It also marked a turn in Shadow and Wednesday's partnership (and how Shadow views his boss). At the very least, it has huge implications for the larger war between the new gods and old gods. Plot-wise, their tete-a-tete with Vulcan was also interesting, albeit less so than the road trip. I loved the entire "Come on Get Happy" sequence at the factory. Stylistically, this next stop on their god-recruiting journey was awesome.
Meanwhile, Shadow and Wednesday headed to Vulcan, Virginia to see Wednesday's old pal Vulcan. Schreiber delivers all of his dialogue with such supreme douchebaggery.
Why? Because he's "his afterlife." Whatever that means. While Sweeney and Laura are supposedly on the same mission (resurrect Laura properly so she can get Shadow back and Sweeney can get his coin back), Salim is on one of his own: Find the jinn who gave him a new life. The road trip had a sidebar which also proved that Laura does still have some feeling in her cold, dead heart – she directed Salim to head to Indiana, not Kentucky, behind Sweeney's back, so that she could peek in on the family she insisted she hates. I'd far sooner buy the idea that Wednesday could somehow just yank the coin out of Laura for Sweeney (though I don't think Wednesday is too inclined to do the leprechaun any favors). In fact, I'm not 100% sure that he's even being honest with Laura in what he's planning. He was doing it as a ploy to get his coin back. Sweeney wasn't doing this out of the kindness of his heart, naturally.
Salim, you'll remember, was the former businessman turned taxi cab driver who had his ~intimate encounter~ with the cab-driving jinn on American Gods Season 1 Episode 3. Lo and behold, the taxi he stole wound up being Salim's. Without a car, Laura wound up needing to depend on Mad Sweeney to steal her a new one.
In any event, I love Wednesday for driving away and cranking up the music as Laura ran after their car because it gave us one of the most bonkers road trips I've seen in any TV show or movie. Is it just because he wants to alienate Shadow from the person he was so that he can maintain tighter control over him? Or is it something deeper and/or darker?
I'm not sure why, exactly, keeping Laura away from Shadow is such a big deal to Wednesday. I'm talking, of course, about Wednesday trying to convince Shadow to let go of Laura, to let her fade away, and actively distracting him from seeing her as she ran after their car. Interestingly, this hour gave us our first direct indication that Wednesday might not have Shadow's best interests at heart and, in fact, may be working against him.