The real reason George spares his would-be assassin in The Gilded Age season 4

*Warning: Spoilers ahead for The Gilded Age season 4 episode 2*

George Russell finally comes face-to-face with his would-be assassin in The Gilded Age season 4 episode 2. But as he holds a gun to his face, he has a change of heart and instead lets the lad and his mother go free. 

If you recall, in season 3 of the HBO series, George (Morgan Spector) was shot and very nearly killed. Thankfully, Dr. William Kirkland (Jordan Donica) was on hand to save his life. 

Fast forward to season 4 and the Pinkerton private detective agency presented George with sketches of the suspect and the woman he lives with. George said he recognised them but couldn’t place them, and episode 2 reveals why. 

As it turns out, the culprit is Will Morris (Will Pullen). He’s the son of Patrick Morris, who took his own life back in The Gilded Age season 1 after George’s ruthless business dealings left him financially ruined. The woman in question is Will’s mother, Anne Morris (Katie Finneran).

Anne begs Bertha (Carrie Coon) to intervene and convince George to spare her son. The Russells aren’t exactly on the best terms right now, but Bertha still tries to persuade her husband to show some mercy.

But George is adamant, saying, “Where was his mercy when he pulled the trigger?” Bertha is clearly shocked at his coldness, and we soon find out the reason for his temperamental moods. George has formed a dangerous new habit: using laudanum, an opioid tincture. 

He drinks some just before confronting Will in a basement where the young man has been held captive by George’s Pinkerton detectives. Anne is also there, desperately begging George to spare her son.

George reveals that he was actually conscious during the surgery that saved his life, and what he saw of his own existence left him feeling empty. He then points his gun at Will, who kneels and begins to pray, convinced he’s about to die.

But George fires into the wall instead. He then orders Anne and Will to leave New York and never return, allowing them to leave. It’s quite the confusing turnaround, especially given how determined George was to make Will pay for what he’d done. 

So, why did George let Will go?

Well, according to Morgan Spector, George never actually intended to kill Will. Despite his terrifying threats, he only wanted to scare the young man and teach him a lesson. In fact, he was protecting him all along.

After all, George could have simply turned Will in to the police. As he tells Bertha, “If I do, he will almost certainly hang.” But instead he confronts him in the basement and puts the fear of God into him. 

Speaking to TVInsider, Spector explained, “The Morrises were people who came to our house. These people were in our social circle. This kid was probably at our house. Now he’s this ruffian who took a shot at me, but not too long ago before his fortunes changed he was just a kid who might’ve been one of Larry’s friends.”

The actor continued, “I think, for one thing, George is not a killer. As much as he’s ruthless and gangster-ish in business, he’s not actually a gangster. 

“People may disagree, but I think he walks into that scene wanting to teach this kid a lesson and wanting to scare the hell out of him. If George really wanted to see the kid dead, he could just call the police and have him prosecuted for attempted murder. He’d probably hang. 

“Even taking the situation into his own hands at all, he’s already kind of protecting this kid from that certain outcome.”

Spector also explained that George’s recent struggles may have opened “a little bit of a window for him to have to be a little more empathetic to that”. Not only is George struggling with his business, but also in his marriage to Bertha. 

And as he tells Will before letting him go, when he was on the operating table, he was still conscious. “Amidst the pain and the madness, I saw my own life with a terrible clarity, and it was nothing,” he says. 

Clearly, George is going through it, and it appears he’s now turning to drugs to deal with the mental pain. So this may very well have influenced his decision. 

The Gilded Age executive producer, Sonja Warfield, also pointed out to TVLine that George has already demonstrated he’s not a killer. In season 2, he stopped the police from opening fire on his striking workers.

“In season 2, there were people who were urging George to shoot upon his workers, but because he had that interaction with the one worker and his family, and he had gone to his house, that humanised him, so he didn’t do it,” Warfield said. 

“Despite the laudanum, despite the rage, despite the fact that this person intended to kill him, there’s a part of George that could not take a life.”

And in a separate interview with The Wrap, Spector noted how George may have compared Will to his son Larry – and even himself. 

“The boy is probably younger than Larry. He’s a kid who made a terrible decision,” he said. “And I think partly because George is in the process of also making a series of terrible decisions, he’s able to have a little empathy with that young man.”

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Featured image credit: HBO