'Jericho': Crossing the line

Hey, have you heard? Corporations are eeeeeeevil! With that news out of the way, Jericho continues to run at a breakneck pace. Some of the developments made sense. Some? Not so much.

My spoiler 'tis of thee, sweet land of liberty

J&R continues its attempt to take over the world (or at least Jericho) by cracking down on all goods coming in and out of town. That makes things difficult for Dale, who is providing vital supplies to the town but is getting them through smugglers. Goetz & Goons slap a notice on the store warning people not to patronize his establishment until Dale registers the market and therefore opens himself up to weekly inspections.

The townspeople gather -- J&R are taking over everything! It's getting really, really hard to get booze into town! The fiends! Emily uses her weekly line to remind people that our glorious forefathers revolted over booze, tea and other comestibles. Is it time for us to revolt? Stanley thinks no -- "This is not 'Red Dawn'!" He refuses to let Dale use his farm as a smuggling route.

One of the townsfolk turns collaborator -- he tells Goetz that Dale is the pipeline and leads to Dale getting caught red-handed. Goetz & Goons haul Dale into custody, which ruffles even Stanley's feathers -- surely J&R doesn't have the right to supercede the justice system of Jericho? Goetz thinks he does, and sends Dale out on a military transport to prison.

Jake and his boys stop the transport and convince Major Beck to intervene. Beck agrees to say that Dale is a top-secret informant about terrorists, and therefore is under his jurisdiction. Dale's off the hook -- for now.

Hawkins gets a call from his mystery man ("John Smith"), who tells him Beck is getting a radiation survey of the area and will therefore be close to catching Hawkins. Hawkins needs Jake to steal a page out of a top-secret binder that Beck is going to get that would show the radiation levels in the area. Trouble is, Jake no longer has free access to Beck's (or his own) office. But Heather does... Jake convinces a very reluctant Hawkins to tell an even more reluctant Heather about the plot, and Heather agrees to steal the page. She nearly gets caught, but Beck trusts her.

Poor, poor Beck... he's 0 for 3 this week. Hawkins convinces him he's got a tip about Sarah, and leads him on a wild goose chase to a burned-out house in Nebraska. Conveniently, there's a hard drive that "Sarah" somehow didn't destroy... and it's got all of Hawkins' documentation on the Nuclear Treason and Plot -- including that shot of Valente trying to buy the bomb. Beck's mind is thoroughly blown. He confronts Hawkins -- you planted this! You're messing with me! -- but Hawkins keeps his cool.

In other news, the Cheyenne government has printed new, more colorful currency, and Daredevil Accountant Mimi discovers a discrepancy in the books. She tells Trish, who tells Goetz, who apparently knows because he's probably the one who stole the missing $10,000. Trish warns him that J&R doesn't stand for embezzlement, and he starts getting twitchy. He tries to confiscate Mimi's ledger. Dude, don't mess with Mimi. She tells him she'll bring it in tomorrow, but neither she nor Goetz is satisfied.

Mimi tells Bonnie about the ledger and the embezzlement just as Goetz pays a call. Bonnie goes outside to tell them Mimi's not home, but Goetz & Goons aren't buying it. They break down the door. Mimi tries to hide, but Bonnie? Bonnie is made of awesome, and she doesn't take home invasion kindly. She picks up a shotgun and starts blowing the goons away. It's kind of incredible. Mimi is hit, at least three or four goons are down, and Bonnie is killed. And while Stanley didn't think booze was worth revolting for, I'm thinking his dead sister and wounded fiancée are another thing entirely. To the barricades!

Other stuff

• Poor Heather. When Hawkins tells her that he's got horrifying information, that only five people outside the Cheyenne government know it, and that people will kill to keep that information secret, she says "Why would I want to know this?" She really likes Beck, and she really doesn't want to know about the whole conspiracy angle. Too late, babe -- you're in it up to your ears, now.
• The military installs a massive security system outside the sheriff's office so it can be used to house confidential documents. Jake's not allowed in. "If it's any consolation, you now hold the distinction of being the first Jericho sheriff in history who doesn't have a key to the sheriff's office." Hee!
• So what's Beck going to do now that he can connect Valente to Sarah and the bombs? Will he go through channels? Will he join the revolution? Will his head explode? I hope he makes it out of this ok...
• OK, Mimi is wounded, Bonnie is dead -- does this mean Trish is going to have to stand up to her Evil Corporate Overlords and expose Goetz? Is this freelance embezzlement on Goetz's part, or is it all part of some overarching plan? And if a corporation is willing to casually bomb millions of people to death, what will it do to someone who really pisses it off?
• I have to admit, my eyes started rolling when John Smith told Hawkins that J&R set off the bombs and destroyed the world. Unless they suddenly moved their corporate headquarters to middle-of-nowhere Montana or all of their executive just happened to be vacationing in a lead-lined room in Wyoming, I don't quite buy it.
• John Smith says all the destruction was laid out in a disaster-contingency document prepared by J&R back in 1993. Now the company is trying to erase all evidence that the document -- and the plot -- ever existed. I buy corporate greed, malfeasance, criminal negligence, massive disregard for human life, and generalized nastiness besides, but killing millions of people to make a profit? I'm not quite there yet. Even Halliburton ain't that bad. (I hope).
• Oh, and John? He knows everything that's going on with Hawkins, and he helped write the document back in the day. Who is this guy?

Do you think this is all a corporate plot? If so, does that make sense or make your head hurt? Or do you think nutjob elements of the government found this contingency plan and decided to play it out? And why did Bonnie have to die -why couldn't it have been Emily?

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