WARNING: Spoilers Ahead!
Is there anyone Jax Teller isn’t willing to burn on his visionless quest for vengeance?
On the latest episode of “Sons of Anarchy,” titled “Playing with Monsters,” Teller turns an ally into an enemy in order to keep his misguided vendetta against Henry Lin alive. Meanwhile, one of the people who betrayed Jax seeks a way back into the club, while the new sheriff in Charming proves herself to be quite different from her predecessors.
Here’s what happened on this week’s “Sons of Anarchy”:
Marks Against August
August Marks, the newly anointed Gun King of NoCal, suspects Jax and the club killed the Chinese gun buyers during the “Toil and Till” massacre. “Don’t cross me, Jackson,” he warns. “I have no remorse killing you or any of the Sons.”
Jax doesn’t like threats, not one bit. Knowing that Marks won’t stand for Jax’s vendetta against the Lin Triad, Jax goes behind Marks’ back and contacts the Niners, the street gang that work directly for Marks. He helps the Niners take care of a renegade threat, and forges a new alliance with them, in order to earn their trust and goodwill for the day that Marks is no longer a factor.
Making matters worse, Jax enlists his Grim Bastards pals in attacking one of the Lin Triad’s massage parlors, under the false pretense that they’re working for Marks. In other words, Jax just put Marks on Lin’s radar in a very bad and very violent way.
Related: Kim Coates on Violence and Venus
The Jury’s Still Out
Meanwhile, the Lin Triad followed up on the club’s tip about who hit the gun buyers. Except they only find one body at the scene of the crime; the dead man that Jury was cradling in his arms is nowhere to be seen, so the club needs to dig in and find out more.
Later, when Bobby calls up Jury and asks for some intel, Jury plays it cool. He knows that Bobby’s lying about the blowback on the two henchmen, but Bobby doesn’t know what Jury knows. We still don’t know all of what Jury knows. Is the missing dead man Jury’s son? Someone else?
Either way, Jury quaking with silent fury makes it loud and clear: Jax has made yet another enemy, and this one lurks within the belly of the beat.
Juice’s Last Bid
Because he just can’t bring himself to leave Charming, Juice uses Unser to reach out to Chibs. He meets his old friend at a local cop diner, begging for one last chance at making things right with the club. Is there anything he can do to rejoin the Sons and make up with Jax?
Chibs has one idea: “If I were you, I’d get out a gun, put it in my mouth, and pull the trigger.”
Not the friendliest advice. Finally, Juice gets the point; he needs to leave Charming. At Gemma’s behest, Wayne and Wendy drive Juice to a motel outside of town, where he can lie low for a little while.
Related: Theo Rossi on Why Juice Can’t Trust Jax
The New Sheriff in Town
As it turns out, Juice has problems outside of the club. Charming’s new sheriff, Althea Jarry, wants to put out an APB on Juice, since he’s the only Son that hasn’t been questioned in Tara’s death. She puts out the word when she meets Jax for the first time, after a small-time assault involving Gemma and the father of an escort at one of SAMCRO’s legit enterprises. (More on that in a minute.)
That’s not all. Jarry also presses Jax on the Chinese’s possible involvement in Tara’s murder, based on intel passed along by Unser, by way of Juice. Even more intriguingly, Jarry seems to have her eye on Chibs. “Let’s connect later, Scotty,” she says to him on her way out the door.
“There’s a new sheriff in town, apparently looking for a profitable relationship,” Jax grins. Later, Chibs takes Jarry up on her offer, and meets her with some cash, and asks her not to put out the APB on Juice, as it’ll only bring more heat to the area. She says she’ll try to stall the order, but it’s above her pay grade. Regardless, it’s clear that Jarry’s a different animal from the David Hale and Eli Roosevelt eras of yesteryear.
Mother-Son Bonding Time
During the aforementioned scuffle, Gemma received a nasty punch to the face, prompting Nero to beat the snot out of the assailant, Mr. Hoss. But Hoss claims the assault was unprovoked, and plans to press charges against Gemma. What’s worse, the whole altercation took place in front of Abel.
Jax doesn’t like any of this. Neither does Gemma. The two pay a visit to Mr. Hoss, with Gemma pretending to come by interested in cake, drinks, and maybe even some other form of mea culpa. Instead, when Hoss lets her in, Jax storms through the door and beats the living daylights out of the man who punched his mother. Gemma watches with a dark smile on her face.
It’s worth noting that earlier in the episode, Gemma once again talks to the spirit of Tara: “When I think about where this all started, sometimes I wonder what would’ve happened if you didn’t come back. If Wendy hadn’t been such a mess. But then I look at them and I realize, it all happened the way it was supposed to happen. Everything, really.”
Well, at least Gemma is totally sane…
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