As 2014 comes to a close, here is a definitive "Nashville" power ranking for our favorite country music-themed nighttime soap opera. [This contains hella spoilers, if you care.]
20 Pam - Back-up singer who we’re supposed to be invested in because she’s temporarily Deacon’s sex-muse during the How Deacon Got His Groove Back arc of the Luke Wheeler tour. Mostly she just sits on her high horse and spits nuggets of condescending “wisdom” that read like the side of a Tazo tea box gone sassy. Who asked you, Pam? Get out of here.
19 Micah - Gunnar Scott’s son, except (sad trombone you heard coming from the moment he was introduced), no, no... he's not. Zero character development beyond “look, it's a child”. Gets lost at the CMAs after going to the bathroom, and sadly, was found. A disappointing human being who enjoys playing in the leaves. Here's to hoping his wretched grandparents win his custody battle.
18 Teddy Conrad - Mayor of Nashville. Getting a freebie from an escort was his highpoint of his arc this season. Slept with Deacon’s girlfriend (remember that?) to get over his freshly dead, non-pregnant creepwife. Just kind of there, smirking and furrowing his brow, getting played by everyone. Never running shit. For all the times this show has killed off useless characters, we’re all left wondering why this dude is spared.
17 Jeff Fordham - This season is playing him as not really evil, just misunderstood. Soulless record execs need love (and boning), too! His plans for keeping Edgehill on track as of late have included blackmailing Will to stay in the closet and giving Layla Grant a bottle full of Klonipin as party favors, trying to sign Rayna's kids to spite her. He's calling in favors with Teddy, so you know he's at rock bottom.
16 Terry - Oh, poor Terry. As if being traumatized by the deaths of his entire family wasn't bad enough, he's got to serve as pivot point of Scarlett's white savior problem. He appears from nowhere, and we find soon enough he's not a "crazy bum" but rather a songwriting genius who is almost too humble to take a sandwich. Mykelti Williamson does a fine job with this shark-jumping storyline, but holy shit, did "Nashville" really go full tilt into a Magical Negro plotline? INDEED THEY DID. The last time we see Terry, he's drinking straight from the bottle while hanging around some extras cast for looking convincingly homeless, though totally inspired by Scarlett's bravery in finding her own voice.
15 Luke Wheeler - Proposes to Rayna in unseemly public display. His drunken CMA outburst where he yells at Rayna like, “You owe your success to me!” was mega-gross. Rich country star who bosses everyone around. Judging by last week's preview, he drives a giant SUV through his uneaten wedding cake, which is a pretty awesome way to show your disapproval--but no one likes a blowhard. RIP RUKE (not!).
14 Zoey - Loves Gunnar, but leaves him begrudgingly because she doesn’t want to mother his bland child. (Makes sense.) Skips town in a huff, and we’re like “cool, bye”. Surely L.A. will suit her better. Her band is way better with Scarlett, anyhow. TTFN, Zoey.
13 Layla Grant - In true "Nashville" style, the most insufferable character at the beginning of the season is the one we empathize with most by its midpoint. Sure, she blackmailed her hunky, closeted husband into doing her famehungry bidding, but if she comes out of that pool alive (#PRAY4LAYLA), and can actually remember the secrets of everyone who's betrayed her-- well, she's shooting to the top of these power rankings. Plus, she's just starting to hit her Jewel phase as a songwriter.
12 Maddie Conrad - Angsty teen. Has an abiding interest, all-season, in frenching her jean-vest wearing EDM step-brother-to-be, which threatened to ruin her mom’s Rolling Stone cover story when the reporter sees the two future siblings smoochin’ and decides in the name of "complete transparency" it's his story hook (Like Didion said: Journalists are always selling someone out). The two things Maddie has going for her? She's one of the two people on the show that can actually sing. Two: she fully gets that her non-bio father, the Mayor, is a walking turdlet. That sullen 'tude of hers put her on a straight up gothwatch for next season.
11 Will Lexington - His every bit of success is endangered by the looming threat of being outted. Closeted because every industry person who’s figured out his secret (save for Deacon) has pressured him into staying in the closet because country music. Hoping he gets to be all "fuck y'all", embrace his true self and find happiness with that trainer dude this season.
10 Gunnar Scott - He's made a pretty quick transition from Sad Sack Gunnar to Successful Gunnar to Father Gunnar, but (wamp-wamp) turns out he’s just Uncle Gunnar. Permastuck on that gee-whiz, dumb-luck, "huh?!" grind; his life implodes with more regularity than anyone else on this show and he's always blindsided by it. Here's hoping that his new riches turn him into an asshole after the season break. Dude needs some edge to move beyond the bottom 10 of this ranking.
09 Avery Barkley - Avery's transition from fame-hungry, will bone his manager for a deal punk-ass motherfucker to the show's walking authenticity barometer seems complete. In this season alone he's gone from barf-strewn multi-episode bender to tenderly folding newborn onesies while maintaining steady eye contact with a heavily preggo Juliette. He'd rank higher but now that these two bad kids are becoming good parents, it's kind of a milquetoast scenario.
08 Sadie Stone - A character you actually believe as country music's next big thing. You want to root for her after she kills it at the CMAs, and she gets bonus points for signing to Highway 65 despite a more lucrative offer from Jeff “Should Be Relegated To The Tail of the Human Centipede” Fordham. Here's to hoping she gets to punch her ex back by season's end and writes a hit about that.
07 Deacon Clayborne - Gained a lot of ground this year by finally going back for a solo run, new sobriety, fastidiously giving guitar lessons to his long lost daughter, and not putting up with Rayna's shit, oh, and a CMA win. Here's hoping he doesn't, uh, die from liver failure and lives to trounce his scorned frenemy Luke Wheeler on the charts and win the hand of Rayna and become Raynborne? Deacna? Ehhh. The multi-season looming of "will they or won't they" tension had all but disappeared at this point, and is now being run through another Romeo and Juliet/mortality debacle, even though we know it will not be "resolved" before season seven.
06 Glenn Goodman - Makes the jump from “how do we make the most money” manager to compassionate human being. More importantly, we know what's beneath the wig now. Dude should go full power Tucci. After long being tied with Tandy for the worst hair on "Nashville" his piece-reveal served it's own crucial plot point, notching him up in rankings.
05 Natasha, Teddy’s friend the prostitute - Looks like she might be into Teddy, but then after that one-off freebie backstage at the CMAs she's like “Wait, nope, my job is to sleep with Nashville fatcats for money, so I’m going to keep doing that instead of settling for this tanned, cocky Mayor,” and we, the viewer, are like, “We get it, lady.” Debuts high on the list for having her priorities in check and holding the power to destroy Teddy, without even having to crack the lid on a container of pig blood.
04 Scarlett O’Connor - Following her boring affair/make out on the piano bench with Liam McGuinness before he left for Game of Thrones and her huge public meltdown (because on a show full of shitty parents, her mom is the actual worst), Scarlett is back to doing her. Realizes that she's spending too much time trying to help a convenient and insensitive television trope...er...Terry...when she should be helping herself. Ends up doing a couple stints on stage, which is good, though she's probably better suited to "cult hero" status whose songs get the appraisal they deserve decades later.
03 Rayna James - Ends the year huge on huge bawse bitch wins: She prioritizes what she actually wants instead of doing what she feels obligated to do in order to keep the record sales, awards, and publicity coming. And thank god, by the way, because as the CMAs accurately taught us: Rayna > Luke, and thus, Rayna > Ruke. How bad do you wanna read that Rolling Stone cover story on her?
02 Juliette Barnes - As an artist, she had an incredible year. Kissing off the industry with her best song ever (“Don’t Throw Dirt on My Grave Just Yet” got robbed at the CMAs), lands the title role in a Patsy Cline biopic, and signs to Highway 65. She may have slept with that horrible slimeball Jeff Fordham, but we also see her end the year genuinely happier than she's been through the entire series, so that's fresh. Also, that scene where she stalks Avery on a motorized scooter, only to collapse a tent of artisanal windchimes is TV at its best.
01 Bucky Dawes - Rayna's quiet, work-oriented manager is the best and most sensible character on "Nashville", always and forever. Classy, strictly business, gets it done. Rarely on screen because he's never in a petty beef. A shining example for the rest of us.
Season Finale predictions:
Jessica: Layla is going to come out of that pool alive, but somehow permanantly injured, holding it over the heads of her husband, Will Lexington, and her erstwhile FWB qua A&R guy, Jeff Fordham. Little does she know, Jeff Fordham has her marked for death. Foreshadowed connection between Sadie and Drunk Luke at CMA's becomes full blown affair after Luke beats the living shit out of her ex, on GP. Rayna will anonymously donate her liver to Deacon so he can live, real Gift of the Magi-style: she dies so he can live. Only to be brought back to life in some stupid and impossible, liverless way (take Tandy's, please). Maddie goes goth, her solo debut gets the first 10.9 in Pitchfork history. Powers Boothe (Rayna's dad) comes back as a singing ghost, appears in every scene.
Evan: Layla lives and after a couple episodes of sullen silence, reveals that she's planning to tell the world the truth because she can't take it anymore. Will Lexington responds by coming out in a YouTube video, and while he suffers an initial backlash, he eventually finds a massive wave of success. Terry makes an unexpected splash with his album Introducing Terry. Teddy's prostitute will take her story to the tabloids. Sadie's ex will show up to the studio with a gun, which fires and kills Avery because the creators of "Nashville" don't want Juliette to have nice things. Gunnar and Scarlett finally decide to make an album together. Rayna and Deacon get married, but it's mostly a symbolic gesture as Deacon readies himself for death. Evan Minsker will finally buy a Team Gunnar shirt and write the word "Uncle" on it to clarify exactly which Gunnar he's rooting for.
Mark: Layla survives, and the day she gets out of the hospital, Liam McGuiness returns from Japan. They begin collaborating on a harrowing song-cycle that will come to be compared to Broken English. Deacon is referred to Phil Lesh's Hepatologist, he receives a transplant, and he becomes an occasional "Friend" at Phil's shows. Teddy goes out for a ride and he never comes back—and no one notices. Luke Wheeler and Sadie begin singing and take a duet to No. 1. Avery becomes a househusband and watches the wheels. Juliette Barnes' turn as Patsy Cline earns an Oscar nod, and her version of "Crazy" goes Top 5. Rayna assures Deacon that she'll figure out their relationship once and for all if "Nashville" is picked up for another season. Jeff Fordham runs for Governor of Tennessee.