I ran a 5K in realfeel 12-degree weather this morning and thought I knew cold… until I watched this week’s 1923.
The blizzard Jake and Cara knew was coming arrives in Episode 2, and, well, there’s a reason the episode is called “The Rapist Is Winter:” By the end of the hours, several characters are totally effed.
Read on for the highlights of the hour.
TO THE SLOPES! | Let’s start with someone who has ice in his heart 365 days a year. Donald Whitfield and Banner Creighton are on a drive when we learn that Banner’s entire flock of sheep — aka the reason he got involved in the whole war with the Duttons — have died of an illness. Whitfield thinks this is funny. “All it took was a worm to destroy everything you fought for,” he say, chuckling as he gloats that mining for gold is a far more stable business. The conversation abruptly stops when Whitfield notices men skiing down the side of a nearby mountain; Banner says it’s Norwegian miners, and he didn’t see the harm in allowing them their sport. “You must take me to them, now!” Whitfield replies, suddenly inspired.
“Skiing. Explain it,” Whitfield asks the workers after he and Banner climb up the hill. So the man does, with Whitfield peppering him with questions throughout. “The one thing you cannot buy in a store is the euphoria of peril, the exhilaration of danger,” Whitfield tells Banner later, already smelling the overpriced apres-ski hot cocoa. “I can sell that for a fortune.” Banner later confides in his countryman, Clyde, that Whitfield’s ability to see men’s natures — and the worst, most manipulable sides of them — “scares me to death.”
THE BEST ENDING ZANE AND ALICE COULD HOPE FOR | Jake and Sheriff McDowell go to see the judge handling the case against Alice, Zane’s wife. The judge is certain she’s guilty of miscegenation and is only trying to decide how tough to make her sentence; the fact that he refers to Zane and Alice’s children as “mongrels” doesn’t indicate that he’s planning to be lenient. Jake suggests that Zane and his family be remitted to his custody, to live on the ranch, which would save the state all the money involved in holding them. But the judge maintains that Alice needs to provide the name of the priest who married her and Zane, so he can be punished, as well. “This is as far as I care to be pushed,” Jake warns him, leaning closer and smelling the liquor fumes coming from the man’s coffee cup. All it takes is the threat of arrest from the sheriff — remember, we’re in Prohibition times — and the judge begrudgingly signs the family over to Jake’s care.
One major problem: The injuries Zane sustained while trying to defend his family have left him unable to stand for more than a minute; based on his description of the “knife in his brain” and my many seasons of watching ER, I’m going to diagnose him with something neurological. It’s rough going before a blizzard sets in; Jake and his men flip the wagon, get everyone under its cover and then set the horses loose in an attempt to keep them alive.
A LADY MARSHAL?! | A glowing Teonna and Pete return to camp the next morning with news of the cowboy they saw; Runs His Horse is dismayed to learn that the land they’re on is no longer a reservation. He rides off to see if he can find the rancher who now owns the land, warning them to stay hidden until he returns.
Meanwhile, Father Renaud and the marshals are in Oklahoma, where they’re shocked to learn that the local U.S. marshal is a woman named Mamie Fossett (played by Dexter’s Jennifer Carpenter). She says she’ll put out wanted posters for Teonna, but she warns her fellow marshals to tread lightly in the Comanche Nation — advice that at least one of them scoffs at.
The priest and his marshals are making camp that night when they’re attacked by a band of Native Americans. One of the marshals is killed; the other presses a gun into Renaud’s hand and instructs him on when to fire. The two white men manage to drive off their attackers, mainly by killing most of them. Renaud seems horrified by what he’s done, but Marshal Kent reassures him that he’ll still get into Heaven if he just asks for forgiveness — then the marshal casually fires a bullet into the head of an assailant who’d been injured and was trying to crawl away.
MEET THE (MOB) BOSS | Spencer and Luca put ashore in Galveston, Texas, and immediately connect with Luca’s cousin, Maceo (played by Switched at Birth’s Gilles Marini), who thanks Spencer for saving the younger man’s life. Spencer takes one look at the contraband booze stockpiled in the backroom of the upscale establishment Maceo runs and realizes that the dude is in the Mob. That point is driven home when Spencer tries to leave and Maceo’s business associate flashes his gun and lets Spencer know that to refuse the boss’ hospitality “is an insult.” So Spencer knocks the man out, takes his bullets, and begins the slow walk to the mainland and its train station. When the henchman (and a few more) find Spencer, they take him down. “You’re lucky he wants you alive,” the big guy says before the beating begins.
Tunrs out, Maceo has a job for Spencer: He gives him a truck, a map, some bribe money and a gun, and tasks him with getting his whiskey to Fort Worth. He’ll send Luca back by train with the money, and the truck will be Spencer’s to keep to help him get home sooner.
Meanwhile, the ship Alex is on is having a hell of a time making it through a storm. All around her, her fellow passengers are screaming and praying as water sprays in around the portholes and people are thrown from their bunks. Alex has to hold on with both hands in order to keep her preggo self in one spot, but we’re distracted from the terror by her voiceover of the fan fiction — er, journal to Spencer — that she’s been keeping. “It is my only thought, my only desire. Your eyes upon me, your arms around me, and our bodies pressed together as if they are one,” she purrs while Ursula has her way with the poor unfortunate souls in steerage.
ELIZABETH HAS HAD IT | Elizabeth has her second run-in with Montana wildlife when she comes face-to- face with a wolf as she goes to gather eggs one morning. The hungry animal chases her out of the coop, managing to bite her leg before one of the ranch hands shoots a gun and scares it off. “Mother of God,” Cara says after she’s sent the worker for help, given that they fear the wolf was rabid, “if it weren’t for bad luck, you’d have none at all.”
When Dr. Miller and his nurse show up, he guesses that the wolf probably wasn’t rabid… but they’d best give Elizabeth the rabies shots anyway, just to be safe. The protocol involves injecting the medicine into her belly with a very large needle; it’s no surprise that Elizabeth is NOT down with this decision. But despite her verbal and physical refusal, she’s held down and injected anyway; the incident leaves a mark on everyone, including Cara, who later finds Elizabeth sobbing on her bed
“It’s too much,” the younger woman gasps out. “I love him, but this isn’t living. This is surviving, barley at that.” Cara gives her a pep talk about how spring in the mountains will make everything better, but Elizabeth vows she won’t be there to see it: “When the storm passes, I’m going home.”
THE WOLF AT THE DOOR (AND ON THE SOFA) | Later that night, Cara wakes up when she hears a thump and a woman’s scream from downstairs. She grabs a gun and descends to find the parlor covered with a light dusting of snow, blown in from the door that’s bumping open and shut. And then, when she hears a growl, Cara looks over to see a wolf feasting on Dr. Miller’s nurse, who had chosen to sleep on the couch instead of in Cara’s bed upstairs. The animal looks Cara dead in the eye and lunges for her, and as we go to black, a shot is fired and Cara screams.