Mayans M.C.
5×02: “Lord Help My Poor Soul”
Directed by Brett Dos Santos
Written by Jenny Lynn

* For a recap & review of the Season 5 premiere, click here.
* For a recap & review of 5×03, click here.
A girl sings the Mexican folk song “La Llorona” while working in the fields, as Adelita watches nearby before taking off in a vehicle. Adelita isn’t exactly enjoying working for Soledad. At the clubhouse, Santo Padre talks about Creeper’s stabbing and what has to be Iron War involvement. Creeper is not doing well, plus he’s pretty much unprotected inside prison. Not a good situation. Creeper refuses to be put in protective custody. Katie, formerly known as Kody, comes to see Creeper. She talks about her partner/boyfriend being shot by “a fucking scumbag” like Creeper. He responds by calling Katie “a fucking lowlife.” But when things calm down, Creeper asks Katie to find out who the rat in Santo Padre is; that could blow things WIDE open for the Mayans. Uh oh.

Iron War find themselves being visited by EZ and his crew. Iron War’s led by a guy called McKenzie (Shaun Benson). They’re not quite a racist biker gang, but they certainly aren’t very friendly to Mexicans. Things start getting a little bit tense, then a bunch of prison guards come out to stand behind McKenzie and his people. EZ lobs a threat at McKenzie, who steps right to him. He’s almost about to drop the gloves when Angel convinces him otherwise. For now, no violence. That’s going to change in the really near future, if I were a betting man.
NOTE: EZ’s reading On War by Carl von Clausewitz, a treatise on military strategy.
Miguel and Soledad meet with Eduardo Villar-Fuentes, hoping that they can all work together. But Eduardo isn’t a fan of either of them, or the puppeteer, Lincoln Potter, with a hand up their asses. He even gets nasty about Miguel’s father. Miguel keeps on trying to get all the puppets together, urging that a “confederacy” would be good for business and would, eventually, give them autonomy from the U.S. government. He talks about the legacy he wants to leave behind: “Do we leave our children an empire, or a battlefield?” Yet Eduardo’s seen blood spilled for decades and wonders if they can put that behind them. Soledad makes clear blood’s been spilled on both sides of the aisle. And after a little while, Eduardo’s prepared to fuck with the Americans as one organised unit. Miguel recognises a man who killed the boy Tomas back when he was hiding out with his nun aunt, so he slips off to the bathroom and smashes the man’s head into a wall repeatedly in revenge. At the same time, Guero hops out of a vehicle on at a red light and walks up to the prison guard/Iron War member with the mouth cars, cranking the guy with a baseball bat.

Sad to see that while everything else is going on, Tranq has to deal with putting his mother in a home. Back at the clubhouse, EZ beats the scarred Iron War member, stomping him into the ground for what happened to Creeper. Bishop intervenes and EZ responds angrily, nearly causing a big fight. Everything’s just going off the rails. EZ looks around at a lot of disappointed faces from his crew. Then he heads off alone. Far from the Mayans clubhouse, Miguel and Emily are having dinner together as a family with their boy. Not exactly a normal family dinner, though. Yikes!
Elsewhere, Isaac and his Sons are holding Hector, the Prez of the Inland Empire Mayans, and his family hostage. Scary shit. Isaac goes on rambling about the “prodigal son” and “blood brothers of his club.” Hector tries to put up a tough front, at least until Isaac points a gun at his wife and daughter. Isaac wants to make Hector choose a family: “capital F” or the club. The Sons have one of the other Mayans at gunpoint, too. So, Hector must make a choice, and he chooses his Mayan brother, his club’s VP.Lots of wild stuff going down. EZ tries to get advice from Alvarez, but the old time Mayan, no longer part of the club, refuses to help after the way everything happened between them. Not a chance, even if EZ comes to Alvarez with a pretty humble attitude, admitting there are things he doesn’t know. Still, Alvarez says: “It‘s not my club anymore.” Though he does get real with EZ about the life of a Mayan; they all end up either “in a box or in a cell.” After that he threatens to shoot EZ if he ever see the new Prez around his house again. Alvarez always keeping it real.
At home, Angel gets a visit from Cole, the mercenary from way back. Cole warns Angel to step back from looking for info about the heroin pipeline. He says bad things will happen if not, and he points his weapon at baby Maverick to make clear he isn’t fucking around. Goddamn. Cole’s involved with the heroin pipeline; this is how Soledad’s getting all the top of the line military equipment and weapons.

When the Mayans regroup they try to discuss how things will go from here.
Despite Angel telling EZ they have to back off looking into the heroin pipeline, EZ insists they’re going headlong at this one because he wants to take down the cartel. Good lord. Season 5 is definitely on its way to being a CRAZY one, if EZ has anything to say about it.