Keeping Up With the Earps: 4×05

If you’ve never seen one of my deep dives before…well it’s a lot. This post is split up into several sections, some highlighting the episode itself and some keeping track of the bigger picture. I hope you gain something from it.

Disclaimer: Nothing included in this post should be taken as absolute fact. Even information that I took directly from the show is stated as I see it.

Brief recap of 4×05: Wayhaught is kinky.

“I know how this looks, but I’m asking you to trust us.”

It’s payback time for whatever deal Nicole made with Mam to get her family home and it’s not pretty. Whatever Mam unleashed on Nicole at the end of 4×04 brought back the memory of what exactly she promised Mam in return, but renders Nicole unable to tell anyone. Every time Nicole tries to confess instead of words, frogs come out. And somehow regurgitating amphibians isn’t the worst thing Nicole has going on, she’s also blacking-out and trying to hurt the people she cares about most, even setting the Homestead on fire.

Wynonna is ready to deal with the threat the Clantons pose, but the rest of the team convinces her that it’s too risky until she has her magic gun/sword back. Luckily Amon gives Wynonna a lead that sends her to the Sanctuary of the Scorned Woman. Peacemaker is somewhere in the sanctuary and if Wynonna delivers a specific scorned woman from a magic painting to the nuns of the Sanctuary she’ll be able to get it back.

The biggest, most beautiful brains in Purgatory get to work on a cure for Nicole, unfortunately a not-so-in-control Nicole sabotages it. Running out of options Nicole convinces Jeremy to help her take drastic, “I need you to kill me” measures and handcuffs Waverly to the bed to keep her from stopping them.

Rachel, who has been ignoring calls from her sexy gay aunts all day, is staking out the Clanton Magpie ranch trying to figure out why she can’t get a hold of Billy. Rachel can’t see it, but we do, Billy has gone full Reaper and is standing right beside her.

Wynonna and Doc have arrived at Steve Gulch and found the scorned woman the nuns are looking for and holy hot-tub, it’s Rosita. She’s back, baby (err maybe too soon to use the ‘b’ word).

Potentially Important Takeaways:

• In the video Wyatt claims that Doc shot first at the O.K. Corral, Doc claims that isn’t true and seems hurt by the accusation. (More on this further down)
• We never learn exactly what Nicole promised Mam.
• Mam tells Holt and Cleo that her plan to end the Earps is already in motion. She thinks that death is too good for them and intends for them to destroy each other, hence Nicole’s violent black outs.
• We already know that the door that brought Wynonna, Doc, and Waverly back from The Garden had a Clanton C glowing on it, which shows that Mam has some kind of link to The Garden. What if she’s been there? I usually don’t bring up stuff that I think is this much of a reach, but this is too interesting to leave out. Look at scar on Mam’s right hand. I wonder if she got it the same way Waverly got her’s in the same spot. Who knows, maybe Mam just had an accident involving a scooter and wine in France. 😉

Musings of an over thinker:

• Frogs have a very biblical connotation, Nicole alludes to it when she refers to Egyptian plagues.
• “Sanctuary of the Scorned Woman”, this is the type of thing that I get caught up on with this show. Scorned WOMAN, not women. Given the way this season started I can’t help but think of a couple of scorned women in particular, Eve and Lilith.
• Yes, I found new birds in this episode, yes a massive Birds and Other Wing-a-ling Creatures of Wynonna Earp is coming eventually.

Tarot Cards:
*Portion removed. Check 4×02 if you’re curious.

Gems You May Have Missed:

• They tell us who started the fire during the wedding cold open by having Nicole use a lighter to light a cigar for Wynonna.
• Wynonna is wearing a shirt that she wore in S01E01. The shirt depicts The Lion of Saint Mark.

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• Today in things that took me way too long to notice: the name Amon is an an anagram of the name of the actor who plays him, Noam.
• When Amon greets Wynonna he mispronounces her name, she doesn’t correct him out loud, but she definitely mouths her name at him.
• When Jeremy is taking the BBD office back from Chloe he is basically cosplaying Dolls (he wore that same jacket and shades combo) which is adorable for several reasons.
• A lot of people noticed that the book Jeremy finds the “cures” for Nicole in is the same one that Nedley is holding in Nicole’s dream, but the first time we saw that book was actually way back in 1×04.

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• “Looks like she puked the Dagobah system” is a Star Wars reference. Thank you, google.
• Waverly brought part of the bed with her.

Answers to questions you may have:

• I’m pretty sure they meant to imply that Waverly didn’t wake up because she had already inhaled too much smoke, not because she is the deepest sleeper ever.
• Up until Nicole starts frog barfing in this episode she didn’t remember the details of the deal she made with Mam.
• Whatever Mam did to Nicole made it impossible to tell anyone what she did, since she vomits every time she tries to say it she tried writing it, but just ended up with tadpoles/sperm.

Questions that I don’t know the answer to:

• Why does Nicole react that way when Doc pulls up to the Homestead? A lot of people have assumed that it means her promise to Mam is to kill Doc. I tend to think it’s something less obvious, especially considering the first thing she did was set fire to a house that Doc wasn’t in.
• Did Nicole know Mam was the Clanton heir when she made the deal? How did she know that Mam was someone she could go to about getting people out of The Garden of Eden?

Favorite Lines:

• That’s not why they make lube.
• I love balls!
• That should keep out Blah and Order for a while.
• Yo! Extreme Makeover Homo Edition
• She doesn’t even go here.
• You ate a billion frogs.
• Have you tried chicken soup and a One Day At A Time marathon?
• Gosh doink-it.
• What up, Kermit?
• We are storming the fucking castle.
• Won’t be the first time. (hey-O)
• I love you, Waverly Earp.

Under-appreciated (according to me) Lines:

• Gold? Frankincense? Tickets to Lizzo?

The Big Picture

My attempt at the timeline:

• Genesis 3 – A deceptive serpent in the Garden of Eden leads to The Fall of Man and two angels are placed at the entrance with a flaming sword to guard the Garden. (Biblical canon, not Wynonna Earp canon)
• October 26^th 1881: Gunfight at the O.K. Corral.
• Bulshar entombed: 1887
• Wynonna Born: 1988*
• Waverly Born / Julian is “pushed outside of the GRT: Sept 8 1994*
• Mama left: 1999**
• Attack on the homestead: May 2000
• Wynonna comes of age: 2015*

*What we know for sure is that the attack was in 2000 and that Wynonna was 12 and Waverly was 6 when it happened. Keep in mind when doing the math, that Emily wrote the pilot in 2015. It all falls apart if you try to use the air date for the math. Also, because the month someone is born can mess up the math, this is all kind of give or take a year.
**The original line was that Waverly was 4 when Mama Earp left, making me think it was two-ish years before the attack, but in 3×01 Wynonna says that Mama had only been gone six months when the Homestead was attacked.

Season Four Credits Breakdown:

• The first of the new images is an old photo of two figures standing near a couple of trees. What appears to be a man in a hat and a smaller, likely female figure. As lightning flashes we see them in more, terrifying detail. Their eyes glow and they have marks on their faces. Scars? Lighting?
  It’s faint, but the man in the photo seems to have the Clanton brand on his forhead.

• The next image is of a female angel walking toward a threshold of light. Again, there is a flash and the image changes. The angel is gone.

• The next change is a little harder to catch. The card for Dom/Waverly has changed. Now on top of a map of the Ghost River Triangle, is an image of the “garden”/ icy Stonehenge.

• The last and most subtle addition is on Kat/Nicole’s card. On the right there is a tree that wasn’t there last season. And you may not have noticed (other than the obvious murder trees), but there is A LOT of tree imaginary throughout this show since the start.

• The most important image of the credits isn’t new, it’s been there since day one, it’s what this show is really all about, the damn birds.

Main players: What we know about what we don’t know

Most of this will be things that were shown or stated in the show, however I am including theories that I feel strongly about, those theories with be in italics. Anything that was added since the last post will be in bold. I’ve taken out some stuff that seems obvious, but it’s still in previous versions.

Gunfight at the O.K. Corral (Real world):

• 30 second shootout between lawmen and a group of outlaws, the Cochise County Cowboys.
• Lawmen involved included Town Marshal Virgil Earp, Special Policemen Morgan and Wyatt Earp, and temporary policeman Doc Holliday.
• There’s no consensus on who shot first.

Cochise County Cowboys present at the O.K. Corral:

• Billy Claiborne : ran from the fight.
• Ike Clanton: ran from the fight
• Billy Clanton: killed in the shootout
• Tom and Frank McLaury: Killed in the shootout

The Clantons: “We thank our kin for this feast, and for the sin that roots us. The power of vengeance will damn our enemies. In the name of Clanton, we vow to never forsaken. Never forget. And never forgive”
I think it’s safe to assume they weren’t going around using the last name “Clanton” since no one knew they were in Purgatory.

• Poison. Cursed. Wynonna asks Amon what they are, “Demon? Revenant?”. Amon replies “A little less and a little more than all of that.”
• Live on Magpie Ranch. Magpies are notorious hoarders among other things.
• Margo aka Mam
  • Clanton Heir. Refers to a “charm”/”gift” she possess.
  • Made a deal with Nicole to get Waverly and Doc home.
  • Not a nice person.
• Magistrate Cleo.
  • Like Holt, potentially uses the last name “Clayborn”. She has a certificate in her office that I’m 80% sure says Cleo Clayborn.

• Sheriff Holt
  • His name-tag says Sheriff Holt, but Nicole and Cleo refer to him as “Sheriff Clayborn (Claiborne)”, which is the name of another family involved in the O.K. Corral shootout.
  • He seems to be ready to be done with the “war” Mam is fighting.
• Billy
  • Performed a ritual to save Rachel. “A soul for a soul. We are rooted together, enemies and kin. But I sever that root and I offer myself.”
  • Definitely turned into a “reaper”
• Reapers are Clanton ancestors, including “Uncle Ike” who is likely the same Ike who was present at the shootout.

Waverly:

• Fully grown half-angel and adult human lady.
• Happily taken Virgo with hair for days. 
• “Destined” to take her place on Julian’s throne as “The Guardian”. “I am trying to protect this place, just like my father did.”
• Has some angel powers, but the extent is not known. I’ll be interested to see what she can do outside of The Garden and without the ring (assuming it stays gone).

John Henry “Doc” Holliday:

• Participant of the famous Gunfight at the O.K. Corral
• Went to hell when he died in the AU. Is super emo about it.
• Is a vampire.
• Was able to climb the stairs to “The Garden”. 
• Seemed genuinely hurt by old Wyatt’s assessment of him.
• Potentially having some sort of existential crisis over his violent history.

Jeremy Chetri:

• Has a sort of empathetic connection to people (“now I can sense when my friends are super scared”) every since he was in a car crash with his mother and stuck with her body for three days. My poor child.
• Black Badge “did stuff” to him as well. Not “purely human”. I don’t really take this to mean anything more than what we already know as stated in the bullets above, but who knows, maybe he’s the werewolf. 

Nicole Rayleigh Haught:

• An Earper, @LoveAndDonuts, pointed out on Twitter that a man named Samuel A. Haught owned a cattle ranch in Arizona where the “Cowboys” were known to do business. And here is a great thread by @PurgatoryArcheo that goes into some Haught family history. Coincedence, Easter Egg, or well thought out plot point? Time will tell.
• Is a Capricorn….This fucking show. They think of everything.
  

Black Badge Division (Guess who’s back):

• “No longer defunct”. They’re different and in way over their heads (I mean Naomi Hycha is no Agent Lucado), but maybe our gang will start getting paid again. For now they are to “observe, not interfere”.
• “If you think I’m afraid of demons, just wait until you meet upper management”.
• Supposedly a highly classified branch of the U.S. Marshalls, but as we according to Agent Moody BBD “isn’t a government agency, never was.”
• Early members include Robert Svane aka Bobo Del Rey.
• All the main characters except for Nicole have signed a contract in blood.

The Garden:

• (Bible) Home to two very important trees, The Tree of Life and The Tree of Knowledge [of Good and Evil].*
• There is some sort of living machine that requires blood.
• from Eve, “what kind of batshit playground experiment for creation was this?”
• Has been used as a prison for Eve. It seems that as long as there was a Guardian on the throne or the machine was being fed, Eve was kept from escaping.
• From Juan Carlo’s journal “We guarded the entrance to keep him in, to keep everything in, but we failed, Julian and I”.   Maybe the Guardians were to keep Bulshar and apparently Eve IN their prison and to keep them away from the Tree of Life.
• Waverly’s angel blood caused flowers and trees to pop up.

Eve:

• (Biblical) One of the first of two (or three depending where you stand on ‘Lilith’) humans created. Lived in relative paradise until she was tempted by The Serpent (our Bulshar) to eat the forbidden fruit from the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil.
• There has been mention in certain versions of her story that well…”the motif of Eve copulating with the primeval serpent takes priority over her other sexual transgressions.”
• From 3×10: Wynonna – “Don’t forget Eve.” Kevin – “Oh, I wish I could. Don’t even get me started on that girl”.
• Has been imprisoned in “The Garden”, potentially, but not surely since her creation.
• Has a long list of things she is “pissed about”, a list which she hopes to address once she is free.
• Her plan, or part of it includes getting to the Ghost River Triangle to get what she is “owed”
• Self-described “nightmare unto the world”.

Amon:

• Demon
• Doesn’t like the Clantons. Seems a bit afraid of them.

Peacemaker: This section is a bit complicated after the developments of 3×12.

• Missing.
• Is a flaming sword that used to be a Buntline Special that used to be a flaming sword.
• Was originally The Flaming Sword meant to protect The Garden. Referred to as “the garden’s security system” by Julian.
• the sword can only be wielded by a Champion chosen by an Angel. As of now that is Wynonna who was chosen by Waverly.
• Disconcertingly referred to by Bulshar as “my sword?”, but that’s one of those things that makes me question if anyone or anything on this show is what we’ve been led to believe they are so I’m not going to think about it.
• As a gun glowed orange when aimed at a demon. As a gun glowed blue for the first time when Wynonna used it to kill Willa. Glowed blue for the second time when Waverly pointed it at Rosita and Wynonna ordered it to fire, grazing Rosita. As Wynonna prepared to shoot the Stone Witch, which was presented more as putting her out of her misery, the barrel started to glow orange, but quickly switched to blue.
• When Wynonna pointed the gun at Bulshar it glowed white, both IRL and in her hallucination.

The ring:

• Belonged to Waverly’s father, Julian. Bulshar stole it.
• Kate tells Waverly not to “underestimate the power of this relic. It’s older than most things on earth.”
• When Waverly finally puts it on, not only can she not take it off, Arabic writing appears on the ring. The writing translates to Garden of Paradise.
• So far we’ve seen the ring: give Widow Mercedes a serious Glow-Up and enable Waverly to punch a zombie witch across the barn, melt a demon’s face, control Bulshar’s former arm (connected to a radioactive revenant), heal her friend’s face, raise Julian, it’s rightful owner, from the dead, and put an end to Bobo.
• Can’t say if this is on purpose or not, but Waverly yelling at the ring to get it to suddenly be useful is too similar to Wynonna yelling at Peacemaker in 2×12.

My original theory was that the flaming sword, the gun, the ring, and the plate from S2 were all made by the same source of metal. Now we know that the gun was the flaming sword, but I still think there is a connection. I also came across some stuff about a very old black stone that is related to biblical story of the Garden of Eden. 

Mel and Kat Tweets of the Week:

I feel like Mel and Kat are pretty consistently hilarious when it comes to live-tweeting, so let’s recap some of the best of the best.

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Thanks so much for reading. Feel free to leave theories and feedback in the comments or hit me up on twitter. If you really liked it feel free to head over to my Ko-Fi page and contribute to my Chipotle fund https://ko-fi.com/earpermarine.