More like cold blanket…okay, let’s just get into the episode.

The episode begins with Danish Graves going through a list of names in a debtors book before heading to the North Dakota Court Services. He presents an employee with the file of an individual that Danish is petitioning to have their name changed. And all of the required forms have been signed and notarized.

He then does this for another individual, and another, as Danish is representing three clients who want to change their name to the same thing.

The clerk finds it a bit odd, but stamps the paperwork anyway. So why does this matter? Aside from a routine visit no more exciting than a trip to the DMV, you’ll find out.

Over at the hospital, Roy demands that Nadine sign some paperwork before they leave. Dot can’t sign the form because it says “Nadine Tillman,” and she’s Dorothy. But Roy reminds Nadine that she’s nothing and again orders her to sign. Dot does sign, though Roy doesn’t bother checking to verify what she signed. Instead, he seizes the blue ink pen that she used.

When Roy does check Nadine’s signature, he finds that it reads “Help me,” which is not how you spell “Nadine.” As Roy tears the form, he asks the employee, Kim, about whether her brother, Pete is staying out of trouble. Roy would hate to send him back to prison. He asks Kim to print a fresh release form. Roy warns Nadine against making a mess of things, because if someone gets hurt, that’s on her.

Because it’s a small world, Deputy Farr makes his return as he brings in an intoxicated civilian. He spots the woman from the service station and addresses her as “Mrs. Lyon,” saying she’s far from home. Farr asks if everything is alright, and Dot confirms that she just took a spill and is finishing some paperwork before heading home. Not home as in Minnesota, though. Nadine’s going to spend some time with Roy.

Farr offers to drive Dot home since his shift is over, and he promises to help in any way that he can, as he was drawn into a chain of events last time Mrs. Lyon was kidnapped, which Dot maintains didn’t happen. Sheriff Tillman warns Farr to get out of his way before he moves Farr himself. Farr tells Dot that she doesn’t have to go with Roy and he can have backup at the hospital in minutes.

It’s too late for that, as Gator and two henchmen arrive. Dot calls this a bit of silliness and assures Farr that she’s fine. She wants Farr to tell Wayne that she’ll be home soon, but when Gator puts a hand on Farr, the deputy puts up his guard and warns Gator to not touch him. Sound advice. Dot tells Roy that if Farr is hurt, she won’t go with him. Roy takes the hint as he and his men depart.

Farr calls Deputy Olmstead, who just threw a couple out of their home. He tells Olmstead that he just saw Dot, who was in an auto accident, but she was checked out by Roy Tillman. Farr knows that Roy has a ranch, so that’s where Dot might be headed. Dot seemed agreeable to her words, but her eyes looked like a trapped animal. Farr left a message with the FBI, but Olmstead knows they don’t return calls.

Do agents Meyer and Joaquin even have phones?

Whatever. At the Tillman ranch, Roy chains Nadine in a shed. Nadine lets Roy know that his day is fast approaching and figures that Roy doesn’t have a plan. Rather, God has a plan. Nadine made a promise, but broke her vow. However, Roy broke her fingers, collarbone, three ribs, and dislocated her jaw. Roy was jus trying to fix her. Nadine yanks at the chain, but Roy figures she’ll just tire herself out.

Nadine tells Roy that she can’t be here- she’s Scotty’s mother and has too much time to spend with her. What Roy is doing, he’s doing to Dot’s new family, too. As Nadine prattles about her new life and new love who happens to be her best friend, Roy again says that Nadine made a vow. He even had a wife when Nadine made that vow. Everything that came after Nadine left is a mistake.

Two wrongs don’t make a right, and Nadine belongs to Roy. She asks Roy if he knows how crazy he sounds. Roy promises that he’ll let Nadine go as soon as she begs him let her stay and actually mean it. Instead, Nadine promises to kill him.

Roy is undeterred, as Karen enters. Two of Roy’s men enter with a bunk. It’s time for Roy’s sheriff debate. When Dot makes a smart remark about Roy getting a set of steak knives if he gets another wife, Karen slaps her. Well, Nadine notes that the third time is the charm for Roy.

Indira arrives home and finds Lars in bed in the middle of the day. Why is Indira home? She just pulled a double shift, just in time to find the woman that Lars had hiding in the closet. Instead of just shooting them both, Indira tells the woman to move and demands that Lars be gone by the time she gets home. Indira tells the woman that she can have her now useless, and now former, husband.

Indira tells Lars that she’d settle for a husband- a real man who pulls his weight. Lars doesn’t work and would sooner sit in the dark than change a lightbulb. He’d rather die than thank the person who does. Before leaving, Indira merely says “shame” to both of them.

Well, they got off easy. But as if by cosmic karma, Indira’s car gets towed. You’d think that the folks towing the car, seeing a nearby police cruiser, would ask questions first, but I’m not in that profession, so what do I know?

Dot stews in her makeshift prison and starts pulling apart the screws on the cot. She manages to pull off a piece of metal and starts sawing through the chain.

Dot would be great in a Saw film.

Meanwhile, the Stark County sheriff’s debate is underway, with three other candidates who recently had their names changed: Roy Chester Tillman, Roy Andrew Tillman, and Roy Floyd Tillman. Well, how about that? Roy asks if Jerry is present and who put these three guys up to this.

The moderator, Andrea Cordell, played by Chelsey Reist, asks Roy the first question: given the types of arrests seen in Stark County, how can he justify spending half a million dollars on weapons, tactical gear, and even a tank?

This question catches Roy off guard, and when he attempts to answer, the other three Roy Tillmans merely echo what he says. Instead of rolling with the punches, Roy gets frustrated and storms off the stage, even overturning his podium. The other Roys follow suit because why not, at this point? As Roy leaves, he pushes a cameraman and strikes Ms. Cordell in front of everyone. Well, that won’t look good on the evening news.

Satisfied, Danish Graves leaves, his work done. It might be the last successful thing he accomplishes today…

Dot successfully cuts through the flimsy chain from her leg, but she’s still chained to the floor. Gator enters on orders to hang back. He asks what she told the FBI agents at the hospital, but Dot says that’s on Gator since they came to him. Why? Because Gator is sloppy, and that means people will ask questions. Dot maintains that she never told anyone anything.

Dot then tells Gator that she saw her mother, Linda. She didn’t want to leave Gator, but she had no choice, as Roy was going to kill her, so she had to save herself. But she was going to come back for Gator. Dot tells Gator that Linda is alive and doing well, but Gator calls Dot a liar who never told the truth once in her life. Gator isn’t going anywhere, and neither is Dot.

As Gator leaves, he stops when Dot asks if ever wondered why he’s not named Roy. He’s the fifth boy in a long line of firstborn Roys. Roy took one look at Gator in the hospital and knew he would be a loser. He’d rather his family name die out than have Gator take it. Gator just hopes that Nadine dies here and doesn’t see her daughter, which Dot knows Gator doesn’t mean.

Gator hops in his cruiser and speeds off to meet with Deputy Farr, who is at the ranch. Farr won’t leave without talking to Dot, so Gator puts a bullet in Farr’s cruiser and threatens to kill him with the next shot. Farr knows Gator doesn’t think consequences are coming, but they’re almost here. Gator tells the two men that if they see Farr again, shoot on sight. Farr departs the Tillman ranch.

Gator continues his drive, unaware that he has a backseat rider…

Meanwhile, Danish stops at a gas station and makes a call, saying to tell someone, presumably Lorraine, that it went well and he’s heading back home. After what Danish saw, he’s confident that Roy won’t win his election.

Farr, who appears to be literally everywhere, rides past and spots Danish outside the service station. He back up and addresses tells Danish that Roy Tillman took Dorothy Lyon to the Tillman Ranch, and Farr believes that Dot probably doesn’t want to be there. Dot said she was going of her own free will, but Farr believes that Dot has been kidnapped.

As Farr leaves to take care of something else, he tells Danish that whatever he’s going to do, he has to do it fast. Danish takes out his phone and contemplates calling Lorraine, but decides against it.

Roy and his family return home from the debate, with Odin telling Karen to keep quiet since Roy is clearly upset. Karen says it’s a curse: this Nadine woman comes back after all these years and mocks his piety. She’s rubbing her sins in their faces and is the real albatross.

An annoyed Roy storms off as we get a cool one-shot scene of him walking to a strange cover of Britney Spears’ “Toxic.” He approaches the barn just as Nadine stops working on freeing herself. We don’t see anything, but hear some thrashing and soon see that Roy has given Nadine a bruised nose and lip.

Nadine tells Roy that this is his last chance, but when Roy sits on the cot with his guard down, Dot wraps her arm around him. The two struggle, with Roy pulling the chain free. He tries to hit Nadine with the chain, but Bowman enters and informs Roy that a lawyer by the name of Danish Graves has arrived.

Roy strangles Nadine, telling her that there’s only one way she’s getting out of here. Roy tells Nadine that she’s always been here. Nadine promises that she’ll leave the same as Linda, but Roy believes Nadine will just end up the same as Linda, as he’ll bury her next to Linda.

That evening, Indira meets Lorraine, saying she can’t put her needs last anymore. She tells Lorraine that Roy took Dot back to his ranch.

Dot manages to break a window and yells that she’s here! She spots a windmill and recounts her time at the cabin in the woods that time forgot.

When Danish arrives at the ranch, he receives a phone call, but ignores it. He meets with Sheriff Tillman and tells him that yes, today was humiliating for him. It was worse than Roy knows, Danish says, and he should have a drink. Roy will lose his election, and he’ll be lucky if he isn’t charged with assault. But Danish can fix it. Those other Roy Tillmans? Danish can make them vanish as quickly as he made them.

As Roy pulls out a gun, Danish continues, saying Lorraine can win him the election in exchange for Dot’s life. Roy stands and shoots Danish in the chest, asking him that if he’s so smart, why is he so dead? With that, he fires another shot, ending Danish.

Dot continues stewing in her prison when she hears a truck. Indeed, a truck backs up to the windmill as Roy and another man pull a metal tub aside and dump Danish’s body down a hole in the ground. Dot sinks to the ground in terror as the episode comes to a close…

Well, for a season that’s had a pretty low body count compared to previous outings, it was getting time for the fifth season to take a major player off the board, especially with the finale approaching. After “Linda” gave Dot a bit of a peaceful side plot, albeit one all in her head, “Blanket” puts us right along with her in the lion’s den as she finds herself captured.

But the good thing about her situation is that she’s not helpless or alone. Danish Graves has, for the most part, been Lorraine’s yes-man, but he does appear to at least care for the Lyon family. he’s following orders, but he’s not blind to Dot’s plight. If anything, there may be some guilt since he played a role. It was Lorraine’s idea to have Dot committed, but Danish followed the order.

He helped Lorraine neuter Vivian, and now he’s making moves to help steal the election from under Roy. Sheriff Tillman is a powerful man, but if there’s one surefire way to harm an individual, it’s by attacking their pride. It’s a clever plan, changing the names of three indebted men and presumably giving them the quick instruction to just parrot whatever Roy says on stage.

If Roy was a clever man, he could’ve just played into this and rolled with the punches. The audience seemed to like it, despite how implausible it is that Danish could get three random guys named “Roy Tillman” on a debate stage in front of an audience where everyone knows who Roy is. Roy could have run with this, but he let himself get rattled, proving that Lorraine and Danish got under his skin.

Then he made things worse by striking Ms. Cordell. We know that Roy has anger problems, but he’s managed to keep them within the household. Now more people in Stark County have seen his rage on display. Is that enough to sink his electoral chances? Well, that’s hard to say. It could have the opposite effect and boost his odds, but the point is that his image has been shattered, and Lorraine isn’t even done yet.

This whole scenario rattled Roy because he’s a man who always has to be in control. It’s why he’s not surprised that Dot managed to free herself from the chain or that she can put up a good fight. He knows what she can do, but he’s unprepared for just how far someone like Lorraine will go to damage his ego.

That sort of damage can enrage anyone. It’s why Roy takes out his anger on Dot, and why he kills Danish without a thought. Dot said that Roy didn’t have a plan, and I can agree with that. What was it that the Joker said?

Yeah, that’s it.

Not having any plan makes Roy all the more unpredictable because you can’t determine what he’ll do next. His ego has been bruised, but there’s no reason to think he’ll be open to negotiating. This proved to be Danish’s undoing, in what was Dave Foley’s shining moment. It’s telling that, while Danish isn’t a main character, he’s been present. For him to get a ton of screen time was a red flag.

The same could be said about Witt Farr, but more on him in a minute. I’m left to wonder why Danish didn’t communicate with Lorraine to update her. Again, maybe it’s a bit of guilt for helping commit Dot, which ultimately led to her being trapped in the first place. It’s at least ridiculous of him to not take the incoming call when he got to the ranch.

Danish is not stupid. He probably doesn’t know that Lorraine has seen Dot’s photos, but he should still keep her in the loop. He knows about Lorraine’s seemingly endless resources, so why wouldn’t he tell her that Dot has been found? She didn’t even know where Dot was until Indira told her. Giving Lorraine a heads-up might have helped.

But then I think about what Agents Meyer and Joaquin said to Indira: if they go all out on Roy, that could tip their hand and give him time to escape. But I don’t expect someone like Lorraine to pull some all-out assault. She’s more subtle than that. Or maybe Danish doesn’t expect Lorraine to change her feelings on Dot, who she’s been very blunt on saying she doesn’t like.

Either way, Danish had no reason to not call Lorraine or at least answer his phone. He’s a strong fixer, but he’s not invincible, and there’s no way he should have expected a bruised Roy to just go along with anything. So he dies, and if Lorraine finds out what happened, well, things will get even worse for Roy.

Full stop on one thing: Dot said that she’s going to kill Roy. I believe she’ll make good on her promise, but I kind of don’t want her to. Suffering is worse than death, and as Lorraine showed with Vivian, she’s not above leaving someone to watch their life melt away instead of granting them a speedy, merciful death.

Would it be satisfying to see Roy die? Sure, but there’s something equally potent in him living to watch his empire crumble around him.

But sticking with Roy, it’s incredible how great of a job Jon Hamm has been doing. You truly hate Roy, and him getting a taste of karma is fun to watch. Being put on the spot with questions about his spending, coupled with being mocked by three random clones of his, has to be embarrassing. We’ve seen how much Roy flaunts his authority. He can kill and make threats, but you can only bury so many bodies before you’re discovered.

I do wonder about that hole we see at the end, though. It can’t be the first body that Roy has disposed of, but the fact that we see the hole where Danish is dumped leads me to believe that it will be exposed. Otherwise, Roy could just burn Danish’s body or dispose of it somewhere that Dot doesn’t see.

Speaking of, Dot might be trapped in a cage, but she’s still a tiger. Juno Temple is as fierce as she’s been all season, and it’s satisfying to see Dot so proactive. She tries to keep Farr out of trouble by maintaining the façade that all is well. She tries to get under Gator’s skin by attempting to turn him against Roy and bringing up Linda. She even frees the chain from her leg and puts up a good fight against Roy.

Dot doesn’t just sit on her ass and do nothing, which I love. All the skills she’s acquired over the years are put to good use. I think her seeing Roy dispose of that body at the end of the episode may have unnerved her, but I doubt she’s truly afraid. Concerned, but not afraid. Again, Dot knows what Roy can do. Her life is in danger, but we know that she’ll fight like hell to survive.

Now, a former victim herself, is there even a thought in her mind that Roy could snap and kill her? Yes. But I think Dot is resourceful enough to find a solution to her plight, no matter how dire it looks.

It’s nice to see Deputy Farr back and, like Indira, represent that good police officer who wants to see justice done. He’s been out of the scene for so long despite witnessing Dot’s abilities. He doesn’t cower when Roy and Gator threaten him, he sees that Dot is in help, and he’s proactive enough to go right to Roy’s door and deliver a message that consequences are coming.

We don’t spend a lot of time getting into Farr’s head compared to Indira. I’m fine with that because at heart, he’s still a good character. But at the same time, he feels like he’s here to give expository dialogue and stern warnings. Aside from early on when he talked about the risks that come with being an officer, there isn’t a lot to take from Farr.

That could be because of the two police officers, we’ve spent more time at home with Indira. There’s not a lot to say except it’s about damn time that she dumped Lars. Again, we’re all wondering what the hell drew these two together in the first place. Indira dressing down Lars was fine, but not as satisfying as it could have been. But at the same time, she’s not one to make a big show or blow a fuse.

Then again, she could’ve shot Lars and his girl-toy in the kneecaps and probably have gotten away with it. The best word I can use to describe her getting rid of Lars is “finally.” It’s long overdue is all I can say. Now the question is whether she decides to take up Lorraine’s offer.

Gator continues to think he’s the manliest man ever to exist, but when Dot talks to him about Linda, his defense drops. Perhaps he knows the truth about Linda and just brushed off Dot as nonsense, but the seed of doubt has been planted. Whether Gator goes through any sort of redemption like the other asshole that Joe Keery played on Stranger Things remains to be seen.

Of course, with Munch in the backseat, Gator might be on borrowed time.

“Blanket” was tense and strong, putting us right in the heart of Roy’s stronghold. He’s taken a few licks and while Danish Graves is no longer a threat, there are other wolves just waiting to rip into the sheriff.