In the “Mayans M.C.” recap, EZ makes a move to strike back at the cartel, Emily asks for a favor and Creeper shares major news with the club…
By Damon Martin — Editor/Lead Writer
If there’s anything we’ve learned through the final seasons of shows like “Mayans M.C.” it’s that anything is possible and nobody is safe.
The same could be said for “Sons of Anarchy,” which ultimately saw several major players wiped out before the last scene in the series. Thus far, “Mayans M.C.” hasn’t really started adding up a huge body count through the first three episodes of the fifth season but it’s likely only a matter of time before the bullets start flying again.
The double-episode debut detailed how EZ Reyes, now president of the Santo Padre chapter, was struggling to maintain control in the wake of a war with the Sons of Anarchy and no longer having support from the LNG cartel after their warehouse filled with heroin burned to the ground. Now cut off from that funding and support, the Mayans are desperately trying to hold onto control over their territory while Isaac Packer — the psychotic president in charge of the Sons of Anarchy chapter in San Bernardino — continues to hunt them down one by one as he makes a slow march towards the Mexican border where Santo Padre calls home.
With options limited and the cartel unwilling to revisit their previous arrangement, EZ decides it might be easier to just take out LNG completely, which seems like a very risky proposition.
Meanwhile, Creeper suffered a brutal attack in prison as a result of the turmoil continuing to fester on the streets and with the Mayans iced out of the heroin trade, there’s no way to protect him.
Nothing seems to be going right for the Mayans but EZ is nothing if not ambitious so he decides to strike back this week with hopes that he can not only eliminate the LNG cartel but potentially set up his club as the major drug running operation north of the border.
With that said, let’s recap the latest episode of “Mayans M.C.” titled “Do You Hear the Rain”…
I’m The Cook
To get started on the cartel takedown, EZ and the rest of the Mayans stage an attack on a cookhouse where they kill several soldiers and steal supplies for making Fentanyl. The only person not on the kill list is the cartel cook, who Angel actually finds hiding out underneath the house but he ultimately decides to let him go.
That is until another member finds the cook and delivers him to EZ, who puts him in the back of the van along with all the stolen supplies as they head back to the clubhouse. Angel continues to deal with his disapproval of what EZ has been doing but he still can’t deny his brother’s orders, especially now that he’s president of the Santo Padre chapter.
Back at the clubhouse, EZ questions the cook named Elio, who tries to play it off like he was just the assistant to help make the drugs. But EZ did his research before staging this hit — and he shows Elio a photo of his family back in Mexico, which shows him just how much the Mayans mean business.
EZ promises that if Elio cooks the drugs as he’s been ordered, he’ll eventually be freed, he can return home to his family and he’ll go back with a pile of cash for his trouble. Elio prepares to get to work to start cooking the drugs with Bottles — the glasses wearing Mayan prospect — ordered to serve as his assistant.
As the cooking gets underway, Bottles learns rather quickly that spilling anything during this process could get them killed as Elio eloquently informs him after some of the chemicals fall to the floor. Caution is key to cook up a batch of Fentanyl, especially the kind that the club could then sell on the street for vastly more money than heroin might have afforded them six months ago.
With Elio and Bottles taking a break from cooking the drugs, Bishop leaves the clubhouse and can only shake his head at the sight he sees with the pair outside the garage. Before he can take off, Angel stops to ask him for some advice.
Now that he’s got a son of his own, Angel desperately wants to keep his family away from the violent world that surrounds him with the Mayans but he’s struggling to find a way to prevent those two worlds from bleeding into each other. Knowing that Bishop had a child that died years earlier, Angel asks him what he should do.
Bishop replies by telling Angel that if he could go back and do it all over again, he’d leave this hell hole behind and go be a janitor just for the chance be a father again. He’s learned through very painful experience that he would give up everything for his child — sadly he figured that out too late.
“I’d let all you motherfuckers burn just for one more second with him. I’m here because I got nothing else. I’m here because I ain’t got nothing fucking else.”
~ Bishop
Bishop’s answer seems almost like what Angel expected because he knows being a loving and caring father to Maverick and possibly starting a family alongside Adelita will never happen so long as he’s constantly mired in the death and destruction that follows the club like a dark cloud hanging overhead. Angel is starting to realize that he’s no longer made for this business but getting out is far more difficult than getting in.
While Angel is facing those personal obstacles, Marcus Alvarez is dealing with the exact opposite.
Despite time at home with his children and another baby on the way, Alvarez is stuck in a funk because serving the Mayans is the only life he’s known for the past few decades. Now he has nothing to do but fix his bike, tinker with his car, drink beer and think about how much he misses the outlaw life.
When his old pal Diaz comes to visit from Oakland, they reminisce over old war stories from their days together in the Mayans. Alvarez brings up the war with the Sons of Anarchy but Diaz says that the Oakland chapter along with Stockton and Lodi are staying out of the fray.
Diaz then reminds Alvarez that he’s really the winner in this whole scenario because he got out clean — nobody’s hunting for him and there’s no chance his wife will have to answer the door one night to the news that he’s been shot and killed.
Alvarez needs to remember what he’s got versus how much he could potentially lose if he was still part of the Mayans.
“Leave the dying to the rest of us”
~ Diaz
No Questions Asked
Felipe Reyes recognized a long time ago how much he’s cost his family with the choice he made, especially after having an affair with his boss’ wife and then trying to escape to America to start a new life far away from the cartel he used to serve. He put his family in harm’s way, which is exactly what got his wife killed and then led to his son EZ exacting revenge only to end up in prison himself.
These days, Felipe has resigned himself to serve as a father to only Angel because he’s lost all faith in EZ after witnessing the destructive choices he’s been making. But as he looks over some family photos where he’s standing next to Angel, Adelita and holding onto baby Maverick, Felipe is beginning to realize that there’s another son he’s also abandoned.
He looks through some old letters from Dita Galindo, who continued writing him even after their affair had ended, and among the keepsakes, Felipe finds a photo of Miguel Galindo as a child. Felipe desperately tried to reach out to Miguel previously but he was less than receptive, especially knowing the hand the Reyes family played in his mother’s death.
Still, Felipe wants to make a connection so he drives to Miguel’s house where he’s currently working on a bicycle alongside his son Cristobal. Felipe tells Miguel that his mother continued writing to him over the years and he saved those letters — he’s delivering them now so perhaps Miguel could learn something about the other side of his family.
Miguel warns Felipe to never return to his home again or he’ll be buried where he stands. Felipe leaves as instructed but later that night, Miguel finally opens up the package of letters as he begins reading his mother’s words while also finding that photo.
Perhaps Miguel is starting to realize that he still has family out there — including two half-brothers who have been at odds with him for years while never knowing they actually shared the same blood.
Speaking of Miguel’s family, Emily is still living under lock and key without the ability to go anywhere with Cristobal without a nanny and an armed escort by her side. Emily wants to escape but her options are limited, especially if she hopes to get out and take Cristobal with her.
A trip to the grocery store affords Emily just enough time to measure a potential exit strategy but she’s going to need some help to get there.
That leads to an encounter in the park with EZ, who compliments her new hair style while also asking Emily if she’s doing OK after they lost touch. Emily doesn’t disclose that she’s back living with Miguel while effectively serving as his prisoner because she knows EZ would come after him guns blazing and one or both of them might die.
Instead, Emily asks EZ for the last favor she’ll ever request of him — she wants an unmarked, untraceable car to be parked outside the back exit of the grocery store where she shops. She can’t say why and he can never ask her about it again later but EZ is no fool and he knows Emily must be trying to get away from Miguel again.
EZ agrees to help her, no questions asked but before leaving they remember the last time they sat on these same swings at the park. It was the day EZ received his acceptance letter to college and he was terrified to open it out of fear of rejecting.
Instead, EZ realized his dreams when the college welcomed him with open arms — and then that dream died in a hail of gunfire following the tragic events that left his mother dead and sent him to prison. EZ wonders if there’s an alternate universe where perhaps none of that happened and he went off to college with Emily still as the love of his life.
As nice as that sounds, Emily doesn’t believe that’s possible and they both just have to reconcile with the choices they’ve made that led them there because there’s no going back now.
Elsewhere, Letty and Hope are still trying to steal their way to financial freedom by robbing drug dealers, which just seems like the worst financial planning ever. They decide to act on the score that Louie put them onto a week ago while warning them it was incredibly dangerous.
It seems they infiltrated a drug den where users show up to get their fix but the house is protected by armed guards with a whole lot of artillery. Realizing this is a suicide mission, Hope tries to leave but the dealers refuse to let her go and that’s when Letty busts in the door and soon realizes she actually brought a knife to a gun fight.
With a gun to her head, Letty is cornered but a brief distraction allows her to strike after one of the dealers emerges from the back and he recognizes Hope. It’s Butterfly — one of the drug dealers from Meth Mountain who used to serve Isaac, which is the same place that Hope called home before she got involved with Coco.
Before Hope can even react to seeing Butterfly again, Letty stabs the guard with a gun on her before grabbing a backpack filled with cash and making a run for the door. She barely gets to the car with Hope before a blast of gunfire rings out through the air and bullets start ripping through everything nearby.
Letty and Hope start to drive away just as Butterfly comes outside to stop the soldier from firing any further.
Back at home, Letty is stunned to find over $17,000 in the backpack, which gives them more than enough to pay the back rent and stay at the home she shared with Coco. Hope tries to warn Letty that seeing Butterfly means Isaac can’t be far behind, which means they are both in serious danger right now.
Letty refuses to listen and she won’t leave the home she shared with Coco so rather than listen to Hope’s advice, she tells her to get out. Hope refuses and returns with a carton of ice cream as the duo share a snack together and become quick friends again but this partnership seems doomed to fail, especially if Isaac comes knocking on their door.
Isaac may have even more to deal with soon thanks to his vice president Terry.
Terry was the person responsible for discovering that the Mayans had a dead Son stuffed in an oil drum outside the Santo Padre clubhouse, which sparked the war between the two factions. In reality, that dead Son named Montez — the road captain from the Sons of Anarchy Motorcycle Club Redwood Original chapter — was killed by a rival club and then his body was planted at the Mayans’ clubhouse.
Sadly none of that matters much now that dozens of members from both sides have been killed.
The original information about that dead Son came from Jess — a bartender at the Mayans’ clubhouse whose sister Jazmine happens to be dating Terry. Jess came clean about the dead member of the Sons of Anarchy and she’s continuously been feeding information to her sister, which gave Terry all he needed to deliver the Mayans to Isaac.
Sadly now that a truckload of guns were stolen on his watch, Terry needs more information but this time Jess refuses to give him what he wants. She’s felt guilty about ratting on the Mayans since this all started and these days, Jess has been growing closer and closer with Nestor, who is a prospect and loyal servant to the Mayans.
So Jess won’t give up what Terry wants and that leads to him breaking down and confessing that if he doesn’t deliver, Isaac will personally come after him instead.
Rat Infestation
Last week saw the Department of Justice find an accounting irregularity and as expected that links back to Lincoln Potter, who has been conducting all sorts of shady practices in his efforts to bring down the Mexican cartels.
This week we are introduced to Patricia Devlin — played by Dana Delaney — who holds a title far too long to repeat but she’s the special investigator assigned to look into these matters and she needs answers about financials behind whatever Potter has been doing. Instead of answering directly, Potter goes into a long, drawn out soliloquy that almost sounds like a threat so Patricia calls him out on it.
Potter quickly refrains from his backwards speak and apologizes if his comments were misconstrued as he then tells her to continue so they can dig into these suspicious reports that tie back to him. It’s pretty clear that Potter has been up to some nefarious dealings but does this mean he’ll actually get busted or perhaps he’ll be forced to give up information he’s got on somebody else?
Speaking of valuable information, Kate/Kody — the undercover agent who busted Creeper — arrives at a meeting with her boss, who is unbelievably livid that she not only compromised a three year operation by sleeping with her target but she then decided to go visit him in prison after he got attacked. Kate is informed that she’s being fired so she lays down her gun and badge but not before borrowing her boss’ credential so she can sneak into the records’ room to retrieve the confidential informant file linked back to a member of the Mayans.
She opens up the file and we see the name Kevin Jimenez — he was the cage agent who served as EZ’s handler after he got out of prison under the agreement that he would provide information to help bring down to the Galindo cartel. EZ eventually broke free of that duty in a blackmail exchange with Lincoln Potter and his name has been redacted from the files that Kate finds in the records room.
Despite the name being redacted, it probably won’t take a lot of research to discover that EZ was the rat when he first joined the Mayans as a prospect.
As for EZ, he gets great news when Bottles delivers a single brick of Fentanyl produced by Elio the cook. It’s worth $100,000 and they have enough materials to produce a second brick of the same size and value.
That gives EZ exactly the leverage he wants, which leads him to a clandestine meeting with Cole — the special ops soldier whose group is running drugs for the LNG cartel and providing them with protection north of the Mexican border. Cole scoffs at the suggestion that his group would stop working with the cartel for a single brick of Fentanyl produced at a makeshift drug lab.
Cole then offers EZ and Angel a head start before the special ops commandos come gunning for them.
EZ quickly counters by offering to produce another brick of drugs along with assurances that Cole and his team should dump the LNG cartel and come work with the Mayans, who will keep this operation completely based out of the United States. There will be no more dangerous travel down to Mexico to protect the LNG interests.
While he seems skeptical, Cole tells EZ to produce 10 kilos of Fentanyl in three days and he might consider the offer along with possibility of returning the drug trade in prisons to the Mayans rather than the Iron Bar M.C. currently overseeing that exchange. But if EZ fails, then the special ops team will have no choice but to protect their interests with the cartel and they’ll come after each and every Mayan stupid enough to stay in Santo Padre.
As they prepare to leave, Angel questions his brother’s decision making, especially after Cole broke into his house and pointed a gun at his baby boy Maverick. EZ admits that he has no idea how they’ll get enough supplies to produce 10 kilos of Fentanyl but they’ll figure it out because this deal is too good to be true.
Rather than constantly running from one operation to the next, just trying to make ends meet, EZ recognized this is an opportunity for the Mayans to build a lucrative drug running operation where the special ops soldiers will actually work for them. EZ believes that’s worth all the risks they’re taking right now.
Back at the clubhouse prior to EZ and Angel’s return, Hank gets a call from a payphone inside the prison where he’s connected with Creeper.
After being released from the infirmary where he was treated for stab wounds, Creeper has recovered enough to return to general population where he’s still at great risk. That’s why he had to make the outbound call to inform Hank of the news he learned on the inside.
There’s a rat in the Mayans and that threat needs to be exterminated.
Based on Creeper’s revelation along with Lincoln Potter getting the squeeze put on him by the government, it almost feels inevitable that EZ’s past will come back to haunt him before the series is over. But “Mayans M.C.” has been great at introducing twists and turns to deliver more than a few surprises so perhaps EZ isn’t marked for death but right there there’s an awfully big target on his head.
“Mayans M.C.” will return with a new episode next Wednesday night at 10 p.m. ET on FX.
