If Wolcott hadn’t done himself in, Hearst probably would have ordered him killed. He may have been pushed into it by Swearengen’s rival, Cyrus Tolliver (Powers Boothe), who disclosed Wolcott’s viciousness to his boss, George Hearst.
Mining scout Francis Wolcott (Garret Dilahunt), a serial killer of prostitutes, hanged himself. Differences were downplayed, commonality affirmed, stability embraced. Deals were brokered, properties purchased. The hour was organized around images of diplomacy, compromise, favor-trading and punishment – the blood and marrow coursing through civilization’s body politic. These events pushed the lawless mining camp closer to its goal of becoming a legitimate town, and reinforced the show’s underlying narrative: the process by which order emerges from chaos, and civilization creates itself.
On top of all this, Swearengen joined forces with Chinese immigrant powerbroker Wu (Keone Young) to kill Wu’s Chinese rivals and establish him as the sole supplier of cheap labor to newly-arrived mining boss George Hearst (Gerald McRaney). The reading of wedding vows served as unifying voice-over narration: two social contracts cemented in the presence of witnesses. Tellingly, writer Ted Mann and director Ed Bianchi cross-cut between Alma and Ellsworth’s wedding and the signing of the Yankton deal.
Later in the episode, Bullock met with saloon owner and power broker Al Swearengen (Ian McShane) and commissioner Hugo Jarry (Stephen Tobolowsky), who brokered a deal with the territory’s capital, Yankton, that recognized Deadwood’s ragtag government and spelled out fine points of residency and voting. Despite her grief, Martha said she planned to stay in Deadwood and teach the camp’s children Seth resolved to stay with her and make their marriage work. Behind closed doors, other bonds were created or strengthened.The secret father of Alma’s baby, Deadwood marshal Seth Bullock (Timothy Olyphant), sat out the wedding to grieve with his wife, Martha (Anna Gunn) over their son, who was killed by a runaway horse. In public, there was a formal, according-to-Hoyle wedding between widow-turned-gold-mogul Alma Garrett (Molly Parker) and her right hand man Ellsworth (Jim Beaver).
David Milch’s profane, philosophical HBO western Deadwood ended season two with a series of unions-one actual, the rest symbolic.