Boardwalk Empire: A Shocking Finale
Well, it is au revoir to "Boardwalk Empire," not, as I once feared , adieu. The novelistic series set in Atlantic City during Prohibition will be back for another season. So Sunday night's finale was an end to what has happened the past weeks and a teaser for what lies ahead.
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I confess I have become a "Boardwalk Empire" fan, though I usually watch the show on a HBO rerun and not on Sunday nights when it was first shown. That's because I am also a fan of "The Good Wife," though this season "TGW" seems less good than in the past. Maybe it's because the tension of whether Will and Alicia will ever do it is gone. They have, in case you don't watch, been doing it, though Alicia finally, and a bit belatedly, got a case of the guilts last week. And this season the show seems a lot more about Cary, a smart assistant D.A., and Kalinda, a bisexual investigator, who are not uninteresting but are, let's face it, quite young and cool. Alicia, her husband Peter, and her lover and boss, Will, are middle-aged and not really cool and that's probably what made the show so popular with its boomer audience.
But back to "Boardwalk Empire," which is like an old-fashion novel based on real-life characters. The main character is Enoch "Nucky" Johnson, the man who ran Atlantic City in the 20's when Atlantic City was very much the Las Vegas of its day. All sorts of historical figures weave in and out, from gangsters such as Al Capone and Arnold Rothstein to corrupt members of President Harding's administration. And there is Nucky's mistress, an Irish widow-thanks to Nucky-named Margaret Schroeder as well as Jimmy Darmody, once Nucky's protégé and now his enemy. See what I mean? There are loads of characters and loads of off-beat but accurate Prohibition details.
Now this season's finale was an absolute wow, with everything getting darker and darker. Up until this episode Nucky, played by the character actor Steve Buscemi, has never seemed like a hero. He is not attractive enough for that. But he had never seemed like an out-and-out villain either. Rather he was someone who was very shrewd and who took advantage of the political corruption of the time and the stupidity of Prohibition, which turned most Americans into lawbreakers.
But when he is charged with murder, along with a battery of other crimes, Nucky uses every one of his wiles to his advantage. And when he is out of danger, he settles scores in the most lethal way with all who have tried to harm him. Only his mistress--now his wife--Margaret manages to get in one more act of betrayal. And one can just imagine what will happen next season when he finds out.
Just before he shoots Jimmy-- yes, the protégé he once loved-- he tells him "You never really knew me." I never really knew you either, Nucky, though I watched and watched. And it will take me until the series starts again to recover from the shock of finding out what you are really like.
Myrna Blyth is editor-in-chief of ThirdAge.
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