The age-old chess metaphor, though tired, resonates deeply with the intrigues unfolding in Mayor of Kingstown Season 4. In Episode 7, "My Way," the movements of the pieces on the board are more conspicuous than ever, but the crux of the matter lies in who wields the real power. Mike McClusky believes he holds the reins, a position he often occupies, but he may merely be a pawn in someone else's game – a game he's oblivious to.
Enter Merle Callahan, who formally courts Kyle for the first time. After the Aryan Brotherhood saved him from a brief stint in general population, he's proven to be a more reliable protector than Kyle's own brother. If Kyle wants to survive his time in Anchor Bay, all he needs to do is accept Merle's offer, just as Mike did before him. But lessons have been learned since then, and Kyle's moral compass outweighs his self-preservation instincts. So, he declines Merle's offer.
Merle is determined to escape from prison and pursue Mike. It seems like a far-fetched dream at the start of "My Way," but by the end, the Aryans have spirited him away in a matter of minutes. Whether Hobbs knew what her associates were up to when she finally agreed to banish him from Ad Seg is impossible to say, but it's clear Mike didn't anticipate the turn of events. This oversight could prove costly for him in the long run.
Speaking of Hobbs, Mike is fuming at her for trying to have Moses hit by the Colombians while he was in police custody. This act has burned a hole in Mike's goodwill with Moses, and he hates being kept in the dark – yet another example of him being a pawn on the board instead of the king he yearns to be. But Mike is definitely hatching a plan. When he briefly visits Evelyn, who immediately assumes he had something to do with her star witness disappearing, he mentions that he can giftwrap the real whale for her. If she cuts Kyle loose, he'll give her Frank Moses. Seems fair enough.
However, there are still obstacles to overcome. A familiar face in Mayor of Kingstown Season 4, Episode 7 is Sawyer, who has become fixated on the idea that Mike is the root cause of all his problems. While we're supposed to feel a pang of sympathy for Sawyer as he pretends to his wife that he's doing okay and watches his son play in the park before going home to an empty house, his delusional belief that he never put a foot wrong and was always simply doing his job makes it difficult to care. When he suggests to Ian that they should take Mike out, Ian realizes that Sawyer has reached the end of his rope. He's spiraling out of control and is about to do something drastic if left unchecked, which he confesses to Mike.
Unable to achieve that, Mike subtly hints at Ian to handle the dilemma posed by the Sawyer-shaped problem they all face, which Ian does with a degree of deftness. I had to rewind the scene a couple of times to fully grasp the intricacies, but Ian's modus operandi is to get Sawyer thoroughly drunk, drive him home, and then stage his apparent suicide. With Sawyer slumbering in the driver's seat, Ian lowers all the windows and seals the garage door as the noxious fumes fill the air. I fear we've seen the last of Robert Sawyer, and his absence will not be mourned. However, despite this, Ian's actions are not without risk; if Sawyer wakes up, he'll have a myriad of explanations to make.
With Mike's master plan for Moses in place, he urges him to seek revenge on the Colombians. Moses accomplishes this by setting fire to the fuel truck loaded with drugs being delivered to Anchor Bay, albeit after carefully offloading the narcotics. This puts Hobbs in a predicament, popping pills under stress and relying on Torres to find out who tipped off the Colombians about the trucks. When Mike meets with her again, he finally holds the upper hand. But it's not just Mike she needs to worry about; when she returns home, she's confronted by Cortez, who threatens her daughter's life if she doesn't reveal who was responsible for the truck mishap. It turns out that Hobbs talks a big game but crumbles under pressure, literally wetting herself and immediately ratting out Torres as being responsible for the truck fiasco. Cortez is set to pay him a visit next.
At the end of "My Way", Mike receives a call from Bunny's sister to inform him that Bunny has regained consciousness. And he is already laser-focused on his quest for revenge. Mike delivers the unsettling news that it was his new business partner, Moses, who tried to eliminate him. But they decide to keep this a secret for now and work together to bring him down legally. This way, Kyle will be released, and afterwards, Bunny can unleash his fury on Moses as he sees fit.
