Wow. Take out the usual fag jokes and racist asides, and you have probably the best episode I've seen since this assignment started. People that act like actual people! Renee convincingly becoming slightly human! Bree getting actual good advice from her pastor! Gabi finding her child satisfactory! Susan being... Not so bad! I hope they continue to use real people writers in future, instead of those nasty old gay robots that usually write this show.
So you've got Gabrielle in a face-off with the Gays over their children's extracurriculars: Their Jenny is learning the violin, whereas Juanita is still on the armpit-music stage of the comedy career that will eventually deliver her from her mother and into the loving arms of drug addiction. Realizing moments before the Big Show that Juanita can't tap-dance for shit, Gabi sabotages her... Only to realize, thanks to the Magical Fags, that parenting consists of actually encouraging your child and permitting mistakes and generally acting like a person. So at the last second she sits everybody back down, "finds" Juanita's shoes, and experiences actual joy, finally, at the total awesomeness of Juanita. It's lovely.
Lynette's Empty Nest issues in the wake of the Twins' exit leaves Renee feeling a child-sized hole in her heart, so before she can adopt a kid ("Preferably a boy, in brown") all willy-nilly, Lynette saddles her with Paige for the night. A few Scavo-type humiliations later, Renee has learned her lesson. But again, Lynette shows compassion for once and inducts Renee officially into her family.
Susan learns she is going to die in about five minutes, but instead of making this everybody else's problem like you might assume, she very gracefully and poignantly resolves to A) Fight fight fight and B) Live every day &c. This involves taking Mike to the woods for an early anniversary celebration, which is of course interrupted by the usual Susan mishaps: Lost picnic baskets, Civil War re-enactors, dead alternators, etc. She accepts all of this with a good humor and only a little guilt-tripping of Mike, who is a champ as usual.
Back home, though, Susan's deformed kidney is causing all kinds of trouble. After some beautiful counsel from her pastor, Bree realizes that she should stop crying over spilt tadpoles and actually give back. She organizes a streetwide donor-testing center and fools everybody into getting tested. In the end, there are only two matches: Bree herself, and Beth Young
See, Beth got tested on her own after being spectacularly dressed down by both Paul and her mother*, both of whom firmly block her from their lives forever, leaving her on her own with no friends, no family, and no clue how to live like a normal person. All she knows is that she is worthless and couldn't even manage to coerce a murder confession out of the man she loves, who now hates her -- so why not donate a kidney and make something of herself?
*(It is devastating. Her mommy, Harriet Sansom Harris, didn't win all those Tony and Drama Desk awards for nothing.)
But no, Bree tracks Beth down at the Sadness Motel and cockblocks her with this whole gross thing about how maybe Beth wants to be of use -- but she couldn't possibly know the pain of having dated a gardener for a couple months and then losing him to his mulatto bastard -- so could she please step off and let Bree do this one thing, specifically so God will stop punishing her. Not Bree's finest hour, but at least she half-gets it at this point.
Beth agrees, but then heads directly to the hospital with her signed donation paperwork, stands in the middle of the ER... And blows her own fucking head off.
Well done, Beth. Well done, show. Let's stay this good when we come back month, yeah?
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Previously, Susan wasn't feeling well. But with her Gollum arms and needy eyeballs, she did still cling to life. Eyes bugging out in a similar fashion, Beth realized she was a sister-wife on the lam with no mail-order husband and no chance but to return to the Juniper Creek she'd abandoned, only to find it burnt to the ground. Gabi had yet another life-changing experience that failed to change her life in any way, and Lynette saw every thought and experience of those around her as Teachable chances to enact just a little bit of her seething rage on a world that never gave quite as strongly as it took. They were all desperately terrible, just despicable people. Just like you and me.
...Or so the smug asshole ghost we call Mary Alice would have you believe. In the first of her usual hellish indictments on us as a society, MAVO would like to call your attention, Andy Rooney-style, to just what the fuck is going on with parents these days.
"Each parent has their own style: There's the Disciplinarian, the Smotherer, and the Negotiator. But the one thing they all have in common is: They love to judge the parents door."
Just despicable people, all around us. Nasty neighbors and fucked-up friends. Oh my God, Mary Alice, shit is not that bad. But try explaining goodness to somebody like this show and you'll get a blank look, because we don't see things as they are, we see them as we are, and what we learn from that little bit of Nin is that this show is created entirely from the worst and most hateful thoughts of the worst and most hateful people currently working in entertainment.
On a completely unrelated note: Still in the top three of Republicans' favorite shows.
So Gabrielle walks her fat daughters through town -- in their matching tie-dyed peace-sign T-shirts, note -- just clucking her tongue and shaking her head and being generally insufferable toward all these different parenting types Mary Alice has identified. But, see, once she gets to Chez Gay Fags, she's just got to say something. She has got to take all that judginess and voice it at the nearest person, like the small-town Catholic nuns she left behind.
(Standard homophobic throat-clearing about whatever gay stuff that makes no sense in 2011.)
Gabi: "Stop making your daughter practice the violin!"
Gay: "Get out of my yard!"
Gabi: "Gay men cannot raise children without my help!"
Gay: "Your children are a federal disaster area!"
(To her credit, Gabrielle is also horrified by this. Perhaps if Juanita had specified "undocumented" Mexican, she would have laughed, because this show is crazy racist, but as it is: No.)
Bree has Rev. Sykes over, and for once he does not condone her ass-awful behavior, noting straight-up that she only cooks him desserts when she's trying to buy her way back into God's good graces.
Sykes: "I have before me a hazelnut chocolate chip scone with currants. Leading me to ask, multiple times, whether you've finally killed someone."
Bree: "No. But you're remarkably on the money as far as my self-serving version of faith. See, lately I feel like Job."
Sykes: "I know you cannot be talking about the Biblical Job."
Bree: "Indeed I am. I was living with a 37-year-old boy man in sin, and he left me for Florida after I put him through about ten different kinds of screwball misogynist hell. Also, abusing and shaming my children for years has left them feeling kinda 'meh' on the subject of me. And finally, I lost my business."
(This either had to do with Krazy Katherine, Awful Orson, or some new and horrible thing she did to Andrew, I can't remember anymore. Sam Page may have been involved, or a fire, or maybe this happened during the Five Year Jump. I do not actually care. Also, I miss Andrew very bad.)
Sykes: "Okay, allowing for your all-consuming solipsism, I can understand how you mean you are Job. But how about this: Stop fucking whining."
Bree: "Not sure I follow."
Sykes: "You are not Susan Delfino."
Bree: "Thank Jesus."
Sykes: "So pull it together and man up."
(Still not getting it.)
Sykes: "Okay. My dad, who I freaking hated, taught me exactly one thing. When the going gets tough, the tough give back."
Bree: "You mean like condescending to the less fortunate so they know who's boss?"
Sykes: "Sort of, but no."
Bree: "You mean, like, God will reward me for doing things for other people?"
Sykes: "Absolutely not."
Bree: "That is a grand idea you have given me. I'll just buy some Jesus by doing shit for people!"
Sykes: "You know what, fine. Fuck it."
Meanwhile, Renee and Lynette -- who are apparently friends, not that they ever hang out together -- have braved the toxic landscape of the Twins' room, because the Twins are off dressing alike and riding a Daisy-Daisy bike and generally being the totally wrong idea about twins.
Renee: "Your children are gone, but this stink remains, of semen and ass-sweat and feet."
Lynette: "The most wonderful smell in the world: Teenage boy."
Renee: "Seriously I'm going to barf. This is why pedophilia is an unworkable concept."
Lynette: "Your womb is shards of glass and Chanel No. 5. You'll never understand what it is to be Woman In Full Flower."
Renee: "So I should shit out 50 kids with the worst man I can locate, like you did?"
Lynette: "DON'T QUESTION MY CHOICES. MADE-UP FEMINISM."
(Mike finally accompanies Susan to the Kidney Wing of Fairview General, where the only thing they care about is Susan's fucking deformed kidney and her six hours of dialysis three times a week. In these environs Mike sticks out like a sore thumb, because he can barely stand her as it is.)
Doctor: "Your shit's all fucked up and retarded."
Susan: "I blame you."
Doctor: "If you want to do anything in your life to be proud of, I suggest you start now. You really don't want to answer to St. Peter at this point, given how you're so far worthless, and frankly pretty gross."
Susan: "You mean like fucking in the woods?"
Doctor: "...Yes, you half-wit."
Mike: "Wait, what?"
Susan: "I blame you."
(Susan proudly takes the thrilling news of impending death to her friends, who have nothing to do in the middle of the day but listen about the six hours of dialysis three times a week.)
Susan: "So basically, now's my chance to get all the attention in the entire universe."
Gabrielle: "You look puffy."
Lynette: "At least you had children, unlike poor, shitty, barren Renee. You can die happy."
Renee: "I still haven't gotten anything out of this. I thought it was going to be like having a friend with cancer, but hilarious."
Susan: "All eyes on me, please."
Bree: "Are you there, God? It's me, your worst nightmare. I am prepared to make Susan's deformed kidney my problem, which makes it your problem."
God: "If any of you think I give a damn about Susan Delfino, let's review the tape."
(Bree travels far and wide, or at least up and down the block, looking for donors for Susan's kidney. Nobody cares or even wants to discuss it. This is because Susan is a horror, but Mary Alice would have you believe it's because we're all secretly sick inside.)
Renee: "I went to the adoption agency to my manicurist."
Lynette: "I was kind of hoping you'd drop this."
Renee: "Nope. I want a Boy, in Brown."
Lynette: "Nobody could be as good a mother as I am; therefore, nobody should try."
Renee: "The Gays get to! And they're every bit as cartoonishly self-centered as I am."
Lynette: "I sense a Teachable Moment, by which I mean humiliation for you. Instead of explaining anything, I'm going to sabotage your life until you cry out in pain, thus vindicating me."
Renee: "Sounds like a plan."
Lynette: "It is the only plan I ever have."
Renee: "And yet I don't see it coming, this one time."
(Renee agrees to babysit the baby. Lynette imagines burning her house down with Renee and Paige inside it. She'll finally be proven so fucking right about things that they'll probably make a statue of her, being right.)
Susan and Mike have decided to celebrate their anniversary early, in case her skellington body is an actual skellington come July. To be fair, it's a pretty sweet idea: A picnic, out in the forest where Julie made that gorgeous wedding for them, i.e., the last time anybody cared about Susan and Mike. Of course, Susan leaves the picnic basket on the roof of the car, because she is worthless, and within seconds there's caviar and pâte smeared all over the road, just like Carlos's mom.
Carlos: "Why are you pushing Juanita to tap dance?"
Gabi: "I want her to have a myocardial infarction."
Carlos: "Is this about competing with the Gays?"
Gabi: "Don't be silly. This is absolutely unlike every other storyline where needlessly I meddle in their affairs and end up learning something from them, like fabulous Magical Negroes."
(Mike and Susan... It's too stupid to even deal with.)
Gay: "[Gay stuff.]"
Bree: "Thanks everybody for coming to this brunch! Now the bad news is that I am locking you in my house until you submit to organ-donation testing. The good news is that this proves I am a good person, and not a sociopath with no regard for others."
Gay: "[Gay things.]"
Wisteria Lane: "We hate you four bitches. We always have. You make our hatred of all women make sense. You are a microcosm of reasons for lazy people to hate women, as if we weren't already going to. This show is bad for America."
Gay: "[Gay comments.]"
Liza With A Z -- whom we're now calling Jenny? -- does her violin solo to close out the now Juanita-less talent show, and biffs it. Gabi responds, of course, by hooting and making fun of her, until the Better Gay One explains that parenting is about how they're still proud of her anyway. Stupid Gabi has an epiphany and makes everybody sit down and watch Juanita flail around for a while; while it's sweet for what it is, don't be fooled into thinking we'll remember this moment or emotional growth week.
(Mike and Susan's car won't start. It is fucking riveting.)
There are two matches for Susan's kidney, and guess who they are? Well, I can't tell you because of HIPAA, but this medical professional sure can! It's Bree and it's Beth. One, an alcoholic headcase who, like her friends, thinks only in terms of emotional blackmail. The other, pretty much a useless storehouse of body parts and organs with no human or life skills. Guess which one's going to shove her way to the front of the line and thus finally prove, as loudly as possible, that she is as good a person as Bono and Sting?
(Lynette and Tom go to a restaurant and wait for Renee to call and say that she has killed their baby. They hear a baby crying and instead of being sympathetic, like fucking normal people would, they talk angry shit about people with babies. Turns out it is their baby, of course, because Renee took their baby on a date. Lynette steals the baby and Renee runs around on a wild rampage looking for the baby; finally, they point and laugh at her and make sure she understands how fucking worthless she is. It is all quite droll.)
Beth: (Sitting in the saddest motel room, getting up the courage to blow her own head off.)
Bree: "Knock-knock! I just came by to tell you that you're a match for Susan's kidney, but you don't get to complete this one act that would give your life meaning."
Beth: "Okay, but all I've ever wanted to do was give. I was an unappreciated daughter of a mental case, and then the unappreciated wife of a fairly demanding crazy person. Just once, I would like to know that the excess of love and compassion in my heart actually had some kind of positive benefit for the world outside myself. I am the very illustration of the charity you're trying so hard to warp into your sickness."
Bree: "Once an addict, always an addict, basically."
Beth: "Cool. Have fun donating your kidney. I'm going to eat poison."
Bree: "If we were friends, or I were capable of noticing other people, your depressed affect and general desire to get cut up on for the sake of somebody who hates you might give me pause. But I don't think you understand: I have a date with Jesus now. He is going to be my boyfriend. My kidney boyfriend. And even though usually I am the cause of my problems -- usually by acting exactly like I'm acting right now, in fact -- nothing bad will ever happen to me again! Thanks, Kidney Jesus!"
Beth: "Well. That sounds nice for you."
Bree: "And that's what matters. Thanks for understanding!"
Renee: (Brings Lynette an apology gift, despite having done nothing wrong.)
Lynette: (Shits all over it; reiterates that Renee is incapable of fostering life or anything other than whoredom and disaster.)
Renee: "My understanding is that people have children to fill a void in their own lives."
Lynette: "Nope, just selfish assholes like me."
Renee: "Wow, so kind of exactly like the Bree thing this week. How can one show get so many things wrong, all at the same time?"
Lynette: "Yeah, kids are just another way of making yourself feel better."
Renee: "I don't think that sounds right."
Lynette: "That's okay, you'll find some other way to be happy. I mean, you'll never be as happy as I am, because your life as a woman is meaningless without children and fucking Tom Scavo, but you can try."
Renee: "Why are we friends?"
Lynette: (Condescendingly invites her to dinner; holds Renee's hand throughout like she has a deformed kidney, only instead of her kidney, it is her sick sad everything. She is Woman In Full Bloom.)
(Mike yells at Susan for having her stupid deformed kidney, but somehow keeps from smacking her; Susan makes Mike feel guilty about his own undeformed kidneys and then promises to carpe her diems or whatever, it's super-stupid.)
Susan, verbatim: "Hey. Lean on me. I'm a lot stronger than you think."
(One thousand years of vomit.)
"Our lives are brief," Mary Alice says, and she should know. "That's why it's important to search for meaning. We find it in our daughter's smile, in the warmth of our friends, or the comfort of our faith."
Everybody: (Does none of these things.)
Beth shows up at the ER with her kidney papers all signed and dated, and since that's not like even a tenth of how the procedure actually works, the lady keeps telling her to get the fuck out of the ER and go to the Susan's Kidney Wing, and Beth is so spooky and friendly and fragile that the lady finally takes her paperwork gingerly and then what happens -- because the ER is full of such stable people in the most relaxing situation of their lives -- is, Beth blows her goddamn head clean off.
God: "Meh. Intention was good, execution was a swing and a miss. But compared to the rest of those assholes she's doing okay."
Susan: "I can already feel myself getting ungrateful about this."
Bree: "Oh, why didn't I think of that? Maybe Lynette can arrange another riot and somebody else can get their kidneys kicked out."
Lynette: "I'm hoping it's one of my kids. That'll teach 'em."
The End.
Watch the episode below, discuss it in our forums, then see last season's most outlandish moments!
What are people saying about your favorite shows and stars right now? Find out with Join the conversation now!