Boardwalk Empire – The North Star

Season Four: Episode Six

Directed by: Allen Coulter

Written by: Howard Korder and Eric Overmyer

The Spin:  Symbolically characters in tonight’s episode were searching for their “north star” which often came in the form of women and families.   Eli (Shea Whigham) wondered how Eddie could take his life like that, leaving children behind, while that crafty double agent Fed insinuated his way into the lesser Thompson’s confidence.  Harrow (Jack Huston) made his way back to Atlantic City to find the elder Sargorsky diagnosed with cirossis and Julia (Wrenn Schmidt) making a sincere plea that she can’t raise little Tommy (now obsessed with star-gazing and mapping his way home) alone.  Then there’s Chalky (Michael K. Williams) falling under the spell of Narcisse’s songstress, who gives a mesmerizing performance of “St. Louis Blues” at the Onyx Club.

Before venturing off down south, Nucky, seemingly directionless without Eddie, stopped in New York to deliver a belated birthday present and the personal news of Eddie’s demise to Margaret (Kelly Macdonald) in a sad attempt to weasel his way back into her life.

Meanwhile, down in Tampa, things are getting soupier than a hopped-up alligator wrestling match. Lansky (Anatol Yusef) continued to strike out on his own, seizing another opportunity to strengthen his union with Nucky, who decided to leave his idiot friend with a finder’s fee only…naming…you guessed it, that feisty Sally (Patricia Arquette) as his in-absentia decision maker.

Best Line of the Week:  Upon Margaret’s questioning of what was in the gift box, fearing it might be a pet of some sort, Nucky, ironically and accidentally cruelly, states, “I would never put anything alive in a box.”

Commentary by David H. Schleicher

To my readers and Boardwalk strollers: Thoughts, reactions, comments?