Why Is Judge Guy's Leather Notebook In Justified: City Primeval So Important? - SlashFilm (2024)

Television

FX

ByJeremy Smith/July 18, 2023 11:15 pm EST

The world has changed dramatically in the eight years since "Justified" signed off with one of the haunting final moments in television history ("We dug coal together"), but as we witnessed repeatedly in the first episode of "Justified: City Primeval," U.S. Marshal Raylan Givens, portrayed yet again with sly self-assurance by Timothy Olyphant, is still the same ornery, rule-breaking lawman. This is excellent news for fans of the series, but it's not necessarily great for Raylan or the people drawn into his trouble-chasing-and-making orbit.

Based in part on a Givens-less novel by Elmore Leonard, this revival finds the marshal struggling to make sense of a fractured society where his rough-and-tumble antics are viewed with disgust by folks like defense attorney Carolyn Wilder (Aunjanue Ellis), whose clients occasionally wind up on the business end of a Givens-administered whupping. He's out of his element in Detroit, Michigan, a metropolis that's dangerous (and, it seems, deeply corrupt) in ways that differ from his old, rural Kentucky stomping grounds.

This shouldn't be a problem for Givens, as he's just blowing through town to testify about his role in arresting a couple of incompetent perps. But his timing stinks. He happens to arrive on the day the judge hearing this case (Keith David) is nearly blown to smithereens by a car bomb. Suddenly, he's tasked with assisting local marshals in tracking down the would-be assassins, and, wouldn't you know it, that seemingly simple errand turns into a massive cluster-cuss that may be partially rooted in widespread civic malfeasance. Get comfy, Raylan. You're not escaping the Detroit anytime soon.

FX

That David's grumpy Judge Alvin Guy asks Givens to co-lead the manhunt for the perpetrator is already slightly sketch. The rationale given is "Sometimes it takes an angry white guy to catch an angry white guy," but what's clear is that Guy wants this wrapped up quickly and cleanly — and it nearly is.

The culprit is an ex-con who wants revenge for Guy hitting him with a maximum sentence and then, rather boldly, sleeping with his mother. When one of Givens' fellow marshals confronts Guy with this information, he meets her suggestion of potential legal sanctions with a vague threat of indiscretions committed by local law enforcement. This is all just bluster at first, since they quickly locate and apprehend the bomber.

The opportunity for a quick prosecution is bungled, however, when Guy winds up in a road rage incident with Clement Mansel, also known as "The Oklahoma Wildman" (Boyd Holbrook). The first episode is clearly setting up Clement as the central villain of the miniseries, but, as far as we know at the moment, he's never explicitly crossed paths with Guy. It's just a random dust-up between two hotheads.

This dispute ends with Guy and his assistant (Rae Gray) being brutally executed by Clement, who helps himself to the contents of the Judge's jacket pockets. It's here he comes across a brown leather notebook seemingly thick with high-dollar transactions. It's been established that Guy possessed a busted moral compass. Was he perhaps engaged in serious criminal behavior from the bench?

FX

Givens and his newly assigned task force are caught flatfooted by all of this. They had a rock-solid confession from the failed assassin, which should've put this case to bed. But Guy and his assistant are nonetheless dead, and for what? The most intriguing moment of this stellar episode is tucked in the background of Givens arrival at the crime scene. Listen closely, and you'll hear marshal Maureen Downey (Marin Ireland) asking someone about the whereabouts of the notebook, which should've been on the judge. This is the same character Guy threatened earlier. We then learn the assistant was working for Downey and her colleague, Norbert (Norbert Leo Butz), as a confidential informant. They were investigating Guy. She expresses guilt about putting this young woman in a precarious position, but she says nothing of the notebook to Givens.

This is classic Leonard plotting in that what at first appears to be bizarre happenstance promises to be part of a much more sprawling operation. Are Downey and Norbert dirty? Is the whole city dirty? The contents of that notebook will almost certainly play a major part in the unraveling of this mystery, and it'll hopefully be a blast watching Givens pull the pieces together.