‘Dark Winds’ Star Zahn McClarnon Delves Into Joe Leaphorn’s Ketamine Dream

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[TriggerWarning:ThisStoryContainsADiscussionofSexualAbuseofChildrenItAlsoIncludes[Triggerwarning:ThisstorycontainsadiscussionofsexualabuseofchildrenItalsoincludesDark Winds SPOILERS THRUGH Season Three, Episode SIX, “ABIDOO’NIIDEE (What We Have Been Told).”]

If you caught the Latest Episode of Dark Winds And you need antiors minute to process it all, you’re not alone.

Season Three Is Reaching A Fwever Pitch, With Episode Six Going Deep In Its Exploration of Joe Leaphorn (Zahn McClarn) and The Challenges He Faces Both, AS HEVING Suspicion for his own crime, and international as he struggles to reconcile his role in bj vj vines’ death with his sense of justice. The Tene Episode Also Circles Back to Events Preview in the Season Premiere, WHEN JOE WAS SHOT IN THE NECK WITH A DART AS HE Faces An Adversary in the Desert.

This Time, Viewers Experienced That Precarious Sity in Its Full Context: Joe Is In A Fight to Save HimSelf and the Teenage George Bowlegs from A Menacing Attacker heer. The Dart, as It Turns Out, Has Been Laced With A Substance That Cause of Him To Have Surreal Dreams That Delve Into His Psyche Years Ago. In the Dream, He Also Faces The Threat of FBI Agent Washington (Jenna Elfman) Uncovering His Crime, As Well As the Fallout on His Margin.

At the heart of the episode, Joe Learns that his Father, Henry (Joseph Runningfox), KILLED The PRIES AFTER JOE REVELED THE ABUSE OUT OF DESPAIR for Released from Custody After HE CAUSED THE DEATH OF JOE JR. Their Shared Heartbreak Highlights “The Gap Between Institutional Justice and True Justice, and the Price Paid for Both,” Says Erica Tremblay, Who Directed The Episode.

“IT is a story about the Monsters We Face, Both Literal and Figurativ, and How The Strength To Face Them of the Fethen Comes from The Stories Our Anocostors Left Us,“ Tremblay Tels The Hollywood Reporter. WHEN JOE AWAKES FROM The DREAM, HE’S ABLE TO FIGHT OFF The Attacker, Wounding Him With A Gunshot, and Realizes that It Was Never A Monster After All.

Below, Star Zahn McClarnon Discusses the Multilelayred Episode – Whoaves in Navajo Mytology with Leaphorn’s Challenges – Touching on Wye Abuse Storyline Hitline. HIM EVEN IN HIS Darkest Moments. Says McClarnon, “He have a chance to lose everything: his wife, his family, his job, his freedom. How can the stakes be any Higher than?”

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There’s A Lot to Unpack in this Episode, With Several Different Narrative Threads HapPening at Once: The Mytological Story Leaphorn’s Struggle to Fight The Attacker that’s Coming After HIM and GEORGE; and the surreal Dream-World that he’s navigating. I Read That You Have A Fraternal Twin in Real Life, WHICH IS Kind of Fitting for the Twin Storyline.

I do, he’s four minutes younger.

The story of the Twins is Represited by a Stage Play HapPening with the Episode. Is that bassed on real mytology?

It’s Based on a Creation Story, The Diné, or Navajo Cretion of the Hero Twins, The Monster Slayer and Born for Water. THESE TWINS Are Embarking on a Battle of the Ye’iitsoh. The Direct Translation of “Ye’iitsoh” is essentially something big that creates fear. Today is kind of a general term that means someting with negative energy.

THEN THERE’S The BATTLE. Joe’s Battling His Own Monsters Throughout this Episode, and We Include Narration Woven Throughout the Amateur Production of the Kids [portraying the Hero Twins] in this episode. I Joe’s Journy.

One of the Elements of Joe’s Journey, Which Takes Up A Relative Small Amount of Time But Sems Veri Important, Is The Interaction He Has with Hison, Emma (Deana. After Her About Vines in Episode Five, She Asked Him to Move Out of the House, Who’s Shocking Because they’ve always had Such a loving margin. Now, in the Dream, She Says That He’s Not Giving Enough At the Things That She Needs, And It Sems Like They’re At A Breaking Point.

Durying the – I Call It A Ketamine Dream – He Gets Shot in the Neth and Animal Transquilizer Dart, WHICH USUALLY IS KETAMIN, they USE KETAMINE TO TRANQUILIZE Animals. In this ketamine Dream, Joe is Exposed to A Lot of His Inner Turmoil and Trauma. There Are Different Characters That Comegh The Ketamine, and One Is Definitely Emma. There’s a Lot Going on there. There’s A Lot of Guilt of How How His Margarige With Emma is a mess, it’s reveailed to him subconscioses in this DREAM, and How he Treats her and how joy his puts his job. Basical How The Job Has Consumed Everything About Him, As Well As The Death [of their son]. For this who’s season we’re exploring thoss areas of joe and emma’s relationship.

Emma Comes in the Dream and Basical Says, “You’re Not Paying Attention, You’re Not Here for Me.” I a party of the psychological makeup of joeaphorn and the things he’s going Through. The Whole Season Is Basally a Continued Exploration of the Ramifications of Their Son’s Death and the ConsequenCes that Come from Joe Leaphorn’s Actions in Season TTSH HWE HTATH Bj vj. d His margin with emma, As Well As [his relationship with] Chee [Kiowa Gordon] and Bernadette [Jessica Matten] – Bernadette’s not Really around in Season Three, She’s Down at the BORDER – But Everything AROUND HIM IN HIS LIFE AND HOW THESE DECISSIONSSES AND HIS SONE’S DEOTH HAVE AFFEREED HIM. We Explore Quite A Bit The Inner Workings of Joe Leaphorn.

I Hadn’t Quite Made the Connection that ketamine was in the Dart.

Yeah, they use ketamine butadays a lot in trauma therapy, for people dealing with figrenties in their lives. The Research Nowadays with Psilocybin and Ketamine for Depression and Anxiety – they’ve come a long way with that. We Touch On It In 1972. (Laughs)

Maybe there’s an accountal benefit for joe.

Yeah, exactly.

One of the Darkest Things That’s Addressed in the Episode Is Joe’s Memories of His Youth And How How His Cousin Was Abused By A Priest, Which He Knew About at The Time, But Couldn’t. Can You Talk About How That Is Addressed?

Joe Revisits An Event in His Childhood WHERE HE WASN’T ABLE TO PROTECT HIS YOUNGER COUSIN WHEN Hen He’s Abused by A Priest. That cause joe a lot of trauma in his yoth, a lot of guilt because he couldn’t Protect him, and he also mixed the events up in his head as a child with the trauma. We Rearrange Stories in Our Heads.

Joe Finds Out in this ketamine Dream that It Went Differently Than He Thought. HE BLAMED HIMSELF [thinking that he killed the priest, which he wanted to do]; HE LIVED WITH this guilt his entre Life, but is Revealed in the Ketamine Dream What Actuly Happy to the Priest: It Wasn’t Joe Who Killed The Priest, It Was Revealed Taer. cousin, to get “Indian Justice.” It was Revealed that Henry, Joe’s Facher, ALSO LIVES WITH A LOT OF TRAUMA AND GUILT Because He Forced The Kids to Go To Church, Which Tured Into An Abusive Sitation. SO Henry’s Also Dealing with a Lot of that guilt and trauma. Joe Realizes this about his fother, whoes bring them closer.

Joe Tells His Father That HE DID THE RIGHT THING, AND HENRY REPLIES THAT HE CAN Tell Joe’s Not Sure. They’re Both struggling because there rewardly is no right Way to Respond to A Sity Who Someone Is Doing Something Evil, But You Have No Legal Recourse. WHAT DO YOU THINK OF THAT DILEMMA THATE Face?

IT’s A DIFFERENT TIME Period. IT’s 1972 and A Lot of People On the Reservations Did Face that Quite A Bit, Whore There’s Two Two Types of Justice: There’s One Justice One for White People and One Justice. I that law that joe have to struggle with as well in his personal life, because he’s a cop and also follows his traditions as a diné man, a navajo man. He’s constantly struggling with Colonialism and Being Colonized and Also Representing His People, So Is A Face That Joe Is Continual Walking Teasons.

And then Obviously we have agent washington, who comes in the Dream Saying, “What You Did to Vines Is Immoral.” SO Joe is Constantly Dealing with These Moral Gray Areas Throughout the Season. WHAT’S RIGHT AND WHAT’S WORNG WHEN IT MAIN TO HOLDING UP The LAW? Are there Two Different Laws, One For Indian People and One For White People? She represents the fact in joe’s heart he professional does know what he did doesn’t skuare up to his principles, and he have to face that.

Regarding the abuse of joe’s cousin by the prist, erica tremblay, who directed this episode, said that “work with zith zahn to bring this story Lean on Each Through the most imotionally challenging scenes, and the result feels True and Raw Because We Trusted Each of Other Enough to Really Explore the Tese Painful Memories. How was that experience for you, work with her to create a representation of these things that, sadly, happled?

Any actor, WHEN he have to be vulnerable, Wants a safe place to be vulnerable. We HAD CLOSED SETS ON SCENES, WHERE IT WAS JUST The Camera and the FIRST ad and erica and I. Erica Made that Environment Extremely Safe – Not Just Even Cast Even Extremely safe for me so i could go to Those places and be vulneval.

To be honest with you, as actors we all have to tap into personal personal experiences. Erica Made It Easy for Me To Tap Into That. I HAD Some VERY, VERY SIMILAR THINGS HAPPEN TO ME As A Child That My Cousin Went Through, and Also What kind of joy of not being about something. For me, having Access to that and Being AROUND WHO ARE GOING TO ALLOW ME to HAVE Access to that and Kep Me Safe, Erica Handled Itly Really. I Trusted Her and She’s A Wonderful Director to Work With. It’s All About the Safe Environment. Not Luckily, But Fortunately, But I HAD A LOT OF THAT STUFF TO TAP INTO.

That is Really Unfortunate to Hear.

EveryBody Has Their – It Doesn’t Define Me, Some of the Things That Happy in My Childhood. I don’t want people feeling Sorry for me or gaying, because everybody’s got their traumas and Things that have happned to them. I just wonderful that as an actor, i ALOW MYSELF TO INTO THAT STUFF, AND THINK TO BRING Some KINE SCENE AS I POSSIBLY CAN. IT’s A LOT EASIER NOT TO HAVE TO MAKE IT UP, THAT’S FOR SURE. (Laughs)

Once Joe Gets Out of the Dream, He’s Still in A Bad Sity. He’s Figured Out A Lot of Things and He’s ABLE TO Shoot and Wound The Suspect, But He’s Badly Injured and Stranded in the Desert – Plus, If He Gets Outs Washington. WHAT DO YOU THINK JEE HAS WORKING FOR HIM THAT HE CAN USE TO OUT OUT OF THAT THAT HE’S STILL IN THE END OF THE EPISODE?

Pragmatical, he’s Got His Experience As A COP, OBVIUSLY. But Joe Comes to Face with HimSelf in this episode and understans How These Past Events Shaped Him and Who He Dealt with Them Through Supppression. Is just a coping mechanism, that’s what we do as human beings; and Joe does, finally, as do the hero twins in OUR Cretion Story in the Play, He Battles the Monsters. He’s Battling The Monster HimSelf, and Finds Out Later on That It’s Not A Monster, That This is a man. He’s Just Projected All this Trauma and Guilt, and It Appears to Him As A Monster, But It’s Really A Man.

He’s put all that guilt and trauma in someting that wasn’t reality. We do that as human beings, but he comes out of that dream and is almost a relief to him to realize that this have all been him and his dsyche that’s been. He have to get his job Done. He have to find the killer who killed erNesto cata at the beginning of the Season. He have a job to do, so he snaps out of it. KNOWING THAT IS A Man Is A Big Relief to Joe. It wasn’t this Monster – But It Was A Monster, if that make Sense. It Was A Monster, But It’s Not A [supernatural] Monster.

I THINK THAT CAME UP IN A Previous Season, Too, Whoer Are Are Really Monsters or If It’s Just People Who Areters.

Henry Talks About That As Well When Joe Meets Up with His Father in the Ketamine Dream. I Think that Leaphorn’s Growth Is More About Self-Undersanding. IT is about healing and reconciliary of the Traumatic Past and the Choices He’s Made and How they’ve affressed everybody around HIM.

Agent Washington Clearly Knows More Than She’s Letting on About Joe’s Involvement With BJ Vines. Joe Must Realize that on Some Level, As A Police Officer HimSelf. SO he’s in a very tricky Spot. And I DON’T WANT YOU TO GIVE AWAY Any SPOILERS, BUT How Could He Possibly Get Out of This?

IT DEFINITELY RAESS The STAKES. It Raises the Highest Stakes, WHEN AGENT WASHINGTON SNIFFING AROUND ABOUT BJ VINES AND WHAT HAPPENED TO HIM. He’s a prominent Character with the Community, The White Community, The Border Town Community, The Navajo Reservation. She’s Been Sent Off from Washington as One of the First Women Fbi Agents in the ’70s, I Think There Were Two In 1972. She’s Sloughed Off To The Reservation by The Tr. Navajo Reservation. She’s Getting Kind of the Shitty Work As A Woman in ’72. She shows up and the stakes become reality High for Joe, Because He Has A CHANCE TO LOSE EVERYING: HIS WIFE, HIS FAMILY, HIS Job, His Freedom. How Can The Stakes Be Any Higher than That? It Creates A Lot of Anxiety for Joe in Season Three. Done by the wonderful actress, and she just nailed this Season, Jenna Elfman.

What was it like work with jenna?

Jenna’s Just A Professional, She’s Such A Pro and Such A Warm Person and Easy to Work with. I Found myselding sitting in some of these scenes and i’m just watching her and i Remember, “Oh Shit, I have to say my Dialogue Back to Her,” Because I’M SO. That doesn’t happen all the time, but when it does you realy have to focus and remember that you’re in the scene. I just love to watch jenna, i’d come [to set] On Scenes WHEN I WASN’T Working Just to Watch Her, See How Many Different Takes She Wuld be and How Many Different Versions. She Just Never Made Any Mistakes. She’s been doing this for so long. Once in a while, You See Her Flub Up, and It’s Like, “Ah, She’s Human.”

I’d also to say that some leaphorn is injured, like he is in this episode, you play that in such a realistic way. You Really Feel His Struggle, As Opped to Action Movies Whole Will Be Shot But Hees On Fighting Bad Guys Like Nothing Happer. I don’t know if you arek about that or if is: written that kind of way?

I do, i’m constantly searching for an Honesty to the performance. IT’s So Important to Me and It Does Take A Lot of Focus for Me. I have to be that person in that moment, and you Know, I’ve Got Everybody Creating that Environment for Me. The least i can do is bring an Honesty to it and do my job. EveryBody’s Working Their Butts Off to Make the Environment and Create the Sets, Etc., SO I’D BETTER BRING EVERTHING THAT I CAN.

It Doesn’t Matter if i’m Getting Shot or i’m in a Scene Where i’m Talking, I’ve Got to Tap Into That Honesty. I a party of the craft that i Really Enjoy, and WHEN I Watch Other Actors, I Want that Honesty. You Know, The Pureness of It. I strive for that as much as i possibly can. It Takes Work, It Takes A Lot of Focus and that’s What i’m there for, i’m there to work. I Take It Seriously and I Want It to Be As Honest and Authentic As Possible. I Apprecciaate that compliment, that’s very kind.

SO MUCH SO IN SEASON TWO, WHEN HA HAD The BROKEN ARM, I ALMOST COURuldn’t Watch That Part.

There was some scenes there i actualally Got Hurt. There was a moment in season two any nicholas logan [who plays the hired murderer that killed Joe Jr.] Pulls me off my feet WHEN I GOT A ROPE AROOUND HIM, AND I LANDED ON MY RIBS AND WE Kept Rolling. I was in a Lot of Pain. (Laughs.) So -of that’s real.

It Certainly Seemed Real. Anything else you’d like to discusses about the Season so Far?

Just kind of explaing what the ye’iitsoh is; Authenticity is a big concern for US. We have wonderful consultants, jennifer and [Manuelito] “Manny” wheeler, and in a previos season we have george joe – just makeing Surey they’re involved in the ceremonies, the language, the Props, the Wardrobe, Things that. We’ve Got A Lot of People Begind the Scenes That Are Indigenous, And We Want To Make Sure that We’re ShowCASING The TRIBAL CULTURE WITH Respect and Honor and Authenticity.

We don’t repressent the navajo people obvioses, we’re doing a tv show, but one of the plea Things is it to do the door to the moments to visit the navajo Nation, to learn more about their culture. That can lead to more people getting involved, environmentally, politically. That’s One of the Positive Rewards About Being On Dark Winds.

The ye’iitsoh is definitely a part of that oral story, the Creation Story of the Navajo People. We make Sure’s Authentic and We Have the Right People in Place to Honor That and Respect It.

The Show Center The Navajo Perspective, Which of Course Has Always Been There, But Wasn’t Represted in Mainstream Media for a Long Time. I a shame it have’t been Done in this Way in the US Until Relatively Recently; Imagine All The Shows We Could Have Had.

It’s Definitely a Better Time in Representation in Television and Film, for Sure, Because Now We Have Native Writers, We Have Native Directors, We Have Native Native Producers. But We’re Just at the Beginning Stages. We’ve Been Telling Tese Stories for Thousands and Thonests and Thonests of Years, and We’re Just Finally Getting The Opportunity for Other People to See It. The Show’s Perspective, It’s Got A Cultural Lean to It, and that’s One of the Positive Things About Being Involved. And’s Connecting with People, People Are Connecting with It And that’s Just A Win-Win for Being on A Television Show.

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Dark Winds Season Three Airs on Sundays on AMC and Streams On AMC+. See Thr‘S Interviews About the Season With ShowRunner John Wild and Co-Star Jessica Matten.