Summary
A fiery penultimate episode in “The Great Ol’ Nazi Cookout of ‘77” leads directly into a finale with plenty of loose ends to tie up.
This recap of Hunters Season 1, Episode 9, “The Great Ol’ Nazi Cookout of ’77”, contains spoilers. You can check out our thoughts on the previous episode by clicking these words.
We’re very close to the end now, and Hunters Episode 9, “The Great Ol’ Nazi Cookout of ‘77”, has that late-game feeling. With yet more fusion of real history with the show’s narrative in the form of televised justifications for Operation Paperclip, an important development from Patricia (Francesca Faridany) that the pathogen can be destroyed at 500 degrees, and the news that Millie (Jerrika Hinton) has potentially found the base of Nazi syrup-poisoning operations, we have all the requisite ingredients for a combustible penultimate episode.
All roads lead Millie to Grimsby (James Le Gros), who is being blackmailed by Biff (Dylan Baker), bringing the previous episode’s cliffhanger to a head rather soon after the introduction that Grimsby was a Nazi associate. Then again it was introduced late in the season anyway, so it hardly matters. In a weird inversion, Biff suddenly seems a more true-to-life figure than the Colonel (Lena Olin), who, upon learning that Travis (Greg Austin) killed Tobias (Jonno Davies) rather than the other way around as she expected, officially initiates him into the order with a ludicrous blood-and-milk ceremony that doesn’t seem anywhere near as uncomfortably true as Biff’s insistence that Americans are, in large part, just as racist as Nazis.
With Roxy (Tiffany Boone) back in the fold after being sidelined for a couple of episodes and Mindy (Carol Kane) over her ordeal with Moritz and the loss of Murray, we have a full contingent of Hunters. Some last-minute cramming of backstory for Lonny (Josh Radnor) seems ill-advised, but a return to the show’s favorite pastime of torture opens up a fun, multi-faceted set-piece as the crew set about sabotaging the syrup plant. It’s a multi-pronged plan to cook the pathogen and disable the Nazis’ ability to move the tainted product. It erupts into chaos within which there is success – everything blows up and virtually everyone inside is killed – and failure, since the Colonel is able to escape.
Hunters Episode 9 thankfully doesn’t forget about the on-going characterization of Meyer (Al Pacino), who believes this to be the culmination of his righteous revenge quest, and Jonah (Logan Lerman), who had begun to lose himself to Meyer’s vengeful dramatics. It’s a fight with Travis which finally forces him to reckon with who he is, and Millie, perhaps unsurprisingly, who offers a voice of reason.
But that voice isn’t heard by Meyer.
