Yea once more, I find myself agreeing with my brutha @avclub-751aba6c2e6c52a659661171026ceef3:disqus .

This show keeps getting better and better. It's the highlight of my Sunday nights, without question. Maybe five episodes in means I'm locked in, but I felt like this ep was the most accessible of the run and worked well as a stand-alone show.

Obviously the dissenting opinion on this thread, but I've never been a Joan Allen fan. Maybe because I was introduced to her in THE CONTENDER (which I hated), FACE/OFF (stupid fun), and had Pam Landy shoved at me in Bourne movies. She was good in PLEASANTVILLE and UPSIDE OF ANGER, but she's not somebody I personally…

What an amazing hour of television. I'm about to watch it again, just to enjoy its epic awesomenessitude, but a couple of brief observations before I enter Capua once more:

Charlie with the longest long-con of all time.

This (cleaning up). It was a bit unnecessary, but it did put a bow on the whole Winona taking the money thing from last season. It also gave Raylan reason to be all the more convinced she took the money and fled, putting things together that really didn't belong together, but could have been, thinking through it…

Mike's the reason Ace spent three years in prison, and Ace hates him for it. As I understand it, the whole thing with hiring the kid is to make of him a distraction, a sacrifice that Mike is going to hurt while Ace gets his revenge on him.

Yes, it was him. He is a teacher at the Jr. High where Kenny and April used to teach. He was in the S2 finale, too. Embarrassed I know that.

Another KFP speech, another white-knuckle ride for the viewer. He's back, and our national nightmare is over.

Finally, I get my Gambon/Hoffman payoff! What an amazing scene with those two going head to head. The barely restrained animosity was delicious to watch. One thing about that scene, though: Was anyone confused by Mike's question about Ace's grandson? I thought Ace and Gus said it was Mike's grandson Ace took the fall…

Tone-Deads?

Dead Dicks

I couldn't agree more with your take @wolfmansRazor:disqus. I can't watch ELR because all it did was remind me of the passivity of my father, the overt humiliation of him perpetrated by my mother, and the utter lack of boundaries enforced by everybody on the show. It made me angry for the kids left to deal with the…

This was a good episode. Blame it on the lateness of watching this post-Grammys, but I wasn't quite as engaged with this episode as I was with the first two. Funny how that works, with a bunch of people on the "my favorite so far" wagon. It was characteristically strong, and I'm addicted to the show on the whole.

YES YES YES YES. Yes. I think the conversation with the doctor highlighted this when he asked for him to up the scrip. There was a familiarity there, a knowing-yet-unsaid understanding between Ronnie and the doc about his taking oxy (I assume that's what it was). Ronnie is by far the most tragic figure on the show at…

Read @sepinwall:disqus for that. A little bulky to have to go back and forth, but worth it if you want to understand the show and where it fits.

Nick Tarabay is killing it. Ashur is a wondergul character and Tarabay plays the shit out of him.

Yep, I sat up in my chair when he showed up. And I love that Milch dresses him uncomfortably in clothes that are just a little too tight, and a goofy hat. I love how they are showing the haves/have-nots around the track, a sort of caste system within this little world, with the underlings fighting for the scraps.

Yeah, this. My m.o. with the lingo is to let it wash over me, picking up what I can when it's not vital, and strain when it is. To me, it's not the vocabulary of the horse-racing language that stifles me, it's the mass amount of yet unknown and unseen referents tossed around so quickly and casually by Ace and Gus who…

Very strong episode.