In a hurry? Read the recaplet for a nutshell description! Finished? Click here to close.
Savi greets the day in her backyard, making April and Karen feel good about their choices for once as she explains about how she told her husband everything about her one-night stand and baby drama, except for the paternity test she stole his razor for. April barely has a chance to crow about finally boning Hot Richard in her place of business before Joss shows up and makes everything weird, because if Savi doesn't have her perfection to hold over Joss's trainwreck head, then the whole system falls apart.
Over at the restaurant, that hostess from the pilot is circling like a vulture, but Savi doesn't let it get her down: She even manages to lie to Dominic about the baby definitely being Harry's, which once again brings up the secret problem we're not talking about yet. Somewhere in there Savi has convinced herself that Harry's doing the hostess, which we all already thought anyway, but he shuts her down on that count, pissy as he deserves to be even after she decides that part of her work/life balance involves cutting back on her hours, which is exactly the kind of thing he would have enjoyed bitching about six weeks ago.
In the end the hostess makes her move and Harry turns her down very delightfully, while at work Dominic couldn't be a nicer fella about the whole way everything is turning out, and tries to be supportive of Savi's career even though she has always treated it like the Jon Snow her husband brought back from the war. On the marriage front, however, Harry is still pretty wigged, so things are not entirely back to perfect for Savi's perfect life.
At work, Joss and Olivier continue to play "who's the big dog in the office," with wacky results like she fills his closet up with bananas, because that is Joss's idea of what happens in a professional office. Back home, Joss finally figures out Savi's whole storyline, and comes at her with both barrels in a way that Savi, and I would think the viewer, ends up respecting. Firstly because sisters share things, and separately because Savannah's reasoning -- that Joss doesn't care about marriage and would just make fun of her -- is more a sign of Savi's assholeness than Joss's.
Karen takes it easy this week, with only a break-in at the office and computer hacking, and then a stalker note from obviously Sam Grey, to deal with. Karen spends, I've noticed, a lot of time being paranoid about things that are obviously not a problem, while pretending that absolutely terrible things like how she is going to lose her license and go to jail and take Elizabeth Grey -- who has wisely skipped town altogether -- down with her, those are not so important. Oh, and I left out of the recap last week how she overlooked her Hilary Clinton-party speech to forge those notes like the Widow Grey asked, which she seemed to think was being grown-ass but was in fact just one more stupid thing in Karen's entire life of doing outrageously stupid things.
Miranda's newest way of dicking April around is to blackmail her in the middle of a date with Hot Richard, which is straight up demonic in my opinion. She gets some zingers in, but mostly it's down to Hot Richard to save her rapidly devolving ability to deal with life -- "your vortex is my vortex," he says, just like a man who knows he's fuckin' doomed -- which I'm sure won't end up making him resent the shit out of her or anything like that once it all goes to hell.
Eventually, though, she's nickel-and-dimed by oddly algorithmic expenses everywhere ($100 for this, $100 for that) into, once Lucy needs $100 for something, she decides to sell part of her store back to the original investor and just pay Miranda off once and for all. Which would seem to have been Miranda's plan all along, because obviously this huge con is all about getting Paul's life insurance money out of April so Miranda can run off with probably Paul.
Anyway, a fast-moving trip this week, mostly focused on settling the accounts in the Davis house after way too long letting that stuff simmer. The two bombs -- Harry and Joss -- that have been lingering in the background finally went off, resulting in some star-powered performances and honestly very layered portraits of all three housemates. Plus, you know, it clears the decks for the round of Karen Kim insanity, which is a very exciting place to be headed.
Week: Joss moves in with April, desperate to find a way to make Savi's problems all about her again, while Harry and Dominic have a fight! Karen's bad decisions continue to pool out and affect everyone in her life, now including that investigator dude she shouldn't even be looking at, much less spending time with. And April tries to move on from her dead husband, like she's been doing for three years -- though hopefully with Joss's special kind of sunshine moving in, she'll actually make some headway this time.
Want more? The full recap starts right below!PREVIOUSLY
Karen is now fabricating medical notes about her boyfriend who she let his wife euthanize, just to make absolutely sure all of her lying testimony contradicts itself. April finally got her boots knocked after three years, thank God, although something tells me her luck isn't going to last with Hot Dad/Richard. Joss is laboring under this horrible new boss who expects her to do things such as work for her paycheck and dress like a grown-up lady rather than a baby prostitute, so that's going great. Oh, and Savannah walked into her bedroom and told her husband that she was pregnant, maybe even with his baby if they're lucky. That part was rad.
DAVIS BACKYARD
Karen: "So hold up. By 'everything' you mean..."
Savi: "Do you really not understand what that word means?"
Karen: "I'm Karen Kim. Maybe I don't, maybe I just want to hear this whole shit again and bask in not being the most fucked-up person we know."
Savi: "Okay, I told him I cheated on him, with Dominic, and I'm pregnant, but I don't know who the father is."
Ladies: "And then what?"
Savi: "And then he went to work. Have you not seen this show before? That is how literally every conversation in this household ends."
Ladies: "And so the paternity test, has he thrown an odd fit about that? Because there's no reason he would, honestly, but we're all acting like it's shocking."
Savi: "Well, I lied to him about it just in case, and stole his razor."
April: "Eat these donuts!"
Joss: "I don't know about any of this, please don't tell me."
April: "Okay, let's tell Joss her favorite subject. I had sex! On a bed in my store that costs $699 plus tax."
Karen: "Thank you for including that detail! It really made the story come alive for me."
Joss: "I love talking about sex! It reminds me of sex."
April: "Oh shit we all have jobs."
Joss takes the only jelly doughnut, which causes Savi to smack the box in a wonderful, spastic way, and they head out. Karen and Savannah stick around, because they can't remember if they have jobs or not because the answer is: Kind of.
REAL ESTATE/PORN OFC
The entire office is watching people across the way have sex because apparently they're filming a porno across the street from Olivier's office. They all stare and salivate through the blinds, like when the sex man used to drink the Diet Coke.
Mona: "Do you think they know we're watching them?"
Joss: "Well, the guy just waved at me. Between thrusts. I think they're okay with us watching, due to how that is what pornography is all about. That, and good parenting."
Mona: "That is a strange and discomfiting move."
Joss: "That is called the Siberian Husky."
Olivier comes into his office, looking more like sex than the actual porn as usual.
Joss: "Sorry, we were just using your office for a circle jerk."
Olivier: "Américains!"
Joss: "Oh, who doesn't like to sully up a work environment with a lot of crass nonsense?"
Olivier: "You are le nauseating. Get out of here and take horrible Mona with you."
Joss: "Mona! God!"
DAVIS UPSTAIRS
Karen: "I love not having a job with you and hanging around in your bedroom, in the middle of the day, like people do. But this thing where you're ignoring me and looking at old pictures, that part is boring."
Savi: "I'm just self-flagellating. Look, pictures of us the day we met Harry in horrible Australia."
Karen: "Remember bikinis? Now we're so old and gross-looking on this TV show."
Savi: "I know, let's pretend to be sad because that's so true. God I am fat."
Karen: "Were I health professional, I might suggest doing something other than looking at pictures of your husband you cheated on. Like literally anything."
Savi: "Good thing you aren't, then."
Karen: "Back to me. So, have you seen Elizabeth Grey lately?"
Savi: "Yeah, I'm her 'point person,' at the law firm where I don't ever go to work."
Karen: "Because I think her lawyer -- you -- might be getting a call from her insurance company today. You know, about that massive fraud I just keep making more and more fraudulent."
Savi: "Is it going to affect my billable hours? No? Then fuck it."
MAISON
Richard: "...Are you really still selling this bed?"
April: "OH MY GOD ARE YOU A GHOST?"
Richard: "No, I'm literally the only other person in the store."
April: "Sorry, I was just so into antiquing this table or whatever. This store is so full of crap it confuses the eye."
Richard: "Well so hey there. If possible, I am maybe even cuter than last week."
April: "For the record, I changed the sheets..."
Richard: "-- At the minimum I would have expected that."
April: "And took off a hundred bucks! Out of guilt. And also I whipped myself with a leather cord for over thirty minutes while saying Hail Marys. Also same reason."
Richard: "Do you have plans tonight?"
April: "Yeah, I'm giving Invisible Lucy some Benadryl and then knockin' over a whole box of Cab."
Richard: "What if instead I took you to a neat place I know on the edge of LA called Fingerbang Point? It's where the teens go."
April: "Is that on the way to Pound Town? Wait, I have to get my ass extorted by Miranda Dickens or whatever her dumb name is. Miranda Doolittle."
Richard: "We can do it after. I already got us a babysitter. I move a little fast."
April: "That's okay, I am incapable of making even simple decisions so that works out nicely."
SAVANNAH'S KITCHEN
Savi: "So wait, you're just chopping carrots? Did you sleep here at this restaurant?"
Harry: "Yeah, it never cheated on me."
Savi: "So um, you should probably live at your house. I can sleep on a couch, if you..."
Harry: "I have several conflicting stories about what's going on right now going on right now, so."
That hostess who never remembers Savannah appears, with her tits pushed up so high you can barely see her face, and rudely interrupts and then continues to rudely interrupt. The only thing that really sells it is Savannah being high-handed, then off-put, then suspicious, then destroyed: All Tits does is stare blankly like a farm animal. The conflicting stories about what's going on right now -- is it a crazy lunch or a crazy dinner or a crazy huge birthday party he forgot or is tonight a table d'hôte or what, because they keep saying it's all of those -- and finally Savannah just says fuck it once again.
KIM & LERNER, ASSOC
When Karen arrives at work, it's to Lila the Incompetent Assistant getting weird on the cops and Dr. Jacob standing around being sexy and everybody looking confused and worried.
Lila: "I'm always here at 8:55 and I'm never late and I have six cats and one of them has feline AIDS so I always have to..."
Dr. Jacob: "Oh, thank God Karen's here. She always knows what's going on. Or wait, she never knows what's going on. Why am I just standing here?"
Cops: "Karen Kim, there was a break-in last night. Insofar as somebody stole a key-card and then used it to get into the building, which somehow alerted the alarm company, who sat on it until just now, hours after the incident, where nothing was taken."
Karen: "This is terrifying!"
Cops: "Actually ma'am this is the least break-inny break-in we've seen in fifty combined years on the force. We're just here as a technicality."
Karen: "Great. Lila, get that gun out of your mouth."
Lily: "Zhe copsh are here to zshee you, Doctor Kim."
Karen: "Do they have an appointment? And why is my computer turned on?"
Cops: "Maybe they looked at your computer files? That's something that could have happened to justify this scene."
Karen: "Please stop asking about my patient files. They have privacy, you know."
Cops: "Yeah I was literally just spitballing... I guess we're gonna get outta here?"
Lila: "Me too. This whole non-event has me all fucked up."
Dr. Jacob: "Karen, why do you look like you're under investigation for fraud and may be going to jail and losing your license? It's probably nothing. Probably just one of those break-ins where they have a quick look around and then they're on their way."
Karen: "Probably."
Dr. Jacob: "Unless you dragged some incriminating evidence into your Recycle Bin and they thought to click on that icon. But what are the odds of that?"
Karen: "The odds. Indeed."
MAISON
April: "Here's a check for $100, bitch. Deal with that."
Miranda: "What? What am I supposed to do with a check for $100?"
April, amazing: "Take it back to Florida and fucking cash it."
Oh my God, I love April Malloy so much. She is on a whole other level from the rest of them. She says she'll send another one whenever she goddamn feels like it, and sends Miranda on her way. You know Miranda's not gonna let it go, but really, does it matter? That bitch is already maxed-out thirsty, she's not going chill regardless of what you do, so you might as well dick her around 'til she tires out. If she had any gumption or elbow grease to speak of, she wouldn't be running these weird scams or fucking married dudes for cash.
SAVANNAH'S ACTUAL KITCHEN
Savi just sits around the house literally all day in no bra, waiting for Harry to come home, and he never comes home because she totally made sure that he would not. This is like Reagan installing a dictator and then being surprised when people's heads get start getting cut off.
"Dear Harry, if you have any petty resentments or spleen you'd like to vent, here's a simple way to ruin my shit for the whole week. I bet making me miserable will make you feel a lot better, so make sure and do that. Are you going to be acting like a grownup? Check one: Yes / No / No Response of Any Kind."
"Dear Harry, sorry I made you feel so powerless! Here's all the power, at your weakest and understandably shittiest point. Hope you use it responsibly! Just kidding, now we are both guaranteed to be fucking miserable. I will just sit around in this kitchen hating myself all day until you feel like letting me off the hook, which I sure hope is never."
"Dear Harry, I hope you brought your A-game of stored up anger and imaginary arguments and all the ways you can win them and all the ways you can tell me off and make me feel shitty because I am going to be sitting at home all day, all alone, doing the same fucking thing. Love, A Lady With A Knife Sitting In Your Kitchen In The Dark."
REAL ESTATE
Everybody is standing around when Joss comes back to base at the end of the day, because Olivier is punishing them. Not even her incredibly great outfit cheers them up.
Joss: "Did they cancel Pretty Little Liars? Why the sad faces?"
Workers: "First of all, shut your fucking mouth. And second of all, it's that darn You Know Who."
Joss: "It's just Olivier, not Voldemort. Jesus, Mona. I'll handle this."
Olivier: "You have that horrible I'll Handle This face on your face."
Joss: "I am handling it. Don't punish everybody just because I have a disorder. I sent out a mass email and picture attachment of the sex. And they know from experience I wouldn't have shut up about it anyway."
Olivier: "Yeah, I'm just gonna go ahead and do my work if that's okay."
Joss: "Why are you so angry at me?"
Olivier: "I'm not. I don't care about you. None of this is about you."
Joss: "I literally cannot hear you when you say that. Let's get it all out on the table!"
Olivier: "There's nothing to get out on the table. Go do this one thing."
Joss: "Work? I don't work, I'm too good at this job to do any work. You are wasting my talents."
Olivier: "You have none. Just please go do this and look up 'employee' in the dictionary while you're at it."
Joss: "Okay, but first I'm going to throw shit around your office because I am a nightmare."
LAW OFFICE
Dominic: "Another partner is leaving or retiring or dying, which is very exciting. And I have heard that -- fucking somehow -- you and I are at the top of the short list."
Savi: "Is that really why you came in here? To share watercooler gossip with me?"
Dominic: "No, it's also to say that your hair looks ratchet in this scene. And also I am in love with you, for reasons that are less and less apparent."
Savi: "You know what, fine. I'm not not into you. But I'm pregnant. And it's Harry's. And our doomed marriage that neither of us care about is just the priority right now. For neither of us."
Dominic: "Oh, that changes things. I mean before, you were just married and not interested and we work together and you ruined both of our careers -- apparently not permanently -- and you've been a bitch to me more since this show started than we actually knew each other before this show started. But hey, another man's baby? Now you're talking my sexist bullshit language."
Savi: "On the one hand, it worked. On the other hand, what an embarrassing lie this might turn out to be."
REAL ESTATE
Mona: "Why are you Googling Olivier? So you can fuck him, I bet."
Joss: "Yes, so I can fuck him. At least in his mind. I can't manipulate him until I understand him. (Also, I am obviously going to fuck him.)"
Mona: "You don't actually have to manipulate every situation. You could try being authentic and..."
Joss: "-- I have to do things my way, Mona. I'm not a stupid ugly bitch like you, Mona. I have borderline personality disorder, Mona."
Mona: "Why are you being so intense about this?"
Joss: "Used to be I would just put on a quote 'nice outfit,' steal some of Savi's jewelry, turn on the charm, boom. Done. Now he's taking money out of my pocket, Mona. He's thwarting me!"
Mona: "Google says he eats bananas because of potassium. Do you think his chest is hairy? What does Google say about his body hair?"
Joss: "-- God. Just shut the fuck up, Mona."
Joss pushes Mona's face into a garbage can and takes Mona's stupid lunch out of the work fridge and smears it all over Mona's ass and then pushes her into a duck pond and then lights her on fire. Joss will not be thwarted. Not today.
LUNCH W/ KAREN
Karen: "Wait, so you bothered Harry at work and then told Dominic you're pregnant? With Harry's baby?"
Savi: "Yeah, it seemed like the best call in the moment."
Karen: "Do you listen to literally anything I tell you?"
Savi: "Fuck no, why would I do that? I'm not even mad at Dominic anymore for no reason. Now I'm mad at Harry for no reason."
Karen: "Savi, Jacob already explained this in a recap. It's not fair for you to expect Harry to just catch up to your point in the story when he's hearing all of this shit for the first time. How self-absorbed can you get? He needs time."
Savi: "What the fuck is up with my hair today. Oh, and I think he's sleeping with his hostess. What a bitch."
Karen: "What makes you think that?"
Savi: "Nothing. She has breasts, that's about it. That's all I'm working with. I would love the shit out of it if it were true, though."
Karen: "Do you even know your husband at all? That's not who he is. He's not the asshole who would cheat for revenge. That's you, but that's not him."
This is the point where Savannah starts gnawing on a lobster, with these amazingly cute rabies faces, and Karen realizes Savi's totally on the brink.
Karen: "Huh. There was a break-in at my office. Undetectable, possibly imaginary."
Savi: "Yeah, and Elizabeth Grey may have skipped town too."
Karen: "How weird would it be if those things were related? Assuming either of them ever happened at all. We really have no way of knowing."
UPSTAIRS
Joss is digging so deep into Savannah's jewelry fort -- an entire bureau just full of jewels, covered in jewelry boxes that are full of jewelry -- that she penetrates time and space and ends up reaching all the way back, Portal-style, Narnia-style, to the bookshelf on the other end of the room, where she finds an inscribed copy of What To Expect and gets really excited. Why?
Because Savi's finally pregnant after months of trying? Because having a project to focus on as a team might give their marriage a new nucleus to work on other issues? No, because she'll be an aunt. Come on. As if Savannah's birth canal is anything other than a subject-delivery system for Joss's experiments in pretending to be a grownup for minutes at a time.
APRIL
Ding-dong!
April: "Guess who's ready to get fffffffajitas why are our kids here?"
Richard: "Babysitters, man. I guess Pound Town can wait."
April: "Can it? Can it, Hot Richard? Well, my meeting with Miranda was..."
Richard: "I don't want to talk about that, I'm exhausted of that. Here's your dumb daughter, let's hook up tomorrow while the kids are at school."
SAVANNAH'S KITCHEN
Savi: "I'm back! To be ignored more. Listen, can I talk and talk at you?"
Harry: "I guess."
Savi: "I have an idea. You know how women in the workplace is like, so solved, and women are paid commensurate with their male equals, and feminism is basically over with because we don't need it anymore?"
Harry: "I'm aware."
Savi: "So I was thinking, who cares about partner track? I'll just go work at another law firm where I have no status or seniority or tenure, and that way they won't give me as many hours, and then I can spend them with you!"
Harry: "How so?"
Savi: "Oh, did I not mention it's at an imaginary law firm where the hours are the same as for a busy LA night spot?"
At this point Harry just straight busts down crying because he hates her so much.
Savi: "...I... sense that I am losing. So uh, way to fuck your hostess."
Harry: "One major difference between you and me is that I know what a coworker is."
Savi: "But one thing we have in common is that I am apparently an ungodly amount of asshole today. It really would have made things easier if you were fucking the hostess. You know what, I'm just going to keep pretending you're fucking the hostess."
KAREN
"Hi, Elizabeth. It's Karen Kim. Again. I did what you asked me to do so we could both move on with our lives, and now you're not returning any of my phone calls. Is this because you have moved on with your life? I am not clear on that concept."
RANDOM STORE
April: "Joss, why are you playing with baby clothes and why are you dressed like a disco asshole?"
Joss: "Hey, did you know that Savi is pregnant? It's a big secret! That's why I told you."
April: "Oh, shit."
Joss: "Do like this shirt I found? It says WORLD'S SLUTTIEST AUNT."
April: "Saw that one coming."
Joss: "Hey, let's converse about my brother-in-law's semen."
April: "That whore knows you're pregnant."
Savi: "Okay just don't tell her I'm pregnant."
April: "Gotcha."
Savi: "This is not something I can deal with right now."
April: "You have said that in this episode about literally everything you are dealing with. If you're not dealing with any of the things you're dealing with, what are you dealing with?"
GREY HOUSE
Maid: "Mrs. Grey isn't here. She has left the country and is not coming back. Do you want to leave a message for when that never happens?"
Karen: "No, I got the 'message' just fine. I'm batting a thousand as usual. Do you know where any other members of the family might be? I need to cause more problems."
HOT RICHARD
April: "Just getting my keys together. Oh, and I forgot to put on shoes apparently."
Richard: "No problem."
April: "You know that picnics are for white people, correct? And surprises, also."
Richard: "Fine. We're going to a Dodgers game, in a private box, and I made sandwiches."
April: "Oooh, a private box?"
Richard: "Yeah because I'm a sports lawyer? So it's not that big a deal?"
Suddenly, Miranda: "You know what is a big deal? My ten pounds of bullshit."
LAW FIRM
Dominic: "Did you really go looking for a junior associate position at some other firm?"
Savi: "I can't deal with this right now."
Dominic: "Savannah, you've worked here for ten years. What the fuck? You are gonna get fired."
Savi: "I have been working on getting fired since minute one. You know that."
Dominic: "Still, I fail to see your reasoning."
Savi: "Working here makes me feel like I'm cheating on my husband. Mostly because I tend to cheat on my husband, on the rare occasions I even show up."
MIRANDA!
Miranda: "You know how you're only giving me some money, instead of all your money?"
April: "I'm aware."
Miranda: "What I would prefer is, if you give me all your money."
April: "That doesn't really work for me."
Miranda: "Is that because you're an asshole?"
April: "No, it's because what are you even talking about? Get out of here with this."
Miranda: "You act like this nice, sweet person, like you're some kind of saint who's trying her best to help poor me, but it's all fake."
April: "It is not all fake. My husband died. Your not-husband didn't*."
Miranda: "Oh, the nobility. Because I'm just some whore that got knocked up, I'm less than you."
April: "Honey, yeah. I mean, say it however you want, but yeah."
Miranda: "You say you're struggling, but your kind of struggling is not the same as my kind of struggling."
April: "That's true. Also true though, is close your legs to married men. Get the fuck out, I'm late for Pound Town."
Way to take your perfectly valid point and make it seem like something the Devil would say, Miranda. God. What a jerk. I was willing to see your point despite my love of April Malloy, but somehow you turned it around into acting like an asshole. I can't even see how you did it exactly, I just know that I wouldn't be giving you a damn thing at this point.
*(Also, if Paul is not dead, this whole thing is hilarious. If Miranda is so committed to this role that she's gonna go lie down in the driveway and wait for April to run her over, then she wins all the awards for awesome because that is some serious character work. That is like some Sydney Bristow shit.)
JOSS'S BUSYWORK
I am still not clear on it. I think the Italian couple who owns this house is unsure about selling the property, and for some reason that's not enough for Olivier, so now Joss is there to railroad the couple into letting her sell the house (or maybe just sell it without telling them?). The lady -- who like all ladies likes to put on a pantsuit and chill by the pool all day, just staring into space -- is impressed by Joss's ability to speak Italian, but even more so by her inability to comprehend boundaries, and before you know it homegirl's snapping photos of the backyard and calling the husband pussywhipped, and the lady just finds all of this darling.
SAVANNAH'S KITCHEN
Long story short, Tits is all over Harry about giving him blowjobs, and Harry is not interested, and then she invites him over to be her live-in sexy boss, and Harry is not interested, and then Tits just lets out one long low Audrina Patridge mooooo and goes off to confirm some more reservations or whatever her job is.
APRIL
April: "God, that bitch is the worst. I hate her and her stupid biracial baby. Let's go to a Dodgers game!"
Richard: "No, I am not in the mood for that anymore."
April: "Are you dumping me? Because of my horrible vortex of a life?"
Richard: "Counter to everything that I have said in the past, I have been sucked into the vortex and now your vortex is my vortex and you're allowed to go on and on about it."
She does. It is amazing because April is amazing.
"The worst part is, that bitch is right! I don't want to give her money. I don't to give her anything, other than a cunt-punting. Fuck her. She ruined my marriage retroactively, she keeps showing up places, she was a ghost for a while..."
Richard: "So maybe just say fuck her. Send her away empty-handed."
April: "Right? But that seems like a dick move, somehow. God, I love my life. Cute daughter, shop crammed full of shit, more throw pillows than you can shake a stick at, I got a hot boyfriend..."
Richard: "You consider me one of your blessings?"
April: "Yeah, it sounds kinda gay when I say it like that, but yeah."
Richard: "I like it. I am perfect, so it fits."
OLIVIER
Joss: "Wait, so we still don't have the listing? That chick was all over me."
Olivier: "I mean it's cool that you made a new MILF friend, but the file clearly says no pictures and the lady told you no pictures, and then you took pictures."
Joss: "Stop judging my job performance based on results! Stop underestimating me by accurately estimating me!"
Olivier: "Seriously though, you are the worst. You pissed off the husband. And the thing is, I know you. I knew you would fuck this up. I only gave it to you so you would leave. This is on me, really. This and all your other mistakes."
Joss: "You have no idea who I am."
Olivier: "Actually I have an uncannily accurate picture of who and what you are. You are the person who thinks her way is the only way, and that everyone else needs to see that as well. So you use your charm, worldliness, and sexual dysfunction to get what you want. In life, the rules do not apply to Josslyn Carver. That is what you are."
Joss: "To be fair, my way is the best way. So your points are all invalid. I win."
Olivier: "Oh my God."
APRIL
Lucy: "Much like everything else in this episode for some reason, the quote 'hip-hop dance class after school that everyone's taking' costs exactly $100."
April: "Sure, fine. I'm going to save a lot of money by ignoring the shit out of Miranda."
Lucy: "Yay! You're a good mom! But maybe a terrible person."
April: "It's not fair that my daughter should take dance classes while Scottie Nickleby roams the streets getting ringworm and eating leftover fast food that he has to grab from the mouths of wild dogs. I should sell my hair and teeth and shop and house and just live on the side of the road, and that way Miranda will be wrong about me and I can go back to being smug."
LERNER/KIM
Karen: "Dr. Jacob, can I talk to you for a second?"
Dr. Jacob: "Sure, about what?"
Karen: "Literally nothing."
Dr. Jacob: "Wait, what?"
Karen: "Remember how that person broke into the office and got on my computer? I think it's because they wanted to see something on my computer."
Dr. Jacob: "Deductively I think you're onto something?"
Karen: "But I can't tell you want it is, or why. So bye!"
Dr. Jacob: "You just called me in here to say that you're sure you're endangering my practice, and that you're going to keep doing it, and I should stop asking questions about that? The opposite of a conversation, that's what you were looking for?"
Karen: "In a nutshell."
Dr. Jacob: "I have put up with so much of your bullshit, Karen. I mean seriously. The way you conduct yourself, frankly it's appalling. But now I feel like you're doing it aggressively. Like it's not even about you constantly going down in flames anymore, it's like you're going down in flames at me."
SAVANNAH'S ACTUAL KITCHEN
Savi: "Hey I just snuck in through the backyard so you wouldn't have time to run."
Harry: "Believe it or not, I'm off to work."
Savi: "Just wait for one second while I explain how thoroughly I am fucking up at work. I mean I put more time and effort into fucking up at work than I ever did into getting pregnant. And why? Mostly to make you feel bad. But I may have a new job."
Harry: "I don't give a shit what you do. All the jobs, none of the jobs. Not up to me."
Miranda: "I have no response to that except total spooky-eyes."
KAREN
Karen: "Sometimes I like to spend the day and long into the night prancing around my home office in a kimono, enjoying tea."
Burglar: "Sometimes I like to stalk and kill you."
Under the tea there's a picture of Karen looking amazing, and on the back Sam has written, "I am going to wear your skin over my body like a costume and your beautiful hair will go over my scalp like a wig. Love, Sam." Karen stares at the picture like she's never seen a photograph before, not even, like, fazed by the fact that a person is fully running around her house in the middle of the night. First of all, How Very Karen. But secondly, if Sam Grey was in my house? Stalking me and being all sexy? I would not let some creepy photograph deter me from locating him. One thump or bump in the night and it's straight to yelling "Marco!" The heat would be on.
CARVER GIRLS
They literally haven't shared more than two sentences since like the pilot, so you knew it was going to be heavy. And it is fuckin' heavy! I mean, Savannah has just completely erased any of her legs to stand on, and Joss is all about herself so that's going to be pretty awful from that direction too, but you also kind of get the feel that it will be remarkable, and it is.
Savi: "Okay so in the spirit of disclosure, April told me you know I'm pregnant."
Joss: "That's actually two shitty things in one. Does everybody know? Because then that's at least five shitty things."
Savi: "Also, I cheated on Harry and have no idea who the father is. And we might get a divorce."
Joss: "...Speaking as the biggest trainwreck in American history, I'm impressed."
Joss: "I am going to need you to tell me why I don't know any of this."
Savi: "I mean, if you must know it's because I knew what you were gonna say. You'd let me off the hook, give me some slutty philosophical bullshit about monogamy, and tell me I was fine."
Joss: "For the record, that's not entirely accurate. Although you're correct that I wouldn't judge you, considering I'm not into that and also because I'm your sister and I love you."
Savi: "Still. I am just so perfect and hard on myself and..."
Ugh. The worst. The worst! I can't stand people who say that like it's a humblebrag. Listen, anybody tells you who they are, just assume the opposite is true. Our reputation comes from our behavior, not our propaganda. Anybody who tells you they work too hard, or they're perfectionists, or whatever sneaky pride thing -- that they are honest or a good friend or a good listener or they just tell it like it is, whatever the thing is they need you to believe -- what they're really saying is that they wish they were that way, but they are not yet that way. Because if they really were, they wouldn't need to say it because you'd already know.
And then the other side of it, which is that consistency is the cornerstone of character and if you're not pretty much the same person all the time, then actual authenticity is asking a lot, maybe too much. I know not everybody is the same, but I think there are certain simple things that are just true about each of us as individuals, and hewing close to those things -- whatever they are, for you -- is a good way to keep yourself honest without having to sell it to everybody all the time.
But it's like, those "What Would You Do" scenarios, on TV or in card games: What? Why is that fun? What does that even mean? How can you not know What You Would Do? And then I watch this show and I wonder how many of us are just in a constant state of having no idea What We Would Do in a given circumstance -- because (to me) I would think the resolution is admitting that you already don't always do What You Would Do, which admission is a quick step to cutting that shit out and acting in accordance with your authentic self, but I guess it depends on whatever compromises you've already made or are used to making.
Like, nothing Savannah has done or is currently doing makes a ton of sense, but as an avalanche of getting further and further away from what makes her strong and what makes her happy -- going back to before the baby stuff even started, maybe -- it does make a ton more sense (that it makes no sense). April too: If she has just spent three years wondering who the hell she is without Paul and thus What Would April Do, I can see having to retrace so many of your steps to get back there, and it makes me sad. Karen, Christ even knows what she is ever doing but I guess she's still in a grief tailspin and before that love threw her off doing the normal Karen things she Would Do. And Joss is such a bullshitty performance so much of the time it almost seems like What Joss Would Do is actually, like, The Opposite Of What Joss Does.
(I think about it a lot because I do tend to humblebrag about my simplicity or authenticity or whatever the applicable word is, even if most of the time it's less about coming off as super rad and more about reminding the person I'm talking to that I choose my words carefully and don't often mean to say more (or less) than I'm saying because I put a very high premium on just these kinds of consistency of character. We get so used to reading between the lines and filling in blanks -- especially smart people do this when you talk to them -- that some conversations feel like they're just 90 percent reminders that there's nothing between the lines, so stop filling in blanks that aren't there. But whenever I hear myself say the actual words, like, "I am [whatever the thing is]," the sound of that grosses me out. You have to immediately ask, Is that still true? Am I selling something right now? Is this a fair generalization about my character?)
Which is the only reason I bring it up at all because if you don't keep your eye on those I ♥ Huckabees questions like that, you will slippity-slide down into knowing zero about what you are actually about, and then you end up just like these bitches, with their gorgeous clothes and fancy houses and exciting romances. Where were we.
Savi: "I didn't want you to be easy on me because I'm soooo soooo hard on myself..."
Joss: "Actually, fuck that. You didn't tell me because you want me to think I'm the fuckup and you're perfect, or else the whole system falls apart."
Savi: "How are you making this about you? Are you a wizard?"
Joss: "This time it's not, though, this time it's about both of us paying the price for it. You're a saint, I'm a screwup. You're setting a good example, which makes you an objectively better person because you have to stay at that standard. I get other, lesser benefits. But this time, you were so perfect that you ruined absolutely everything, and you hurt my feelings in the process."
(There is a neat thing where the line from earlier with Mona comes back, where Joss was like, "Mona, I'm not like you for about a billion reasons," and now it's back in play with the Carver sisters. Whose outfits are almost the same color, but just far enough apart to clash.)
Joss: "You were scared I'd think we were the same?"
Savi: "Fuck that, I'm nothing like you."
Joss: "Wow. Okay, well maybe Olivier is right and you are right and I don't take other people enough into consideration because I'm sloppy with my boundaries. But you're wrong for thinking that's a plus sign for you, for your side. Because my sloppiness with boundaries is the exact reason I could never in my life do what you just did to me."
Wow. Well done, Joss. Valid points, all, and expressed more eloquently than anything Savannah's had to say all week. I thought it was weird when Harry won, but this one was even better because she did bring herself into it: The think that makes you awesome is the thing that makes you suck, always, and in this case she showed where the virtue of her bullshit really lies. She's great with people and charming not because she's a sociopath but because she's an empathy-- she's the opposite. She blends into people without even knowing it. And frankly that's exactly what Savi could use, because right now she is just fucking it all right up.
Although I will say that Savannah's dedication to full disclosure -- and the ongoing white-hot fire she's setting to every bridge and safe space she can locate -- is also pretty admirable. I didn't think she'd keep it up this long, and certainly not once it started getting close to Joss. Color me impressed (and of course also appalled).
WEEK
Sam's back, Paul's ghost is back, Dominic figures out Savi may be lying, there is a fistfight, and Joss moves out of the pool house. I am so glad this turned into one of those shows where things happen, because the people are great and the things are great and April told Miranda she could go cash her $100 check in motherfucking Florida, and that was truly beautiful.
JACOB CLIFTON is a freelance writer and critic based in Austin, Texas. He currently recaps The Killing, Pretty Little Liars, Ray Donovan, Mistresses, True Blood, and Defiance for TWoP. Jacob can be found online at jacobclifton.com, Twitter, and Facebook, as well as a regular column for Tor.com, Geek Love.