Deadwood Episode Guide: Deadwood

Written by David Milch

Directed by Walter Hill

Unlike The Sopranos, which was the first major series with an antihero lead, or The Wire, where Simon would make it very clear that the central character was Baltimore, Deadwood had two characters that were at the center of the series. And it is significant that while the lead character of the series is Al Swearengen, the first character we meet is Seth Bullock. It is also critical that the opening scene takes place in Montana where Bullock is among to fulfill his last deed as Marshal – the hanging of Clell Watson.  The scene plays like the opening scene of many Westerns – a conversation between the lawman and his prisoner, (if, of course, you subtracted the significant amount of profanities). Watson talks to Bullock about how he was going to Deadwood, that there’s no law at all, that he just had some bad luck, and then gently tries to prod Bullock into letting him go, and absently offering him a bribe.

Then Sol Star enters the scene, and everything changes. There’s a drunken mob gathering that wants to see Watson hung now, and they are perfectly content to go through him to get it done.  Gunfire starts, and then we go outside. Bullock then comes out, dragging Watson, and memorably says: “He’s hanging under letter of the law”. He then lets Watson dictate final remarks to his sister, assures him “he’ll help him with the drop” and Watson finally yells out: “FUCK YOU!” before jumping and Bullock does what he’s told. He then takes down what Watson just said, asks “who’ll give word to his sister”, hands the note and his badge to one of the suddenly shame-faced mob, and rides off. And with that, we know we’re not watching John Ford. And before we set even one foot into Deadwood proper, we know we’re not in Monument Valley.

Yes, there’s a lot of swearing – a dozen ‘fucks’, a couple ‘cocksuckers’, and half a dozen other stray curses. Not much by what’s going to come later, but it was a big deal coming in 2004, which started Milch on his long explanation tour for critics. But mainly, there’s the dialogue in general. Walter Hill is one of the more established directors in film, who had quite a few Westerns under his belt, so it was a big get that Milch got him to direct the Pilot. Milch deferred to him when it was shot, but halfway through the season, it became clear just how critical dialogue was going to be to this series, so the scene between Watson and Bullock was reshot. And then there’s the fact that Bullock could’ve just stepped aside and let the lynching happen – it was literally his last day before retirement – but his choice to step in as executioner is both a meaningless distinction and absolutely critical. Deadwood is about imposing order into chaos, bringing law to lawlessness, and the grey area of the camp as they wait to be legally absorbed into the United States and, by definition, civilization. If Bullock lets the mob win, they finish stringing up Watson and looking forward to doing it when the next bastard breaks the law – or maybe just for the hell of it. Done Bullock’s way, it shames every drunk son of a bitch in that crowd (there’s a reason for Watson’s last defiant words), reminds them of the cost of taking a life, and maintains the veneer of civilization, which, in mere minutes, we will learn is completely absent in Deadwood.

Two months pass before Star and Bullock arrive in the camp to set up a hardware store. Before we get a look at the town we will basically be spending the entire series in, we meet two more critical, historical characters. Wild Bill Hickok is arriving in town, led by his fellow rider Calamity Jane.  We get a few things clear almost immediately. Wild Bill is the world-weary gunslinger, but the first time we meet him, he is prone, and looking not unlike a dead body. He seems to be getting by more on his legend then his actual ability. Jane is clearly in love with him, even though it’s made clear soon after that Bill has new wife.  We also meet Charlie Utter, who seems more determined to keep his friend alive, and it’s pretty clear that this isn’t something Hickok is interested in. His first goal upon riding into town is to find a saloon, and to find a place to play poker. Charlie immediately tries to set up what could be considered a finder’s fee for Nutall (who owns of the three major saloons we will see in the series), but he knows that most of it “Bill’s just going to piss away.”

When Seth and Sol find themselves a spot, they’re told to pay their fee to Al Swearengen at the Gem. Swearengen is then seen working out a line of credit for Ellsworth, a bearded prospector who is in the process of getting liquored up. He then delivers one of the most famous early lines:

“I may have fucked up my life up flattered than hammered shit but I stand here today beholden to no human cocksucker and working a paying fucking gold claim – and not the US government saying I’m trespassing or the Savage fucking Red Man himself or any of these limber-dicked cocksuckers passing themselves off as prospectors had better try and stop me.”

The amount of profanity in that dialogue is indeed awe-inspiring, and it tells you more about Ellsworth than fifty pages in a novel.

Swearengen appears perfectly benign, but the second we here a gunshot, he changes personalities like putting on a coat. The second he gets upstairs, and finds one of his whores standing next to a john with a hole in his head that she put there, his reaction is to grab Trixie by her arm, and demand the “Doc” show up.

Swearengen then watches Trixie desperately trying to explain herself to her pimp, a man she knows will kill her, not because she killed a man, but because she didn’t ask him for help and because she caused the possibility of trouble.  He then beats rather severely (with Trixie’s haunting words – “I’ll be good” And then she asks Jewel – the mentally deficient gimp who sweeps the floors to get her another derringer.

We are so scaled to accept certain Western clichés that at this point we simply think Trixie is either a simple prostitute being victimized by her pimp. But we will soon realize there are layers to this relationship that we have yet to fully grasp.

Very quickly, we begin to see that Swearengen has a hierarchy among the camp. Dan Dority is clearly his trusted soldier, utterly loyal, offering his opinion, but willing to follow his orders however ruthless. Next is E.B. Farnum, one of the most memorable characters, whose initial appearance is that of a rodent, and is probably the least respected character in the entire series. Slightly lower down is Johnny Burns, younger and slower-witted, but who nevertheless trust Swearengen implicitly.  Trixie would seem to be at the bottom of this totem pole (the fact that he refers to her as a ‘loopy fucking c—t’ after she shoots her trick would seem to indicate this) but there’s a level of trust there that becomes clear.

In the midst of all this we see Al trying to run a con on the ‘dude’ Brom Garrett. Brom seems the quintessential Eastern rube playing cowboy, who nobody respects, not even his wife. We don’t see much of Alma, and we do she seems mainly in the process of getting high, but she seems to have a slighter a bit of cunning that her husband clearly doesn’t respect.

The critical story for the second half of the episode is the only thing that you might find on a traditional. A lone rider shows up down saying that he saw an entire family massacred on the Spearfish Road – the Metz family, who we see leaving the town as Wild Bill rides in.  The Metzs are the only traditional family we will see in the entire series, and the fact that they are slaughtered this quickly demonstrates what kind of place Deadwood is.

It is critical to Deadwood that we consider Bullock and Swearengen reaction to this slaughter. Bullock may have hung up his sheriff’s badge, but he is still a cop. He convinces the man to get drink, guides him to Nutall’s saloon, and manages to get him to acknowledge that there might be someone alive out there. Sol then shames the crowd – and most importantly, Hickok – into forcing him to ride out there, and he and Hickok have a whispered conversation in which they say the man’s story doesn’t add up. After they find the child, and ride back into town, after he’s left with the Doc, Bullock looks at the man, and basically tells him that he and his group massacred the kid. Hickok walks beside him, and when the man tries to run, they both fire. This is the only traditional gunplay we’ll see in the series, and it’s one of the few moments Wild Bill seems truly awake and alive.

Swearengen, by contrast, gets pissed when the news breaks in the Gem, because everybody’s stirred up, and the night’s profit margin is being eaten up. He then goes downstairs, and talks everybody in the gem out of riding out that night, putting a $50 on anyone who brings a decapitated Indian head, and reducing prices on the next round. However, there’s far more to it – like Bullock, he doesn’t believe these were Indians, and he knows the names of the people who may have done it – and that seems to be one of the reasons “He’s got a lot on his mind.”

There’s a lot going on in the Pilot, and in the tradition of Deadwood, we’ll get to chasing down the other threads later in the guide. But the one thing I can’t omit is one of the men Hickok meets in the saloon – Jack McCall. He says he’s not impressed by Hickok, and that he plans to gut the sonofabitch at poker. From the start, he seems determined to bait Wild Bill, and one can’t help but think an earlier Hickok would’ve shot him quicker. Two things come to mind: McCall seems like a detached hanger-on, and Hickok seems to know he’s courting danger – and doesn’t seem to care.

The opening episode of Deadwood is a difficult series to get your mind around now, much less fifteen years ago. But the critical characters of the series seem to establish themselves in minutes. No doubt part of this is do to Milch’s genius as a writer, but credit must go to Ian MacShane, Timothy Olyphant, Keith Carradine, Robin Weigert, W. Earl Brown, Jim Beaver, and John Hawkes. A lot of the characters – particularly the women – are mere sketches at this point, but I have a feeling much of this is by design – at this stage, even Milch would’ve confessed “he didn’t understand women”. But you get the feeling straight on of being in the muck and the mire, which is a level that none of the other Westerns even came close to realize.