Gunbarrel

**Gunbarrel** is the tenth episode of the first season of AMC's *NOS4A2*. It is also the tenth episode of the series overall and the season finale.

## Synopsis

Vic enlists a local biker to help her try to stop Charlie Manx. Manx makes a pitstop on his way to Christmasland.

## Plot

**SPOILERS AHEAD**

Vic gasps for air as the flames consume the Sleigh House. She escapes through a window and scales down the house, though she fractured her leg while attempting to climb up the air vent, making her escape especially difficult and painful.

Meanwhile, Craig breaks free of the duct tape restraining him in the trunk of the Wraith. He finds a tire iron in the trunk and punctures the tank, causing Manx’s nose to bleed and the tank to leak.

Vic passes through a forest of Christmas trees strung up with ornaments. She can hear Haley and Bradley’s voices. Vic limps out to the road and flags down a biker passing by. His name is Lou Carmody. Vic tells him about Manx, how he has her boyfriend and a little boy. And how he trapped her in a house and set it on fire. Vic gets on the back of Lou's bike, and they drive off. Lou takes Vic to a convenience store called the Gunbarrel. They go inside and ask to use the phone to call the police. Sam, the owner of the store, calls the police to report a fire and kidnapping. A young woman with her baby asks Vic where she’s from. She replies Haverhill. However, they’re in Colorado, much to Vic’s surprise.

Detective Hutter wakes Maggie as she sleeps on a couch in the precinct. She apologizes for not being faster and catching Bing at SoChemPharm. Hutter advises Maggie to go home. She promises to call Maggie should there be any developments. Maggie puts her ability on display for Hutter, asking her Scrabble Bag when Vic will call, reaching into her Bag, shoulder deep and pulling out Tiles that read "SOON." Hutter asks to see the Tiles, but Maggie advises against it. She stutters as she explains that it’s dangerous. Maggie’s abilities work by tearing the fabric between the real world and the world of thought. Maggie then gets a call from Vic, who informs her that she’s in Colorado and her Bridge is gone. Manx destroyed it. Vic needs Maggie to ask her Bag for the Wraith’s location. Maggie’s stutter worsens. Her Tiles spell out "GUNBARREL." Lou explains that they’re in Gunbarrel just as Manx pulls up outside the convenience store. Sam pulls out two guns, a pistol and a shotgun. Vic grabs the pistol while Sam leads the young woman and her baby into the back to hide. She then hands the gun to Lou.

Vic and Lou confronts Manx by the gas pump. Manx address Lou by his name and informs him that taking orders from a woman is not a good habit. While Lou holds Manx at gunpoint, Vic tries to save Craig from the Wraith. Bradley bounces around in the back of the Wraith, inviting Vic to play with him.

While Vic searches for the keys inside the Wraith, Manx tries to convince Lou to put down the gun. He knows Lou’s record of petty crimes; shoplifting, vandalism, smoking underage. All a juvenile attempt for attention. He’s never known the softness of a woman’s touch. Never had an ounce of affection, not even from his own mother. And yet here he is risking his life for Vic. Manx assures him that Vic won’t reward him for helping her.

When Vic fails to find the keys, Craig takes the tire iron and uses it to puncture the backseat, allowing him to force his way out, where he is attacked by Bradley as soon as he does. Craig hits Bradley with the tire iron, but it does little to deter him. Bradley then to bite Craig, sinking his teeth into his arm.

Manx tells Lou to hand over the gun. Helping Vic is pointless because when it comes to woman, nice guys finish last. The Wraith suddenly starts on its own and reverses, knocking Vic to the ground. With Lou distracted, Manx grabs a gas pump and strike Lou with it repeatedly. As Manx grabs the gun, Vic sprays gasoline allover the Wraith and holds a lighter over the hood. Vic drops the lighter, setting the Wraith a blaze and causing Manx to shrivel up and burn. As Manx burns on the ground in agony, Craig continues to fight off Bradley in the backseat. Vic attempts to intervene, reaching in through the front seat, but there’s a force field separating the backseat from the front, preventing Vic from pulling Craig through. Craig realizes that he can’t get out, so he tells Vic to save herself and leave him behind. However, Vic is reluctant. She only exits the vehicle after Bradley bites her arm. Vic runs for a fire extinguisher to hopefully put the flames out, but the car explodes before she can, taking Craig and Bradley with it.

Vic wakes up in the hospital. Lou isn’t far away. He tells her that Manx is cuffed to an ICU bed with a U.S. Marshal at his door. As for the Wraith, it was taken by the police. However, Vic has to completely destroy it to ensure Manx’s demise. Still coping with the loss of her best friend, Vic cries as she remembers Craig and the commemorative pin he gifted to her that she keeps pinned to her boot. Lou surmises that Vic set the car ablaze to hurt Manx. He saw Manx age rapidly in a matter of seconds, as well as his skin blister as if he was on fire. Lou reads comic books, and it’s because of that he believes that weird, unexplainable things happen in the world. He looks to Vic as if she's a super hero. Lou is discharged from the hospital. Before leaving, he gives Vic his number in case she’s ever in Colorado again and in need of a sidekick. Vic thanks Lou and gives him a hug. Vic, on the other hand, has frostbite on her left arm, torn tendons in her right leg, and a sprained ankle. Lastly, the doctor informs Vic that she’s pregnant. Only a few weeks.

Detective Hutter stops by Maggie’s hotel room to inform her that Vic is safe, and Manx is in custody. However, Hutter hasn’t had any luck in finding Bing. She’s hoping that Maggie will ask her Scrabble Tiles where Bing is. Hutter reveals that she was born three months premature with a collapsed lung. It didn’t look like she would make it. So, Hutter’s mother brought her home to her grandfather. He’s a Santero in Mattapan. Hutter’s mother swears that he saved her life with offering to the Orishas. Hutter has never been a religious woman. Until yesterday, she thought that story was just superstitious family lore. She admits that there may be forces in the world beyond their comprehension. However, as Maggie explains, there’s a cost to messing with these forces. Which Hutter acknowledges, but she has to stop Bing and needs Maggie’s help to do so. Maggie reluctantly grabs her Scrabble Bag and asks where to find Bing. The Tiles spell out "HOUSE OF SLEEP TWO."

Bing sets up shop in his new House of Sleep. He shaved off his facial fair so not to be recognized and burns his SoChemPharm uniform. He then replaces his Massachusetts licence plate with one from Maine.

Vic is met by a U.S. Marshal just outside Manx’s hospital room. Manx is in a coma and the state police impounded what was left of the Wraith. Vic asks to see Manx for herself. Vic enters Manx’s room. She stands over his body and and professes her plan to find Christmasland and burn it to the ground.

Vic and her mother attend Craig’s funeral and later his reception. Linda holds Vic close as she struggles with the possibility of it just as easily being Vic who died. Vic looks over to her dad and asks her mom what she would’ve done without him. Linda used to think about that a lot when he was in the Gulf. She remembered thinking she would die without him. In reality, she’d have to stay with her mother for a while, which wouldn’t have ended well as Linda has always had a strained relationship with her mother. Chris checks in on Vic, and she reveals that she’s pregnant with Craig’s child. Chris assures Vic they’ll figure it out.

Vic suddenly feels the urge to throw up and runs outside to puke in the grass. Coincidentally, Tina Harrison, Craig’s mother, is outside having a smoke. She knows that Vic was the only person in town who truly knew the type of person Craig was. Tina describes him as having a solid gold heart whilst everyone at the reception is carrying on as if it’s a party. He doesn’t even have a decent headstone, which Vic assures Tina won’t be true for long. Tina advises Vic to get out of Haverhill before it ruins her. Craig always said she was an artist.

Vic heads inside, where she steals her dad’s keys out his coat pocket and rides his motorcycle to the Shorter Way, stopping by her house as well as Haley’s on the way there. However, without her dirt bike, she can not conjure the bridge, and so, she looks off the cliff where the bridge once stood, gazing at the widespread river. Maggie joins Vic after using her Tiles to track her down. Having lost Craig just as Maggie lost Joe, the two share an indistinguishable pain. While they may have lost love ones, they are at least comforted with the fact that they stopped Manx. Unfortunately, Bing is still at large. Leading to Maggie’s decision to stay in Haverhill to help Detective Hutter find him. However, just like Maggie can’t go back to Iowa, Vic can’t stay in Haverhill. While Manx may be gone, she fears that Christmasland still exists. Maggie asked her Bag, but she got a blank tile.

Six months later, Bing has settled down in a new town, under a new identity, working as a janitor in a dentist office. He offers a little girl a piece of candy after her appointment. "Brush and floss, shine or rain, all good girls get candy canes."

Vic returns to the now decimated Sleigh House. Just outside, among the decorated trees, Vic receives a seasons greeting from Haley. She asks Vic where Manx is and if she’d be joining them in Christmasland. Lou joins Vic, who’s now six months pregnant. Apparently, she left Haverhill as planned as has been working in Lou’s garage ever since. Vic vows that her child will never ever meet anyone like Charlie Manx.

The charred remains of the Wraith sit in a repair shop. A mechanic jump starts the vehicle, also waking Manx from his slumber in the medical center of a prison. He grabs Dr. Thornton by her wrist, startling her and causing the blood bag she had in hand to drop on the floor and splash all over. Manx speaks of her son Josiah and how there's room for him in Christmasland with all the other boys and girls. Manx could could give him a new life as well as a new set of teeth. Josiah was among the children Manx saw in the Graveyard of What Might Be. Dr. Thornton runs out the room screaming, leaving a trail of blood behind.

## Cast

* Olafur Darri Olafsson as Bing Partridge
* Jahkara Smith as Maggie Leigh
* Ebon Moss-Bachrach as Chris McQueen
* Virginia Kull as Linda McQueen
* Zachary Quinto as Charlie Manx
* Ashley Romans as Tabitha Hutter
* Jonathan Langdon as Lou Carmody
* Pierson Salvador as Bradley

Co-Starring* Rebecca Gibel as Tina Harrison
* Oscar Wahlberg as Matty
* Larry Vigus as Sam
* Scot Ruggles as Paul Helm
* Al Thompson as Zach Jones
* Brigid Ryan as Ellen Thornton
* Dana de Celis as Dr. Debra Clark
* Vishaal Reddy as Malik Patel
* Veda Durgampudi as Sophie
* Jasmine Richard-Brooks as Young Mom
* Jennifer Dorr White as Dental Hygienist
* William Ragsdale as Auctioneer

## Trivia

* Gunbarrel is a reference to the gas station that Vic blew up the Wraith.

## Multimedia

### Videos

'Gunbarrel' Next On Season 1 Finale NOS4A2'Save Yourself' Season 1 Finale Talked About Scene NOS4A2'The Children of Christmasland' Season 1 Finale Sneak Peek NOS4A2