Dead Bodies and...What? No Cliffhanger? Review: Justified, Season 4 Finale "Ghosts"

Season 4, Episode 13

Air date: Tuesday, April 2, 2013, 10PM E/P on FX

Rating: ★★★★★

“I’m going to find the guy responsible for this and I’m gonna take care of it.” – Raylan

Will Raylan be a good daddy? If he lives long enough…he will be.

What happened to epic season finales? Especially for a show as ingrained with gun slingin’ and outlawin’ as Justified. There is one intense moment almost immediately when Raylan (Timothy Olyphant) is confronted by some of Nicky Augustine’s (Mike O’Malley) guys who are holding Winona (Natalie Zea) hostage but then things become subdued…too much from my perspective. Of course, now that someone has tried to hurt Raylan’s family, he’s out for payback, yet the outcome turns out to be quite unexpected. I guess he does care about his job, suspension or not.

To say I’m disappointed is an understatement. “Ghosts” doesn’t leave us with much of a cliffhanger, and we don’t we see any ghosts, either. I thought for sure Arlo (Raymond Barry) would return post-mortem to give Raylan a hard time; my hopes for Theo Tonin’s (Adam Arkin, not seen) big entrance are dashed when he flees the country leaving his wimpy brother Sammy (Max Perlich) in charge of his Detroit kingdom. And the cards up Boyd’s (Walton Goggins) sleeve to help save Ava (Joelle Carter) seem good in theory until he’s double-crossed by the Clover Hill boys he double-crossed. What a twisted mess! The whole body switch at the morgue is just ill-conceived and executed poorly, both in writing and in the execution. I can’t blame the actors, much, because they’re only working with what they were given, which isn’t much.

Boyd picked an even more decrepit body to replace Delroy’s in the morgue…

What the hell was Ava thinking anyways, trying to move Delroy’s (William Mapother) decrepit remains all by herself? It’s almost like she wanted to get caught. She doesn’t seem the type to handle looking over her shoulder for the rest of her life very well. And if you think it’s Ellen May (Abby Miller) who spills the dirt, —she does, offhandedly—in actuality it’s Cassie (Lindsay Pulsipher) who rats on Ava. Boyd inadvertently killed her brother so naturally she wanted revenge…she just didn’t know how she would manage it.

Wouldn’t it have been nice to see what happened to Johnny (David Meunier), if anything? Did Nicky kill him? Did Boyd get to him? And why did Limehouse (Mykelti Williamson) let Ellen May go without any compensation? Was it out of the kindness of his heart? It’s highly unlikely, from what we’ve seen of his actions, but anything could happen. I’m stumped, to say the least, about why “Ghosts” was such a dismal finale. Aside from knowing Justified has been renewed for season five, I can’t begin to fathom what adventures lie ahead for our Harlan County residents except for Boyd partnering up with Wynn Duffy (Jere Burns) to be his heroin man in Kentucky and trying to find a way to get Ava out of jail.

And I was truly hoping the writers would elaborate a bit more on Rachel’s (Erica Tazel) story line. She left her husband and started getting a bit more…ballsy, if you will. It pains me when the show has such wonderful characters and actors to play them yet under-utilize them. Same goes for Tim (Jacob Pitts). He shoots and kills Colton (Ron Eldard) in a tense showdown and that’s it. We get nothing else. What’s the point of introducing Army Ranger/Sniper veteran without embellishing more on his back story or giving him the opportunity to shine a little? I will say, I did enjoy Raylan showing us what he’s really made of when he takes out three thugs holding a pregnant Winona hostage in the baby’s nursery of all places.

“Ghosts” is a very disenchanting season finale. It has brief moments of suspense but that can’t salvage the episode. I can only hope the writers are saving their goodies for the season five opener.

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Justified will return for season five in 2014.

For more on the show, go to http://www.fxnetworks.com/shows/originals/justified/.

Follow FX on Twitter and use hashtag #JustifiedFX.

Follow cast members Joelle Carter @Joelle_Carter and Jim Beavers @jumblejim on Twitter.

For fans of Walton Goggins, follow @WaltonGFan.

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Judy Manning

Dream chaser extraordinaire! Judy tends to be a tad sarcastic and kind of goofy! She is an avid admirer of all things supernatural, paranormal, celestial and mystical. She loves to read, write, and watches way too much TV. She enjoys many genres of film and music (and let's be honest, most music from the 80s). She also has a wicked sweet tooth. Cupcakes beware.