Justified Wasn't Canceled After Season 6 – It Ended With Purpose
There are several reasons why "Justified" is one of the finest series of the Peak Television era. The show captured the snappy repartee and peculiar characterizations of the Elmore Leonard stories on which it was based, and was cast to utter perfection. We savored every second we spent in the hotbed of Bluegrass criminality that is Harlan County, and were sad to see it close out after six seasons. But endings are important. They're necessary. And "Justified" is one of the few shows that knew precisely when to end its run.
As much as I love "The Sopranos" and "Mad Men," these shows strained a bit down the stretch. "Justified" always kept its plates spinning. After establishing the Givens-Crowder feud in the first season, creator Graham Yost and his writers expertly fleshed out their world with fascinatingly eccentric villains like Wynn Duffy (Jere Burns), Robert Quarles (Neal McDonaugh) and Katherine Hale (Mary Steenburgen). Each episode played like an exquisitely plotted chapter of a Leonard novel. There was room to, as they say in series television, accordion out the narrative if the audience demand was there, but the series was, at its essence, about the Givens and the Crowders. And it just didn't make sense for that rivalry, as it existed between U.S. Marshal Raylan (Timothy Olyphant) and Harlan crime kingpin Boyd (Walton Goggins), to stretch beyond six seasons.
Know when to fold 'em
At the 2015 Television Critics Association winter press tour (as covered by Entertainment Weekly), Graham Yost said, "We just felt like if this chapter in Raylan's life was about Raylan and Boyd ... that we could only take it so far, that was basically it. We didn't want to outstay our welcome."
Timothy Olyphant, who'd previously experienced a frustrating lack of closure as Sheriff Seth Bullock on David Milch's HBO Western "Deadwood" (which eventually received a film sendoff in 2019), was pleased with the wrap-up to "Justified." "Usually when things end, I'm not the first person to find out," he said. "It's been wonderful to just be able to see the finish line and enjoy it."
Yost added that a major part of his decision hinged on not wanting to burden "Justified" with retread episodes. As he told the TCA audience:
"[Executive Producer] Fred Golan and I have been talking about how to end the thing probably since season 3 and it changes every year. We didn't want this to be the greatest hits, but that said, there are characters who come in because they're part of that world. It doesn't feel to us like we're just checking that box."
Tempting fate with one last quasi-season
Graham Yost and company stuck the landing. Raylan and Boyd finish out the final episode in their fated positions: In a prison, with Raylan speaking to an incarcerated Boyd behind glass. It's a beautiful exchange, one that leaves you wishing the slightly mad, but ever-savvy Boyd could've pulled his life together and found a legitimate outlet for his entrepreneurial spirit. But he's a redneck who's only known how to thrive via the drug trade.
Raylan got out. He found a career as a marshal, though his itchy trigger finger has stymied his advancement. Raylan could've easily followed Boyd's example, but he despised his father too much to backslide into the family tradition.
Boyd's tale has apparently drawn to a close, but Raylan will return this year in the FX miniseries "Justified: City Primeval." This will take the surly lawman to Detroit, where many of Leonard's best novels are set. As the coda to "Justified," it's a nifty idea. Let's hope the execution clears the high bar set by the original show.