Episode Report Card Jacob Clifton: A+ | Grade It Now! YOU GRADE IT Caring About Nobody Today
By Jacob Clifton | Season 3 | Episode 4 | Aired on 04.18.2011
In a hurry? Read the recaplet for a nutshell description! Finished? Click here to close.Jokes! Wisecracks! Funny script! I like this new tone, I really do. So after your obligatory, but still fairly awesome Nurse Jackie takedown (waitress-abusing businessman), we learn that O'Hara has been named Head of Emergency in the wake of her recent job search. Of course, she couldn't care less, but once Coop gets wind of this and freaks out, the women decide to use it against him, turning him into an even more caffeinated Chihuahua than usual.
Also bopping about like a meth-head: Zoey Barcow, who has purchased a pedometer and will be doing her first double-shift and will be enjoying both these things at 100% intensity. Akalitus is moving ahead with the Fat Kid Initiative, so there are some laughs to be had there.
Jackie gets a momentary scare during a family barbecue to celebrate Eddie's "new" job at All Saints: She thinks for a second that Kevin has left her, but it turns out his dumb sister sent him to an Al-Anon meeting, and so as usual the stakes go back to zero almost immediately.
Patientwise, there's a neat guy patient that all the nurses really love, but we don't really get to know him that well; there is also a young father-to-be that is losing his mind until Jackie pumps him full of Valium and the smell of a baby head.
Want more? The full recap starts right below!While a pretty good -- especially for this show -- Elbow song plays, Nurse Jackie does her usual drug-seeking, drug-hiding, drug-addict thing around the house; then she goes to lunch with Eleanor. They catch up on how things have been in the short interval since Jackie chased her best friend out of the house with a meat cleaver for suggesting she might have a drug problem, then threatened her with stalking if she didn't get back in line.
Jackie: "Yeah, so Grace is good, and of course Fiona is having a ball at her new school you thought you were paying for. Oh, and we've got Kevin's random sister sleeping on the couch or in various beds. She's not at all as annoying as you might think, but there's still no reason for her to be in this show. My total paranoia has me thinking that Kevin brought her in to keep an eye on me, but that's fine because she's a total trainwreck anyway."
Eleanor: "Well, since you broke my heart and I went looking for other jobs, Mrs. Akalitus got real scared and offered me a meaningless title that only Fitch Cooper would care about."
Jackie: "That'll be fun to watch. So yeah, so great! Hopefully that will help me manipulate you into staying for sure?"
Eleanor, verbatim: "I don't do empty titles. My uncle was an Earl, it ruined him."
Jackie: "I don't believe you answered my question."
Eleanor: "...No, I'm no longer looking for other employment."
Jackie: "I love how I get away with everything all the time. It's a really satisfying narrative, not at all repetitive or empty for the viewer."
Eleanor: "Just, next time you're having a drug-related freakout, could you point the gun at somebody else? I'm happy overlooking your unsatisfactory behavior as long as it only hurts your children and other loved ones."
Jackie: "Can do, good buddy! I don't really care about them either."
White Anglo-Saxon Member Of The Patriarchy: (Oppresses.)
Jackie: (Humiliates.)
The Universe: (Heaps praise on her.)
Repeat: ad infinitum.
Nurse Zoey is acting like a meth-head, having been given her first double shift. She is both good at her job, and squirmy/wonderful to be around, as usual, but at twice the volume and carrying a pedometer that talks more than she does.
Akalitus: "How do you guys like this picture of sad fat kids I stole from the train? I had them made so that the First Lady will think I'm fighting childhood obesity, first through vandalism and later through means as yet undetermined."
Zoey, verbatim: "All of those kids are fat. That one looks really sad. Oh no, I'm sad! That ad is good."
Akalitus: (Bugs everybody to give her money for fat kids, and then doubles down on the annoying by bugging Eleanor and calling her "Chief" over and over.)
Meanwhile, Sam has nothing better to do than needle Coop about the Chief thing with Eleanor, which he does in either a faux-comforting way or an actually admiring way, depending on if this show even cares anymore or ever really did. Coop hobbles off to start some shit about this once he actually tunes in to what Sam is saying; he's got a limp because of a -- SPOILER -- bunion, which he thinks is a b-ball injury from shooting the hoops.
Jackie and Eddie kid around about how they fooled her stupid husband into thinking that he just got a job at All Saints, and then Jackie learns that she is hosting a barbecue at her house in honor of this, and that Eddie will be motorcycling her home after work.
Eddie: "He gets me a job, he's making me a steak? You better hope that guy never leaves you."
Jackie: "Yeah, he's a keeper. You were so right when you said that things would get way less totally fucked up and weird once we fake-got you the job here where you work."
Eddie: "Whattaya gonna do?"
Jackie: "Horrible things with zero accountability, I wager."
Akalitus, yelling at a nun on the phone: "What I want and expect is your full support and a list of potential donors, and if I don't get that, there will be a bunch of obese children standing outside your door every day until I get what I need. Listen, Sister, you married God. I married this job!"
Coop: "I'm throwing my hat in the ring, look out."
Since the Chief thing is a meaningless shot in the dark anyway, she has no idea what he is talking about, but after a second realizes she can use this to squeeze out the very lifeblood of his sexy, idiotic frame: