Up to Speed: Justified Season Three

What: Justified on FX

When: Tuesdays at 10 PM

Key Characters:

• Raylan Givens- The protagonist of the show and a US Marshal in Kentucky.  Raylan has a very old school law enforcement style which usually entails shooting first and asking questions later.  Raylan grew up in Harlan County and worked in the coal mine there when he was a boy and his familiarity with the traditions and customs usually results in him being sent back to Harlan to defuse the many criminal situations that arise there.
• Boyd Crowder- A childhood friend of Raylan, Boyd followed his father into a life of crime and the Crowders became one of the most powerful crime families in Harlan.  In season one, Boyd was shot and arrested by Raylan and seemingly became born again and formed a makeshift church in the woods, which his father destroyed.  Boyd quickly returned to his old ways in Season Two and made a power play that put him in control of a massive amount of the criminal activity in Harlan but also in the cross hairs of the rival Bennett clan.
• Winonna Hawkins- Winonna is Raylan’s ex-wife but in Season Two they got back together after Winonna divorced her current husband, Gary.
• The Bennetts- The main antagonists of Season Two, The Bennetts were a powerful criminal family in Harlan.  The matriarch, Mags, was outwardly kind but she was ice cold and cunning inside.  Mags pulled a massive scam on a big coal company, who were attempting to negotiate a land deal.  Mags bought up all the land surrounding the one road going to and from the coal mine, forcing the coal company to give Mags a massive buyout.  The other Bennetts were Doyle, Dickie and Coover.  Doyle was the oldest brother and a local sheriff who Mags was going to give the money from the land deal to so he could move his family out of Harlan and carry on the Bennett legacy in a more respectable place.  Dickie is the scheming middle brother who resented Mags constantly overlooking him and declared war on Boyd and his crew at the end of Season Two and also killed Raylan’s Aunt Helen and critically injured Boyd’s girlfriend Ava.  Coover was the dim witted stoner youngest son.  At the end of the season, only Dickie was alive as Doyle was killed by a police sniper, Coover was killed by Raylan and Mags poisoned herself when her plan collapsed.
• Loretta McCready- Loretta was a young girl that was “adopted” by Mags after Mags poisoned Loretta’s father for threatening the Bennetts weed supply.  Raylan became very protective of Loretta and killed Coover Bennett to protect her when Coover, in a drunken rage, tried to kill Loretta out of jealousy for getting all of Mags’ attention. 

Other Characters:

• Art Mullen- The head of the Lexington Marshal’s office and Raylan’s boss.
• Tim Gutterson- One of Raylan’s fellow Marshals and a former Army Sniper.
• Rachel Brooks- Another of Raylan’s fellow Marshals
• Ava Crowder- Ava was formerly married to Boyd’s cousin but she shot him dead because of his abuse.  She had a relationship with Raylan in Season One but she and Boyd became an item in Season Two when she let Boyd stay at her house while he worked at the coal mine.
• Arlo Givens- Raylan’s criminal father, he worked with Boyd Crowder when he made his power play against Mags and the Bennetts by stealing their drug supply.
• Wyn Duffy- A lieutenant in the Dixie Mafia, a powerful Kentucky crime organization.  Winonna’s ex-husband, Gary, put a hit out on Raylan and Winonna through Duffy, which Raylan found out about but was forced to rescue Gary when he realized Duffy would kill Gary after the hit was finished.

Key Events:

• Raylan tracks down and puts an end to the Miami crime organization who wanted him dead after he killed one of their members way back in the Pilot of Justified.
• Boyd seemingly tries to go straight by working in the Harlan coal mine but slowly returns to his criminal ways by double crossing some of his fellow miners who want to steal the mine’s cash supply.  Boyd is recruited by mining official Carol Johnson to be her bodyguard and enforcer while she deals with Mags Bennett but Boyd double crosses her by making a deal with Mags to buy up all the land around the entry road to the spot where a new proposed mine would go, forcing the Black Pike mining company to make a huge payoff to Mags to get the land back.
• Dickie and Coover Bennett hatch their own scheme by stealing a shipment of drugs from the Dixie Mafia and various other criminal acts.
• Mags Bennett kills Loretta McCready’s father and “adopts” her.
• Winonna, in money trouble due to her divorce, steals $10,000 from the marshal’s evidence locker, which Raylan is forced to return but it’s clear that Art know what happened.
• Coover Bennett, jealous of the attention Loretta has been getting from Mags, attempts to kill her after he catches her after she finds evidence about her father’s murder.  Raylan arrives just in time to kill Coover and rescue Loretta.
• Dickie strikes out on his own, angry that Mags made a deal with Boyd Crowder and that he’s been overlooked by to take over the family’s weed business and that Doyle will be getting most of the reward from Mags’ deal.  Boyd steals the Bennett’s weed stash which forces Dickie to retaliate and he attacks Boyd and Ava’s house, seriously injuring Ava.  Dickie also attempts to kill Arlo but kills Raylan’s Aunt Helen instead.
• Raylan heads into Harlan to find Dickie and arrest him Helen’s murder but is ambushed and beaten with a baseball bat by Dickie.  Boyd arrives and rescues Raylan and Raylan is about to let Boyd murder Dickie when Dickie reveals that Loretta is on her way to confront Mags.  Raylan arrests Dickie and heads to Mags’ house to stop Loretta before anything happens.
• Loretta confronts Mags and shoots her in the leg.  Mags admits she killed Loretta’s father.  Outside, Raylan is kept at bay by Doyle and his men.  When they hear the gunshot, they open fire on Raylan and he takes a bullet to the side.  Doyle moves in to finish Raylan but he’s shot in the head by a sniper and it’s revealed Art brought in a task force, at the behest of Winonna, to help Raylan.  Raylan manages to get inside and stops Loretta from killing Mags but Mags kills herself with her poisonous moonshine after hearing that her plans have died with Doyle and that she’s lost Loretta.