Tag Archives: Terence Winter

Boardwalk Empire: Margate Sands

Boardwalk Empire 3.12

Boardwalk Empire: Complete Episode Guide 

Boardwalk Empire – Margate Sands

Season Three: Episode Twelve (Season Finale)

Directed by:  Tim Van Patten

Written by:  Terence Winter & Howard Korder

The Spin:  Well, the third season went off in grand style with a suspense and violence-riddled hour mixed with quiet manly heartbreak as the brains of the show –  Nucky (Steve Buscemi) –  and the heart of the show –  Harrow (Jack Huston) - closed off their story arcs in classic style.  Van Patten opened with another signature montage detailing the war on the streets of Atlantic City between Rosetti’s gang and Nucky’s thugs-for-hire that the whole season has been building to.  Meanwhile the mechanization of the plot became more twisted than a flapper’s dress in a cyclone, and to try to recap who double-crossed who would leave me with mental whiplash.  Suffice it to say, Rothstein (Michael Stuhlbarg) appeared to be holding all the cards, until at the very last-minute… Continue reading →

Boardwalk Empire: The Pony

This is the girl.

Boardwalk Empire: Complete Episode Guide 

Boardwalk Empire – The Pony

Season Three: Episode Eight

Directed by:  Tim Van Patten

Written by:  Terence Winter & Howard Korder

The Spin:  It was an hour of new alliances made, chapters coming to a close and pawns being put in their place as series creator Terence Winter colluded with the series’ best writer Korder to coauthor an explosive episode where an act of fiery terrorism brought destruction to the boardwalk (and poor Babette’s!) while in real life the modern day Atlantic City licks its wounds from Hurricane Sandy.  And wouldya look at that, Gillian (Gretchen Mol) has become the greatest pawnbroker:  her mock-Jimmy funeral brought her ownership of the whorehouse, she kicked Luciano to the curb as a partner, she came to verbal blows with Nucky (revealing that she’s not delusional and is fully aware of his part in the real Jimmy’s death), and then invited Gyp (Bobby Cannavale) into her lioness’ den to give him a tasty bit of information about where Nucky and Rothstein would be cavorting on a certain evening (hint: there’s only one supper club in town).

Continue reading →

Boardwalk Empire: Spaghetti and Coffee

Boardwalk Empire: Complete Episode Guide 

Boardwalk Empire – Spaghetti and Coffee

Season Three: Episode Two

Directed by:  Alik Sakharov

Written by:  Terence Winter and Howard Korder

The Spin:  Home is where the spaghetti and coffee are in this Winter & Korder penned family-focused episode.  That old dope Eli (Shea Whigham) must’ve learned him a few things in prison as he comes out contemplative and humbled to a loving brood of children and a kind wife he knows he doesn’t deserve while having to suffer the humiliation of now working under that even bigger dope Mickey Doyle (Paul Sparks).  Meanwhile, Chalky White (Michael K. Williams) shows up and is served a compelling self-contained story-arc concerning his eldest daughter.  After having a turn of heart and blessing her well-groomed boyfriend’s intent to marry her (a doctor will be good for the family is his train of thought), his daughter rebuffs the idea thinking her suitor a bore and longing for the romantic thrills of gangster life.  Well, my friends, expect a lesson to be learned here.  Chalky ain’t havin’ none of that youthful foolishness in his house.  Up in NYC, Nucky can’t seem to get enough of that youthful foolishness and has become totally enamored with the flighty but charming Billie Kent (Meg Steedle - again stealing the show) to the point it might affect business.  Lo and behold, in Tabor Heights, Gyp Rosetti (an increasingly interesting Bobby Cannavale) sets up shop to get back at Rothstein and Nucky for their rebuke of his business offer last week by blocking their fuel supply on their route from AC to NYC. Continue reading →

Boardwalk Empire: Resolution (Season Three Premiere)

Boardwalk Empire: Complete Episode Guide 

Boardwalk Empire – Resolution

Season Three: Episode One

Directed by:  Tim Van Patten

Written by:  Terence Winter

The Spin:  Everything was just so in the comfortably familiar premiere of Season Three – Van Patten’s sure-handed direction, the infectious flapper-ness of the period music, all the players from last season in their place and Nucky’s new persona as gangster-totalis.  A year and half may have passed, but Harrow (Jack Huston) is still all brokenhearted over Angela’s murder while playing protector to little Tommy.  Meanwhile, Gillian (Gretchen Mol) has turned the Commodore’s former digs into an upscale brothel.  In Nucky’s inner sanctum, my favorite character from last year, Manny the Butcher (William Forsythe) is now a partner while Margaret (Kelly MacDonald) has her pretty little panties in a bunch over the lack of pre-natal care at the hospital she’s been spilling a carload of Nucky’s money into.  Out in the Midwest, Capone is trying to keep his temper in check while Van Alden (Michael Shannon) has taken up a sad new life as Mr. Muller the travelling salesman only to serendipitously walk into a flower shop owned by Capone’s competitor.  Continue reading →

Boardwalk Empire: To the Lost

Hey, kid - shove your guilt in a sack!

Boardwalk Empire: Complete Episode Guide 

Boardwalk Empire – To the Lost

Season Two: Episode Twelve (Season Finale)

Directed by:  Tim Van Patten

Written by:  Terence Winter

The Spin:  Admittedly the season finale’s “big bang” was exactly what I thought it was going to be, but I have to give credit to Winter and Van Patten for making me think during the better part of the hour that maybe it wasn’t going to conclude that way.  It seemed Nucky and Jimmy were going to make amends.  Jimmy came through in a big way and brought justice for Chalky White (Michael K. Williams) - thus ending the strike are we to assume?  Then he helps commit the most egregious bit of witness tampering I’ve ever seen - with Harrow (Jack Huston) at his side of course.  All of this benefits Nucky, right?  And ol’ Nuck seemed to be in a forgiving mood.  After giving one of the more unorthodox marriage proposals, he and Margaret get hitched, thus solving her moral dilemma of testifying against him (as his wife, she can’t – badda bing!)  Then he offers up his dope of a brother (Shea Whigham) a nice ultimatum – take the fall for that other stuff and go to jail for a few years – it’ll make up for trying to kill me.  Poor, poor Esther Randolph (Julianne Nicholson) - she’s suddenly in court with no ducks in a row anymore – because they’ve all been shot down one way or another by Nucky.  Look who’s off scott-free and looking like the family man of the year!  Hooray for Nucky!  But oh wait, there’s that thing, you know… Continue reading →

Boardwalk Empire: Two Boats and a Lifeguard

Say, you wouldn't throw a guy like me over a balcony at the supper club, now would ya?

Boardwalk Empire: Complete Episode Guide 

Boardwalk Empire – Two Boats and a Lifeguard

Season Two: Episode Eight

Directed by:  Tim Van Patten

Written by:  Terence Winter

The Spin:   The latest Winter/Van Patten hour opens in purely Sopranos-esque style with Nucky’s dream.  Oh, the symbolism!  Oh, what does it all mean?  Where’s Dr. Melfi when you need her?  What transpires next is possibly the series’ finest hour.  Behold! – Nucky’s old pap bites the dust.  At last! - The Schroeder kids start callin’ ol’ Nuck ”Dad.”  Look Yonder! – It’s Torrio and Rothstein (Michael Stuhlbarg) meeting up with Nucky to discuss the little problem with their underlings.  Apparently Rothstein is the 1920′s gangster version of our own modern-day Warren Buffett advising the others to wait…wait…wait…and then place the perfect bet.   And then! - After his own brush with death last week, Nucky sees all the signs and tells his enemies he’s resigning and stepping down to retire with his new “wife and kids.”  Oh, brutha, but even Nucky’s own dumb-as-dirt brother (Shea Whigham) knows that Nucky is smarter than Jimmy – he’s smarter than them all.  And we know that Nucky is bamboozling his enemies into thinking they’ve won – as you see, he’s plotting with Chalky White (Michael K. Williams) to shut down the city with a strike and arranging for Slater (Charles Cox) to take him over to Belfast and arrange a meeting…for perhaps a little arms dealing?  While pouty-lipped Jimmy is too dumb to realize his wife (Aleksa Palladino) is about to hook-up with novelist Louise, he takes out his blind frustrations by throwing the even stupider Mickey Doyle (whose laughing now, buddy?) from the balcony of Babette’s during their evening of celebration.  Continue reading →

Boardwalk Empire: A Dangerous Maid

Boardwalk Empire: Complete Episode Guide 

Boardwalk Empire – A Dangerous Maid

Season Two: Episode Three

Directed by:  Susanna White

Written by:  Itamar Moses

The Spin:  Aha!  The title was a rouse, ya see?  Here I thought we would be seeing Margaret’s maid  getting entangled in…something or someone…but instead it’s just the name of a play poor little Lucy Danzinger (Paz de la Huerta – getting her first chance to really act on the show) longs to star in while Van Alden keeps her locked up like a prisoner until she plops out that bastard of a chap.  Under the watchful eye of director Susanna White, the ladies are front and center in this slower moving family focused episode.  Margaret comes to a revelation about her estranged family (recently emigrated to Brooklyn) while Jimmy continues to wrestle with his mother’s devotion to the conniving Commodore and his own conflicted feelings over who’s the better (or worse) father-figure to him.  Meanwhile, down in the dumps Nucky marks his territory in a great tell-off scene at Babbette’s Supper Club.  Oh yeah, and watch out for that Owen Slater (Charlie Cox) - he’s a man on the move, ladies and gents! Continue reading →

Boardwalk Empire: Ourselves Alone

Boardwalk Empire: Complete Episode Guide 

Boardwalk Empire – Ourselves Alone

Season Two: Episode Two

Directed by:  David Petrarca

Written by:  Howard Korder

The Spin:  Things aren’t so comfortable anymore for Nucky as the newly renovated Commodore rallies the troops to bring him down.  It seems he can’t trust anyone…though he still has some shrewd players in his corner, most importantly Margaret, whose stealth operation to capture his ledger and petty cash before the investigators get to it anchors the episode.  Meanwhile, in the Subplot Land – Jimmy travels to NYC to try to make a deal with Rothstein, who gives him the cold shoulder.  What’s an angst riddled young gangster to do in the city but get down and dirty with Luciano’s rivals?  Back in AC, Chalky White is stuck in the slammer with a loquacious chap from Baltimore.  We learn that while Chalky might be illiterate, he continues to write the book on bad-assery.  Lastly, an Irish lad named Slater makes an impression on the ladies at the Thompson house and might prove to be a key player going forward.  Korder keeps things moving tightly along with his workmanlike writing and David Copperfield allusions, while Petrarca lingers on images of offices torn asunder, blood pooling quietly in city parks and the warm glow of the past burning in fireplaces. Continue reading →

Boardwalk Empire: 21 (Season Two Premiere)

Boardwalk Empire: Complete Episode Guide 

Boardwalk Empire –  21 (Season Two Premiere)

Season Two: Episode One

Directed by:  Tim Van Patten

Written by:  Terence Winter (series creator) from the novel by Nelson Johnson

The Spin:  The winning combination of series creator/writer Terence Winter and producer/director Tim Van Patten pick up in season two right where they left off with season one’s superb finale.  Opening with a signature Boardwalk montage done to the tune of “After You Get What You Want…” the masterminds behind the show deliver a two-fold message.  To the characters, they’re saying, “Watch out, you might get what you ask for.”  To the audience they’re saying, “We’re not going to let you down, and you will get what you want and then some this season.”  Witness next a Klan shoot-em-up of Chalky White’s booze warehouse.  Strung throughout the episode; where we find Nucky trying to balance work/partying with home life/Margaret, Jimmy now married to Angela, and Van Alden’s wife visiting the city for the first time; is one of the show’s most compelling themes:  false domesticity and tortured father/son relationships.  Nucky knows something is up with Jimmy and the Commodore, but it’s his newly strained relationship with Margaret’s young son (apparently there’s no one Nucky won’t try to pay off) and an arrest for election fraud that throw him for the loop.  Meanwhile, other more hapless characters long for what Nucky and Jimmy have – seemingly having it all – the family, the luck, the power – but there’s something rotten in Denmark, my friends, and what those poor saps long for is a fantasy about to be riddled by bullets.  Beautifully weaving in all of those painstaking period details with self-contained motifs (love the kids watching Chaplin’s The Kid at the end there) while propelling forward the plot and character arcs that will define the season, Winter and Van Patten are setting us up for one doozy of year. Continue reading →

Boardwalk Empire: A Return to Normalcy (Season Finale)

Boardwalk Empire: Complete Episode Guide 

Boardwalk Empire – A Return to Normalcy (Season Finale)

Season One: Episode Twelve

Directed by:  Tim Van Patten

Written by:  Terence Winter (series creator) from the novel by Nelson Johnson

The Spin:  If I’m being honest, Van Patten has been the weak link in terms of directors for the series, but he finally pulls out all the stops and delivers a deeply satisfying season finale helped immensely by the hands-on teleplay from series creator Terence Winter.  Next to Mad Men, Boardwalk Empire is the best written show on television, and though there’ve been some rough patches, it tops AMC’s award-winner in terms of pure entertainment.  In the finale, all of our favorites get their big scenes (Emmy…Emmy, can you hear me?) but Van Patten keeps the histrionics turned down a notch.  Just as it seems like Nucky is making peace with all his enemies, the local and national elections go his way, and Margaret comes back to his side (not after his emotional revelation about the true nature of his wife’s passing, but after a silly superstition gives her a grim premonition she will do anything to make not come true), those closest to him (a recovering Commodore, a soused Jimmy, and a spiteful Eli) begin to plot against him.  Meanwhile, Van Alden is about to heave-ho from his new Carthage riddled with guilt until a saucy special someone shows up while he’s packing to announce a bitter bun is in the oven.  A winning period-song accompanied montage (which in grand Scorsese-inspired style has become the show’s most potently dramatic calling card) leaves us tinged with melancholy over what has passed and filled with equal parts hope and fear over what is to come.  The closing images of an early dawn soaked boardwalk are the perfect postcards to send viewers off for a long hiatus. Continue reading →