'Jamestown' Recap: Season 3, Episode 8
Previously on Jamestown: Jocelyn, Verity, Pedro and James Read all head off to search for the mariners who originally brought slaves to Jamestown. Along the way, Joss gets shot with an arrow in the gut, but doesn’t die thanks to James savvy medical skills, which involve digging around in her body with a dirty knife. It’s fine. Why start doing hygiene now? Afterward, as an injured Jocelyn continues to traipse through the countryside, Verity decides to give her a pep talk about James Read and how great he is and eventually both of these idiots admit they’re in love – kind of. But Jocelyn isn’t down to give up her freedom to any man Elsewhere, Temperance has decided she’s over everything and enlists the help of Maria to help drive her husband insane so they can go back to England with their unborn baby. For a full rundown of all this weirdness, our Episode 7 recap is this way.
As most viewers probably already knew coming into this, Season 3 of Jamestown is the series’ last. Whether this is due to poor ratings, expensive filming costs or simply the cast’s desire to move on is unclear. But though the series’ finale does try to tie up most of the (many, many) outstanding plotlines this show, Jamestown somehow manages to end with both a bang and a whimper, dedicating its final moments to the long-hinted-at native attack on the colony, which historically did kill hundreds of settlers. But since that climactic moments takes place during the episode’s final minutes, it feels like nothing so much as a cliffhanger into Season 4 that never got to go anywhere.
Yes, the show tries to cover it up with an ending card that explains the many deaths and the subsequent backlash against the Pamunkey and the other Powhatan tribes that ultimately drove the tribes from their Virginia land. Maybe Jamestown wasn’t interested in depicting what is essentially revenge genocide, and to be honest, I kind of get that. This isn’t a show that does nuance terribly well. But as the settlers watch the encroaching Pamunkey army creep closer, and the fates of several major characters are left pretty up in the air. Well. It’s hard not to assume that this wasn’t supposed to be the show’s endpoint.
