Warning: This recap contains spoilers.
In this week’s episode of Tulsa King, “Token Joe,” Dwight attempts to mend fences (and also breaks down some others in the process) when he returns to New York for his brother’s funeral. Meanwhile, we begin to see the depth of corruption in Tulsa from Black Macadam.
The funeral
Dwight returns home for his brother’s funeral. His sister, Joanne, is tearful and happy to see him arrive, greeting him with a hug. After walking up to Joe’s casket to pay his respects, he spies his daughter, Tina, across the room. She glances over at him with a conflicted expression and then looks away. Dwight excuses himself to step outside, where Tina fills him in on how Tina is doing — she has a degree in horticulture, she owns her own business, her husband adores her, and she has twins.
Later, Dwight receives an angry call from Chickie, who’s not impressed that he had to hear from strangers that he’s back in town. Regardless of the fact that Dwight’s there for his brother’s funeral, Chickie firmly demands that he come to the hospital in the morning, because Pete’s there.
When Dwight joins his family to eat, Joanne goes around the table to reintroduce him to everyone, because it’s been so long since he’s seen all of them. He makes the mistake of insinuating that his daughter’s husband should have called the prison to get his blessing to marry her, which makes Tina even angrier than she already is. She makes a remark about how he’s just trying to throw money at all of them, finally excusing herself after Dwight makes a toast.
Dwight gives Stacy a call, eager to hear a friendly voice, though he can’t accept her coffee invite since he’s in New York. He opens up about how difficult it’s been seeing his daughter again. Then, she begins to warn him that there’s more to the nitrous guys from the fair than meets the eye — things that she can’t tell him over the phone.
Making amends
With a letter written down on paper in his hands, Dwight calls Joe’s wife and leaves a long, heartfelt message saying all of the things he wanted to say to his brother at the funeral that he couldn’t quite get out in the moment. She and Joanne listen on the other end.
Not ready to give up on his daughter just yet, Dwight pays a visit to Tina’s flower shop. She bluntly tells him that there’s a flickering ember of love for him inside of her, but something’s telling her to stomp it out once and for all. He says that he wants to see his grandkids.
Dwight asks Tina if there’s any way that they can just move past all of this and if she would have preferred he was the one that died, rather than his brother — but no, that’s not what she would have wanted. She reflects back on the time that Uncle Joe was the one who parked outside of her senior prom to keep an eye on her date, and then she begins to lay into Dwight about what they went through after he went to jail. He left behind nothing but burdens and dead weight.
Dwight gets revenge
Unexpectedly, Tina informs Dwight that Nico used to come and “check on them.” And one day, she learned the hard way why he’s called “The Package.” Dwight’s immediately on edge, demanding to know what happened, but Tina tearfully tells him she doesn’t want to talk about it and begs him not to do anything.
Regardless of her wishes, Dwight storms back into the waiting room of the hospital, but the guys have all cleared out. He goes to see Pete, sitting down beside his hospital bed to talk to him. While the conversation starts off calm enough, it grows heated as Dwight turns to him and reminds him that he swore he would watch out for his wife and daughter while he was in prison. Pete is shocked when he stands over him menacingly, gripping his face as he asks if he knew what Nico did to his daughter (he didn’t). Dwight takes matters into his own hands afterward by burning Nico’s face on a stove, choking him out, and stomping on his head.
Corruption in Tulsa
A member of the Black Macadam biker gang stops to talk to a pair of highway patrol cops about Dwight and his gang encroaching on their nitrous sales territory, and they make it clear that their boss isn’t happy. He gives them the license plate number for Dwight’s SUV, letting them know that he’s one of the guys that they’re looking for.
The cops find Tyson driving the SUV, and they pull him over, asking who Dwight Manfredi is. After he tells them that he’s his boss, they ask him to step out of the car, and they throw him over the hood and cuff him. He’s not under arrest yet, but it’s for “their own safety.” One of the cops finds a joint while searching the car, so they take Tyson to jail and put him in a holding cell. At one point, he’s begging for them to let him use the bathroom, but in exchange, he has to give them the password to unlock his phone.
When Dwight tries calling Tyson from New York, we see that the cops have turned his phone over to Black Macadam. When they let Tyson go, they tell him that according to their records, he didn’t have a phone or any money on him when they brought him in — they stole the $1,200 he had, too. Elsewhere, one of the gang members and Bodhi sit in the back of a cop car, and he throws a bag over Bodhi’s head.
Black Macadam surrounds Bodhi as their leader, Caolan Waltrip, holds a knife to his throat and asks him about Tyson and Dwight. Because he has no real ties to Dwight, he flat out admits that he’s extorting him. When they’re finished with him, the cops drag Bodhi to Bred 2 Buck. They attempt to heckle Mitch, but he’s entirely unfazed and gives them both a killer verbal lashing in return, after which they begrudgingly hand Bodhi over.
Episode 5 of Tulsa King is now streaming exclusively on Paramount+. Catch the next episode on Sunday, December 18, and stay tuned for our weekly episodic recaps. In case you missed it, the series was recently renewed for a second season.
