'1923' Season 2 Episode 7 "A Dream and a Memory" Review

We made it, we made it to the season (series) finale of 1923. Taylor Sheridan has said this part of the Dutton story would only be two seasons and Brandon Sklenar has also confirmed it. The next part of the story is reportedly taking place in 1944. If this holds to be true, this was a fitting end to this part of the Dutton history. So let’s get into it.

I have to point out one of the happier parts of the episode was Rainwater getting released for the murders. The Marshalls understood why she did what she did and what she has been through. The Judge agrees to dismiss the case due to all the witnesses being dead. She gets a fresh start and is heading to California. I would not be opposed to her getting her own spin-off story or perhaps she will show up in 1944.

I knew Banner in the end could not morally reconcile what Whitfield was doing. He decides to take his family and leave. He makes a good point about the Duttons being takers but they are not evil. He could kill men and steal their land but the beating of women was just too much for him to handle. Banner goes to the train station Jacob tells him he has to stay but his family can go. 

Alex burns the car and gets noticed by a passing train - the train Spencer is on. He sees her and we have the reunion we have been waiting for all season. She lets him know she is pregnant and they catch up to the train. Our happy reunion lasts all of sixty seconds before it is revealed her hands and feet are frost bitten. When the train makes it back to the station where Jacob and everyone is waiting there is a nasty gun fight. Banner is killed (he saved Jacob in the end) along with all of his and Whitfield’s men. Jacob continues on with Alex to the hospital so Spencer can go help Cara back at the house. 

At the hospital, the doctors want to amputate and terminate the pregnancy but Alex refuses and delivers her baby. Jacob and her share a special moment and the acting here with Harrison Ford and Julia Schlaepfer is phenomenal. Emmys all around. 

Back at the house Cara and the cowboys are holding it down the best they can but Whitfield’s men enter the house just as Spencer pulls up. Single handedly without any of Spencer’s men getting off one shot takes out all of Whitfield’s men. They really should’ve been more afraid of Spencer. He and Cara have a nice reunion as well and Elizabeth points out that Jack is missing. Cara sends two cowboys to look for him. 

When Cara and Spencer show up at the hospital, Spencer meets his new son (Alex names his John after his brother) and he and Alex share their last moments. We waited all season and when our soulmates are finally reunited she dies. Taylor Sheridan gives you happiness and takes it away moments later. Cara takes the baby and Spencer tells Jacob he wants to meet Whitfield, the man that killed his wife. 

On the road, Jack’s body is found and he has indeed died. I was hoping he survived. When Spencer and Jacob pull up on Whitfield they shoot him, they take out his crazy girlfriend and tell Mabel to run. Whitfield thinks he is going to jail and Spencer has other plans, he makes him say Alex’s name then kills him. 

We wrap up on the episode with the funerals for Alex and Jack. Jacob is retiring and Spencer is back permanently going to round up cattle. Elsa in the voiceover explains that Spencer never remarried, he did have another son with a widow but would not marry her. He died of old age in front of Alex’s grave and met her in heaven. 

This was an emotional season full of deaths of people on our team but in the end I think everyone got a decent story. It makes me want to binge (rewatch) 1883 then 1923 to see the full story again. Let’s hope 1944 is greenlit and in production soon as I cannot wait to see the next generation of Duttons. 

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