‘Sons of Anarchy’ Season Six Finale ‘A Mother’s Work’ Recap — ‘Own Your Place’

A mother’s work is never done and it’s an ominous reminder for what transpired in the season finale for Sons of Anarchy on Tuesday night…

By Damon Martin — Editor/Lead Writer

In some way from the very beginning of Sons of Anarchy when creator Kurt Sutter called his show ‘Hamlet on Harleys’ that we had to know this tale was not going to end with smiles and happiness. Hamlet after all was one of Shakespeare’s greatest tales of betrayal and tragedy, so from the genesis of this show we understood that death was looming around the corner for so many of the characters we would eventually grow to love.

It didn’t take long for Sutter to smack us all right in the face with senseless death when Opie’s wife Donna was gunned down during season one. Every season a new death would evolve and we’d all grow to accept the necessary losses of people living in a world like this. Where it really started to strike home that we were in the home stretch of this outlaw opus was in season five when Ryan Hurst said goodbye to the show as Opie sacrificed himself to save Jax and the club while in prison.

As much as just about every person felt hatred and disdain for the character of Clay Morrow, his exit was still a hard one to process as he had been a center piece of this show from the first day it landed on air. And then on Tuesday night during the season six finale, possibly the saddest and most tragic death of all took place that will spiral this show towards its ultimate conclusion next season. Before we get to that, let’s start at the beginning of episode 13 titled ‘A Mother’s Work’.

Self Hate and a Harsh Reminder of Friends Lost

For the past couple of seasons as Jax has been leading his tribe of outlaws, much like his father, he’s been keeping a journal. His isn’t a testimony of what went wrong with his club, but instead a personal diary where he expunges his soul of everything inside, bled out as pencil on paper, as something for his sons to remember him by or to know about him at this turbulent time in his life. Jax admits early on that the writings he’s putting down on paper as much for him as they are for his sons — a place where he can be completely and brutally honest.

In these pages, Jax knows that despite his best efforts he’s become the thing he hates the most — his stepfather Clay, who at the same time we are hearing his confession is being buried in a prison cemetery. with no one to see him off except Unser, who stands nearby to toss dirt on the grave of an old friend. As he gets ready for one of the most difficult days of his life, Jax is torn on the inside between responsibility and the man he wants so desperately to be for his wife, for his kids and for his club. Since losing his best friend Opie, he’s had a hard time finding the center again and keeps swerving to the left or to the right. Jax hates what he sees when he looks in the mirror and it’s leading him down a very dark path right now.

“My self hate is so deep, so palpable I feel I’ll lunge at my own image, shatter the glass and cut myself with shards of broken reflection,” Jax writes in his books.

Jax believes that Opie was always the moral compass in his life, his sense of ‘true north’ as he puts it. But in reality he’s always had another center that’s kept him on the straight and narrow, and that was Tara, who despite all of her flaws and misgivings was always trying to steer him to a life away from violence and crime and towards a future with her and their children. Today will be the day that bond will be tested.

Own Your Place

Jax finds out that Tara has run away with the boys and while he still believes she’s making a deal with the D.A. for immunity in return for her cooperation, he quickly finds out that she hasn’t shown up at Patterson’s office either when she pays him a visit at the ice cream shop for a little one on one time. Patterson lays it all down for Jax about what Tara is doing and how his life is affecting all those around him.

Like the brutal truth he puts into the pages of his journal, Patterson is unrelenting with the hard boiled honesty about the life he’s led and how that’s landed on Tara and his sons. She implores him to look beyond his leather cut and the brothers at his table and remember that he’s a father and a husband first.

“Own your place,” Patterson tells him.

Back at chapel, Jax reveals Tara’s deal that’s pending with the D.A. and how quickly they need to track her down. Tig reminds them all that they have a job to try and convince Tara that turning on the club would be wrong, but Jax puts an even harsher reality on the table when he says that if she’s willing to turn rat they will do what they have to do. Ominous tones from the president about his wife.

War is the Answer

Before the meeting can finish, Jax receives word that Marcus Alvarez and his Mayans are outside waiting to chat with him. Alvarez expressed concern last week that the Sons turning the gun business over to August Marks would shift the balance of power and pit brown and yellow against black and white. His worries are now at Jax’s attention when Alvarez unloads the fact that he’s opening up a Mayans charter in Stockton, just miles away from the front doors and green grass yards in Charming.

Jax promises that nothing changes with the gun deal and he even sets up a meeting with the One-Niners to get the first shipment of guns to the Mayans in good faith of this new arrangement. Alvarez also lets slip that he met with Nero to inform him about all of this happening a day ago and of course Jax is learning this for the first time. As he exits to set up the gun sale, Jax asks Happy to call ‘King Nero’ and make sure he’s at the buy as well.

At the gun meet, Jax finally comes face to face with his old friend Nero and when he asks him about the Mayans moving into Stockton, he’s hit with some more uncomfortable truths that he thought were long dead and buried.

Nero: You believe in karma, manu? Something greater that’s moving all the pieces around? I do, I know it. Shit, I feel it every time I see my boy. You ever think maybe all of the bad things that are happening to the mother of your children just maybe that’s because of some heinous thing that you did to another child’s mother?

Jax: I don’t know where you’re going with this

Nero: Please don’t lie to me twice, Jax. I know what happen to Darvany, I know what you had Juice do.

Jax: What did Juice do?

Nero: Killed an innocent woman. And then you looked at me in the eye and you lied to me about it. You embraced me and called me brother. Think shit like that just gets buried? Just goes away? It don’t manu. It comes back and when it does it makes you pay

During the meet, Alvarez and his crew do the gun deal with no problems and they are assured that despite the fact that Mr. Marks no longer gets involved in any street deals, they will continue to work together without any problems going forward. Jax and his boys split feeling confident they’ve put the two parties together in an amicable situation but this partnership is anything but settled.

Seconds after SAMCRO leaves, Alvarez hands over a bag of money to the Niners and when they open it up, a bag of rice awaits them. A not so subtle reminder of the bloodshed they just unleashed by killing Henry Lin’s uncle and seven other members of the Chinese crew. Alvarez’s hit squad takes out all of the One-Niners while sending the messages to everyone that old treaties will not be honored and things are about to get very bloody in the streets.

Nero is hesitant to sign on with this plan, but much like the end of last season when Jax told him to get out while he could and move up to his uncle’s farm with his son, the old school gangster is still drawn to this life. There’s a certain kind of rush that goes along with the outlaw life. Sometimes it’s because it is the only life they know, and other times it’s because they can’t escape that rush. Whatever the reason is for Nero — he can’t get out either.

At Diosa, Nero breaks things off with Gemma once and for all, telling her that he doesn’t have the time or patience to deal with her problems anymore and as much as its killing him to say goodbye, he knows the only way to join up with Alvarez and his brothers in brown is to shed any part of his current life with the MC and that includes the matriarch of the bunch.

As the meeting goes down between Alvarez and Lin to solidify the partnership between the Mayans and the Chinese, Nero and his top lieutenant enter the room and as he sits at the table after shaking hands with the other leaders, it’s clear his loyalty now lies in another part of town. War is coming to Charming and Nero is helping to lead the charge.

A Final Plea

Tara’s decided to move forward with the deal to testify and hand over the evidence to the district attorney, essentially sealing her husband’s fate along with his entire club. She has to meet with her attorney to go over the final paperwork and then turn herself in later in the day. Unfortunately, Jax has had the club staked out with Tara’s friend Margaret from the hospital as well as following her lawyer wherever he goes. Where he’s going is straight to Tara and moments after he leaves, Jax, Happy and his boys show up.

Tara believes this is it. Her entire plan to escape has been foiled and this is the last time she will see her boys. There’s no getting around it — Jax is going to kill her for betraying the club and betraying their marriage. As the tears roll down Tara’s cheeks, she tells Jax how she’s sacrificed everything for him and tried to live in his world. Through all the violence and death, Jax has turned into a monster and not the man she once loved. She reminds him of the future that their boys will have if they continue to live under his roof — it’s a life of pain and a life of suffering.

“I’m not going to hurt you, I’m not going to hurt them,” Jax says. “You don’t have to run. Not anymore. Just be a good mother. Save our boys. Please.”

Back at the hotel, D.A. Patterson arrives to pick up Tara and what she finds instead is both Tara and Jax awaiting her arrival. Jax has a different plan in place for what happens next. He will turn himself in as the sole person responsible for the gun that landed in Matthew Jennings’ hand that killed four students. He will plead guilty and go to prison for the crime. In exchange, Tara’s conspiracy to commit murder charges against Pamela Toric are dropped and she is free to go and raise their sons.

“That is the only deal,” Tara tells Patterson.

After Patterson leaves, Tara can only reach for her heart and tell Jax thank you for what he’s doing to help save her and the boys from suffering any more pain at the expense of the club, their past deals or violence that’s touched her life. In a sweet moment, Jax and Tara kiss and fall back into bed together as husband and wife. There may not have been a more real moment in the history of this show that the passion and hear that went into the scene where Jax and Tara finally reconnected. Flashback to the beginning of this season when Jax and Tara had sex and she looked like an unwilling participant almost forced into this act of physical love, tortured with each minute Jax spent on top of her. Now as they say their goodbyes with Jax facing years in prison, she’s come full circle and wants him near and needs his embrace.

A New Presidency

With Jax resigned for his sentence, which he believes will be 25 years with chance of parole in maybe seven to 10 years, he has to hand over the reigns of the club to a new leader. That person is Bobby — and despite his protests, Jax knows that he’s the man to lead this club in the direction that they need to go to survive in a legitimate world. With Chibs at his left as vice president, Jax knows they will keep walking the path he’s put them on with every action he’s taken this entire season.

As Jax lays down his crown, at this point Bobby has found out about the sour deal between the Mayans and the One-Niners and how they gunned down the gang members and took the guns, which will undoubtedly serve as a fire started to a powder keg of bloodshed that’s coming their way like a tornado bearing down on Charming. Bobby decides to keep this information from Jax, who just has a few hours left to see his boys before he surrenders to the cops and begins his prison sentence.

Jax only has a couple of decrees before he hangs up his patch and begins his new life behind bars. First, the club is to do anything and everything Tara requests and they need to be there for her for whatever she may or may not need. Second, Juice can no longer be trusted. Jax knows that Juice revealed the information about Darvany to Nero and that’s one lie too many for him.

At the same time this is going down, Unser pays Gemma a visit to tell her about some awful news he just got wind about — the D.A.’s office are asking for some old police files about the club, which means Tara turned rat and Jax and the guys are soon headed for prison. Obviously, Unser is off on his facts of what’s really going on but at this poing Gemma, who is booze soaked and weed smoked dealing with the fallout from Nero dumping her, only needs to hear this to send her tumbling over the edge.

She steals Unser’s truck (since he’s blocking her car in the driveway) and she leaves in search of answers.

Back at the clubhouse, Unser arrives and tells Jax that his mother needs to be brought up to speed of what’s happening but she’s missing already. Juice volunteers to go find her but before he can go look he has one final embrace with his president that marks him with a scarlet ‘B’ that won’t be washed away with any amount of soap.

“You betrayed me,” Jax whispers into Juice’s ear.

Jax walks away with one final look of disgust when looking at Juice, who goes off to find Gemma before something bad happens.

The Saddest Goodbye

Tara arrives back at the house with Sheriff Eli Roosevelt in tow as she’s now free and clear to resume her life as mother to baby Thomas and his big brother Abel. When the get there, Eli notices that Unser’s truck is parked in the driveway but Tara just assumes he’s been there to check on the house.

She heads inside, sets down her bags and with one giant sigh of relief, smiles the biggest smile possible knowing that she’s finally free and has Jax’s blessing to raise their boys away from SAMCRO, away from the violence and bring them up the way all children should be raised with a happy and well adjusted home.

The happiness is short lived, however, as seconds later Gemma comes around the corner and spots Tara, still unaware of the deal she made with Jax or that this all happened at his request. It only takes a second for Tara to realize she’s in trouble with Gemma baring down on her, and a moment later the fight breaks out.

Gemma goes after Tara with every ounce of strength she can muster and as much as she can fight back, this tale can only end one way. As the fight rages on, Gemma shoves Tara’s face into a cold sink filled with water and as she struggles to get free, the woman responsible for leading John Teller to his death is now responsible for taking away the only person Jax has ever loved more than his own mother.

With each disgusting plunge of a carving fork into Tara’s head as the blood drained out of her, Gemma finally got rid of the only obstacle that stood in the way of really having Jax for herself again and at the same time doing what she believes had to be done to protect her son from this vile woman that was about to betray him.

The screams from the outside alert Eli and Juice, who has arrived looking for Gemma, and when the sheriff goes inside the house he sees Tara laying on the floor dead from the stab wounds and a shaken Gemma on the floor still realing from what she’s just done.

“It had to be done. I have work to do. She did this, she made a deal, she betrayed him,” Gemma says under a veil of tears.

That’s when Eli unloads the hard truth on Gemma — Tara never turned rat. Jax gave himself up to protect her, to keep her safe. Before Eli can make the call to get reinforcements to the scene, Juice shows up and puts two bullets in his back before picking Gemma up off the floor. He helps Gemma get cleaned up and escape and he gets rid of the evidence implicating her in the murder.

Going Home for the Last Time

Jax says his final goodbyes to the boys at the club and kisses Abel and Thomas for the last time as he readies himself for jail. He stops by his house to see Tara as well but as he turns the corner he sees a dead body on the floor and Jax pulls his gun. Just then he spots his fallen bride, bloody and broken, laying on the floor, cold, white and lifeless. He runs to Tara’s side and cradles her head in his arms as he kisses her goodbye one final time while saying ‘I’m sorry, I’m so sorry’.

District Attorney Patteron shows up at that moment and spots the gun on the floor, Eli dead, and Jax holding his dead wife in his arms. It’s clear she believes he’s responsible for this and as the reaper appears to signify the end of the episode we are now headed towards the final season of Sons of Anarchy.

Going back to the Hamlet reference, Tara was always Ophelia and her end was pre-determined from the day this show started filming. Kurt Sutter said after the episode aired that he knew Tara’s death would happen at the end of season six, and with her gone they will now explore Jax without any kind of moral compass or ‘true north’ to keep him in line the way that Tara and Opie have always managed to do.

Tara’s exit was definitely a heart wrenching moment that will certainly define season six of Sons of Anarchy and there’s no doubt that actress Maggie Siff will be missed immensely by the cast and crew of the show. Her brutal ending was just another reminder that no one enters this world and leaves untouched as we say goodbye to Tara one final time.

“We know what we are, but we know not what we may be”
~ Ophelia, Act IV, scene IV from Hamlet

Notes of Anarchy:

— The final song played over the last minutes of the show was a song written by Noah Gunderson and the Forest Rangers called “Day is Gone” from the Sons of Anarchy soundtrack volume 3, which you can pick up on iTunes.

— Kurt Sutter says that Tara’s death was always planned for the end of season six, and it was something he had in mind from the very early stages of the show’s inception. “As difficult as it was, I knew that it had to happen,” Sutter said.

— Maggie Siff was actually pregnant for the biggest part of filming this season, and she found out about her baby just before the scene was filmed where she faked the miscarriage after the fight with Gemma. The only people that knew at the time were Kurt Sutter and executive producer Paris Barclay. Eventually the entire cast found out and she had a stunt double on stand by at all times for any strenuous or physical scenes.

— Sutter says that he will take the next month to six weeks off before heading back into the writer’s room to start plotting out the stories for season seven, which will debut on FX in September 2014 and will be the final season of the show.

— Don’t forget to come back on Thursday for our season finale special of Charming’s Most Wanted as we close the books on another amazing season of Sons of Anarchy and make some predictions for what happens next in the final season next year