Wonders Of The Unknown – As this episode of Dark Winds begins, Joe Leaphorn (Zahn McClarnon) drags Jim Chee (Kiowa Gordon) from the trailer. Colton Wolf (Nicholas Logan) works on the wounds on his face. Joe worries Jim will bleed out before he can get help. He tries to keep him awake. Joe nearly gets run over when he tries to flag down a truck for help. After the intro, Bernadette Manuelito (Jessica Matten) receives her mail. She notices an envelope from US Customs and Border Protection. Once she reaches the station, she learns that Bigman is on the roof trying to fix the TV antenna so they can watch the moon landing tomorrow.

Bern gets a call from Joe who tells her that he and Chee got in a mess. They’re at the hospital because Jim has been shot. Joe wants her to take his statement when he gets up. He suspects the man who shot Chee is the same man who blew up Emerson Charley’s truck. Emerson’s son Tomas has something to do with it. Chee got a good look at the shooter. When he can think straight, Joe wants to know what else he knows. Bern says she’ll be there soon and she is glad they’re both okay. Colton installs a bomb inside a doll. When Joe makes it home, Emma (Deanna Allison) says she was worried.

Emma tells him that the medicine man is coming to the house today at five. When he is alone, Joe looks at his son’s buckle. Bern picks up a pouch for a friend who is in the hospital. Joe visits BJ Vines (John Diehl) to ask him about the buckle. BJ insists there was no reason for him to have possession of something like that. Joe admits they haven’t recovered the lockbox but the buckle was near the location where it was supposed to be. BJ reminds him that his son died three years before he purchased the land. He asks why the burglary is his business. Joe says his wife hired a private investigator who came to him. BJ wasn’t in town when the break-in happened.

Rosemary has a conspiracy theory about a crazy Indian church. BJ was a good friend of their chief named Dillon. He can’t imagine anything in his lockbox meaning anything to them. Joe says his brother was killed yesterday when someone blew up his truck. Then, Joe visits Gordo Sena (A Martinez) to talk about BJ Vines. He receives a list of everything that was supposedly in the box. Joe shows him the buckle and explains that he found it up there. He tells Gordo how they found it and that a guy was trying to burn stuff up there. Gordo says he got himself involved in some Navajo witchy witch. Joe is told to keep the People of Darkness business on the reservation because it makes white people uneasy.

Gordo recommends speaking to his old man. Joe suspects the Charley kid connects the dots between the truck, the blond man, and the People of Darkness. Bern arrives at the hospital to take Jim’s statement. Jim describes the shooter as a white guy with blond hair and six feet plus tall. He explains that the man got away in a green and white Ford F-100. Jim knows he owes her an apology for putting her in a bad spot at the cave with Whitover. Bern learns that he didn’t have protection because he doesn’t carry anymore. She gives him the pouch she picked up earlier. Joe visits his mom and dad. His mom reveals she has been working on a rug for a long time to keep her mind strong.

Joe sits next to Henry (Joseph Runningfox). When Joe asks about the People of Darkness, Henry says the tribal police dropped the ball on those peyote freaks when he left. They disobeyed the law, held meeting in secret, and looked for a vision quest. They weren’t like the Native American church since they were real criminals. Henry believes the worst decision Joe ever made was letting that woman drag him back there. Henry tells him to go speak to his friend’s mother named Margaret. Joe visits Margaret to ask about the People of Darkness. He says he is looking for Dillon Charley’s nephew, Tomas. Margaret says Dillon was clever because he knew the white man’s way of life was not good for them.

He thought some of their people were using the white man’s laws against them. Dillon believes they would prevail over them if they befriended the white people. Joe asks if Dillon was the founder of the People of Darkness. Margaret says he let white people commercialize the ceremonies and use the sacred medicine for fun. She argues that the people calling themselves People of Darkness now are clueless. When Dillon died, she thought the People of Darkness died with him. Joe returns to the hospital to give Jim something to eat. Jim tells Joe what Mrs. Vines told him and how she believes the People of Darkness are behind the burglary.

Jim says Tomas told him BJ Vines is People of Darkness. He is supposedly a witch who witched his father. Rosemary believes Dillon gave her husband something back. Emerson wanted it back. When Vines wouldn’t return it, they argued over it. Then, Emerson sent his son to get it. Joe says he and Bern will return to the Malpais tomorrow. When he returns home, he helps Sally (Elva Guerra) deal with her crying baby. Mary Landon from the LA Times visits Emma Leaphorn at her workplace. Mary wants to know if Emma can help. She is writing a story about the effect of the Family Planning Services Act on Indian women.

Emma doesn’t want to help. She claims Mary is playing with their lives and she has no idea what it is like to wake up every day knowing everything you couldn’t do. Bern joins Joe later because she wants to talk to him about her interview with Border Patrol. Congress is passing a law requiring them to hire Native officers. Joe reminds her that they have a border there. Bern is ready to move up after passing the lieutenant’s exam. Joe tries to convince her to stay and take his post, but Bern wants to find her own way. Joe apologizes and offers to give her a reference. She tells him she’ll be back in the morning. Colton drops off the package somewhere.

The following day, Joe and Bernadette check the mountains again. Joe finds a box with the initials BJV on the lid. Then, they discover a body that they suspect belongs to Tomas. Joe is adamant that they need to find his boy. He visits Benny to see if he can find Tomas. Benny has the box containing the doll Colton made. He thinks his dad left it for him. Joe wants to help him cut the ribbon. Once they open it, Joe notices the bomb in the back of the doll. Bern puts Benny in the car before Joe tells her to get Henry. Sally sits with Emma who begins telling her a story. Colton calls the Scarborough Community Hospital while claiming to be Special Agent Ralston with the Flagstaff Field Office.

He says he wants to interview the victim of the shooting out in the Malpais yesterday so he asks for Jim’s room number. Henry arrives and learns that the doll is loaded with Semtex. He begins working to disable the bomb. They manage to do it before going to the moon landing. Jim watches it at the hospital. Joe makes it back to the station and tells Bern that the bomb has been taken care of. Bern shows him that the paperwork has the Arizona state steal on it. It is paperwork Drumco had to file with the state. She’ll head over there tomorrow to see what she can find out. Benny questions why Bern doesn’t just call his dad. Joe says she can’t.

He admits Benny will never see him again. Moments later, Benny says he saw an astronaut near their house last week. He had lighter hair. His grandpa told him to stay away from him because he was bad. When Benny asked why, his grandpa said the man blew up that well. A bunch of locals arrive so they can watch the moon stuff on the television at the jail. Bern notices that Joe is shocked by what Benny just said. He thinks the blond man murdered his son. That man goes to the hospital so he can deal with Jim.

 

Dark Winds Review

The second episode of Dark Winds’ second season was pretty standard without a lot of action or shocks. The story is moving ahead very slowly even though there are only six episodes in the season. If I am being totally honest, the episode was pretty dull compared to what was offered in the first season.

Joe has to investigate and find out what is going on, but there should be some story movement or action to keep viewers interested too. The series might be trying to do too much with the little time it has. This episode spent a lot of time on the culture, the moon landing, and other things that frankly weren’t all that exciting.

The cast is great for the most part and the characters are very good. There is really so much they could do with Dark Winds and this feels like the bare minimum. One more thing the show could do better is showing its age because it looks too modern for the most part, but that would be easy to ignore if the story would move along at an exciting pace.

At the very least, viewers need to feel like they can sympathize with the victims. That hasn’t happened because these characters were hastily introduced and swiftly killed. The pacing needs to pick up for this season to match the quality of the first though. This episode scores a 5.5 out of 10. Recaps of Dark Winds can be found on Reel Mockery here.

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