Two days after “Mad Men” wins its second straight Emmy for Best Drama and “Sons of Anarchy” opens the episode with Luanne shooting a porn parody. Coincidence? Perhaps, but I can’t help but think that Kurt Sutter planned for the expected win. Of course, the opening minutes also featured Bobby performing as Elvis at a Bar mitzvah, and it’s apparently beginning to take a toll on him. His time in prison has resulted in a pile of bills, and in an attempt to reward him for his services to the club, Clay assigns him to go take care of the bookkeeping at Luanne’s studio. She’s not at all happy with the idea of SAMCRO taking an even bigger bite out of her business, but as it turns out, Luanne also has something to hide. It doesn’t take long for Bobby to discover that Luanne has been skimming off the top over the last six years, and when he threatens to report it to the club, Luanne makes him an offer he can’t refuse. If Otto ever finds out about it, however, Bobby is as good as dead.
The same can be said of Ethan Zobelle and his gang of Neo-Nazis once Clay finally realizes what’s really going on with Gemma. Personally, I can’t believe three weeks have already passed, because Gemma is acting way too fragile for Clay not to be a little more suspicious. Their fight in the parking lot outside the porn studio seemed to be more about Clay not getting laid than Gemma not acting like herself. Wayne suggests that Gemma attend an out-of-town support group for sexual abuse survivors, but she quickly shoots down that idea – and just in time, too, since Tig was apparently just around the corner. I don’t think he heard anything, though, because he would have told Clay right away.
The meat of the episode this week revolved around Ethan Zobelle’s latest plan to force the Sons of Anarchy out of Charming, and it all hinders on convincing Deputy Chief Hale to join the witch hunt. Hale doesn’t like Zobelle’s idea of purposely bringing drugs into the town – thereby discrediting SAMCRO’s worth and Chief Wayne’s ability to control crime – but that doesn’t stop him from doing it anyway. When Opie and Half Sack catch a dealer selling meth at the mill (with Nords in tow), they go back to the club to get re-enforcements before beating the information out of him.
When they learn where Darby has set up his meth lab, Jax gives Hale the location to see if he can be trusted. Clay, meanwhile, tells Wayne all about their little test to keep him in the loop. It looks as if Hale is going to pass after he visits Darby’s base of operations (albeit without a warrant), but after speaking with Ethan about his reasoning for wanting the Sons out of Charming, his outlook suddenly changes and he lies to Jax about there ever being a meth lab. Not that it really matters, since SAMCRO just blows it up themselves, but I can’t believe that Hale would do business with Zobelle. Isn’t he supposed to be all about doing things by the books? Now that he’s resorted to his own crooked methods, however, there’s no going back. Oh yeah, and he just sided with the wrong bad guys.
Most television shows start off hot and then get increasingly…um…less satisfying as time goes on. This is not the case with “Supernatural.” The series started off with a definite “freak of the week” vibe and didn’t spend much time on its season-long story arcs. While it has always had its quirky sense of humor and excellent chemistry between its two stars (Jared Padalecki and Jensen Ackles) the show didn’t thrive in its first season — it survived. But over the course of its second, third and now fourth seasons, “Supernatural” just keeps getting better and better.
