S-Town · Serial Productions

Chapter III

March 28, 2017·53 min·4 clips

Faye Gamble describes being on the phone as John B. McLemore mixed and drank potassium cyanide in real time.

Chapter III begins in the immediate aftermath of John B. McLemore's suicide, with Brian Reed receiving a call from Skyler Goodson while sitting stunned in his studio. Reed searches his inbox and finds John's last email, sent Father's Day evening — a graph of Russian gold reserves — followed by a string of messages including a lengthy 'Collapse List' of environmental statistics that Reed had replied to calling 'fascinating,' not recognizing it as a distress signal. John had spoken openly about suicide to Reed and others, always matter-of-factly, as if describing retirement plans. Tyler Goodson describes the days leading up to John's death, including a falling-out over a careless remark John made in front of Tyler's young daughter, followed by a tearful phone reconciliation in which both men told each other they loved each other. On what became John's last day, Tyler and John spent Father's Day fishing at the Cahaba River, with John sipping a pint of Wild Turkey, growing nostalgic about dead friends and family, and telling Tyler it was the most important day of his life. They spray-painted their names on a bridge. That evening, after Tyler dropped John off drunk at home, John sent increasingly desperate texts begging Tyler to return and threatening suicide. Tyler's girlfriend persuaded him not to go, and he went to sleep. The next morning Tyler arrived to find police tape and John's glasses, twisted and bloodied, on the porch where he died. Distant cousins from Florida arrived almost immediately, more interested in accessing the locked house than in visiting John's elderly mother Mary Grace at the hospital. Tyler, acting on Mary Grace's explicit instructions, refused to let them in, but the cousins used their legal status as next of kin to take control of her care, blocking Tyler from bringing her home. At John's graveside funeral at Green Pond Presbyterian Church, roughly 40 people gathered, with mourners repeatedly using the words 'so smart' and 'genius.' A preacher named Brother Ben delivered a generic service that barely mentioned John and was entirely Christian, despite John being a fervent atheist who once cited Ezekiel 23:20 as his favorite Bible verse as a joke. Mary Grace wept openly. After the service, the female cousin intervened to separate Tyler from Mary Grace as he said goodbye. Reed visits John's lawyer, the memorably named Boozer Downs, who confirms John died without a will despite years of discussion about making one. Boozer hints cryptically that John had converted his assets into some hidden form and had told him where, but won't say more. John had described himself as 'unbanked,' keeping money outside traditional financial institutions, making his estate effectively a treasure hunt. Woodstock town clerk Faye Gamble, introduced by Boozer, delivers the episode's most devastating testimony: John called her at 9:15 the night he died, told her not to call police or he would shoot them, gave her instructions for euthanizing his dogs, and then described in real time mixing potassium cyanide and drinking it. She heard him scream in pain, heard the screen door, then silence and barking dogs. She says she replays it every night. After the funeral, Tyler gathers with the Goodson family at his grandmother's house, excluded from the official luncheon, and reflects on being judged by his appearance while having quietly cared for John and his mother for years. The episode closes with Reed noting that Tyler will eventually be the one to make John's tombstone, because no one else will.

As heard by us

A hospital bedside becomes the story's sharpest battlefield.

Chapter III narrows S-Town into a tense, deeply human fight over care and control. Mary Grace, Tyler, and the cousins stay at the center, and the hospital bedside turns from concern into a sharper argument about who gets to speak for her, where she should live, and what should…

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Why you'd press play

A hospital bedside turns family loyalty, legal authority, and money worries into one tense standoff.

Read the full recommendation in PlayNext →

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