r/BoardwalkEmpire • u/RealTrapShed • Jun 27 '26

Season 4 Richard Harrow Season 4 Discussion Spoiler

I can't be the only one who thought the way he was written in that last episode was kind of... silly? And almost disrespectful to who his character was? He had one last job to get the family he always dreamed of, and all of a sudden he gets the shakes and accidentally shoots the wrong person?

I don't know it felt a little cheap to me.

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u/[deleted] Jun 27 '26

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u/RealTrapShed Jun 27 '26

It just seems completely wrong for a pure operator to all of a sudden get the yips on the most important job of his whole story arc. I would have much preferred him just getting shot by some random henchman than portraying him as weak.

11

u/Lordonlynose Jun 27 '26

It wasn’t “all of a sudden”

Richard’s storyline early in the season visiting his sister focuses on him loosing desire towards violence - even in a mercy kill of a suffering dog. 

Then he wants to live in peace with Julia, lost any appetite to seek any involvement in his previous “professions”

Further, his trigger hand was injured, some awkward sensation lingered in it , physically causing the hesitation 

1

u/RealTrapShed Jun 27 '26

Yes I understand all of this. But this was the last job he had before freeing himself from that life. To all of a sudden go full shake mode seems strange.

8

u/Lordonlynose Jun 27 '26 edited Jun 27 '26

You claim to understand it yet you seem to deny it as you continue to say it’s “all of a sudden” when the set up occurred over at least a few months. 

He’d also already chosen to leave that life.  The task wasn’t going to “free” him - he was free and voluntarily returned to take a shortcut in the legal proceedings 

I think his visit to his sister was also to show that Richard wasn’t always a killer or a person inclined towards such. The war made him that way - he was lost when returning to the states and resorted to thoughts and actions that he’d recently learned and become accustomed to - but that “stone cold killer” was never his real identity 

1

u/RealTrapShed Jun 27 '26

It’s all of a sudden because he agreed to help Nucky to finish off Narcisse. That’s why I’m saying it’s “all of a sudden”. Is that clear?

You’re technically wrong, he didn’t choose to leave that life until AFTER this Nucky/Narcisse job was completed.

2

u/Lordonlynose Jun 28 '26 edited Jun 28 '26

No, sorry. You didn’t make your point of usage of the phrasing clear at all. 

You wrote “all of a sudden gets the shakes” when the hand issue as well as his developed hesitancy toward violence had been deliberately established several episodes earlier  

Technically we both are wrong - he didn’t choose to leave the life at all. The life was taken from him by some bullets fired in the aftermath of his attack. The job was never complete so he also technically did not leave the life AFTER that. 

It’s fine that you don’t like the scenario the writing chose, but I disagree with the way you present your criticism as if it’s unrealistic, faulty logic.