Pretty much everyone dies in American Primeval, which is to be expected. Nobody thought a happy ending was coming to any of these characters, even if a couple get pretty close, but Episode 6 is full of more tragedies and atrocities than even I thought it would be. The show started with a massacre and ended with one, and little was learned in-between, which is about as accurate an American origin story as you could really ask for.
The few glimmers of light come from an unlikely love story, even though the finale doesn’t let it progress any further. But despite the tragic circumstances Sara and Isaac really do represent the beating heart of the show, and even in Isaac’s absence, Sara, Devin, and Two Moons make it out relatively unscathed and heading for their next adventure. So, we might as well start with them.
Isaac and Sara Can’t Be Together
It has been obvious for several episodes that Isaac and Sara have fallen for each other, but the finale confirms it unambiguously. However, even if they could put their respective circumstances aside to be together, which they decide not to, Isaac also gets killed, which doesn’t help matters.
Episode 6 of American Primeval begins with Isaac rescuing Sara from Virgil and Lucas, leading to the death of the former but not the latter, which will come to matter later. Devin and Two Moons are able to fight off some wolves for long enough that everyone is reunited and sets out on the final leg of their journey to Crooks Springs together.
Since making it there seemed so unlikely, nobody anticipated how difficult it would be to say goodbye. Devin, who has come to see Isaac as his surrogate father, has no interest in meeting his biological one. Even Sara knows that they’re unlikely to be welcomed with open arms, but since there’s still a bounty out on her head, she needs to settle somewhere where Devin will be protected in her absence.
Sara and Isaac confess their feelings and share a smooch before they part ways, but they do part ways. However, while he’s retracing their steps, Isaac comes across the creepy French doll that made its way from the camp of disfigured French rapists – maybe check out the full season recap for more on that – to Lucas’s saddlebag. Isaac realizes that Lucas has followed them and races back to save Sara, but he takes a bullet in the effort.
Sara sits with Isaac while he dies, and later, she, Two Moons and Devin cremate him. They decide to set out for California together rather than settling in Crooks Springs.
The Fate of Fort Bridger
(L to R) Kim Coates as Brigham Young and Alex Breaux as Wild Bill Hickman in Episode 102 of American Primeval. Cr. Courtesy of Netflix © 2024
Anyone with a cursory knowledge of history likely knew that Fort Bridger wasn’t going to make it, but it’s still a crying shame to see it burn. If nothing else, it’s just frustrating to see Brigham Young get his own way.
But get his own way he does. If nothing else, though, Jim remains as stubborn as ever. He remains drunk and jubilant even as his fort burns around his ears, and the saloon is packed with revelers even as the flames lick the walls. A few of them probably die, but Jim doesn’t. He takes the shovel he used to chop Wild Bill’s foot in half along with a few bags of money and happily walks away, a final act of spite even in the face of utter defeat.
This scene is deliberately juxtaposed with one of Bridgham’s sermons which accuses everyone else of doing to the Mormons what we’ve seen the Mormons do to everyone else throughout American Primeval. If the ending is about anything – beyond fire and death, of course – it’s probably about irony.
The Shoshone Go To War
Brigham also gives the Nauvoo Legion the go-ahead to attack the Shoshone camp, and they take Jacob with them after picking him up on the road earlier in the hopes of killing two birds with one stone. If they can get rid of him and his wife, there are no remaining witnesses who know what happened during the Meadows Massacre (except for Isaac, who’s dead, and Sara, Devin, and Two Moons, who’re nowhere near.)
What they don’t anticipate, though, is the Shoshone being ready for them. Thanks to Abish and Red Feather they were prepared well in advance, so they ambush the Mormons as they approach in full war regalia. But they’re heavily outnumbered and fighting a losing battle, one that ends, predictably, in tragedy.
At least Wolsey dies, though – Red Feather kills him. But he also does enough damage to Red Feather that he’s on death’s door himself, so when Young Elk hugs him in the midst of the melee, he can do nothing but hold out while they’re both skewered with arrows and bullets.
Jacob and Abish meet an almost Shakespearean end. The former doesn’t recognize the latter as she’s wearing Shoshone war paint, and he shoots her by mistake. Once he realizes this, he gives her a snotty kiss while she dies and then, blessedly, takes his own life. They both end up dead in a heap. Even Winter Bird doesn’t make it.
This is not, needless to say, a happy ending for anyone, but American Primeval never set out to be about happiness. In that regard, at least, Episode 6 performs exactly as advertised, bringing a messy, bloody story to a messy, bloody conclusion.
