“Sold Under Sin” (S1, Ep 12)
Over the course of ‘Deadwood’s first season, Reverend Henry Weston Smith (played by Ray McKinnon, who would go on to create the series’ “Rectify”) gradually loses control over body and mind. By the time our first finale rolls around, the priest is having intense seizures, frequently, and has nearly lost the ability to remember a conversation in detail – let alone recognize who his true friends are. He confesses to Seth Bullock and Sol Star (Timothy Olyphant and John Hawkes) that he is frightened by devils he fears surround him. Seth, our idealistic lawman, has been taking his deeply repressed rage out on the Reverend. Thus, the clergyman’s inability to recognize the blurry line between good and evil is understandable, health deterioration aside. Smith is later dragged, by sled, through the muddy thoroughfare; “Custer’s Avengers” ride through town, jingoistic marching music in the background. Most of the series’ players are strung together across this sequence. Seth picks up the silver star, pinning it on himself; despite knowing how often he lets emotion get the best of him, but recognizing his destiny within the community, a purpose worth enacting. By contrast, it is Al, who ends up putting the poor preacher out of his misery, smothering the sickly man with a wash rag, pragmatically describing the process as not so different from packing a snowball. Al knows what needs to be done, and Al knows what he is capable of. Walking that line is not always so easy, especially when you’re living comfortably. “Deadwood” is a series concerned with ailments from which we all suffer, understanding that being keenly aware of one’s own sense and sensibilities is part of how we all find our place in the world. “Sold Under Sin,” is an excellent episode, a testament to a season of respectfully measured pacing control.
“A Lie Agreed Upon: Parts I & II” (S2, Ep 1-2)
“Deadwood,” perhaps, never defines Al Swearengen’s moral sense of right and wrong as clearly as it does in the second season’s two-part premiere – the show’s sole, official two-hour episode. Milch builds to an ending of utter pathos by taking the classic Wild West showdown and stripping its essence down to an unflinching, ugly street fight. (The show would use the device again, similarly, to even more uneasy effect, in the Season 3 episode, “A Two-Headed Beast”). The entire two hours are an exercise in tension surrounding this standoff – an act itself rooted in unspoken rules of honor, a series of lies agreed upon. The event is punctuated by the famous line: “Welcome to fucking Deadwood!” Everyone expects the outcome of the situation to end in bloodshed, but Al holds out his hand. Spinning a tale of Reverend Smith’s body being discovered, by the side of the road, murdered by heathens. The viewer knows the real story, but that doesn’t mean the history books will. Deadwood’s newspaperman, A.W. Merrick (Jeffrey Jones), later asks the sheriff for his statement on the confrontation. He refuses, and the Black Hills Pioneer founder angrily exclaims that this whole town makes him wonder if there is a point to the First Amendment even existing. Al, meanwhile, resigns to a tame telling of this local clash of the titans for the Pioneer. For truth and decency need not be at odds, says the newspaper man. Except when it comes to writing the unspoken rules of history, might be the more pragmatic philosophy. Al Swearengen is a man who can see when an idea is larger than himself, as one of his closest confidants puts it; he’s the most honorable man you’ll ever meet. At least, when he’s not lying to you.
“Amalgamation & Capital” (S2, Ep 9)/“Advances, None Miraculous” (S2, Ep 10)
This writer treasures the entirely of “Deadwood’s second season (I wish I could include every episode on here), but the last four episodes are arguably four of the best episodes in the history of television, and I genuinely feel the need to include all of them on this list; its entire construction is simply on a different level, and “Amalgamation & Capital’s” end sequence, in particular, is so viscerally effective, that it makes clear much of the overarching plotting of the season, inevitably overshadowing the season’s incredibly confident middle section with an odious emotional wallop. The hardest thing for any parent to go through is watching their child die; thus the tragedy of William Bullock’s (Josh Eriksson) demise and Tom Nuttall’s (Leon Rippey) bike ride is nothing short of absolutely devastating. The death of William could easily be seen as trite method of earning cheap drama points (especially now, that we’re all Bran being thrown out a window desensitized), not so with how young boy’s passing is handled. The hour quietly foreshadows the encroaching shock of its final image’s inescapable impact.
The show then sits the viewer beside poor William – alongside his parents – as he passes on, allowing the audience an entire episode to emotionally process this absolutely terrible occurrence. If you’ve ever sat beside a loved one while their standard of living deteriorates, and you haven’t watched “Deadwood,” well… you should seriously consider watching “Deadwood.” From Reverend Smith’s seizure episodes to William Bullock’s deathbed, Milch’s series knows what it feels like to sit next to someone we love, helplessly, before they leave us. Like the death of Wild Bill Hickok, the incident that mortally wounds William Bullock instantly seems to freeze the insides of the entire community. Like “The Trial of Jack McHall,” “Advances, None Miraculous,” acts as the back-half of a two-hour tearjerker. The first part is the story of how William Bullock lost his life over the course of a single day, the second hour, we share in the process of his passing. The drama isn’t just metaphorically heartbreaking, it’s downright sentimentally wounding. The fact that part 2 opens on a pair of black men, expressing the possibility that they could very well be lynched, if suspected of being involved in the boy’ death, is all the more discomforting. This is a show that knows what kind of mood it needs to set. And when Cy Tolliver (Powers Booth) acts genuinely concerned about another’s well being… well, you know shit’s gotten serious. ‘Amalgamation’ & ‘Advances’ are two of the most emotional episodes the series ever produced, but the payoff to season 2 was just beginning.