Sons of Anarchy Season 4 Episode 8 recap

I have this kale addiction. I eat kale salad (kale, raw garlic, sea salt, olive oil, lemon juice) like three times a week.  It makes me happy, even as it horrifies the other members of my household. (Lainey: and me, her part-time roommate)

But I might be done.

They had to use kale to cover up the chopped-off head? Seriously?  They had to take what was already, let’s face it, kind of a goofy scene (way to make that head feel real and heavy by tossing it like an oversized ping-pong ball) and cover it with my favorite vegetable?  Now all I can think about are dead-person boogers in my beautiful green bouquets, or whether the ends of the stalks were touching the seeping, congealing blood..

In general, it’s probably sad that an episode about the continuing goals of those trying to protect Tara from murder, and in fact involving no fewer than five actual murders, counts as the ‘lighthearted’ episode of the season.  But that’s how it seems.   They managed to make Juice’s suicide attempt seem like a hilarious B plot (at least until the end) and honestly,  a bag full of heads, even though it’s terrifying (and let’s face it, so was the spray of bullets that immediately preceded it), seems a bit Hallowe’en-esque, no?

Of course, given how Machiavellian Clay either is or is trying to be, we could speculate that in fact he set the whole thing up in time to interrupt the vote.   Right?  I mean, come on.   What if the vote had gone Bobby’s way (and we sure didn’t see a lot of him after that)?  We know Piney wouldn’t be dead, at least, but what about the cockamamie plan of Jax’s? Would that have been pulled to a halt?

(Lainey: on this Jax tip again - ALL of his plans are cockamie; does he EVER get anything right? Get beyond what he looks like when he’s mounting a girl - he is a LOSER.)

You have to wonder what Clay thinks is going to happen.  We know, from earlier in the season, that he realizes his time is limited due to his health.  We know his love for Charming is legit.    So…what?   He’ll wrest back control of SAMCRO, get the pesky cartels off their backs, and suddenly trust Jax enough to leave the club in his hands? He doesn’t think Piney’s death is going to incur any surprise from the rest of the club?  A hastily painted “LS” is going to absolve him?

This is where I started to wonder if Clay had a brain tumor.  No joke.  I’m not being callous, but how do you go from being a tough leader but unquestionably a leader, to the kind of crazed maniac he is now, absolutely sure that what he’s doing is going to be completely above the reproach of his ‘family’?  Especially since you and I both know he’s the one who planted that threat against Tara.   I mean…right?    

So now he’s on the mad descent.  He’s reacting to being impeached by, among other things, killing off a sure ‘nay’ vote.  He’s lying to his wife who knows damn well that he is (and who kept a straight face as Tig threw her bag over his shoulder. I know you’re like “she couldn’t see him, maybe” but I guarantee the crew broke up laughing HARD.”) .   What does he expect to happen?

The other person I wonder about, interestingly enough, isn’t Jax and it isn’t Tara (is it ever?). It isn’t even Roosevelt, though I loved the nine different degrees of pissed off he was at the garden party, none of them even remotely communicable in that environment because of how ‘good’ everyone was being.

It’s actually Chibs.  Because he knows, now, that by being Juice’s buddy, by being there for him and not immediately selling him out, he’s into some deep stuff.  It’s gonna get ugly for sure, and fast, and he’d be a fool not to realize it.   Will he cover himself, or does his bond with Juice triumph over all?