Four words: Best. Season. Finale. Ever.
This episode of “Longmire” should have been called the Absaroka County Confessional, as it seems like everyone was confessing something in this season finale.
Episode opens with a great visual – Walt riding a horse on the open plain. Cady is sitting on the porch, a hefty brace on her leg as she watches her dad ride around. Ferg calls looking for Walt and the beautiful ride comes to an end.
Walt meets Ferg at a local motel, where we find out someone has beat the dickens out of Ed Gorski, the Philadelphia ex-cop who has been stalking Vic and leaving her threatening messages (though Vic can’t prove it). The sheriff goes to the hospital to question Gorski, but the smarmy man thinks Longmire was behind the beating since he pretty much promised such last week when he told Gorski to get out of town.
Back at the office, Longmire tells Vic about Gorski and how Gorski thinks he had him beat up. He also confesses to Vic about his visit to Gorski. Vic, in turn, confesses to Walt that she and Gorski had a brief romantic relationship before she was married. She tells Walt she can get Gorski to drop the charges.
Meanwhile, Mathias, the sheriff on the reservation, calls Walt to tell him he has Branch in custody for trying to break into the home of David Ridges. As Mathias has impounded Branch’s car, Walt has to take Branch back to town. As he admonishes him for his actions, Branch confesses to Walt that the reason he was trying to break into Ridges’ home is because he think Ridges had something to do with Cady’s accident. He goes on to explain how he got to this conclusion – his findings on Cady’s tire. After hearing this, Walt spins the car around and they go back to Ridges’ home.
There they find a videotaped confessional from David Ridges. As the tape plays on, it shows Ridges shooting himself, committing suicide, yet there was no body at the home when Walt and Branch were there. Branch tells Walt that Ridges worked for Jacob Nighthorse and wonders if Nighthorse has anything to do with Ridges’ death.
They take the tape to Henry who says Ridges was dealing with bad (or dark) medicine.
Vic goes to the hospital to talk to Gorski. She gives him a crime report to fill out and leaves to go back to the office. At the office, she tells Walt that she beat up Gorski. Walt notes there are no scars on her hands. She also denies hiring Hector, a local Cheyenne thug that we saw once last season. She tells Walt that Gorski will name her in the crime report. Walt says she’ll lose her job for that and probably won’t ever work as a cop again.
Over at the offices of Jacob Nighthorse, Branch questions Jacob about David Ridges. Jacob says Ridges confessed to him about tampering with Cady’s car and when Jacob found the body he burned the body on a funeral pyre per Ridges’ wishes. He takes Branch out to the pyre. Branch wants to take samples to verify that the body burned was Ridges’ but Jacob flat out refuses. It is sacred burial ground and can not be tampered with.
Walt meets up with Hector and convinces him to confess to the beating of Ed Gorski. As he leads a handcuffed Hector into the Sheriff’s office, he is surprised to be greeted with a bunch of cops taking files out of the office. Detective Fales from Denver has served a search warrant on his offices, his home, and Henry’s bar, hoping to find evidence against Henry or Walt over the killing of Miller Beck, the meth head that killed Walt’s wife.
Walt decides to take Hector over to the next county because of the all the ruckus in his own jail. Henry stops them in the middle of the freeway and we learn that Hector went to Denver on Henry’s request, though he confesses he never killed Miller Beck. In fact, he’s never killed anyone in his life. He just beat Beck within an inch of his life. If Hector didn’t kill Beck, then who did? both Henry and Walt wonder.
Vic tells her husband that she might be out of work soon. He is worried when she explains that someone from Philadelphia has been stalking her, but becomes angry when he learns it’s Gorski. Vic gets a call from the hospital saying that Gorski 
wants to see her. She goes to meet him, assuming he’s filled out the crime report, but learns that he has checked himself out of the hospital. The report has been left blank except for the words “SEE YOU SOON.”
Walt returns home to find Cady sitting on the floor, clutching the tea box that holds her mom’s ashes. They start to talk about Fales and they both find it strange that the witness (who named Walt as the “cowboy” who got beat up by Miller and some other meth heads) said Miller stole $700 from Walt’s wife’s purse. Both Cady and Walt knew that she never kept more than $50 in cash in her purse for fear it would be stolen.
The next day, Walt meets with Fales and tells him about his wife’s max of $50 in her purse. Fales counters with a small medicine bag found at Henry’s containing two teeth, teeth belonging to Miller Beck. Fales leaves Walt to stew over that information. In a fury, Walt destroys his office, overturning his desk and breaking his bookcases to kindling. In the aftermath, his phone rings. He answers it to hear Branch gasping to Walt for help.
Walt races out to the funeral pyre to find Branch sprawled on the ground, shot in the chest twice. When he asks Branch who did this to him, we flash back to Branch collecting samples from the funeral pyre. He turns to see David Ridges, dressed as a dog soldier running toward him and firing shots at him. “A dead man,” he answers. Walt tosses Branch over his shoulder like a rag doll and heads back toward the truck, a look of determination on his face.
What a great season finale! There was so much going on and everything was so intense! Will Vic lose her job? Is Henry going to jail? Will Branch live?
No word yet if A&E has renewed “Longmire” for Season 3, but why shouldn’t they? The show is good. Really good and I’m sure anyone who has seen the season finale will need to know the answers to those questions posed in the episode! I can’t believe I have to wait almost a year for a new season! This show should have a full 24 episodes each season instead of the truncated 13.
I guess the tossing of Walt’s office gives the set decorator a chance at redesigning the place. With all the intrigue, secrets and lies between Branch, Walt and Vic, it seems like Ferg is the only cop in town with a clear conscience! Maybe he’ll end up being sheriff one day.
What did you think of the finale?
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