‘Justified’ season 6: Graham Yost tried to honor Elmore Leonard’s work
The FX series Justified, which is in its sixth and final season, is based on the novella Fire in the Hole by Elmore Leonard. Leonard was an executive producer of the series until his death in 2013. The show’s creator and showrunner, Graham Yost, says he has made it his mission to stay as true as he can to Leonard’s vision and storytelling style.
“Ultimately I look at this show as Elmore Leonard’s show, and we’re all in service of him and his view and his way of writing and creating these characters,” Yost tells Fresh Air‘s Terry Gross. “So whatever feels like it works within that world is something we’re open to.”
Timothy Olyphant’s Raylan Givens and Walton Goggins’ Boyd Crowder are set to come face-to-face for a final showdown after years of tensions.
“Elmore’s world is a violent world,” he says. “In the best Elmore scenes, you think that something is either going to take a hard turn into romance and some kind of liaison, or it’s going to take it the other way and go into violence. There’s often something oddly humorous about the violence in Elmore’s movies and in his books.”
The show relies so heavily on Leonard’s vision that Yost says fans who want a peek into how the show might end should read Leonard’s works.
“Not because that will tell you how the series will end,” he says, “but because it’s always a good idea to read some Elmore Leonard. But there is, in his world, a certain way of ending things, and we aim for that.”
There are only two episodes remaining: April 7’s “Collateral” and the series finale titled: “The Promise.”
Boyd sacrificed his men and kidnapped Katherine Hale (Mary Steenburgen) to get to Avery Markham (Sam Elliott)’s money – $10 million. Afraid to put Ava on the stand, Vasquez nixed her deal, so knowing she was going back to prison, Ava stole Boyd’s gun and shot him. Rylan promised he would chase after her as Ava drove away with Markham’s stolen money.
Carter reveals what Ava is thinking, “She’s running forward, and she’s not looking back. She’s in fear of every situation. She’s in fear of Raylan catching her. She’s in fear, of somehow miraculously, Boyd standing up through yet another bullet and finding her. I don’t think that’s ever going to leave, her existence of paranoia. She’s seen [Boyd] do some pretty miraculous things and get people who have betrayed him. So, yeah, she’s very fearful.”
The actress continues, “Not only is it going to be Boyd and Raylan, it’s going to be Markham coming after her because she’s going to have his money. So, there’s no turning back. You shot the bank teller, you’ve got to keep going.”
Now, Katherine’s story comes to a head as Duffy (Jere Burns) and his thug Mikey have to pick loyalties and Nick Searcy’s Art is back in a big way.
TV Guide reports that in the new episode, Boyd and Raylan will search for Ava in the mountains and their paths will cross with each other as they do so.
