Deadwood "Full Faith and Credit" Review (3x04)

“People are strange about things, Charlie.”

“Full Faith and Credit” isn’t an episode featuring big, sweeping changes in the Deadwood world, but it revolves around important steps forward in the community and for the characters involved. They may be small steps, but these negotiations and conflicts of ownership and deal-making are just as much a part of community life as, say, a bank is. The show is really pushing the idea of real estate ownership here, whether that be through the Jack-Joanie discussions about selling the schoolhouse or through the Steve-Hostetler conflict about the livery; we also have the big Al-Hearst conflict that’s by extension about the way of life in Deadwood itself. It’s an interesting way to get everyone in on the action and to expand on one of the biggest themes of the series: lies agreed upon in order to advance as a society.

I’m also glad that this Steve-Hostetler plot allows Timothy Olyphant–one of the greatest men walking the earth at the moment–to play a bigger role as Bullock here. What’s great about this show is that subplots like this don’t only exist to serve the main characters…yet they do anyway because the writers understand their characters so well. It’s nice not only to return to some colorful characters of earlier episodes, but also to further explore Bullock dealing with others (it’s fun watching impatient Seth as well).

Even though the show is moving forward, it doesn’t lose sight of past events that have shaped who these characters are. We’re reminded of the grief Bullock and Martha are dealing with due to the death of William, Alma seems to be getting back on drugs again, and Al’s masterful blowjob monologue connects his time in the orphanage with his Hearst difficulties in the present. What we know about these characters is reframed within the context of the new developments in the town, and it’s yet another fantastic example of the show’s characters driving story.

GRADE: B+

OTHER THOUGHTS:

-Cocksucker count: 7

Total cocksucker count: 252

– “She’d make the uses of money available for people in the camp who ain’t belligerent cocksuckers. Short of following you around with her fucking mine on her back, how else is she supposed to do it?”

-And now, an excerpt from Al’s monologue: “Another one that held me down, that fuckin’ proctor when I tried to get to that ship. He fuckin’ held me, fuckin’ wouldn’t let me go. Fucking my mind, you see? She was being restrained. Couldn’t get back off that had got on the boat to New Orleans to go suck prick in Georgia. She changed her mind and—and I was being restrained by that fat bastard orphanage proctor. Anyway, that’s it. That’s the end of it. That’s the fucking conclusion. Christ, I’d have wished to—though probably she’d have thrown me overboard anyway–but I’d have wished to get to that fucking ship. But I was being restrained. I couldn’t get from where she’d left me. He held me to that bed, her calling from the ship that had changed her mind.”