With every passing moment on Sons of Anarchy this season, it becomes increasingly obvious that getting mixed up with the Galindo Cartel was a bad decision of epic proportions on the part of SAMCRO. This week the decision caused even more tension. I’m losing sleep over it.

Squeezing Juice Dry
The theme of this season seems to be consequences. We keep seeing the consequences of decisions snowball out of control. Maureen sending the letters home with Jax. Juice keeping his lineage to himself. Clay deciding to get in with the cartel. It all goes completely out of control. First there is poor Juice. And now, I suppose, poor Chibs. If the club gets word that Juice tried to kill himself, they will kick him out. Chibs tells Jax, being that Jax is the one with heart, and asks if they can keep it to themselves with the promise that Chibs will watch Juice. My heart will break if Chibs finds out the real reason Juice is so upset.

Juice, meanwhile, is busy dealing with Roosevelt and Potter. Juice tells Roosevelt that he wants out. He’s done and he doesn’t care what happens. After seeing the bruising on his neck, Roosevelt believes him. Juice’s situations is making me sad not just for Juice, but for all around him. And it certainly makes me feel for Roosevelt who is obviously torn up about being a part of this. Potter…. well he’s not so torn up. His new plan involves telling Otto that Bobby lied to him – Georgie didn’t kill Luann and he isn’t dead. Given all that Otto has sacrificed for the club (his eyes, his life) it’s understandable if he turns.

What Potter wants from Juice – corroboration of Otto’s story. But when Juice sees just how deep SAMCRO is in it with this RICO case, he goes ballistic. Potter uses it – cooperate and SAMCRO won’t get the RICO. He’ll focus on the Five Kings of the IRA and the Cartel. I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again…. poor poor Juice. Oh! And Chibs notices he is missing during this time with Roosevelt and Potter. Eek.

How about them Niners?
As we discovered last week, the Lobos seem to have more connections than just their intel from the one Mayan. Jax and Luis  narrow it down to the Niners and set up a meet/ambush with LaRoy. Poor guy doesn’t know what hit him when all the cartel members come out ready to kill. LaRoy did make a deal with the Lobos, but that was back when SAMCRO was still inside and before they made their Galindo deal. So Luis decides to make a set up for the Lobos to meet the Niners and they would all ambush them. Of course, it doesn’t work out because the Lobos are always better at this and they get away. Luis’s reaction – kill LaRoy and the Niners. Oy.

This leads to one of many fantastic Jax moments this week. Honestly, I didn’t think I could love him more. I was wrong.Silly me.  He puts on a one man show to stop Luis from killing them. He says that while the Cartel gets to go home to Mexico and do their dealings however they want, SAMCRO is here and they will fall apart if other gangs and clubs don’t trust them. So Luis lets them live. For now. But things could not be more volatile.

Despite earlier that day when Jax gave Bobby crap about always having comments about the Cartel, Jax knows that it is way past time to get out. Bobby tells Jax that Clay told him that Jax is getting out and offered Bobby the seat. Bobby doesn’t want Jax to leave, feeling he is the only one that can truly lead this club (truth). Jax meanwhile is just upset because he knows Clay is a big fat liar.  He tells Clay this has all gone too far, they need to come up with an exit strategy for the cartel. They will connect the Real IRA and the Cartel and once that is done – he’s out. Clay says that Tara is clouding his judgment (in a really nasty way) to which Jax responds:

“If you ever talk that way about Tara again, I will pound those half dead hands so hard into this table you won’t ever be able to hold that gavel again.”

I don’t know what it is about Jax/Charlie Hunnam, but when he threatens physical injury or actually hurts someone in the name of Tara, I swoon. I’m seeking therapy.

A pile of old letters and a throw-away cell
Who would have guessed that these two things can cause me so much anxiety?? But they do. Gemma, worried no one had heard from Piney, heads to the cabin where she finds him dead. Of course, she knows it was Clay. She calls Wayne who comes clean to her about Clay having read all the letters and only burned the copies. He says he will take care of Piney – easy enough since Clay made it look like the Lobos did it – and Gemma said she would deal with Clay. Wayne wanted to finally turn him in, but of course Gemma isn’t going for that.

Meanwhile, Tara is getting ready to go to Oregon. She tells Margaret she is leaving and goes to hand her the copies of the letters to give to either Jax or Piney in case anything happens to her. But she finds out that the letters aren’t there – it’s just the blanks pages Wayne put in when he stole the copies. I love her reaction of, “That duplicitous bitch.” Their relationship cracks me up. She confronts Gemma – no more crap since they both know that the other knows about the letters. Tara says Piney never read them (something that saddens Gemma since it got him killed anyway) and that she agrees with Gemma that Jax shouldn’t see them because he will go into such a dark place she will lose him. Gemma tells Tara the same thing she told Wayne – while she knew Clay killed JT, she didn’t really know the reasons and wasn’t sure she wanted to. Sad.

Tara tells Gemma she is going to Oregon. Jax tells her the boys are going too. Unfortunately, Gemma decides to tell this to Clay as a way to let him know that Tara isn’t a problem anymore and that she isn’t going to show the letters to anyone. She promises she would never let Tara hurt the club and he has to promise her that he won’t hurt Tara. Which he does. LIES!! He is so evil! Jax meanwhile is very happy and decides he is going to take Tara up to Oregon, get her settled, come back to Charming to tie up loose ends and then live happily ever after with Tara. Unfortunately the last thing we see is Clay making the call to have Tara taken out by the Cartel’s guy. A call that once made can’t be taken back.

Cue the reaper on screen. Cue me going into a panic attack.

If you saw the previews for next week, you know that this week’s madness is nothing to what we will be dealing with on Tuesday. I’m not sure I’ll be able to handle it. My mantra of “They are fictional characters. They are fictional characters” doesn’t seem to be working. Imagine that.

How are all of you feeling? Do you want Gemma to just kill Clay already? How scared are you for Tara?? And just how amazing what Jax this week?? Charlie Hunnam is killing it!

Written by Melissa Miller. Find her on Twitter @serrae

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