 Timothy Olyphant (Damages and Deadwood) stars as a modern-day Western hero based on the character created from legendary crime novelist Elmore Leonard's Fire In The Hole. Deputy U.S. Marshal Raylan Givens (Olyphant) is something of a 19th century-style, Old West lawman living in modern times, whose unconventional enforcement of justice makes him a target of criminals as well as his U.S. Marshals Service bosses. As a result of his controversial but "justified" quick-draw shooting of a mob hit-man in Miami, Givens is re-assigned from Miami to Kentucky. The Lexington, Kentucky Marshals office's jurisdiction includes Harlan County (a hopelessly impoverished, backwoods coal-mining community in southeastern Kentucky), which Raylan hates, and thought he had escaped for good, in his youth. Raylan's new job pursuing prison escapees, fugitive con men and a corrupt local sheriff has never been more intense. He is an anachronism - a tough, soft spoken gentleman who finds his quarry fascinating, but never gives an inch. Dig under his placid skin and you'll find an angry man who grew up hard in rural Kentucky, with an outlaw father, who knows a lot more about who he doesn't want to be than who he really is. Find out what makes Raylan's Wild West, gun-slinging actions... Justified. Storyline: The story arc of season one concentrates on the crimes of the Crowder family. Raylan seeks to protect Ava Crowder from the rest of the Crowder clan when she shoots her husband Bowman Crowder dead in retaliation for years of abuse. Her biggest threat initially comes from Boyd Crowder, a local criminal masquerading as a white supremacist who Raylan shoots in a stand-off. The season builds towards the release of family patriarch Bo who wishes to re-build his family's drug trade and to settle old scores, including one with Raylan's father, Arlo, who has cheated him out of money. A recovering Boyd, however, claims a spiritual rebirth and creates a recovery group and tries to deal with his family's criminal past. Disc 1 of the Justified The Complete First Season Blu-ray 1.01 Fire in the Hole - After some bad publicity involving a shooting, Deputy U.S. Marshal Raylan Givens is transferred to Lexington, Kentucky and under Chief Deputy Art Mullen, an old friend from the academy, he takes on the case of the murder of a young white supremacist who is linked to a church bombing. The chief suspect is Boyd Crowder, a childhood friend of Raylan's. In order to catch him, Raylan returns to his hometown of Harlan, a veritable 21st century Wild West. Boyd gives Raylan an ultimatum: leave Harlan within twenty-four hours or be killed. After a tense confrontation at an old acquaintance's house, Raylan gets the drop on Boyd and shoots him in the chest, though he survives and is hospitalized. 1.02 Riverbrook - Raylan visits Boyd in the prison hospital to check on him, and transport Crowe to prison. Meanwhile, during a 'prison band' performance, convict Douglas Cooper and a fellow inmate escape. After Art Mullen asks Raylan to return to investigate, Raylan makes a stop at a gas station. Unbeknownst to Raylan, the convicts have set a trap, and Cooper makes off with Raylan's guns, car and hat. After learning that Cooper only had three months left on his sentence, Raylan and marshal Gutterson make a trip to Cooper's ex-wife, Shirley. Cooper then visits after and makes a deal with Shirley and Dupree, Shirley's 'cousin'. They are looking for money Cooper hid in the flooring of development housing during construction. After Ava makes a house call to Raylan, he discovers a hunch as to the location of the money. Cooper, however, screwed up the location. After Dupree shoots Cooper, they find the right house, whose occupants have spent it all. A hostage situation ensues after Cooper helps Raylan find the right house, and Shirley helps Raylan by allowing Gutterson to snipe Dupree, citing that it 'wasn't right' to shoot Cooper. The episode ends with a nice conversation between Cooper and Raylan as they once again leave the prison. 1.03 Fixer - Raylan comes to the aid of a bookie informant, who has been kidnapped by one of his collectors and one of his delinquent clients. In tracking a vanished confidential informant, Raylan goes against a pair of violent ex-cons who are just dying for a showdown with the "Kentucky Cowboy". 1.04 Long in the Tooth - Raylan and the mob compete to capture a fugitive dentist, 'Roland Pike,' racing to the Mexican border. Someone the "cartel" and the Marshals Service have been looking for for over 5 years. As the now dentist and his receptionist are trying to escape two cartel members spot Givens in the crowd of police (it's not hard with the cowboy hat) and get permission to wait until Givens leads them to Rollie and when they are both together, clip 'em both. 1.05 The Lord of War and Thunder - Raylan's surveillance job on a fugitive is interrupted when he is forced to deal with his troubled father, who is causing mischief for a drug dealer who is renting from him. Raylan is forced to take sides when his estranged father Arlo Givens goes to war with a local drug runner. Disc 2 of the Justified The Complete First Season Blu-ray 1.06 The Collection - A wealthy man seemingly commits suicide on a luxurious Kentucky horse ranch, and Raylan must hunt for his missing art collection while resisting the advances of his attractive widow. Raylan turns to an art collector to help bring a criminal to justice, but the case soon turns to a murder investigation. Meanwhile, Raylan's ex-wife turns to him for help, and he turns to Boyd Crowder to gather dirt on his father. 1.07 Blind Spot - After disrupting an apparent assassination attempt on Ava, Raylan is hellbent on tracking down the responsible parties. However, he soon discovers that Ava may not have been the real target. Raylan and Ava survive a hitman's attack, and Raylan suspects that the Crowder family is trying to get revenge on Ava. But are his own biases clouding his judgment? 1.08 Blowback - Raylan is turned hostage negotiator when a dangerous inmate holds a group of people hostage. Raylan tries to defuse a hostage situation in the Marshall's' office without any casualties, and later discovers that his actions with Ava could have repercussions on Boyd Crowder's prison sentence. 1.09 Hatless - While away from the Marshall's office because of a forced "vacation," Raylan comes to the aid of his ex-wife after she is threatened by dangerous loan collectors who are looking for her husband. Having been suspended from the Marshal's service, Raylan decides to use his free time to go head-to-head with the gangsters who are bothering Winona's new husband. Disc 3 of the Justified The Complete First Season Blu-ray 1.10 The Hammer - Fresh out of prison, Boyd Crowder begins his mission to being "religion" to the backwoods. Meanwhile, Raylan starts trying to make a new case against Boyd while working as a bodyguard for a judge whose life has been threatened. Raylan is tasked with guarding an eccentric judge, but Raylan takes time off from the assignment to track down an old lead connected with the Crowders. 1.11 Veterans - Raylan learns that his dad's life is in danger because he ran Bo Crowder's business while Bo was in prison and ran it in the ground, and he turns to an unlikely source to pin a meth lab killing on Boyd Crowder. It's up to Raylan to keep Harlan safe when Boyd Crowder and his cadre of "followers" turn vigilantes. 1.12 Fathers and Sons - The marshals are forced to turn to Arlo for help in making a case against Bo Crowder, but will he go along? Meanwhile, Bo is having problems of his own with Boyd, who continues to wage a religious war against his drug business. Boyd Crowder's increasing influence has gotten out of control and Raylan is ordered to bring in his estranged father, Arlo, to help defuse the situation. Raylan has an intimate encounter with his ex-wife Winona that is witnessed by Ava. Ava finds some unfriendly visitors in her house and decides to pay a visit to Bo Crowder to prove her resolve. Boyd decides to up the ante against Bo's business by targeting his supply truck. Bo wants to take out Raylan Givens, so he reaches out to people who want him gone, including Miami gun runners and his own father Arlo. 1.13 Bulletville - In the first season finale, Harlan is turned into a battlefield when the tense situation between Raylan, Arlo, Boyd and Bo Crowder finally comes to a head. When Bo sadistically kills all of his son's followers, Boyd looks to Raylan for help. Arlo's plan to betray Raylan is found out, and he is shot by Raylan. Ava is kidnapped by Bo and Johnny Crowder, after which, Bo shoots Johnny for suspected collusion with Boyd. Boyd and Raylan go after Bo to rescue Ava. At the standoff, Bo is unexpectedly killed, in an ambush, by Miami gun runners who are after Raylan. Raylan and Boyd manage to save Ava and kill three of them, but one of them escapes. Raylan is forced to let Boyd (who calls Raylan his "only friend") chase after Bo's surviving killer. Bo gets revenge on Boyd for blowing up his ephedrine shipment, asks Arlo to help him kill Raylan at the request of the Miami cartel, and kidnaps Ava for bait and insurance against Raylan. Reviewer's Note: Reviewed by Martin Liebman, January 17, 2011 You got ice cold water running through your veins. It's an old story that never, well, gets old. The law and the lawless meet in Justified, a show that pits a slick and smart lawman who's in his element whether playing country cool or city slick and faces off against a down home criminal element in the small little 'ville of Harlan, Kentucky. Justified is a modern-day Western, not modern-day only in the sense it was made recently, but in that it brings old-timey law and order to a world where values and landscapes and weapons have evolved since the days of the old west, but where a particular brand of justice remains the same. It's still a world where the law need outclass, outsmart, and yes, even outdraw the bad guys, and that's where the show's star shines. Timothy Olyphant (The Crazies) stars as U.S. Marshall Raylan Givens, a Kentuckian by birth and a big-city lawman by trade who's forced to relocate to his home state after a deadly shooting in Miami. Givens gives 'em fair warning before pulling the trigger; an honest man who says he's gonna getcha and he does, Givens is a fast draw with a quick wit and a confidence to back it up. Givens is a modern day John Wayne, a lawman who puts his money where is mouth is and backs it up with a deadly aim and a know-how that makes him the perfect man, whether he likes it or not, to juggle the big-time trouble that can spew from a small-town setting. The slick-dressing, hat-wearing, fast-drawing U.S. Marshall Raylan Givens (Olyphant) has been reassigned from Miami to his home state of Kentucky following what he dubs a "justified" shooting of an armed suspect-turned-assailant, all in broad daylight. The case makes national news, and it's decided that it's in the Marshalls's office and Givens's best interest alike if the Kentucky native were to "get out of Dodge" and take a lower-profile position in the small town of Harlan. The city slicker-turned-small-town marshall goes back home to deal with the small-time country bumpkins of his youth, but he soon learns that even rural America isn't immune to the ills of big-city crime. While he's not laying down the law and drawing his gun on those to whom he provides ample warning (he shoots to kill, he tells them), he's dealing with an old flame, Ava (Joelle Carter), who's just put a bullet through the chest of her abusive husband and is cleaning up the bloody mess in her dining room with Lysol when she's not trying to bed the handsome Marshall. Givens is also forced to contend with a feisty ex-wife (Natalie Zea) and his semi-estranged father (Raymond J. Barry). Givens's first course of action is to put an end to the local rabble rousing white supremacists, led by Raylan's old friend and mineshaft co-worker Boyd Crowder (Walton Goggins) who, like a bad penny, keeps turning up in the middle of trouble throughout Givens's tenure in Harlan. Remember when Han shot first? It wasn't a "justified" killing, or at least it wasn't in the eyes of George Lucas, nor would it have been in the eyes of the U.S. Marshalls or Raylan Givens. But now that Greedo has yanked out his piece first -- and missed from across a table -- Han's killing of the bounty hunter can't be mistaken for cold-blooded murder. Justified opens with a scene similar to that most controversial Star Wars change-em-up; Givens sits across from a bad guy not at a cantina on Tatooine but rather in a posh Miami restaurant. Givens has offered the bad guy a quick and painless way out of town, but stubbon as he is, Mr. I'm-About-to-Die is just begging Givens to prove his worth as a fast draw and a man of his word. Once Death-Awaits-Me tries to get the best of Givens, the lawman wastes the bad guy with a Sig P226, he later tells Boyd when asked the make and model of the gun used in the infamous shooting. Though Givens appears to carry a Glock for the rest of the show (the Sig must've been taken in for evidence), the name stamped on the slide of this or any other gun matters not; the series's opening shooting -- as it should -- encompasses what Justified is all about. Raylan Givens is a man of principle, but he's not afraid to pull his piece and he's especially not timid about plugging a bad guy, given ample verbal warning and justification, of course. Givens backs up his mouth and swanky city/country hybrid talk and walk with brains and his unflinching knowledge of law and order and how to differentiate what he's learned in the classroom against what really works in the field. Givens -- derived from a character from the story "Fire in the Hole" by Elmore Leonard -- is an old-time lawman who is himself not immune to crossing the line between right and wrong but straddles it better than most and favors the right side. He's a character slicked up for the 21st century but who could no doubt blend into and work within the constructs of the old west way of justice. Justified may not be a perfect show, but its lead character is one of the best in the business. Just as its main character would probably fit in any era and place, Justified as a series attempts to blend traditional and nontraditional elements, which gives the show a unique flavor and elevates it a notch against lesser law-and-order type series. The modern-day setting hasn't spoiled the down-home charm of Harlan and the surrounding areas; although the show ventures out of the small-town setting here and there -- notably to Los Angeles for one of the series's best episodes -- the rural Kentucky backdrop becomes a character itself, not necessarily because it does anything unique but because it's home to a world that's old-time traditional with modern-day troubles. Whether dealing with old-day racists who bend Christianity to suit their goals, the ever-present criminal rivalries, or the more modern trouble that comes with cooking meth out in the woods (it couldn't have been a small-town law and order show without a meth lab out in the woods, now could it?), the rural Kentucky locale is the perfect backdrop in which to plop a lawman who speaks both the language of the modern world and the tongue of the rural way of life. Even the series's catchy theme song is a hybrid that perfectly morphs Down Home and Hip Hop; yeah, it sounds crazy, but it works. It's the small touches like that -- the old with the new, whether the music, the plots, or the I-Miss-Miami hero who wears a hat and sports that Sunday-best back home country church look -- that help set a wonderfully captivating tone for a show that's sure to please, yup, even the most diverse of audiences. For all it gets right, though, Justified still stumbles a few times along the way. Rather than present a singular story arc, similar to Breaking Bad, Justified instead weaves in a few constant themes through the series -- Givens's relationship with his ex-wife and an old flame, his dealings with his semi-estranged father, and his confrontations with his old chum Boyd Crowder that really only bookends the season -- but primarily deals in standalone episodes that develop the primary character and build his relationships with several secondaries but certainly don't construct a unified, singular storyline throughout. Whether Justified would have worked better with a sweeping arc of some sort is debatable, but the result is a handful of episodes that don't live up to the series's potential and struggle to find a thematic and emotional footing, even if they do prove somewhat entertaining in a bubble and work towards furthering the audience's understanding of the characters. Additionally, the acting occasionally suffers; Olyphant is a fantastic actor -- and oftentimes, it seems, underrated -- but the series surrounds him with a few not necessarily miscast but certainly underperforming players who occasionally suck the life out of even the most intense scenes. Otherwise, Justified is a smart and oftentimes engaging program; what it lacks in a greater story arc it makes up for in a wonderful primary character whose modern-day John Wayne veneer is a welcome addition to the 21st Western landscape. Justified is a solid all-around show. It doesn't have the intensity of some of television's best -- it's not Breaking Bad -- but that laid-back atmosphere is nevertheless one of the series's charms. A wonderful lead character is the primary attraction here; Timothy Olyphant nails the role of Raylan Givens -- the body language is perfect and he wears the costumes like he was born to play the part -- and he's the primary factor in the show's success. Most of the rest of the cast could be taken or left behind, though Boyd Crowder works awfully well as a primary antagonist. Pacing issues and a few lesser episodes aside, though, Justified is an entertaining ride through the new-meets-old world of small-town justice. Sony's Blu-ray presentation of Justified: The Complete First Season yields a solid technical presentation and a nice assortment of extras. Recommended. Cast Notes: Timothy Olyphant (Raylan Givens [40 episodes, 2010-2012]), Nick Searcy (Chief Deputy Art Mullen [39 episodes, 2010-2012]), Joelle Carter (Ava Crowder [39 episodes, 2010-2012]), Jacob Pitts (Tim Gutterson [39 episodes, 2010-2012]), Erica Tazel (Rachel Brooks [39 episodes, 2010-2012]), Natalie Zea (Winona Hawkins [39 episodes, 2010-2012]), Walton Goggins (Boyd Crowder [35 episodes, 2010-2012]), David Meunier (Johnny Crowder [20 episodes, 2010-2012]), Jeremy Davies (Dickie Bennett [19 episodes, 2011-2012]), Raymond J. Barry (Arlo Givens [18 episodes, 2010-2012]). IMDb Rating (02/11/17): 8.6/10 from 66,834 users
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