S02.E10: Eidolon

[coloradoqt]

I'm sooo confused. Where does the flashback start? When did Eleanor wash the blood off and kill the kid?  Was there 2 massacres at the housing complex?  Where did the incident occur, the cartel money being stolen, which brought Eleanor in the first place? If Hank and company did not know Eleanor after she killed the kid, wasn't this just after the massacre? I'm sooo confused....

[AuntiePam]

I'm confused on the timeline too but there was only one massacre. 

 

Eleanor was bloody from killing the guy in the red car -- the one who came across the border with her.  Then she walked to the car wash, met the kid and killed him.

 

The Red Ridge massacre happened later. 

 

 

 

 

[Cardie]

A timeline:

Last season:  the courier does not move the money from the old lady's house to the bank on tine and Adriana and Frye find it.

 

This season, Eleanor's clean-up operation

1. She and Mr. Inappropriate cross the border.

2. They go visit the bank; this is when she cuts off the asst. manager's ear.

3. They visit Red Ridge for the first time. We think they perpetrate a massacre there because of the flashforward but apparently they just check out its suitability as the new cash stash house.

4. They are on their way to deal with the courier when Mr. I tries to blackmail Eleanor and meets his end. We only have just seen this in this week's opening flashback. (We know the courier is killed and ends up in a duffel bag but the timing of that and the perpetrator is still hazy.)

5. Eleanor leaves the dead body and the stuffed dog in the still moving car, which Sonya discovers in the first episode.

6. Eleanor goes to clean up at the car wash and all the stuff with the boys, her first hiring Jaime, and her showing up on Sonya's radar occur. Eleanor escapes to Mexico.

7. Eleanor comes back to the US and installs Charlotte and Ray as owners of the Red Ridge property and thus custodians of the cash.

8. Eleanor defects to Cerisola who apparently gets her to pressure Charlotte to transfer title to Wade Williams, thus depriving Fausto of access to Red Ridge.

9. The transfer signing occurs at Red Ridge; first Eleanor has to kill Chip because he told the police about seeing her at Red Ridge on the visit she made in item (3) above.

10. All hell breaks loose as DEA/Fausto's men/Eleanor try to kill each other.

11. Lyle Lovett comes to deal with the massacre mess. The scene of his arrival, as he slips on the blood, is the same in the first scene of Ep. 1 flashforward and in this episode. His views of the carnage are slightly different in the two episodes. There is only one massacre, however, and it occurs in real time here.

[shapeshifter]

Late to one of my favorite slasher parties.

On a side note, if anyone wants to visit "Red Ridge", it's located in Fillmore, CA, on Hwy 126.  The green bridge, which caught my eye right off the bat, is the old Hwy 23 bridge over the Santa Clara River and can be seen from the highway.  River and Mountain View is an intersection in a new development.  I hope they really cleaned up that house.

Corn syrup and red dye can be removed with Eleanor's wet naps.

Hank may be tough, but man is he stupid.

 

Eleanor is hellbent on getting the truth out of you before you die, Hank. Did you really think that saying, "You know you won't get the truth out of me, so you might as well kill me" would work?

He is probably quite familiar with the use of threatening to harm and/or harming loved ones to get info out of people, so if he could goad them into killing him, his family would be safe.

He didn't get very far and left a trail of blood. It was unrealistic that they couldn't find the ledger, but that's show biz.

So, two for $5 and one for $3.25?  Once Eleanor's made up her mind, there's no changing it.

Plus, she's an accountant. She knows it's not worth spending $5 when you only want $3.25 worth.

[dubbel zout]

Corn syrup and red dye can be removed with Eleanor's wet naps.

Wet naps are awesome.

[Neurochick]

I think Cesar is one of the most interesting characters in this show, his journey has been up and down.  It made me think, If Charlotte's husband hadn't died, then neither Cesar nor Charlotte would have been at Red Ridge.  

 

7. Eleanor comes back to the US and installs Charlotte and Ray as owners of the Red Ridge property and thus custodians of the cash.

 

I had forgotten about that.  When Ray and Cesar were robbed of Fausto's drugs, Ray and Charlotte thought they'd have to run, but Fausto needed them to put their names on Red Ridge.  This show...so much stuff.

 

And why did I root for Eleanor to escape and that Sonja not catch her?  Am I crazy?  I guess I dislike Sonja more than I thought.  lol

 

 

Not me, I was hoping Sonja would drop Eleanor; I'm tired of the woman.  

 

Is Eleanor supposed to be CIA?

Edited September 13, 2014 by Neurochick

[Cardie]

Eleanor could be deep cover CIA but it seems more likely that she's just an excellent money laundering accountant for drug profits that fund some CIA black ops. She seems loyal only to the ones who hold Cagey. Right now that CIA operation is in transition, with Fausto deemed a liability. Cerisola needed to recruit Eleanor because she's the one with intimate knowledge of the money trail.

[miles2go]

Hank, hang in there!  Don't want you to die!

Sonja, glad you finally thanked Marco for saving you.

Fausto, you're evil to the marrow of your bones, but . . .  and this is bizarre . . . I actually kind of like you.  If this were real life, I'd be rooting for you to be executed ASAP.  

 

Next week, the ledger!  Looking forward to that.

[Haleth]

Thanks for the timeline, Cardie.  The way this season was laid out is very confusing.

 

I kept yelling to Hank, "HIDE THE LEDGER!"  Guess he finally heard me.  Man, that is one tough ol' coot.  I reaaaaalllly want him to make it through this season, keep thinking, naaaw, they won't kill off an important, popular character.  But then I remember last season they killed a kid.  RIP Gus.

 

Loved Lyle Lovett trading in his blood spattered white hat for a black one.  BTW, the song that was playing at the beginning of the episode, when Eleanor and Mr Inappropriate were discussing the ledger, was that a Lyle Lovett song by chance?  I don't really know his voice but something told me it might be him?

 

I don't think Cesar has the heart or the stomach to be a boss.  Yeah, he'll do what he has to to protect his family, but he really wants no part of the ugliness.  

[shapeshifter]

I agree with others that Lyle's character trading the white hat for a black one is fraught with old western symbolism, but, really, I can imagine him just thinking of blood stains and dry cleaning inconvenience and expense: "[sigh]. I shouldda known this was a black hat affair."

There must be dry cleaners who lost their licenses for, say, money laundering, or maybe "taking people to the cleaners" who now do jobs for sharp dressing killers for a price and with a guarantee of not squealing to the law, just like alcoholic doctors and disbarred lawyers.

ETA: Or do wet naps remove blood from felt?

Edited September 14, 2014 by shapeshifter

[Catherinewriter]

If I remember correctly, Hank was dragging himself along a pretty barren roadway, with nothing on either side to use as a hiding place. So what the hell did he do with the ledger? Must rewatch, I guess.

Hank better live. Eleanor better die. Marco better take a stand against Fausto.

Edited September 14, 2014 by Catherinewriter

[AuntiePam]

At least part of Hank's crawl was near some piled up bags, so he probably tucked the ledger in with those bags.

 

 

[Curious5]

Great scene showing a person just doesn't get it.  Lyle Lovett listens patiently to Eleanor who gives him instructions of what to do if she dies.  Take her body home, burn it? and put under the tree so the demons won't get it. Blah, blah blah.  Doesn't she realize she has no value dead and  probably will get dumped out of the car if she dies?

[Cardie]

Sonya would honor Eleanor's burial wishes; hope she tells her about them. I would think Eleanor might end up in Witness Protection except that those funeral instructions are pretty much a Chekhov's gun.

[bunnyblue]

Great scene showing a person just doesn't get it.  Lyle Lovett listens patiently to Eleanor who gives him instructions of what to do if she dies.  Take her body home, burn it? and put under the tree so the demons won't get it.

 

As Eleanor rambled on about her burial instructions to Lyle, I wondered if there is personal history between them. It seemed like Lyle was supposed to know where that specific tree is located and the other rituals she wanted done. I wondered if maybe they were from the same Mennonite sect.

 

Hank is a tough SOB, both physically and mentally. I'd have been singing like a canary as soon as Eleanor stuck her fingers in the bullet wounds. And especially when she threatened to torture his wife.

 

The show needs better set directors. The differences in the aftermath of the Red Ridge massacre drove me nuts. In the season premiere, Eleanor was looking down at Lyle with a bloody machete. And the house was poorly lit. This time she's injured upstairs and there was a lot of sunlight streaming in.

 

And after Sonya crashed her car into Cesar's, the overhead shot showed the cars stopped 20-30 yards apart facing away from each other. But when Marco and Sonya got out of their car, Cesar's car was only a few steps away that Marco could easily see inside. Little things like that bug me until a scene is over and then I have to re-watch to pay attention to the actual goings on.

 

Fausto is a terrifying dude. I shudder to think what kind of video he is going to make of Cerisola's daughter. 

[Haleth]

Great scene showing a person just doesn't get it.  Lyle Lovett listens patiently to Eleanor who gives him instructions of what to do if she dies.  Take her body home, burn it? and put under the tree so the demons won't get it. Blah, blah blah.  Doesn't she realize she has no value dead and  probably will get dumped out of the car if she dies

 

And his reply, "okey dokey."  That's commitment.

[coloradoqt]

 

This season, Eleanor's clean-up operation

Thank You!!!!

[MDKNIGHT]

I would hope even deep cover CIA don't murder kids.  Then again maybe I'm naïve. 

 

I am a little disappointed at the discrepancies between the early Red Ridge scene an the new one.  They should have made show the scenes matched.  I got the impression in the old one that Eleanore had the machete upstairs and was not wearing the clothes she was in the retake and the person upstairs is right that it was dark.  There also didn't seem to be any movement but in the reshoot Jaime and Cesar weren't harmed so they would have been moving around while Lyle did the thing with getting Chip's number and phoning it. 

 

ETA We'll be finding out soon but my guess is that Fausto will film  that guy's daughter being serially raped.  While I liked to keep Fausto's drug business separate from the girl abductions because I kind of like the character the reality is that he's in league with those guys so he probably does that kind of thing too.  IF I'm right I won't mind seeing Fausto die at all.  No Norway for you rapist.  

Edited September 18, 2014 by MDKNIGHT

[paramitch]

I'm guessing this is discussed in another thread, but with every episode this season, it becomes clear that they decided to downplay Sonya's autism/Asperger's. Agree or disagree about *how* DK played it last year, she's clearly not doing nearly as much this year.  I have mixed feelings about this: I'm fine with Sonya as a neurotypical character who's messed up because of her sister's death -- but I wonder if the producers/writers just couldn't cope (or didn't trust the audience to cope) with someone who thinks and relates differently.

 

I've been very disappointed with this aspect of the show this season. I liked DK's performance last season and felt like I was watching a truly unique character I hadn't seen before. This season I've been saddened at the 'softening' of Sonya's character, because I really liked her prickly irascible weirdness last season and have missed it. For instance, in this episode, when she leans down to talk so kindly to Jaime about the candy -- it just wasn't the Sonya of last season. She shows no interpersonal awkwardness anymore at all.

I still like Sonya, and I like the show, but I do feel it's lost a bit of last season's zing. But this was a good, tense episode, and I was very happy to see Sonya pair up again with Marco, and square off with Eleanor. It's great that the showdown came down here to the two women as opposing (and formidable) forces.