clear their decision with what to do about the Sons. But the guards want a show; she paid for a conjugal and they want to watch, or one of them will rape her. While it was horrible, the choice was easy for her to make, and she leaves, sullied and defiled, to go back to the Sons’ clubhouse.
Sheriff Roosevelt rolls up to Teller-Morrow at a few minutes ’til 8 o’clock. The Sons of Anarchy clubhouse is on lockdown and their all ready to go to the table and vote once the call comes in from the Irish. But something’s not right: there/s a shamrock pen on the counter from the latest beer delivery. And why were the Irish so specific about when the Sons had to be back at the clubhouse for their call? Everyone hits the bricks, with Jax just barely getting Abel out before the clubhouse explodes.
Wow. Talk about going out with a bang. Total anarchy.
The Sons of Anarchy Motorcycle Club’s Redwood charter is without a home. What impact will this have on how Jax runs the club? Will he learn from his missteps and start looping the rest of the Sons in or will he keep running roughshod, doing things the same way Clay did? Look at where it got him.
The immediate emotional impact from that conjugal visit is incredible, twisting and turning the audience inside-out. It even affected the people on set as part of the Sons of Anarchy crew.
“In the end, it’s just so sad because of the intimacy they once had, and that they’re now having it again, in a way, but only because they’re so sorry that this has to happen. There’s a certain empathy and respect for each other in that moment, even though the relationship is over,” director Gwyneth Horder-Payton told Entertainment Weekly.
“It was difficult. I cried a lot while I was directing. It was awful.”
