“Outer Range,” Episode 4, is all about rocks. The strange celestial rocks found on the west pasture of Royal Abbott’s ranch make everyone curious, including him. It is these rocks that bring Autumn Rivers to Amelia County, and coincidentally, she is wearing a similar-looking stone as a part of her necklace. A flashback sequence at the beginning of “Outer Range” Episode 4 suggests that a man brought a strange rock (geode) to Wayne Tillerson that he found on Abbott’s west pasture, and since then, Tillerson has been obsessed with the property and had been planning to seize it at all costs.
In the last episode, Royal informed Deputy Sheriff Joy Hawk about Trevor’s body that Amy saw in the mountains, and thus this episode continues the investigation by further bringing in Trevor’s mother, Patricia, back to Amelia County, who swears to take revenge on her son’s murderer.
‘Outer Range’ Episode 4: Recap & Ending
Joy and her team quickly recovered Trevor’s body from the mountains and sent it for a post-mortem. Meanwhile, Joy interrogates Amy if she found anything out of the ordinary at the time when she saw Trevor’s body. Joy tries to connect the dots to find out what exactly happened on the night of Trevor’s disappearance, and through Amy, she finds out that Rhett had been missing for 2 long hours that night. As Joy stands to leave the house, Perry lies to her that Rhett was with a girl on that night, and Joy immediately instructs an officer to interrogate Rhett, who is currently in town and has no idea about the appearance of Trevor’s body.
Perry tries to call Rhett to inform him about these new details, but Rhett doesn’t pick up the call and, in the meantime, knocks on the bank’s window to call his lover, Maria Olivares, for a chit-chat. When an inspector approaches Rhett at the bank and inquires about the night, Rhett senses some danger and quickly picks up the call, where Perry informs him about the story that he told Joy. Rhett tells the officer that he was with a girl, and when he asks about the identity of the girl, Maria, trying to save Rhett, lies that he was with her the whole time. However, the entire story is short-lived. Joy personally interrogates Maria, after which she confesses to lying to the officer, and soon Joy brings in both Perry and Rhett to the police station.
Joy tries to trick both Perry and Rhett into confessing their crimes, but before they can spill the beans, Royal arrives at the station with a lawyer and saves his sons from getting themselves arrested. However, during the interrogation, Joy tells a bunch of lies to create a rift between the brothers that leads to an argument between them outside the police station, which Royal tries to sort out peacefully. While driving his boys back to the house, Royal subtly suggests that if he had the ability to turn back time, he would have done so to protect his sons. His words hint at the possibility that maybe in upcoming episodes, Royal may go back in time to stop Perry from committing a crime.
Patricia, Wayne’s wife, and Trevor’s mother, arrive in Amelia County the next day to mourn their son’s death and plan a funeral for him. An argument and the tension between Wayne and Patricia establish the fact that while Patricia is more concerned about taking revenge from the Abbotts for murdering her son, Wayne is still obsessed with the west pasture and can only think about it. Possibly, it was Wayne’s obsession with land, property, and wealth that led to his separation from Patricia.
Meanwhile, Royal pays a visit to county assessor Karl P. Cleaver, and tries to clear up the issue regarding his west pasture, but the corrupt officer refuses to listen to anything and continuously informs Royal that the hearing is scheduled for the end of the month. Royal suddenly loses his temper and threatens Karl that he will bury him in a big hole in the Earth, thereby literally hinting at the cosmic pit on his west pasture. However, Karl informs Royal’s wife, Cecilia, during Trevor’s funeral that he has moved the hearing to the next week as her husband tried to threaten him.
The forensic doctor reveals to Joy that they found some metal lacerations on Trevor’s torso. However, what is hard to believe is the fact that, according to their tests, Trevor had been dead for less than ten hours from the time he was found. This particular information branches out numerous possibilities around the cosmic pit on Royal’s ranch, the closest one being that the effect of time on the body or an element reverses once it returns to its original timeline or that the handshake between Royal and Autumn has reset the timelines, thereby bringing everything back to its original place, even Trevor’s body.
Patricia intentionally invites the Abbotts to Trevor’s funeral, where she impulsively opens the casket and observes a sort of guilt on Perry’s face, thereby concluding that he is the one who killed her son. At the funeral, Autumn compliments Billy Tillerson’s singing, hence suggesting the attraction toward him.
Later, inside a bar, Royal challenges Autumn to a game of cards and cheats in the game to get her precious necklace, which has the same stone that Royal found in the mountain where the police recovered Trevor’s body. On the same night, Wayne Tillerson observes some ominous occurrence in the rock (geode) that one of his men recovered from Abbott’s ranch. The black matter inside the geode shows some movement, and this phenomenon compels Wayne to get out of bed and visit Abbott’s west pastures to explore the mystery further. At the same moment, a restless Royal picks up Autumn’s necklace and arrives near the bottomless pit, where he finally encounters Wayne and suddenly attacks him to protect his secret. However, after a violent struggle, Wayne hits Royal with his prized stone and leaves the property in the vehicle, laughing like a maniac.
See More: ‘Outer Range’ Episode 3: Recap & Ending, Explained
Are The Mysterious Rocks From Outer Space?
It is possible that the rocks discovered by Autumn, Wayne, and Royal on the west pasture were part of a meteor that struck the earth centuries ago, and that some phenomenon related to these rocks caused the appearance of the cosmic pit on Royal’s ranch. A moving black matter covering the pit that was also found in these mysterious rocks could be some extraterrestrial anomaly that found its way to the Earth and has been affecting the lives of the planet since then. In many other science fiction narratives, especially the Icelandic series, Katla, the meteor from outer space, leads to strange occurrences on the planet, and it can be surmised that in “Outer Range,” too, these rocks are not a part of the human world.
If Wayne decides to reveal Royal’s secret to the world, then it is most likely to bring government bodies to Royal’s land, thereby leading to extensive drilling, evacuation, and army deployment, something that Royal had already seen on his short trip to the future in “Outer Range” Episode 1. Or maybe, Wayne’s geode contains oil, which is the reason why he is obsessed with the west pasture and probably will bring huge drilling machines to exploit the lands. He may even believe that the pit is nothing but an oil well, as nothing was revealed with certainty at the end of the episode. Whatever the case, maybe, the question here is, will Royal be able to change the future and stop Wayne from revealing his secret? Hopefully, the upcoming episode will translate better.
See More: ‘Outer Range’ Episode 5 & 6: Recap & Ending, Explained – Why Did Autumn Help Billy Tillerson?
