Deadwood "Bullock Returns to the Camp" Review (1x07)

“He was just trying to live, same as me, and do honor to his friend, and make some fucking sense out of things.”

After seeing unity develop over the plague, “Bullock Returns to the Camp” decides to take a slightly different approach to the characters by zeroing in on specific parallels between people. We’re not necessarily seeing everyone as one body just yet, but the point the show is trying to make is the fact that these people may be more similar than they think, the fact that when you come face to face with the product of very different circumstances, there is still always some type of connection to be found. We could be talking about Seth and the man he killed or Seth and Al or Cy and Al or Alma and Seth or Trixie and Joanie or pig 1 and pig 2; what matters is that they are in Deadwood, and something is forming.

Also in Deadwood now are Flora and Miles Anderson, two seemingly innocent–at first–kids trying to find their father. I’m not sure how long their storyline will run, but they’ve already made a notable impact on the other people we know, and their interactions with characters like Cy and Joanie and Al serve to shade in more of their characterizations; for example, there’s a clear difference in the way Cy and Al approach Flora and Miles, as while they both see the business opportunity here, Al seems to take a liking to the boy. Al’s a guy who won’t hesitate to assert his power and control–as we see later on with Trixie–but Cy’s someone who doesn’t seem as perceptive to what the town needs, someone who needs to have everything go his way at all times.

Through Flora and Miles, the episode delves into characters like Dan Dority and Joanie Stubbs, and in the case of the former, his internal struggle over Flora is reflected in the tension between him and a drunk (who ends up dead from a not-very-pleasant-looking wound). This kind of struggle can apply to many of the people in this town, as while it may be easy to characterize them as one way or another, there are always multiple sides that come into play; we see this with Dority’s demeanor around Flora being followed up by a fairly entertaining 180 around the men.

As for Joanie, she also takes a liking to Flora, and their talk in front of the mirror is reminiscent of the Cy-Joanie conversation from “Plague”. As much as Joanie may want some type of change, she and the other women in this town are still going to remain trapped in their situations; Flora is going to end up like her, and it’s difficult to change that. Someone like Trixie has certainly been working to change her life, but in the end, she’s going right back to the Gem and right back to Al. And because she has to face this fact, the resentment bubbles to the surface at the end as she speaks to Alma. “The point is, I gotta go back,” she says. “And you need someone to look to this child. With choices bigger elsewhere, and nothing I can tell to hold you here, maybe you better think about sellin’ and gettin’ out.” Trixie will never have that opportunity, and it’s easy to see why she’s so angry at the end; all her efforts are erased because Al caught a glimpse of Alma in the streets.

Back to Flora and Miles, though, both of whom are revealed to be con artists; this adds an extra layer to each of the scenes mentioned above, and although I’m not sure whether this is the better route or having them actually be innocents is the better route, I’m still intrigued by where we might go with them next. Perhaps this revelation suggests that in an environment like Deadwood’s, true innocence may not have a place.

GRADE: B+

OTHER THOUGHTS:

-Cocksucker count: 7

Total cocksucker count: 63

-Kristen Bell is adorable–I just re-watched a bunch of her Craig Ferguson bits, and you should seek those out if you haven’t already–and along with this role, she also showed up in The Shield before her wonderful three years as Veronica Mars.

– “Was I asleep, E.B., when you and me declared undying loyalty and full-faith mutual disclosure about every fucking detail of every fucking move we’re ever gonna fucking make together?”

-$19,500. Oh, E.B.

-One of my favorite scenes from the series so far: Charlie and Jane at Wild Bill’s grave. Another great Charlie scene: the one in which the card players recount how Wild Bill died, already creating a legend out of the death.

-Andy recovered, so that goes to show you that the people coming together to combat the disease is actually paying off. Also, Doc Cochran’s pretty good.

-So, Seth and Alma look to be getting closer to each other. I feel like the show is also drawing a few connections between them through their characterizations at the end: Alma with Trixie, and Seth with Al. They both feel a bit as if they’re above the others around them, and they both come across kind of negatively here as a result.

-Al monologue of the week: “Stand with us here a second…And out the door he’ll go, and prompt as a Swiss timepiece three big-tittied whores will now emerge from behind that screen. He lines ‘em up at two-foot intervals, smock-tops down, and all but sprints past ‘em, giving their titties a lick. And if he misses a titty, he does not let himself retrace his steps…And on he goes, on his way home, relieved for the day….Strange, huh, Miles? But something you gotta know about specialists. They pay a premium, and they never cause fucking trouble. I sometimes imagine, in my declining years, running a small joint in Manchester, England, catering to specialists exclusively. And to let them know they’re amongst their own, maybe I’ll operate from the corner, hanging upside-down like a fucking bat.”

– “Say what you’re gonna say, or prepare for eternal fucking silence.”