I loved recapping this episode. I feel like it was really funny, but also I cried so many times?! I’m not a big cryer but wow. There were some moments. I was alternately laughing and crying.
Last episode left us on a cliffhanger: is Dani’s dad sick, or is he a criminal? He’s a criminal. No surprise there. He’s shady and has gobs of money. Dani’s dad is being arrested and pulled into a cop car. All he says to Dani is, “Everything is fine. Call my lawyer.” The cops won’t tell Dani what’s going on, but we hear a cop tell Dani’s dad he’s being arrested for criminal conspiracy and fraud.
Maribel and Micah are together, because they’re always together! Because they’re in loveeeeee. Micah asks Maribel if she wants to hang out later, but she can’t because she has a date?! And worse, she has a date with a man child?! Ugh, can’t Maribel see that Micah is in loveeee with her?? He took her to ride a pony! And now she’s just going to run around dating man children?
Also, what is up with straight women: “I hate him and he literally disgusts me. We’re going on a date later tonight.” Uhm, why? I’m not an expert on dating but I’m pretty sure you’re supposed to actually like the person you’re dating.
Maribel asks Micah if he wants to come on the date so she can set him up with Harry, a boring lawyer with a bangin’ bod. At this, Micah makes a face like he just coughed up a furball. And then he says, Sure, Maribel, I’ll come on your date with Manchild and Harry The Boring Lawyer with a Bangin’ Bod. Simpin’, Micah. Stop simpin!
Back at Micah’s house, Finley is notably not hungover, but rather, glistening with health after going on an early morning run and “kickin’ the ball around”. This is big news because that means that Finley is…gasp…a sports gay? I thought the Adidas fits were just an aesthetic.
Also, she volunteered to referee at the community center! Oh! Where Nat’s kids play soccer! Ah! So I guess we’ll be seeing even more of Nat, hopefully accompanied by her new throngs of lovers. I want another throuple! I want another throuple!
Sophie is very anxious about her segment pitch for Alice, and Finley recommends pitching Alice her own ideas, which is very solid career advice. Sophie ogles Finley as she sorts through eggo waffles and dairy smoothies AKA ice cream in the freezer and then invites Finley for dinner. Would Finley like to go for dinner? Would she ever! Finley’s like, 7? We’re going to dinner at 7? 🙂 🙂 🙂
Alice and Shane are at Bette’s after Alice spent the night at Bette’s watching sad soldier Youtube videos and crying and then took a vitamin D supplement to soothe the pain. Because Alice’s longtime lover agreed to a sexual relationship with a married woman named Marissa that she talked to for like five minutes at a wedding and now their relationship is toast and Alice is very sad. Boo, Nat! Whatever. Alice can do better.
And now Alice has to kick her mom out of her house (what?) and Shane is all like, I can talk to Lenore for you if you like 😉 HAHAHA
Shane notices that Bette is dressed like a million bucks and Bette says it’s just for work, but Shane isn’t fooled! Takes a player to know a player! Bette is up to something spicy, mark my words!
Micah asks Sophie to check in on Dani because her phone is off and her car is gone. Also, Dani’s dad called Micah from prison earlier and I was like whoa why?!?! But he was just asking Micah to check in on Dani because the lawyers couldn’t get ahold of her.
Angie is hanging out with her stepsister at the park and her stepsister talks about her dad a little bit. It turns out he’s nice, and encouraging, and talented at music, and also a lot like Angie! Okay, I can kind of see why Tina and Bette didn’t want her to learn about her donor now. That’s actually kind of scary. What if they get along amazing? I wonder how I would feel as a parent. Also, Angie’s step sister says there’s something Angie needs to know about her donor.
Tess is going to Vegas but no worries, she’ll be back for the night shift. Shane says, Vegas? My middle name is Vegas! How are you going to go to Vegas without Shane Vegas McCutcheon? Tess is going to Vegas to see her sick mom and she doesn’t want Shane to assemble the projector without her because this is Tess’s bar now and Shane can’t be trusted to do things, period.
** SURPRISE! ANNE ARCHER IS BACK FROM THE OG PLAYING ALICE’S MOM!!!! **
Alice arrives at her house to find that her mom replaced her alarm system with a cackling halloween doormat from the dollar store and a firearm. Genius runs in the family. Lenore lives in an LA house rent free and has been filling her time by participating in a pyramid scheme. Maybe Alice got the smarts from her dad.
Shane has a point, Lenore is kinda fine.
Angie decides to confide in Shane about her daddy issues. Excellent choice. Shane wrote the book on daddy issues. Her dad is a real class A jerk who ruined her life by abandoning her and then showed up to RUIN HER LIFE again by psyching her out before her wedding to Carmen de la Pica Morales, aka the most perfect human woman to ever exist. In this scene we get a GUT-WRENCHING reveal from Shane, who refers to her altar skipping as the worst mistake of her life. The Worst Mistake of Her Life. Wow!!! I feel so healed by this revelation!
And Angie wants advice from Shane about whether or not she should meet her donor. Because her donor is dying. 🙁
Wait, that’s so sad! Of course she should meet him! Not because he’s her dad or their relationship is important or whatever, but because this is her last chance! If she doesn’t meet him she’s always going to wonder what it would have been like!
But what if he doesn’t want to meet her and he’s, like, mad at her for breaking the confidentiality agreement or whatever? I mean, he has his own kids and Angie’s not his kid. He just did a thing in a cup to help some lesbians out. Oof! This is stressful!
Back to the Carmen thing, I think a lot of fans think this means they’re going to bring Carmen back. That would be great, but I don’t think so. People were upset about Sarah Shahi being cast as a Mexican American when she’s Persian and Spanish. It’s totally understandable, but I also wonder why this is different from other casting decisions. Carlos Leal, who plays Dani’s dad, is supposed to be Chilean. But Carlos Leal is Swiss and Spanish. I was confused about his accent so I looked it up. He was born in Switzerland. Maybe it’s less of a big deal to people since he’s not a main character?
Sophie pops up at a sexy ivy-wrapped castle in the woods, where Dani is locked up and avoiding the would-be interactions with lawyers and law enforcement now that her dad is in prison. Uhh, you better get out of there, Dani! If you wanna keep the castle, you gotta protect the king!
Dani yells at Sophie for not giving her space, now or ever, and Sophie yells back. Thank God.
Finley bought a new pink blazer and has requested Micah’s assistance with picking farmer’s market flowers to match, because today is not like other days. Today is the day Finley is going to curb side sushi with Sophie at 7pm! Micah tells Finley to stop making a big deal out of dinner and to give Sophie time. Finley tells Micah that the woman at Men’s Warehouse thought she was a 14 year old boy. Haha! A universal lesbian experience.
Sophie asks Dani if she can come inside to piss, but instead they have SMEXXX. Oh yeah. I knew this was coming. Dani’s grinding on top of Sophie all slow and sexy and then Sophie’s like, Wait! We can’t do this! At first I thought Sophie was going to say that she and Dani can’t do smex which would be very mature and farsighted of her. But no, she just shoves Dani over and then rolls over and starts fucking Dani. We can’t do what, Sophie? We can’t do…Dani on top? I feel that. Gotta switch it up.
Angie decides she needs a therapist. Specifically, right now. Specifically, a queer therapist. Specifically, Micah. So she shows up at Micah’s office and requests therapy. Damn, I wish finding a therapist was that easy.
Bette drives to Topaka? Topanga? To meet her #1 crush, Pippa Pascal. Pippa is a hermit who lives in a cabin in the woods, so unsurprisingly, she slams the door in Bette’s face. Unfortunately, that’s Bette’s #1 kink. Hours go by. Day turns into night. Peppa cracks open the barn door. Surprise! Bette is still there. Peppa’s like, get lost, stalker. But Bette has a speech planned. Bette is Peppa’s #1 fan. She drove all around the country to see Peppa’s shows. She had posters of Peppa’s face in her dorm room. The password on all her social media accounts is P3ppaPascal4Life.
If I was Peppa, my takeaway from this convo would be that I need a new zip code, stat. But Peppa’s like, come on in. Peppa’s art barn is mad cool. Bette’s probably trying not to sob cry. Then she asks Peppa for dinner, because if there’s one thing Bette has, it’s the audacity.
Sophie cancels dinner with Finley, but she does it the wrong way, cuz see, if you’re going to cancel dinner with someone, you’re supposed to do it BEFORE said dinner was set to occur. I know lesbian sex lasts 7 hours, but come on Sophie! A text would have been nice! Finley hands a giant stack of sushi to a homeless guy and walks away with her flowers unbitterly because she’s too pure for this world.
Angie asks Bette if she can go to therapy, but surprise, she already did. Which is a good thing, because Bette’s response is you can always talk to me. No, Bette! Angie can not always talk to you! You’re kind of rude sometimes! Angie wants to go to therapy with her two moms and Carrie. Wow, she’s the greatest. Such a bright kid.
Tom wants to dig deeper on the Dana chapter of Alice’s book and Alice’s speech about how much she misses Dana makes me cry ACTUAL TEARS. Maybe Tom is a good editor after all? Still, he better not become a main character. Straight men don’t need any screen time. That’s not what we’re here for.
Micah comes out to Maribel as Not Gay. Did he ever come out as gay on the show? I don’t think so. A man dates a man and everyone assumes he’s gay. Hello, bi people exist.
Maribel offers to maybe find Micah a woman to date. Uhmm. Awkward!
Bette Porter and Pippa Pascal are at dinner enjoying red wine and SEXUAL TENSION.
Bette didn’t mention this was a business dinner until after they ate, so Pippa’s a little salty. Pippa doesn’t want to work with Bette’s racist boss. She thinks Bette’s a sellout. Bette says she needs Zakarian’s resources. Pippa says Bette is beautiful. Then Bette says Pippa is the most beautiful woman she’s ever seen.
Ugh!!!! It’s achingly intense. I ship them, fuck it. I love Gigi but Bette worships this woman. We love to see it.
Bette grabs Pippa’s hand twice and then Pippa says…wait for it…don’t touch me like this unless you’re coming home with me. Goodnight.
I live for this scene and the surreal combination of sexual desire and hatred/spite that Pippa communicates. Is Pippa going to hate-fuck Bette? I’m here for it, I am.
Bette’s super horny from her hours of lustful eye contact with the woman she’s essentially stalked for decades, so she’s off to have aggressive sex with Gigi. I appreciate the realistic depiction of ring removal, but is that a wedding ring on Bette’s finger? EW, BETTE. WHY?
Tess gets home from her Vegas trip to find Shane on her lawn with a romantic projector screen/ La Croix / lawn chair setup. I’m very confused by simp Shane, but okay, I support it.
Shane tries to kiss Tess but then Tess says she’s seeing someone. Then she says her sponsor says it’s too soon. Which is it, Tess? I’m guessing that neither of these are true.
Dani and Sophie are still in bed, talking about their old fantasy of Sophie being the sugar baby housewife of the relationship.
Sophie says she’s not sure if she wants that anymore and she likes her job now. Dani brings up an old documentary idea that Sophie had about lesbian history– eep! Love that. I hope that becomes Sophie’s inspiration for the segment. Dani finds out that Sophie was on the phone with Finley earlier, and she freaks out on Sophie. On an unrelated note, Dani looks better in high-waisted underwear than any person ever should.
Micah accidentally spills the tea to Finley that Sophie was in Ohai with Dani all day, and Finley freaks out and runs out of the house. Poor Finley. She ends up at the liquor store, which is a bummer, because I think she was trying to stay sober.
Sophie and Dani have what seems like a really nice closure conversation. Dani aptly comments, I think we dodged a bullet.
They talk about how hard things were and how it’s not hard anymore. Then Dani says, maybe you should stay. NOOOO, Dani!!! How is that the takeaway?!
Now we’re left on this cliffhanger of whether or not Dani and Sophie are going to get back together. I definitely didn’t think this would even be on the table.
If they do get back together, I’m guessing that they’re going to try for a different relationship dynamic. After breaking up, they found a way to start actually communicating. And Sophie is asserting herself and her opinions a lot more. That’s good! But…why couldn’t they do that when they were together? And what’s different now?
Until next time…
