It's been a fantastic journey for Hell on Wheels, but all good things must come to an end as we start the first part of the final season of AMC's western drama, which I finished binge-watching over a week ago to catch up on for the purposes of reviewing this final season, and over time it's rapidly grown into one of my favourite shows, so I'll be sad to see it go. However, we're spending more time with Hell on Wheels than we otherwise would if all the episodes were aired back to back, because the show is going down the Mad Men route of airing the first half of the season in one block and then the second half of the season next year, so it will be a long wait when the seven episodes that we're getting conclude. But for now, it's great to have the show back and that was a pretty awesome episode to return with, as the final season gets well and truly underway.
Opening with a dream sequence, we see Cullen Bohannon looking at his wife and child on the hillside above him, along with a house. It's his dream, the one he's been fighting for - to find his family and complete the railroad so he can live out a happy life. He's standing by the beach, looking out. His kid comes along and hugs him whilst his wife invites him in for supper. It's a brief snapshot of his ideal life, until of course it's revealed to be non-existent (a possible flashforward to the end of the season perhaps?), and he's climbing a mountain, and on the path to completion, which will put him closer to completing the railroad than it will do for Durant, shaving a lot of time off their hands. And with Durant fighting against Cullen, the race is on. Both are taking different routes, and it's going to be very exciting to see what the end result will be, especially as Cullen, who's been working for Durant's team for a while, has now switched sides following the end of last season. We got to see little of Durant himself aside from a brief teaser where he found out who Cullen was now working with, but needless to say, there should be more in store next week so it should be fun to see how the characters that have remained with him have been holding up whilst we've been gone.
Chinatown does a great job at establishing the new characters and cast as we enter the final season. We've said goodbye to many characters over the course of the show and Hell on Wheels proves that it isn't afraid to see major players bite the dust. Lily Bell and Elam Furgurson have just been two of the major characters who have been taken out thus so far and we've got to wonder who won't make it to the end of the season. Will the show kill off its main character, Cullen? Or will he get the peace he's been searching for? What about The Swede, for that matter? There's plenty of interesting questions but we probably won't have to deal with the deaths just yet, especially this early in the season. It's more about laying the groundwork, introducing the new characters and setting the stakes. We met Mr. Chang (Byron Mann, who you may recognise from Arrow), as the primary new antagonist for the final season, comes head to head with Cullen when he learns that Chang isn't paying the Chinese workers a decent wage. He's shaping up to be a formidable threat even though Cullen has found new allies in the form of Tao (Tiza Mang), a Chinese worker, and his son, Fong (A. Zhou). We also spend some time with James Strobridge (Reg Rodgers, The Americans, The Knick), who's shaping up to be a new friend of Cullen, or at least, judging by what we've seen so far, and a friend is someone that Cullen could use right now especially given that all his have died, or in the case of his wife, is missing.To make matters worse, The Swede (Christopher Heyerdahl) is back, to add another adversary, another challenge, for Cullen to face this season.
The show itself has picked up a month after Cullen took the job with Central Pacific and has found his way to a new railroad. The return of The Swede should at least give the writers a chance to fix what was wrong with the series last season, their handling of that character in partiuclar, and they've already started on a promising footing given that the Swede's confrontation with Cullen at the end was one of the stronger scenes of the episode. Cullen, upon recognising who was knocking at his door, immediately went for his gun and threatened the intruder. Their exchange was handled pretty well, as Cullen was regarded as the devil in the eyes of The Swede, who naturally believes himself to be the prophet. Cullen counters, wanting to know if he's got any followers other than the dog that he brought with him (the dog, who earlier, The Swede ran into when he had to hide weapons underneath some hay, hinting of a further conflict to come), but also says that the Devil may be just what they need to finish the road, and doesn't care what The Swede calls himself as long as long as he has a shovel. Finishing the railroad is the aim of the game here, and the race to the end is getting closer and closer.
We are quickly introduced to a problem that we'll be faced with for the season to come in the fact that Mr. Chang, as mentioned before, isn't paying the Chinese workers the same wages as those who aren't Chinese, even though the Chinese are describing as working harder and are less sick. Fong and Tao are already annoyed by this, and despite Cullen's intervention, it's clear that Mr. Chang is not going to listen to them. Cullen's insistent that the workers get paid or else there may be another strike, which is something that they can't afford, and the tension isn't resolved by the end of the episode so there'll of course be more in store. I thought the writers were going to have Cullen use the card game to make Chang bet the worker's wages, but Chang joining the game was only a distraction so they could beat up Tao without Cullen interfering. It didn't work, of course, as Cullen found out, but the damage was still done. How the Tao, Cullen and Chang conflict evolves will no doubt take multiple directions over the course of the season and it'll be interesting to see whether it escalates to a time-consuming strike. One thing that's good about this is that Chang should be a worthy final antagonist for Cullen to face, as he has arguably been one of the best parts of the premiere, as the two violent men with a bloody past go head to head. It's interesting to note that they're veterans of of two different wars, where factions on different sides of both conflicts committed atrocities, with the Taiping Rebellion and the American Civil War being of course the wars that we're talking about, so there's plenty of potential there for things to get even more intense as Hell on Wheels gets closer and closer towards the end.
With everything taken into consideration, Chinatown was a fantastic episode that's got us right back into the thick of things and could see the start of a strong momentum that will hopefully be kept over the next seven episodes that we'll get until the long break. What did you think of the premiere? Are you happy to have Hell on Wheels back even though it's for a final season? Who do you think are going to be the casualties of this season? Let me know in the comments below.
Overall Episode Verdict: A-
Positives:
-A race to the finish.
-Introduction of the new cast, including Mr. Chang
-The return of The Swede, his first confrontation with Cullen.
Weaknesses:
-Doesn't affect the score, but this is the final season! I'm going to miss this show.
