By Potes
We open the episode with Rayna and Deacon in post-coital bliss, but alas! It is all a dream! And Rayna sure feels guilty for dreaming it when Teddy wakes her up with a cup of coffee. When she learns from Tandy that Teddy is way down in the polls, she's also guilty enough to offer to sing at his fundraiser. This is before she learns that it's being held at the country club frequented by all the former high school classmates who made fun of her for liking country music and whom she emphatically says are not "her people," even though everyone else says that they are. One of these is a lady named Peggy. Rayna thinks that Peggy has a crush on Teddy, and some shady eye contact at the fundraiser and a clandestine meeting in a car suggest that something nefarious is going on between them. And though the suggestion is that they're having an affair, I think this actually probably has to do with all the boring, evil, bad financial dealings.
Meanwhile, Deacon somewhat reluctantly agrees to play with Rayna and the rest of the band at the fundraiser, then gets into it with both Lamar and Teddy before they go onstage. And then while they're singing their opening number about changing ground, Teddy and Deacon engage in some sort of complicated dynamic that happens entirely in emasculating stares. Deacon seems to come out ahead, since Teddy leaves the room when they finish the song. This of course leads to yet another inscrutable conversation between Rayna and Deacon. Eventually they both cry a little, and when he asks if they're done, she says they're done. And I think she means DONE. At home, when Teddy says he can't deal with it anymore, Rayna tells him that she's firing Deacon. Noooooooooooo! How are they ever going to go on their intimate sexytimes tour? Plus, true love! Thwarted! In more positive news, I think Connie Britton is becoming a better singer. Hooray!
So, this is all light drama compared to what's going on with Juliette. The video of her shoplifting has of course gone viral and she's been disinvited from presenting at the CMAs and is the butt of every late night joke. She laughs it off, saying that all publicity is good publicity. But her manager, Glenn, and her publicist, McKenna, disagree. They finally convince her to do an interview with Good Morning America, and though they provide her with a script to set the record straight in a way that won't hurt the Juliette Barnes brand, she goes rogue. Juliette first tries to convince Robin Roberts that she just put the nail polish in her purse so it wouldn't slip through the holes in the basket, then says that jealous people are just trying to bring her down. But you can't fool Robin Roberts, who then starts asking Juliette about her mom's arrest. Juliette freaks and walks out on the interview, and then everything goes all to hell. With sponsors pulling out, her tour is off for now and Glenn wants to dump her. Finally humbled, she asks him not to and promises to do everything that he tells her to. In return, he wants to know why she stole the nail polish. The answer is that it was tastier and more nutritious than eating MethMom's pink macaroni dinner. Eventually, Juliette calls Deacon, who is sucked in by her genuine sadness and vulnerability.
Meanwhile, Gunnar and Scarlett land a publishing deal, which is no surprise. Avery is less than excited by this, which is also no surprise. What IS a surprise of the pleasant variety is Gunnar's burgeoning romance with Hailey, an assistant at the publisher. She's a hot hottie who loves yogurt, and so makes the ideal mate. While they have sex and yogurt jokes, Avery is a total dick to Scarlett. Again. Still. She wants him to support her like she supports him, and he says that he's trying. Maybe if he washed his hair once in a while he would be more magnanimous?