‘Longmire’ season 5, episode 3 review: The latest on Walt and Donna

At the end of this past episode of “Longmire“, we had a situation play out where Walt finally resolved the cliffhanger from last season. With that, Donna was put through a great deal of emotional trauma and it was hard to decipher precisely how she would come back from that.

During episode 3, we saw some mixed results. Her insecurity following what happened was understandable, given that she did not want to feel like a charity case to Walt and did feel that she was suffering from some bouts of fear over what happened. She avoided his phone messages, and only eventually came around when she was tied into a case about a missing father that later confirmed to be dead. Having her later claim that she was pregnant to Walt to try and elicit a reaction to him as a whole was a little strange, mostly because Walt’s such a straight shooter for the most part and he doesn’t really need those sort of games to get him to admit to something that we would assume to be true: He cares about her. That may be what keeps them going forward if anything does.

The case itself was captivating, even if it did have one of the darker endings the show has ever given us: The man’s daughter ended up running over him as a means to save her mother the physical and emotional torment. There was something a little off about her virtually from the beginning of the story, so while it was a surprise reveal, it was not a particularly shocking one. One quibble you could make is that for a guy who seemed to not be concerned enough about his wife to not abuse her, he was conscientious enough to teach his ten-year old daughter to drive so he wouldn’t get a DUI.

The most important thing about this story in the long-term is that it exposed a few cracks in Jacob Nighthorse’s foundation at the casino, most notable that Malachi Strand may be doing some secret operations, a mysterious “travel company” is renting out a room for long stretches of time, and that he really seemed to want Cady to hire Sam to help put together her new office. That’s a part of her quest to be the best attorney for the reservation that she can be.

As much as we love “Longmire,” we’ll admit there were a couple head-scratchers in the episode, with Donna’s pregnancy comment being the biggest one. Yet, it was good to see Vic challenge Donna on her feelings, just as we also appreciated Walt getting back to some of what he does best. Episode Grade: B.

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