Gemstones Season 3 Finale: Kelvin and Keefe married? Pontius a Dark Lord? Peter redeemed? Plus saying goodbye to the Gemstone hunks

 

On The Righteous Gemstones, season finales is not a separate episode; it is a scene set some time after the various plot resolutions, allowing viewers to say goodbye to the characters, a sort of "and they lived happily ever after." There are few plot developments, and only vague hints about the future. 

The Season 3 Finale has more of a timeless,dreamlike quality than the previous finales.  It has a flattened structure with no dialogue and not a lot going on.  The family gathers for a private monster truck rally.  Thus, the season begins and ends with the Redeemer.

The Arrival: Setting: a field, with a wooden fence to the side and a swing set.  The Gemstone garage is visible in the background.  This is the same field where Jesse played with the Redeemer in the 2000 flashback.  

The family arrives and sets up lawn chairs in a row, in this order: May-May, Chuck, and Karl; Peter (he has a prosthetic leg, and doesn't bring his own chair, so maybe he's in prison, out on furlough for this special event); Eli and Martin.

Next, Baby Billy, Tiffany, and their two kids sit on blankets instead of chairs. In a deleted scene, Tiffany is letting her baby sit up, so it's been at least nine months, probably a year, since we last saw them. 

Next: Amber, Gideon, and Abraham.  Pontius is not present, suggesting that he is completely estranged from the family.  In the future he will be an antagonist, the Dark Lord of the family.

The Rocking Chairs: Then Judy and BJ, and finally Kelvin and Keefe.  Now they have two rocking chairs, depicting Keefe as the roots of the tree, and Kelvin as the branches. Those things must be very uncomfortable to sit in, and rather fragile.  Adam Devine notes that he broke his chair when he kicked it during the fight scene, and they had to get a replacement. 

Kelvin points the chairs out to the family, who look surprised.  Why haven't they seen the  chairs before?   Maybe  Kelvin and Keefe keep them in the bedroom, where they don't gete many visitors; or maybe Keefe has just finished his chair. In real life, the family would get up to take a closer look, but on the show that would involve a lot of staging with no payback.

 Why bring them today, instead of regular lawn chairs?  The guys' conflict this season has been whether to be open as romantic partners, and the two chairs certainly do the job.

 The Rings:  Kelvin sits in an odd position, with his fingers splayed, to draw attention to his new ring.  It is thicker and more substantial than the "wedding ring" he wore earlier in the season.  Keefe's is hard to see, but it looks thicker, and not as shiny.  Did they pick them out for each other?  Maybe we are to infer an advance in the relationship; maybe the guys are now married.

Gideon's Role: Kelvin pats Keefe's hand several times, presumably call attention to the fact that he built the chairs.  Keefe raises a thumbs up, and Eli and Gideon, the head of the family and his apprentice, return it.  Remember that the last time we saw them interacting, during the kidnapping, Gideon was explicitly rejecting Keefe as a member of the family.  This is a gesture of inclusion.

Also notice that Gideon did not drive Eli to the event, but they use the same gestures, suggesting that he has moved from driver to apprentice minister.

The Guys' Couture: Keefe is wearing an Eckhaus Latta Accordion Sweater in Kelvin's standard green color, with the midriff and back bare, giving him a feminine appearance.  

Eckhaus Latta is known for experimenting with unconventional textures and styles, and unconventional advertising.  In 2017, the ads for their Spring Collection featured gay, straight, and gender-indeterminate couples having unsimulated activity. This certainly adds a lot to our understanding of the Kelvin/Keefe relationship.

Kelvin is wearing a shirt depicting fish, suns, and the letters S and W in rainbow colors, a callback to the young Kelvin's Hawaiian rainbow shirt in the 2000 flashback.  It comes from Moschino Couture, a Milan-based fashion company that offers clothing for everyone (who can afford to spend $300 on a t-shirt), but is best known for its gay line.  Kelvin is, in effect, wearing a gay shirt.

By the way, it comes with matching boxer shorts.  

The Monster Truck Rally: Each family member gets a turn at driving the Redeemer to crunch cars and other things.  They crunch in this order:  the siblings (Jesse, Judy, and Kelvin), the partners (Keefe and Amber), the Montgomery boys (Chuck and Karl), BJ, Martin, the Freemans (Baby Billy and Tiffany), Abraham, and the older generation (Peter, May-May, Gideon, Eli).  They seem to go order of distance from the siblings, with some variation to get different reactions. 

Why is Peter redeemed:  If you've ever wondered why the monster truck is called The Redeemer, now you know: being permitted to drive it signifies redemption, wholeness in the eyes of God and the family.  Uncle Peter tortured Jacob, subjected his niece and nephews and their loved ones to trauma that will take years to work through, sent goons out to kill his own children, and plotted to blow up the church, yet he has been redeemed.

In spite of the Cycle Ninjas, toilet babies, Bible Bonkers, and proliferating p*nise the ongoing theme of this show is a profound theological question:  Is there an sin that can't be redeemed?  Is there any darkness so deep that there's no coming back? 

The answer: no.  Sometimes it takes a lot of work and a lot of pain, but everyone can be redeemed.  In Season 1, Scotty assaulted Eli, robbed the church, and treated Gideon as a slave, yet after his death he was admitted to the family.  In Season 2, Baby Billy was reconciled with his long-abandoned son through a punch in the nose.  Kelvin was redeemed through Keefe's symbolic death and resurrection. Peter sacrificed himself to save the family. 

Other activities during the event include: Baby Billy riding a donkey-shaped piñata and hugging Jesse; BJ riding a stuffed giraffe; Keefe riding Karl's shoulders;  the siblings doing a line-dance; Eli and Martin pretending to dine with the stuffed animals; Eli riding a swing; Kelvin pouring popcorn into his mouth.  A  shot of Kelvin riding Keefe's shoulders was deleted, probably because Keefe is grimacing.

We can find some character development in these acts. Kelvin and Keefe no longer need to spend every moment together. They are comfortable engaging in independent activities and forming separate alliances. Nor does Keefe need Kelvin as a conduit into the family: he is a Gemstone in his own right, not just "Kelvin's friend."  This is a significant relationship advance, suggesting again that the two have moved forward to marriage.

More after the break

The Top 14 Hunks of "The Bride", including Christian Bale, Peter Sarsgaard, a gay guy, and a lot of queerbaiting

This weekend we saw The Bride! (2026).  I assumed that it would be a sequel to Frankenstein (2025), but it is not.  The frenetic, lunatic ghost of Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley, channeling Bellatrix LeStrange from Harry Potter, complains that she died before she had a chance to write anything meaningful (lady, you died at age 53, having published dozens of novels, short stories, essays, travel journals...)  So she possesses a 1930s floozy named Ida, who starts a lengthy diatribe and falls down a flight of stairs.  Frank the Monster (Christian Bale, left) convinces a mad scientist to revive her, and they go on a rampage, channeling the Joker and Harley Quinn, Bonnie and Clyde, and the Me, Too Movement.   

There are a few nods to 1930s gay culture: Ida kisses a lady in the first scene, and takes Frank to a nightclub frequented by a few same-sex couples.  But it is ruined by a monumental queerbaiting. 

 Detective Jake Willis (Peter Saarsgaard) and his partner Myrna, who has to pretend to be his secretary because female detectives aren't allowed, investigate the murder of a railroad cop in rural Indiana.  After Jake gets intel from the small-town sheriff, Partner Myrna points out that she does all the detective work; all he has to do is seduce small town sheriffs to get intel.  

In the 1930s, all sheriffs were male.  She very clearly and unambiguously states that he has sex with men. 

But at the end of the movie he admits that he keeps letting Ida get away because he is in love with her; they used to be romantic partners, before her accident.

WTF?  A real life person could be bisexual, of course, but in movies, a hetero-romance obliterates gay references.    Myrna's statement was an outright lie, a nasty joke played on the audience. 

This is not a review of the g*ddam monstrosity (it would get an F----).  I was so angry that I looked through the entire cast list, hoping to find a gay person to profile.  I finally found one, after researching a gaggle of straight hunks:

1. Christian Bale as Frank the Monster

2. Peter Sarsgaard as the queerbaiting Detective.

3. Jake Gyllenhaal as Ronnie Reed, a Fred Astaire-like dancer.  Frank idolizes him, so they travel to all of the sites where his movies were filmed.

4. Zlatko Buric, on Nysocboy's Beefcake and Bonding, as mob boss Lupino.  The Mafia is involved, too.

5. Will Dagger, left, as a guy at a movie theater who is trying to get with his girlfriend in spite of her protests.  Frank and Ida intervene.

6. Louis Cancelmi as Officer Goodman, one of the cops that the couple kills.

7. Neil Vincent Smith as a patron in a restaurant that the two disrupt.  Sorry, I couldn't find a photo where he isn't hugging a lady.

8. Antony Abbato, left, as another restaurant patron.

The gay guy after the break

Rooster: Trashy novelist at an elite college, hetero romance problems, a gay sidekick, Dunster dick, and the guy from "Scrubs"

 

Robert Heinlein once complained that science fiction was about exploring the vastness of time and space, while mainstream fiction -- the Rabbit Runs, Appointments in Samarra, and  Complaining Portnoys of our college lit classes -- was about men who hate their jobs and their wives.  "For Heaven's sake, get new jobs, get new wives, and shut the f*k up."

I am reminded of that quote when I think of the works of Steve Carrell:  Anchorman, Dan in Real Life,  The 40 Year Old Virgin, Cafe Society,  Date Night, Dinner for Schmucks, The Morning Show, The Four Seasons, all about little men trying desperately to find meaning in jobs and wives that they hate. Coincidentally, this is precisely the "job, house, wife, kids" trajectory that I rebelled against growing up.

So I wasn't planning to watch the HBO MAX series Rooster (2026).  Then the promo showed a young man telling Steve, "nice washboard (abs)," referring to the hunk on the cover of his book.  Later he seems to become Steve's sidekick.  So Steve probably writes gay novels, and probably has a gay sidekick.  Enough potential to review Episode 1.

Scene 1:  Famous novelist Greg Russo (Steve) looks morose as he is escorted through the elegant Spanish Colonial campus of Ludlow College (actually the University of the Pacific, Stockton).  He sees a naked old guy, who waves -- but his escort, Eric (Myles Perez, left), doesn't see anyone.  A hallucination?

Eric tells him to wait here, then zones him out and refuses to speak anymore.  Fortunately, Professor Shepherd, who arranged his campus visit,  is just walking up. 

He's nervous -- he writes trashy beach novels, not literature: "Characters you like have sex, characters you don't like get shot in the face."  Why would elite college students want to see him?  

Scene 2: The reading, in a giant lecture hall.  The students criticize his protagonist, Rooster, for describing the Girl in food terms during their 17 sexual acts (18, if you count the blow job). Isn't that sexist?  

Russo counters that she is strong and powerful -- she rescues Rooster, remember? "But she takes off her bikini top to do it."   A jock praises that scene: "The Girl is smokin'!"  Hey, isn't he the gay sidekick?  I'm starting to suspect that I've been tricked.

Scene 3: Next Russo meets the College President (John C. McGinley, the homophobic, sexist jerk on Scrubs).  He strips to his underwear to show off his physique: "You're thinking, most college presidents are bookish shut-ins, but this guy is jacked!" He looks like the naked guy from earlier.  So it wasn't a hallucination, just a crazy act that would never happen on any real college campus.

They allude to a "sex scandal" involving Katie and Archie (not mentioned before), and the President offers Russo a job as Writer-in-Residence.  "But I didn't even go to college."  "Who cares?  It's over-rated."  Academic malaise at its snarkiest. 

Left: McGinley's butt

Scene 4:  Next stop: Another giant lecture hall, a lecture on French impressionism, Monet at Giverny.  It's Russo's daughter Katie, a professor of art history (and the sex scandal lady).  As the students leave, she notes that her Dad doesn't like interacting with other humans, so they can get extra credit for looking him in the eye and saying "I love you very much."  A student does it!

Next Katie points out that the college has asked Russo to do a reading a billion times; why agree now?  "Admit it -- you're checking up on me, to see if I'm ok after the sex scandal."  We finally find out what it is: her husband Archie dumped her for a grad student.  Hetero Romance Problem #1.  

She has no idea why. Everything was normal, and then she was moving into the dead hockey coach's house.   Everybody on campus knows, and keeps staring at her and asking questions.  And it's difficult to avoid running into him or his new girlfriend on a small campus.  She's about to crack.

She points them out, sitting on a park bench.  "The girlfriend isn't even hot.  She's like a regular person.  Why did he dump me for her?"  Maybe he liked her personality?

As Russo peeks through the bushes, husband Archie and the girlfriend leave, and a lesbian couple notice him.  They think he's a perv, har har.   He runs away as they film him.  

Spoiler alert: This is set up to have consequences, like Russo being arrested, or the job offer rescinded, but it is never mentioned again.

Scene 5: Russo stops at a convenience store for some water.  Tommy (Maximo Salas), the jock from earlier, praises the Rooster books. Uh-oh, he forgot his id, so Russo buys his beer for him.  If he's under 21, you're in big trouble, buddy.

More after the break

Gemstones Episode 3.9 : Five plot resolutions and a funeral. With collegiate cocks and a Josh O'Connor bonus

Title: "Wonders that Cannot be Fathomed, Miracles that Cannot be Counted." From Job 5,9, NIV.  Many terrible things have happened to Job, including physical ailments and the deaths of his children, but Eliphaz assures him that God can perform "wonders and miracles," and rescue him. We'll see what wonders and miracles God performs here.

Baby Billy is Bi:  Still trying to sell the siblings on his Bible Bonkers game show, Baby Billy (Walton Goggins, top photo), reveals he is friends with Dusty Daniels, the racing champ.  We cut to a scene of the two, plus famous actor Gene Hackman  (played by Kevin Murray) in Monte Carlo on New Years' Eve, 1999.  They're awaiting the Y2K bug, hugging, dancing, and dropping acid as if it's the end of the world.  

We cut to a bisexual after-party, with Dusty, Baby Billy, and Gene Hackman screwing and getting blow jobs, maybe from men, maybe from women -- hard to tell.  There's a male full frontal, but it morphs into a naked lady so fast that I can't get a screen shot, so I'll substitute Josh O'Connor's cock, left and below.

We zero in on the guys facing each other as they get blow jobs.  Baby Billy's partner is a woman, but Dusty's may be a man -- remember that he was established as bisexual back in Episode 3.2.

"Wait, " Jesse asks, "Did did you fuck Dusty Daniels?"

"I doubt it,  but you never know...we might have touched dicks. That's not the important part of the story."  The important part: he can talk Dusty Daniels into leaving his fortune to whoever wins at Bible Bonkers, the Gemstones or the Simpkins. 

So Kelvin came out to the family yesterday after years anguish, angst, self-doubt, backing-and-forthing, and annoyed viewers, and he still hasn't said the word.  Now Baby Billy comes out as bi with utter nonchalance.  Why couldn't he have said something to his nephew during Cousins' Night, or back in Season 1?

El Molino: We cut to a locust splatting on a windshield.  It's Uncle Peter and Chuck, driving the U-Haul full of explosives.  Peter has finally come up with a plan,  He doesn't specify what it is, but since it involves the Gemstones and explosives, it's not hard to figure out.  They're nearly out of gas, and the militia took all of their money, so they stop at El Molino, a real Hispanic supermarket with two locations in Charleston, to use the cash-counting machine.  

While Peter is inside, the U-Haul explodes!  He thinks that Chuck has been killed.

Out to the Family: The family gathers in Eli's parlor to watch a tv news report about Chuck's death.

Wait --when did the siblings stop hating their father?  Was a reconciliation moment cut?

 Notice that the guys are sitting on the right side of the room.  In four shots, Keefe moves from sitting a few inches away to leaning against the chair, his shoulder touching or almost touching Kelvin's thigh. They are so close that Kelvin can't move his hand or foot without bumping into him.

  They used to be very careful to avoid public displays of affection, holding hands under the table and forehead-pressing instead of kissing.  Now they casually cuddle in front of everyone, even family members who did not see the kiss.

They discuss the Bible Bonkers Family Feud-style game show.  The siblings will compete, but they need two more.  They were going to ask Chuck, a big Bible nerd, but he's dead, so it will have to be Karl and May-May.  

Cut to Jesse and Vance Simpkins (Stephen Dorf) at the Cape and Pistol Society, sniping at each other over who will win the Bible Bonkers game. Vance claims that he has the entire New Testament memorized.  When I was in the Nazarene church, we did the Jump Quiz based on a single book, and some very competitive types did try to memorize the whole thing. 

"We're going to humiliate your family," Vance proclaims, "On your own network. Let's see how far the mighty Gemstone Empire has fallen. They're all going to leave you.  Even God will forsake you."  God will forsake him for losing a Bible trivia game? 

Of all the gas stations in South Carolina:  Homeless, friendless, abandoned by his family, Peter sits outside a convenience store.  He prays: "I am in my darkest hour.  I am but a lost sheep in need of a shepherd.  Please give me a sign."

At that moment, Keefe pulls up in the Smut Busters van.  He's using that van for everyday chores?  Surely he and Kelvin have a dozen cars.  

He's listening to the song "Holy Lightning Rod" by Blesst, a Christian metal band (created for this episode?).  In Season 1, he considered metal music Satanic. He's come to realize that you don't need to give up things that you love to be a Christian, like heavy metal, Goth/Fetish outfits, and sex with guys.

Did God send him as the sign, to bring Peter back to Christ?  If so, it doesn't work -- they don't recognize each other.  (After all, they have only seen each other once).  So no soul-winning for Keefe.  But Peter does steal the Smut Busters van.

God saved you:  In the wilderness church, Karl and May-May mourn Chuck's death, clear off brush, and pray -- then she crosses herself   Surely somebody on the staff knew that only Catholics use that gesture.   Suddenly Chuck walks in!  He's alive!

Cut to the family back in Eli's parlor.  This time it's just Eli, the siblings, and the Montgomerys. Chuck explains that he made sure the parking lot was empty, then set off the explosion and ran away, so his Dad would think he was dead and he could escape.  

"Why were you super-mean to us, while we were in captivity?"  Chuck doesn't explain, but he avers that he didn't actually want them to die. Then why were you shooting at them?  Besides, he blew up the van to save them.  Doesn't that make up for the kidnapping?  I thought you blew up the van to save yourself.

So, about Bible Bonkers?  Chuck is a Bible expert, so May-May can drop out. The team will consist of Jesse, Judy, Kelvin, Chuck, and Karl.

Later, at the amusement park, Chuck tries to apologize to Jesse. They bond over having Daddies who are embarrassed by them.

 

The Bible Bonkers Filming:   Apparently several weeks have passed. The Bible Bonkers set is finished, and they're going to film the first episode.  

In the dressing room, Billy offers to give the sibling  the answers to the quiz questions.  Apparently once a grifter, always a grifter.  They refuse.  He claims that their parents were so neglectful, he practically had to raise them.   

As Gideon drives Eli and May-May to the filming, they see Peter in the stolen Smut Busters van.  He's up to no good!  Follow him! Why didn't Keefe report the van missing?

On set, the band starts to play and the dancers twirl about. Showtime! Baby Billy does a cheesy stand-up bit, then introduces the Gemstones vs. the Simpkins. 

Notice Kelvin's textured single-breasted green coat, "The Attico" from Farfetch, "The global destination for modern luxury."   It will become important later.

 The Simpkins team includes siblings Vance, Shay, and Craig, not seen since Episode 1, plus two young Asian girls.  Apparently they are ringers: there is no indication that any of the siblings has a partner or children.  Compare with the Gemstones, who, for all their faults, have devoted partners. 

Baby Bill asks easy fill-in-the-blank style Bible questions to Jesse-Vance and Judy-Shay.  The Gemstones lose.  

Now it's Kelvin-Craig's turn.  First Kelvin does a self-aggrandizing coat-swirling dance. Keefe, watching from the VIP section with the other partners, responds with a  weird robot thing.  It looks like he's following along with the move they practiced.  

Meanwhile, Gideon, May-May, and Eli follow Peter to the Salvation Center.   Couldn't they have called the police from the car?  Don't these people have cell phones?  He drives to the loading dock, on a day when there are no services, so he probably expects the church to be empty. 

When the Gemstones confront him,  he announces that he has filled the Smut Busters van with explosives, triggered by his fitbit watch.  Wait-- where did he get a second batch?

 May -May yells that both his sons are inside.  Chuck is alive after all.  At this point, Peter would probably give up the plan, but he is interrupted by......

Whew!  I'm so anxious to get on with the story that I don't have time to look at any dicks.  Well, maybe one.

More after the break