Summary of Last Chapter

Ross is an intelligent criminal who knows how to make his way in the world of the outlaw bikers without getting caught. He has no criminal record despite the fact that he lives off the fruit of the drug traffic and other illegal activities. A Franco-Ontarian living in Toronto, he belongs to a gang – the Devil Riders. His best friend, Bob Durelle, belongs to the same brotherhood and dreams of joining up with a far more powerful pan-Canadian organization: the Triple Sixers. Bob is an ambitious man who covets the leadership of the 10 new chapters that the Triple Sixers want to create in Ontario.

Ross’ aspirations are of a different nature. He wants to withdraw gradually from this milieu. Bob’s plans will perhaps permit him to do so. But Bob isn’t reconciled to seeing his friend take a different road than his. He makes Ross an offer to join the ranks of the Triple Sixers. Ross resists. The two men then come to a tacit understanding to secretly share the Toronto territory. Bob allies himself with the Triple Sixers and, on his end, Ross tries to reorganize the independents who have their own territory, all the while concealing his contacts with Bob.

But the relationship between the two men is poisoned bit by bit, and their longtime friendship takes a blow. Plots and killings multiply around them. Everything seems to combine to drive them apart, up to the dreadful day when Wendy, Ross’ wife, is killed in her husband’s place by a bomb beneath his car. Crazed with grief, Ross is convinced that Bob is responsible for Wendy’s death, and he has only one idea in his head, that of avenging the death of his wife by executing Bob.

The characters

Around these men we find a series of characters. There are those who share the life of Bob Durelle – his wife Karen and his children. His allies - his impressive bodyguard whose nickname is The Brain, then the biker-painter Glen O’Sullivan, advisor and right hand man. Next comes Zip O’Connors, the director of the Quebec chapters, and Roots Racine - well-portrayed by Dan Bigras – who aspires to the title held by Zip, and all the others, those prospects (aspirants) to being full patch (regular) members of the Triple Sixers.

Around Ross: his wife Wendy, his friend Dany Lazarus, a member of the Devil Riders, and the members of other Toronto biker gangs, including Ricky Jones and his followers.

Then the clan of the police. The clan of the watchers, those whose thankless job is to spy on this beautiful world in an attempt to catch it in flagrante delicti. Bill Guenette (Michel Forget), the police expert, and his young assistant; his bosses, who are often out of their depth in this situation; and the sole breath of fresh air in the entire police department, Jennifer Mackenzie (Maxim Roy), with whom Bill is in love. I call them the watchers because throughout the series, they are there to film, to listen, to photograph. Arrests are rare, traps even more so. This is a police force given more to watching than getting involved, that seems to wait for the right time to strike a decisive blow, and that gathers evidence rather than interfere in the bandits’ den.

The Last Chapter, a look at the life of the outlaw biker gangs

Luc Dionne, the author of TLC, is a man who writes for men. Virile writing with nuances all his own. There is always in Dionne’s characters a heavy, muted violence. A black despair. Little or no light. Always money, lots of money. Money which soils hands and corrupts lives. Sex sometimes is an affair of the heart, but not often. Dionne’s heroes are men thirsting for power, upstarts at the peak of their glory who inexorably begin their slow descent into other hells. Friendship between males exists but it’s fragile and subject to the hazards of this environment. Omerta* or TLC, whether one is in the heart of the Montreal mafia or the bowels of a motorcycle gang in Toronto, it matters very little, the universe is the same. All hunted men. Prisoners of their ambitions or their dreams, and on top of everything, enlisted in a criminal sect that will never let them quit its ranks. To belong to this type of organization is to choose to live according to immoral principles at the price of one’s own life. To make a pact with this world is to commit yourself perpetually to violence, to damn yourself for money, despite everything. To snap your fingers at those who you love as much as yourself. In exchange, those who accept the terms of this contract will have a right to the privileges conferred by membership in this cruel and astonishing brotherhood.

* Dionne’s previous series, Omerta, dealt with Montreal’s organized crime.

In The Last Chapter, being a brother assures a life of ease, even wealth for some, and guaranteed enjoyment of the advantages of belonging to the pack. Here «pack» is a word chosen deliberately. Because one thing that is evident in each scene, in every shot of this series, is the animal nature of these men. Not simply in a pejorative sense but in every sense that phrase can convey. A chapter is a pack of wolves who fight to keep their territory and to conquer new ones. The pack leaps on its prey so that each member can tear off the best bit. Each member eyes the others, eyes greedy, mouth ready to bite at the slightest deviation in behaviour. That’s the supreme law of the hierarchy. But it’s also what gives it its strength and power. All are bound together to defend each other. The law of the gang. Alone they can do nothing. Together they are omnipotent.

The series conveys this reality with remarkable accuracy. It’s necessary to see the connection these men maintain, then to watch how they behave individually after that. To see them act on their own and interact with each other. And above all, to see their eyes, eyes that they all have, almost without exception. All have pale glances, in which green or gray predominate. All have the look of carnivores. Looks which pierce the other person, which scrutinize life in depth and detail, which miss nothing. In this jungle of theirs, extreme vigilance is a virtue for survival. One must not and cannot neglect anything. To know how to read and anticipate the behaviour and the thoughts of others is the trump card of the predator, and it’s a subject on which they are all experts.

The universe of the outlaw biker gangs is a despicable world, violent and bloody. Everyone in it is immersed in an atmosphere that’s dark, nearly dismal. These are men of the shadows if not of the night. Clothed in black leather, helmets, tattooed.like warriors, astride powerful and gleaming mounts, they are always ready to attack. Their society reminds us of another one, and no doubt that’s what strikes our imagination. Showing just below the surface of this sordid environment, with its unlimited barbarity, is the appearance of the ancient code of chivalry. Like the knights of the Middle Ages, the bikers are riders. Knights who have traded the horse for the machine. Men who move in a masculine world subject to rules that are brutal and macho. As in olden times, women fall into two groups: whores on one hand or virgins on the other: the wives, girlfriends, daughters of the bikers, women tied to them by alliance or blood.

Another trait shared with chivalry: the fact of earning one’s colors. One has to be worthy of one’s coat of arms. Decline leads to the loss of the right to carry the organization’s emblem. Their dubbing ceremony consists of being patched. One must pass tests to earn such an honor. Exactly as in the times of the chevaliers. The quest is less noble, but no matter, the rule and the ceremony are the same.

A quest for power but equally a quest for the freedom whose supreme symbol is the motorbike. On a Harley, the world belongs to them. This beautiful machine wonderfully expresses the restless spirit of these men who risk their lives in wanting to live them to the fullest. It’s not surprising that the motorbike plays a part in the creation of criminal gangs since it carries dreams, evokes passions, pushes beyond rules and limits. In the hands of men battered by life, it becomes a natural ally, and the union of these men and machines in turn creates the perfect ferment for birthing an organization that’s outside the law.

The character of Ross Desbiens belongs to this universe.

We know nothing of his past but his face says a great deal about who he must have been. The tragedy of Ross is that at this point he has a dream that no longer fits with that of his pack. Ross has become a lone wolf. Wanting to free himself from the group, he will push his quest a bit too far. Unforgiveable transgression. In the bosom of the gang, they can understand the most ambitious desire to climb to the top of the hierarchy, but not that of wanting to distance yourself forever from your brothers.