Summary
Sheriff Country‘s midseason finale builds to a pretty major cliffhanger. “Crucible, Part 1” is one of the series’s stronger outings and teases the death of a key character just as things seemed to be looking up.
Just like with Boston Blue, the midseason finale of Sheriff Country is one of its stronger episodes – and right on the back of an uncharacteristically weak one. Also, like Boston Blue’s latest, Episode 9 ends on a major cliffhanger, this one leaving the Edgewater Sheriff’s Department under siege, Assault on Precinct 13 style. And there might already be a tragedy. It’ll be a couple of months before we find out one way or the other.
The siege thing pertains to the episode’s A-plot. That sees two members of a local ranching family, the Barlows, getting into a dispute over the custody of their child. With a bit of pulling, this thread eventually reveals the Barlows as a kind of heavily-armed separatist group ready at a moment’s notice to take on the government. And while Mickey might not see herself that way, that’s certainly how the Barlows see her badge.
But the reason all this is engaging is because of all the character-driven subplots bundled up in it. Boone, Travis, and Cassidy are all in the building, and according to Cassidy, Travis is shot in the opening salvo, possibly even fatally. And the timing couldn’t be worse, since he and Mickey seem to have just decided to give their marriage another go.
Yeah, that’s the direction we were moving in after all. I did predict this, but then it seemed like we were heading more in the direction of Boone as Mickey’s potential paramour. I wouldn’t say that idea is completely off the table, but he doubles down on his efforts with Nora here, and Mickey and Travis jump into bed together at the top of “Crucible, Part 1”, so it certainly won’t be happening any time soon.
Is it more of a sibling dynamic? You could make a case for that. Mickey and Boone are former partners whose relationship was made complicated by her sheriff appointment; working a case together again here helps to rekindle some of that connection, but it’s ostensibly platonic. You never know, though. Boone deciding to really commit to sharing his feelings for Nora, only for bad service to cut the call short, suggests to me that Sheriff Country is avoiding having him commit. If Travis ends up dead… well, you never know.
This isn’t the only thing going on. Cassidy gets a surprising – and welcome! – amount of focus in Sheriff Country Episode 9, as she and Hank respond to a call about a woman domestically abusing her partner. This woman turns out to be Cassidy’s mother, who is clearly suffering from some quite serious mental issues. This either stems from or is exacerbated by – it’s honestly a little unclear – the sudden disappearance of Cassidy’s sister many years prior. The case was never solved, and thus neither Cassidy nor her mother has ever been able to move on from it. For Cass, there’s some solace to be taken in not knowing the outcome, since she’s aware of the statistics, and the uncertainty allows her to believe that her sister might be alive. But for her mother, the lack of closure has ruined her life, and continues to.
This essentially creates a small whodunit within the larger story that Sheriff Country is telling, and I’m sure it’ll rope in a few more characters before it’s over, but it creates a nice bond between Cass and Hank in the meantime (is there a romance blossoming here? Unclear). I’m sure this will be picked back up in short order, but the attack on the sheriff’s department is likely to take precedence when the show returns for its midseason premiere. I’m sure fans will be looking forward to it much more now than they were before.
