Expect twists, turns as 'Justified' blasts through final season

An autumnal haze seems to hang over Harlan, Ky., as the critically acclaimed drama “Justified” returns for its sixth and final season Tuesday, Jan. 20, on FX. After years of faithful, if rule-breaking, service, U.S. Marshal Raylan Givens (Timothy Olyphant) is jonesing to pull up stakes and move to Florida to join his ex-wife, Winona Hawkins (Natalie Zea), and their baby daughter.

First, though, he has to help the Feds build a strong enough case against longtime nemesis Boyd Crowder (Walton Goggins) to keep him behind bars for the foreseeable future — and that means relying on an untrustworthy confidential informant: Boyd's fiancee, Ava (Joelle Carter).

Executive producer Graham Yost, who developed the Peabody- and Emmy-winning series from works by master storyteller Elmore Leonard, says there are surprises in store, but longtime fans should know what to expect from these final episodes.

“When people ask me how it is going to end, I always tell them to pay attention to Elmore,” Yost says. “We are not going to end this series in a way that is not consistent with his world — which means it will be very violent, with lots of twists and turns. But that's all I can say about it.”

If Raylan already has one foot out of Harlan as the season opens, Boyd is seeking personal and professional redemption following a Season 5 that went from one humiliation and disappointment to another for him. He desperately wants to restore the fire to his troubled relationship with Ava, which means getting into bed, criminally speaking, with Dixie Mafia queen Katherine Hale (Mary Steenburgen) to build up his nest egg. Yet Boyd knows his own glory days as a Deep South crime lord are coming to a close.

Yost says he and Olyphant, also a co-executive producer on “Justified,” decided it was time to wrap things up after taking a look at how much story was left to tell.

“We knew that ultimately that came down to Raylan and Boyd and Ava, and how long could we string that out?” Yost explains. “Once the Raylan and Boyd story wraps up, we couldn't imagine the story continuing in Kentucky for Raylan. He would be done there and he'd want to move on. Six seasons seemed right. If we tried to extend it beyond that, we would be treading water.”

As for future Raylan Givens TV movies or films, Yost says he can't speak to that definitively, for a somewhat chilling reason.

“It kind of depends on who lives and who dies, and we haven't entirely landed on that.”