Serial Watcher – The Black Donnellys – Episode 1-05

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That’s more like it. This week’s episode of The Black Donnellys was much better than last week’s. The action was tighter, things made more sense and we had some advancement in the Donnelly’s rise to the top of the Irish mafia.

Jimmy’s plan, started last week, to take over Louie’s booking business is starting to materialize and become a serious business venture for the brothers. But Jimmy’s slowly transforming from someone who just had a violent temper and short fuse to a full blown psycho. He actually believes this is his booking line, that those people owe him the money and have always owed him. He had a weird, maniacal look on his face when he talked about those gambling debts and not eve Jimmy and Kevin could reason with him. Furthrmore, he even convinced Tommy to make a collection for him, after he convinced him that the future of the brothers is riding on it. And Tommy, as always, came through for his brothers with ruthlessness. Yes, he did show mercy to Maxwell at first, but once he realized he’s been taken advantage of, the gloves came off. He didn’t even care about his old flame a debt is a debt and must be paid, even if it’s not a real debt (Did that line make sense? I hope so). Of course, Tommy had another incentive to make that collection (Jenny) but he still did it for his brothers.

And this is where we see Tommy grow and learn from last week’s dealings with Doakie. Last week he trusted Doakie but was only used by him. This taught him to never give second chances. He gave Maxwell one chance and Maxwell failed now Tommy is going to get what he wants from him, no matter what. This is a major lesson for Tommy and it’s a big part of his character development. He tried to do the right thing and it only hurt him. I guess that Doakie won’t get any second chances from him either.

And speaking of Doakie, he’s getting comfortable in his seat as leader of the irish mafia. Nicki tried a power play on him early on in the episode but Doakie came on top when the episode ended, thanks to a little politicking. It wouldn’t surprise me that Nicki will now approach Tommy and offer him his help in removing Doakie from the leadership, as an act of revenge. One thing I have to say tough, is that every time I see Doakie with his ax it totally freaks me out.

Jenny’s life is going through more rough times. Now it’s no just matters of the heart it’s her dad. We got a hint about it in the past, but this week it was made clear that her dad is senile and can’t take care of himself anymore. The news came the hard way, as she learned that he hasn’t been making any deposits and their bank account is empty. Even though she wanted to keep it private, Tommy overheard them and naturally felt compelled to help. Jenny had no other choice but to accept his help, even though she didn’t want to. I just wonder what she would have done had she known for sure where the money came from.

And finally, back to Jimmy and Kevin. They’re no longer satisfied in doing some small collections. They’ve expanded to running a full betting program and found a good partner Whitey. They also had a great plan to recruit new customers, which worked very well (Which is a surprise, considering Jimmy was involved with it). But it’s clear that they can’t work well together for long, as a few wrong comments about the family Got Whitey a decent beatdown from Jimmy and Kevin, proving family does come first (Man, what a cliché).

The most noticeable thing about this episode is that the main characters experienced growth. Tommy, Jimmy and Jenny all had significant experiences this week that advanced their characters as well as the story. The Black Donnellys came back from a last week’s weak installment with a very strong episode this week and it seems to be back on track.

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