The war for criminal control of Atlantic City is over and the winnah and
still champeen is Nucky Thompson. But he neither acts nor feels triumphalist at
the end of the season finale, Margate Sands. Btw, the title is drawn
from TS Eliot’s epic poemThe Wasteland and that’s what AC feels like
when the guns are silenced. How’s
that for highbrow, y’all?

The primary theme of the episode is betrayal. There’s so much backstabbing
and double dealing going on that it seemed like a smoked-filled room at the1924
Democratic Convention. That’s the one that went a record 123 ballots, and
produced a dark horse nominee, John W. Davis, who went on to be slaughtered by
Silent Cal in the general election. Of course, that’s in the future, Boardwalk
Empire-wise.

Reety alrighty, here are some scatter shot observations, hopefully a few
will hit the target:

Machiavelli Thompson: Nucky’s allies spill a lot of blood
but victory is really secured by playing the old bait and switch. Nucky devises
a brilliant scheme to get Arnold Rothstein’s help in convincing Masseria to
betray my main man, Gyp. Andrew Mellon’s inactive distillery is used as bait.
The trap is laid by Icky Mickey Doyle who pretends to betray Nucky to Rothstein
in the way that only a fake Irishman who is really Jewish can do. What that
means, I’ll never know, but I like the sound of it…

The greedy and conniving Rothstein swallows the bait hook, line and sinker. Sucker.
He cuts a deal with Nucky to take over the distillery by getting Masseria to
dump Gyp. This is, in turn, accomplished by Rothstein’s betrayal of his smack
dealing pal, Charlie Lucky. Masseria gets the heroin and a player to be named
later and Gyp gets got.

There’s yet another turn of the screw when Nucky betrays Arnie baby by
alerting the Feds that the latter is operating the Overholt distillery. Nucky
even gets the uber plutocratic Mellon to do his dirty work for him. The plan
was a thing of manipulative beauty, y’all.

Richard Channels Travis Bickle: The first time I watched
Richard’s balletic bordello bloodbath, I knew it reminded me of something. On
second viewing I realized that it was reminiscent of the finale ofTaxi
Driver: an armed gunman shoots up a whorehouse to rescue someone. Scorsese
is one of the executive producers ofBE,
and this was the most Marty-like episode evah.

I’m not really sure what will become of poor Richard. When he dropped Tommy
off at Julia’s pad, he was too ashamed to enter and track blood on the carpet.
I’m hoping that Richard will be back: Nucky could use a graceful gunslinger,
after all.

Jillian and Gyp’s Fatal Dance: It
wasn’t fatal for Jillian or even the Gypster but it was one of the most
perversely exciting scenes in the entire series thus far. The emphasis, of
course, is on perverse, which both characters are. They’re also as crazy as
Michelle Bachmann on steroids.

Jillian very nearly vanquishes Gyp by trying to inject him with smack while
she’s got him cornered and collared, but he’s as strong as he is insane. I
guess that makes him, as Ken Kesey would surely say, the bull goose loony. He’s
certainly cuckoo or was…

I’m glad that Jillian survived her battle with the Gypster. Bat shit crazy
characters with bizarre back stories come in handy. It will be interesting to
see what becomes of her once she recovers from the shock of seeing how much
blood is splattered all over her cheesy Victorian wallpaper.

Margaret Moves On: Margaret is
hiding out in a hovel in Noo Yawk, doing her best to avoid both Nucky and the bloody
gang war. She decides to move on from IRA Man Owen by getting an abortion.
She’s one of the lucky ones: her illegal abortion is performed in a doctor’s
office by a physician instead of in a back alley by a fat lady with a coat
hanger.

At episode’s end, Nucky tries to convince her to return to him but she’s not
having it. Will she stick to her guns? I don’t know, but I’m hoping we won’t
see the Tony-Carmella thing of serial break-ups and reunions. The ties between
Margaret and Nucky seem too frayed for that to be credible but ya never know.

Arrivederci Gypster: I’m still in
mourning this morning but I knew Gyp’s demise was inevitable. He’s a classic
Dillinger/Roy Earle/Jimmy Cagney-style movie gangster who lives large and dies
that way too. I’m considering flying a flag at half-staff or wearing a black
armband because I’ll miss his sociopathic ass. I somehow doubt Dr. A will let
me but I can dream, can’t I?

Gyp experiences serial betrayal in the season finale. Masseria sells him out
to Rothstein and Nucky. (The latter, of course, betrays Masseria by having
Capone’s men slaughter his henchmen.) Jillian tries to administer an opiated
coup de grace to him. Finally, his closest associate, Tonino, literally stabs Gyp
in the back on the beach to save his own life. Who can blame him? Gyp beat his
cousin to death with a shovel on the same beach, after all.

I hope that Bobby Cannavale wins a slew of acting awards for his portrayal
of Gyp. He was absolutely spectacular, and his death scene was positively
Cagneyesque. Top of the world, Ma.

I’ll let Al Capone and Chalky White have the last, uh, word at the conclusion of the concluding post of season-3: