Season five of Longmire may be focused on that upcoming lawsuit but there is still room for a murder mystery, Vic possibly suffering from morning sickness and Cady having to defend a reservation woman from her brutish husband. “From This Day Forward” covers all three of these storylines, although Vic’s illness is a peripheral plot thread compared to the other two.
Two treasure hunters find a dead body stuffed inside a hollow tree. They believe it to be the corpse of another treasure hunter. The think the dead man followed a cryptic poem that contains clues to a “fortune” hidden in the area.
The corpse turns out to be the missing husband of Tizz Kaufman. A known philanderer who left his wife because of her mother’s treatment of him. All three lived together.
Walt tries to figure out how Tizz’ husband, who moved to Colorado, wound up dead in a hollow tree is Absaroka county. As the clues mount up Longmire realizes that Nancy Crandall, Tizz’ mother, was either having an affair with her son-in-law or killed him.
It turns out to be the latter. Nancy hired Raul, a former gangbanger turned firefighter to do the deed. As interesting as this storyline was, it felt quite familiar.
The stifling mother who kills her offspring’s spouse because they want to protect their baby from their horrible mate has been done before. In real life.
Crandall’s murder of Tizz’s husband eerily copies the real life murder of Arthur Duncan’s pregnant wife, Olga, by his mother; Elizabeth Ann “Ma” Duncan.
Both women were jealous of the relationship their children had with their spouses. Granted, “Ma” killed had her son’s wife and Crandall killed her daughter’s husband but the storyline is very similar to the real life murder committed back in 1958.
(Ma Duncan got the gas chamber for her crime as did the two men she hired. Her son missed her execution.)
In Longmire Crandall only hired the one man but the implication was that Raul’s boss may have been in it as well. Walt arrests Raul.
Vic is going through what appears to be morning sickness. Although she initially blames the nausea on her lox and bagels. She finally buys some pregnancy test kits to see if that might be the problem.
The other big storyline in episode seven of Longmire is the Asha and JP domestic abuse problem. Asha was introduced in the previous episode and this was when Cady got involved.
A restraining order was taken out, and Cady asked Walt in episode six to help her serve it to JP. Her father refuses, as he was working on another case.
JP drinks and he is not a happy drunk.. He refuses to honor the restraining order and approaches Cady and Asha a couple of times. At one point he lies to his wife telling her he is sober. Cady catches him out and JP leaves.
Later he returns with a gun and a bottle. Throwing the bottle to the side, he forces his way into Cady’s office. She and Asha are locked in the kitchen and he kicks the door in just as Cady loads two cartridges into the rifle that Jacob Nighthorse gave her.
After a short drunken rant about “From this day forward,” (part of the couple’s wedding vows) JP points his gun at Asha. Cady fires the rifle and the bullet hits on his left side. JP staggers back out of the kitchen.
He raises his gun and both he and Cady fire at the same time.
Fade to black and cue closing credits.
The whole shooting incident was signposted from the moment Nighthorse gives Cady the commemorative lever action rifle. We know that this weapon will become crucial later on. In that respect, the Cady storyline felt tacked on.
It seems like a chance for the series to address domestic abuse on the reservation, and as such, this section of the episode was the least believable. Surely Cady, in real life, would have approached the tribal police as well as Henry about finding shelter for Asha much earlier.
The gunplay at the end of the episode does make for a great cliff hanger ending. What will be interesting about the entire thing will be Walt’s reaction to Cady’s predicament.
As mentioned before, Longmire is not really himself this season. It may have something to do with that concussion but most likely his distraction is down to that lawsuit and Donna Sue.
The storyline dealing with the continued romance between the lawman and the doctor has yet to reach any sort of satisfying conclusion. They may never become a couple regardless of how hard they try to be flexible about where and when.
Their timing just feels…off.
Longmire, season five, is streaming on Netflix right now and all 10 episodes are available to watch at once or several at a time if the viewer prefers.
Tune in and see what you think of season five. There have been charges of character’s acting outside their norm. Have a look and let us know. Are characters “acting out?”
Cast:
- Robert Taylor – Walt Longmire
- Katee Sackhoff – Victoria “Vic” Moretti
- Lou Diamond Phillips – Henry Standing Bear
- Cassidy Freeman – Cady Longmire
- Adam Bartley – The Ferg
- Zahn McClarnon – Officer Mathias
- Ally Walker – Dr. Donna Sue Monaghan
- Graham Greene – Malachi Strand
- A Martinez – Jacob Nighthorse
- Louanne Stephens – Ruby
- Dan Donohue – Eddie Harp
- Chelsea Kurtz – Asha Wright
- Laura Regan – Tizz Kaufman
- Bess Armstrong – Nancy Crandall
- Jose Abril – Raul
- Roderick Hill – JP Wright
