The almost 2-hour series finale of Sons of Anarchy has just come to an end. These are my initial reactions – if you haven’t watched it yet stop reading now.
Last week’s episode was the big confrontation we were all waiting for. The one that Jemma and the rest of us were fearing/wanting/waiting for the entire season. That all happened in last week’s episode.
This week. This time around. This was Jax’s swan song in more ways than one. A lot of times guys in SAMCRO when things catch up to them. A lot of guys die out of nowhere. For Jax Teller, the entire episode felt like Jax was allowing things to catch up with him. He was tired and he was finished.
He knew it was too late for him. His father was long gone. His best friend was long gone. His best friend was gone. His stepfather was gone. His wife was gone – and now his mother was gone. Whether he pulled the trigger or not, he was part of all of these deaths. And he was just tired. He finally was going to give Tara her long time wish and get the boys out.
The boys deserved a real life, a live that he knew he could never give them. He even said that he wanted them to grow up knowing he was a bad man – hoping that knowledge would keep them away from the life forced upon him. He knew that his killing of another charter’s murder meant the end for him, so he made damn well sure that on his way out he was going to take care of both of his families.
He made sure that Nero got Wendy and his boys out of town – and hopefully they’d eventually stay out for good. He made sure that Wendy would be set up with the boys to give them a good life. Actually taking care of that family proved to be fairly simple – at least in comparison to what he needed to do to take care of his SAMCRO brothers.
He had nothing to lose and the club had everything to gain. Jax killed one of the Irish Kings and set things up so the the club can finally get out from under the green thumb of the Irish. One problem solved. He walked right in on Borowski (maybe my favorite moment of the night) and took him out, ruining a few bagels in the process. And, after taking the blanket from that homeless lady (that was a little weird) he ambushed Marx and took him out.
He was able to get revenge AND clear up some loose ends or the club.
And because Jax killed Jury, his charter had to give him a “Mayhem Vote” – basically a death sentence. I always figured this was code in case anyone was listening they could always claim they never mentioned anything about anybody getting killed.
So the club voted for Jax to meet “Mr. Mayhem” which we all thought was going to be a bullet in the head (I had no idea how long this episode was so after a while I realized it could have ended anywhere). But it didn’t end with a head shot. Instead the club let him go and would cover for him. This way SACMCRO would not take any heat from other charters for not following through with Mr. Mayhem.
And in one of the best scenes of the entire show, Jax (after having one last spiritual talk with his dad) took a shot at a cop, missing on purpose – to start a massive chase. Dozens of cop cars and bikes all chasing Jackson Teller as he rides, without his helmet, his #FinalRide.
In that Final Ride, we got our finale SAMCRO montage (Sutter loves a good montage) set to this frigging perfect song.
Within this montage we see D.A. Patterson (CCH Pounder is so awesome in everything she does) figure out what Jax meant when he said the violence would end by the end of the day. I think she realized that he was done and he was going out in a blaze of glory.
But not a blaze of gun fire. I was thinking he might take the “suicide by cop” option – then I was afraid he might “Thelma & Louise” it off a ledge. But in the end, he just let go. He let go and well – we finally got to see what the episode title “Papa’s Goods” meant. That was the only “Really?” moment for me – that the truck that killed Jax was the same one that brought Gemma to see her dad.
Actually I just realized with Michael Chiklis, now everybody on the Shield task force and almost all the cops in that precinct have been on Sons of Anarchy at some point.
But besides that coincidence, the final moments of Jax and the show were downright poetic. And again it really has a lot to do with that song bringing it all together.
I was expecting a lot more death – to the SAMCRO boys actually. I knew that anybody was fair game. Hell, I thought Tig would’ve been dead seasons ago and yet he lives on. And I thought there was no way Nero was getting to that farm – he wasn’t getting a happy ending.
But he did. And with Jax’s death – the club gets to live on. Maybe not a happy ending, but a solution to their problems. They didn’t kill Jax, but after he got away he died anyway. And now Chibs is the new President and Tig is the new VP.
Jax’s children and his brothers are able to move on towards a new tomorrow. That is what allowed him to just let go….
Follow Mike on twitter at @geekmentality.
Follow Fan Not Experts on twitter @fansnotexperts.
To buy “Come Join The Murder” by “The White Buffalo & The Forest Rangers” (that’s right, two bands – and not Eddie Vedder like I thought) check out the SAMCRO Soundtrack on iTunes.
And check out TheWhiteBuffalo.com and TheForestRangers.com (the latter of the two sometimes features Gemma herself Katy Sagal)
It’s very late and I’m very tired – so if none of this made sense or was just factually wrong – this is me making an excuse!
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