This was an excellent start to the season, though I'm only going with "Very Good" on the poll so that I don't go overboard with too many "Excellents" as the season progresses.
Now that Ronnie has committed an outright murder, how will this affect him? Does anyone else feel like that act is going to loosen him up so he can take a run at Shane later down the road or will it be a crippling blow to his conscience?
I don't think it will affect him in a negative manner; that is, I don't think it'll trouble his conscience all that much. He may be distant for a few episodes, as he was in this one -- commented on by Vic and one other, I believe -- but I would see that more as Ronnie processing his actions. Ultimately, he's going to rationalize it through the simple fact that that hitman had been hired to kill Vic's family. Ronnie is just as loyal as Vic, albeit not in the bulldog manner that Vic embodies. I would agree with you that, out of all the members of the Strike Team we've had over the years, Ronnie is the most comparable to Vic.
If the circumstances so arise, will Ronnie calculatedly do Shane the way that Vic calculatedly did Terry? Consider also Ronnie's new position as Strike Team Leader.
The only way in which I could foresee Ronnie deciding to kill Vic is if he becomes convinced that Vic is a threat to his continued safety and freedom. I think it much more likely that he may decide to finish things with Shane, even if that ends up going against Vic's orders. Considering he wanted to transfer to SIS, it'll be interesting to see if any friction develops between Ronnie and Vic now that Ronnie is in charge of the Strike Team, or if he'll run things "officially" and Vic will be in
de facto command of the team.
As far as the question about Julian goes, I'm not entirely sure what capacity he was in during this episode. Since he wasn't promoted to detective last season and was merely an officer on the team, it's possible that he was pulled and put back into patrol duty -- especially since, as Dutch remarked, the Barn is under-staffed at the moment. He did seem to head into the raid, though, in the same manner that a Strike Team member would, though that may have been more the result of his having been used as surveillance leading up to the raid and therefore not having time to change back into uniform. In any event, I imagine we'll get an answer to that question soon. If he's not on the Strike Team anymore, they're going to need another guy, since they only have Ronnie, Vic, and Shane right now.
