Spoilers forYour Honorseason 1 ahead.Your Honorseason 2, episode 1, “Part Eleven” picks up right where season 1 left off, requiring any recap to cover the big points of the season 1 finale. Adapted from the Israeli seriesKvodo,Your Honorseason 1 premiered in December 2020 on Showtime, billed as a miniseries. The show earned middling reviews with a 49% onRotten Tomatoes, but it’s one ofBryan Cranston’s best performances. He plays the lead and titular “honor”, Michael Desiato, a respected New Orleans judge who subverts the law to save his son, Adam (Hunter Doohan).
The end ofYour Honorseason 1 sees Adam shot dead, despite everything Michael tried to do to protect him. It’s a tragedy in every sense, as Michael compromises his morals to protect Adam, but his son still winds up dead from a fluke accident and Michael ends up in prison. Despite the finality of season 1,interest in the show convinced Showtime to renew the series for season 2, which premiered in 2023. Now,Your Honorseason 3even seems to be on the table, as popular as the show has remained.
Michael Desiato Wastes Away In Prison Until His Help Is Required
Olivia Delmont Wants Michael To Help Take Down The Baxters
Your Honorseason 2, episode 1, takes place shortly after Adam was killed the previous season. Michael is now in jail, sporting a scraggly beard, and coming to terms with his actions. He’s so filled with grief that he refuses to eat, resulting in a painful scene of a feeding tube being put down his throat. Later in the episode, Michael takes part in a game of poker, situated within a bullring where cheering fans bet on which player will be the last one remaining in his seat, a shocking real-life event that occurs at Angola prison (viaAngolaMuseum).
Your Honor: The Worst Thing Each Character Did
Bryan Cranston’s new show Your Honor is a breath of fresh air. Illegal dealings and overall questionable actions are, so far, a staple of the series.
When the bull charges toward Michael, he closes his eyes and waits, as if longing for death. He doesn’t die and continues his miserable, and self-inflicted, penance. However, a newcomer tothe cast ofYour Honorarrives, Rosie Perez as Olivia Delmont, the assistant U.S. Attorney for the Eastern District of Louisiana.
Olivia reveals how Michael ended up in prison, mentioning recordings the court found of Michael conspiring with Jimmy (Michael Stuhlbarg) to rig Carlo’s (Jimi Stanton) trial. She has an offer for Michael. Olivia wants to take down the Baxters' criminal empire and thinks that Michael would be the perfect person to help. Michael turns her down, butshe returns and tells him that she will get him released from prison if he cooperates.
If he doesn’t help Olivia, his only friend could face being run out of office, and possibly sent to jail himself.
When that fails to convince Michael, she plays him a recording of his meeting with Jimmy, which directly implicates Charlie Figaro (Isiah Whitlock Jr.) in the conspiracy. If he doesn’t help Olivia, his only friend could face being run out of office, and possibly sent to jail himself. Without much recourse, Michael exits his jail cell as a pleased Olivia congratulates him on his decision.
Gina Baxter Urges Retribution
Jimmy Baxter Pushes For Non-Violence With Desire
While Michael is suffering in prison, the Baxters are trying to get their revenge on Eugene Jones (Benjamin Flores Jr.) for attempting to kill Carlo in the season 1 finale.It was Eugene’s poorly aimed bullet that killed Adam, but Carlo does not take the attempt on his life lightly. He searches for Eugene, who has fled and, unbeknownst to the Baxters, finds refuge with Desire, a criminal gang in the Lower Ninth Ward. The leader of Desire, Big Mo (Andrene Ward-Hammond), captures Carlo as he’s invading her territory.
Jimmy preaches patience, but Gina wants revenge, no matter the cost.
She kindly returns him to Jimmy, in an attempt to soothe the rising tensions between the criminal gangs, and Jimmy seems amiable enough, or at least he wants to avoid an all-out war for the time being. His wife, however, Gina (Hope Davis), one of themost dangerously intelligent characters inYour Honor, berates her husband for not doing more in retribution and is the one who sent Carlo after Eugene in the first place. Jimmy preaches patience, but Gina wants revenge, no matter the cost.
Big Mo Helps Charlie’s Reelection Chances
Little Mo Releases Eugene
After shooting Adam, Eugene flees to the only people he can, Desire. Big Mo agrees to hide him but is angry with the young man for bringing his problems to her doorstep. Though he’s saved from the Baxters, now Eugene is essentially held captive by Desire, and Big Mo is getting more agitated by the day, particularly after Carlo invades her territory looking for Eugene. Though she and Jimmy come to a truce, it’s an uneasy one andthere’s no telling how quickly the violence could ramp up.
Eugene is not a member of Desire, but as a Black man, he and Desire are united along racial boundaries.
At the same time, Mayor Charlie is taking a lot of political heat in the run-up to the election due to all the recent violence, and he needs a win, fast. His answer comes after Little Mo (Keith Machekanyanga) releases Eugene, and sends him on a bus with some cash, telling him to never come back. This throws a bit of a wrench into Big Mo’s plans, who had hoped to give Eugene to Charlie to earn a little political cache with the mayor in exchange for a scapegoat for the violence happening around the city.
Making something out of nothing, Big Mo encourages Charlie to pin Eugene’s crimes on someone else, and she’ll make sure Eugene stays away from New Orleans forever. Charlie has some cops pay off a coroner for a body and has them claim that it’s Eugene’s. Mayor Charlie gets to go on television and tell the community that he’s caught Eugene andBig Mo now has something over the mayor of New Orleans, a helpful card to play for a major criminal lord.
Sofia Baxter Has A Surprise For Michael
Back in prison, Michael has been receiving frequent letters from Sofia “Fia” Baxter (Lilli Kay) asking about how he’s doing and trying to connect with him about Adam, her boyfriend and his son. Michael has been ignoring her letters, however, prompting Fia to visit him in jail. She asks Michael if Adam really loved her, and Michael tearfully replies that Adam was a terrible liar, soif he told Fia he loved her, then it was the truth.
Michael asks that Fia never visit him again, her presence being a painful reminder of his son and his past. Fia does write one more letter to Michael at the end ofYour Honorseason 2, episode 1, and the camera pans to show her holding a newborn baby. Though it’s not said, there’s likely only one man who could be the father: Adam, and it’s only a matter of time before Michael finds out he and the Baxters share a grandchild.
Your Honor
Cast
Your Honor is a legal drama series starring Bryan Cranston as a respected judge whose son becomes involved in a hit-and-run accident. The incident sets off a dangerous chain of events that forces the judge to confront his own principles and navigate the moral complexities of the law. The series explores themes of justice, loyalty, and ethics, offering a compelling narrative of a father’s desperate attempts to protect his son.
