In a hurry? Read the recaplet for a nutshell description! Finished? Click here to close.
Maggie finally goes to Africa! And, in less than 24 hours, she kills a kid. Not just any kid, mind you – the kid she forged an incredible bond with who is shot in the back while she carries him to the escape bus as the Ugandan orphanage she gets stuck at overnight is raided by bandits. Apparently, it's not such a good idea to stand up in the back of a truck with your expensive video-camera for all to see and then later try to rob you of, Gary Cooper. Oops! And after all that, Maggie and Gary Cooper are sent back to America immediately, safe in the knowledge that their "reporting" somehow made everything worse.
Marcia Gay Harden is back to hear Maggie's story because Maggie is a crucial witness and they're worried that Africa made her mentally unstable. Maggie insists that she is fine and only cut off all her hair and dyed it red because the dead kid liked her long, blonde hair. Anyway, that is why Maggie shouldn't be allowed out of the ACN building let alone the country.
Operation Genoa hits a roadblock when the only person left with a lead is – coincidence!! -- known only to OWS Shelly. But, oops! She's not in the mood to help the ACN crew out after a particularly brutal interview/inquisition from Will on NewsNight. She punches Neal in the stomach for it, because everyone on this show is very violent, and demands an on-air apology from Will before she'll help. Instead, Will tells her that her movement is troubled and her appearance on his show was terrible but he really shouldn't have enjoyed tearing her down as much as he did.
Life off the campaign bus ends up being worse than life on it, as Jim, Hallie, and Stillman have to get their own car and their own hotel rooms and their own press releases. When Jim hears Hallie's boss abusing her on the phone for not having the access to the Romney campaign she once did, he makes it up to her by getting her a thirty-minute interview with Romney. When MacKenzie finds out that he gave the exclusive away to a competitor, she's pissed. When Hallie finds out, she's also pissed, but then they hook up. And Jim goes back to New York.
Want more? The full recap starts right below!Marcia Gay Harden is back! And she's providing context: she's there to represent AWM in a wrongful termination lawsuit. I think we can all guess who was terminated. Jerry Dantana, after he screwed up Operation Genoa.
Hey, you know what would have been kind of cool? If the show had used one of its regular cast members instead of having a guy we've never heard of be the bad guy. It's as if everyone in the opening credits is a saint incapable of journalistic errors. Please. Also, Dantana appears to be the only person terminated out of this whole thing. I'm dying to find out how MacKenzie and Will escaped punishment.
Marcia Gay Harden is interviewing Maggie, unfortunately. Also, this is future past Maggie, which means she has short red hair. She insists that "the general" did not say "it happened." Marcia Gay Harden knows what she's dealing with here, so she asks Maggie a very difficult question that she's sure Maggie will have to think hard about before she answers: what is her name? Marcia Gay Harden has Maggie all figured out, I think.
Also, it turns out that Maggie lives on East 75th Street. No wonder she can't afford rent! Just live in Washington Heights or Harlem, Maggie. It's much cheaper and you won't have to live with someone who hates you, probably. Marcia Gay Harden asks Maggie about real estate and mentions some expensive place on the market that she thinks will go for as low as $14.5 million. "I looked at the same place but I needed a bigger ballroom," Maggie deadpans. Hmm. Could it be that I LIKE New Maggie?
Marcia Gay Harden cuts right back to business, asking Maggie if she did, in fact, interview a general with Dantana on March 22. Then Marcia Gay Harden goes off on Dutch people and how she doesn't like them. "I'm Dutch," Maggie says. "Well then fuck you!" says Marcia Gay Harden. None of this makes much sense but I love it. Marcia explains that she's trying to see if Maggie "laughs anymore." Yeah.
Maybe the best time to test that isn't sitting across the table from someone with your team of high-priced lawyers and saying "fuck you." But Marcia insists that she makes her underling lawyers laugh all the time, so she must be funny. She says Maggie can look her up to see how funny she is. Maggie says she did, in fact, do just that and saw that Marcia handles first amendment cases, not wrongful terminations.
Maggie says she wants to, once and for all, "abeautiate" the idea that she's messed up. She proves that by making up the word "abeautiate." "I am funny, too," Maggie says. Oh, it's a funny-off! Dr. Dr. Sloan wins. Maggie insists that she's not messed up because she saw "a dead guy" and she doesn't appreciate that her state of mind is being called into question. Marcia agrees, but says they'll have to talk about "Africa" now. Well, good. We can finally find out what happened to make Maggie so not messed up.
Marcia says they'll have to get into it because Dantana said Maggie was a flawed witness due to being on SSRIs when she interviewed the general with him. LOL. Isn't, like, most of America on SSRIs at this point? Especially journalists. Our profession is so depressing, it just makes sense. That's not enough to call someone's mental state into question. Yet Marcia is sure that Dantana's lawyers will try to break Maggie and make her cry while she talks about Africa, and that would somehow be enough to convince a jury that she's crazy. So Marcia's going to try to do it first.
Maggie begins: "Gary Cooper and I flew to Uganda." More making fun of Gary Cooper's name. "I laugh every time I read that!" Marcia says. "I can't wait to meet him." Hooray! That seems to indicate that Gary Cooper is not, in fact, dead. So the "dead guy" Maggie saw was someone else. This is fantastic news. Anyway, Maggie says she was on her way to report on her story about the Kony army or whatever but had to do the military's bidding and shoot a puff piece about the army building an addition onto an orphanage. Maggie says they went to the airport straight from ACN's newsroom, because it's always fun to go on long-ass international flights after a long day of work.
Maggie giggles as she recalls the night she left for Uganda and how it was the same night that Will destroyed an Occupier on NewsNight. Nice to see that Maggie has learned compassion for others out of her ordeal. Let's cut to that first.
Maggie of the past and her long blonde hair shuffle through the control room. MacKenzie tells everyone to put in his souvenir requests. One guy immediately asks for any kind of weapon. Keep your eye on him, guys. Another guy asks for a dress. I kind of love that the control room guys are weirdos like that.
Shelly gets her makeup done and tells Neal that "her friends" think this might be a bad idea. Well, now is definitely the time to have second thoughts, Shelly! Dantana calls Neal into the hallway, where Maggie is waiting. Um. Maggie. Just leave already. Stop wandering around ACN with all of your luggage. Neal exposits that they've done everything possible to reach Hamni8, of Twitter fame, but had no luck so far.
This angers Dantana! He punches a wall and decides that Hamni8 must be dead. Neal points out that it's been two years since Hamni8 tweeted. He may well not be able to afford internet anymore. Dantana isn't buying that. He'll buy that the US Military committed a heinous war crime and covered it up for two years, but not that Hamni8 might not be into Twitter anymore.
A woman calls for Shelly. Neal returns to the make-up room, where Shelly is still having her face brushed. Very attentive make-up people over at ACN, I see. As she heads out into the hallway, Dantana whines that their only chance on the Genoa story is if something falls into their laps. "A preposterous stroke of luck has to occur," he sighs.
Shelly then announces to Neal that one of her OWS friends used to work for an NGO that was shut down by the Pakistani government after he reported that US troops where using chemical weapons on civilians. Well, that's definitely the kind of thing you just off-handedly mention on your way to your ACN debut. Dantana and Neal chase after Shelly, but she doesn't have much more to tell them; she doesn't know the guy's name but would be happy to help them find him once she's done with Will. Neal and Dantana embrace.
Shelly meets Will in the few seconds before the show comes back from commercial. He fucks with her immediately, making her think he's talking to her and then saying he's just taking to the producer in his ear. Wow. What a strategy, there. As Neal looks on nervously because he's personally invested in this OWS thing in a way he should not be as a journalist, Will introduces the audience to Shelly Wexler, "one of the leaders" of OWS.
Neal hopes she won't "take the bait" but she totally does, saying that she isn't an OWS leader because OWS doesn't have any leaders. "This way everyone should have a voice," she says. Or, Will says, there will be a lot of people talking at once. So, OWS is a Sorkin script? Where are the stupid women? Besides Shelly.
Will asks Shelly what OWS is protesting, and she lists off several things. Will says it sounds like the movement isn't very focused, and announces that he is the "1 percent" that those "99 percent" signs hate. But Will's fine with being rich because he's not overpaid – he's paid exactly what he's worth, because of capitalism. He asks Shelly what she thinks we should replace capitalism with. Shelly says she just wants the system to be "fairer."
Will says if she wants that to happen, we'll need new laws. And that's Congress's job. Not Wall Street's. Uh huh. Like Wall Street has nothing to do with the what Congress does and doesn't pass. Okay, Will. And there's no one for a Congressman to meet with anyway, as Shelly stupidly points out. "We're not looking for a meeting," she says. They just want attention, and that attention will somehow make change happen. Oops! Shelly just got exposed as an Underpants Gnome. Phase 1: Protest. Phase 2: ??? Phase 3: Change!
Neal tries to convince Shelly that her interview went well, but she's not having it because it went terribly. She tells Neal to fuck off and that Will is an asshole. Neal claims he isn't, which is incorrect. Neal also can't read a room, as he then asks Shelly for a favor. Shelly says she's not helping him find that NGO guy now, no matter how many times he tells her it's really, really important. Finally, he tells Shelly that she "tanked" the interview, and Shelly punches him in the stomach. HA HA HA! Neal got assaulted.
He staggers into the newsroom and tells Dantana that Shelly left. Dantana is not able to catch her on the way out.
Looks like the Radisson paid HBO some product placement fees! That's where the Romney bus is staying, and that's where Jim, Hallie, and Stillman show up to get their room keys. Also, we learn that Stillman's first name is, in fact, Stillman. His last name is Frank. Oh, and the Romney campaign isn't paying for their rooms anymore. Can't imagine how they didn't see that coming.
Jim tries to convince Diane at the front desk that they need the hotel rooms because they're staging a very important protest against the Romney bus. Diane doesn't understand what he's talking about and says they don't have three rooms available. Just one, of course. "That was a predictable plot twist, don't you think?" Hallie metas. Yes, it was.
Then Taylor and Cameron show up just to rub it in, because they are evil geniuses. Taylor says she has six empty rooms and would be happy to rent them out to anyone who will say "Romney rocks." Jim says he'll do that for 30 minutes with Romney. Taylor asks him why he keeps asking for this when he knows she's going to say no. "So I can say I kept asking," Jim says very seriously and newsman-y. Taylor says she hates the press. Jim points out that she might want to find a new line of work, then.
With that, Diane offers them a room with two queen-sized beds. Stillman volunteers to sleep in the cot. Hallie mutters that "these things aren't supposed to happen to me. I went to Vassar." Um, those are exactly the things that are supposed to happen to people who went to Vassar. Oh, and then Maggie texts Jim to let him know she is on a plane.
Marcia comments that Maggie's flight was probably very comfortable because first class is awesome. Maggie says she and Gary only merited economy class, and even then just barely. They arrived in Uganda around 8 in the morning, met their "fixer" (the guy who basically saves Maggie from herself whilst traveling in a foreign country), were impressed by his credentials with National Geographic and The Amazing Race, and then had to go directly to the orphanage, Army's orders. Maggie says the drive to the orphanage can take between four and nine hours, depending on the roads. Marcia doesn't understand how Africa works. "Sometimes there's mud. Sometimes there's a genocide," Maggie says. Well. Good to know genocides only add on five hours to one's commute. That's almost as bad as LA.
And now we're in Africa! Or whatever set is filling in for Africa. Gary Cooper spends 100 miles of the trip filming the drive from the bed of the pick-up truck because their fixer, Ronald, told them he might see a few drug lords. He doesn't. Which … what was he going to do if he did? Film them while driving past? How would he even know who the drug lords were? That's dumb. Ronald tells Gary Cooper as much. "There were no drug lords," Maggie tells Marcia. "And I didn't see one animal I haven't seen in my apartment." Wow, I didn't know that Maggie kept sheep and chickens in her apartment!
They arrive at the orphanage. The army guy runs up and greets them and makes fun of Gary Cooper's name. Maggie says Gary Cooper started off by getting "B-roll of the soldiers," and then we see him filming interviews with the soldiers which I'm pretty sure is not B-roll. Not that it matters, as I'm sure Gary Cooper and/or Maggie forgot to take the lens cap off and this footage will be unusable.
They head inside to meet the orphans, who are in the middle of school. Maggie introduces herself to Pastor Moses and then Gary Cooper walks in with the camera and scares the shit out of all the children, who confuse it for a gun. They scream and cry and duck under their desks. Gary Cooper feels pretty bad right about now. Marcia asks if that was all that happened, then. It would be pretty funny if that was the entirety of Maggie's Traumatic Trip to Africa, actually. And make a lot of sense. But of course, there's more! While Maggie is trying to calm down the rest of the kids, she sees one sitting off to the side, clutching a book.
Back at ACN, Neal and Dantana tell MacKenzie about Shelly's NGO friend and the unlikelihood that they'll ever find him now. Neal says he got Shelly to agree to help them on one condition: that Will apologize to her. On the air. MacKenzie says that's never going to happen, ever. Especially since Will doesn't know what Genoa even is. He's being deliberately kept in the dark in case they need him to check it for holes when it's done and ready for air. Well, we already know that's not going to go very well, don't we?
Jim managed to be so bad at driving that he couldn't keep up with the giant Romney bus. Hallie is duly disgusted with him. Meanwhile, Stillman is looking for pictures of Maggie. Jim reacts to that by taking his eyes off the road and nearly getting into a terrible accident. And then Hallie's phone rings. Because she hooked it up to the car for reasons I can't begin to understand, Jim can answer it from his steering wheel and let everyone listen in. He does this.
It's Hallie's boss, Evan. How does she have a boss on her own blog? Also, he's an asshole. Hallie isn't getting advance copies of Romney speeches anymore and he's pissed. Hallie says they've got something the Romney bus doesn't: "guts!" Evan is not in the mood for this. He tells Hallie that for the $500 a week he's paying her, she either has to deliver the Romney talking points or have sex with him. I'm not sure if we're supposed to think Evan is bad or that Sorkin thinks this is the way all bosses are supposed to talk to women.
In the newsroom, MacKenzie is pranked with a fake rundown list. Oh, what fun those ACN folks have! The real list says that Rick Perry leases a hunting ranch called "N----rhead." MacKenzie makes sure to apologize to Kendra, The Only Black Person In The Room, for saying the racial slur. "I accept your apology on behalf of all the black people in the room," Kendra eye-rolls. Then Charlie presses his body up against the glass wall and startles MacKenzie. He's drunk.
He asks her in private for a Genoa update. MacKenzie tells him about the NGO guy and the issue they're having in locating him. Charlie tells her to do her job and find him and also to bring Jim back soon because they pay him "way too much" to be an embed. MacKenzie orders Kendra to run the meeting while she talks to Will. And now we know that when Jim is gone, Kendra is the second in command! She's like the Lt. Cmdr. Data of the newsroom.
MacKenzie heads into Will's office and tries to explain to him that he has to apologize to Shelly on the air without knowing why it's so important that he do so. Will's not bending. He says Shelly was unprepared and her movement is stupid so he had every right to be dismissive of her. MacKenzie says he can apologize for being smug. Will claims not to know what makes her think he'd ever be smug. MacKenzie gives up.
She heads for Dr. Dr. Sloan's office, where Dr. Dr. Sloan informs her that she just saw Titanic for the first time. She held off for so long because she doesn't like sad movies. And even though she knew how the movie would end, she still somehow "didn't see it coming." Also, she suddenly notes, Kodak's stock are plummeting right now. "I'll never let go, Kodak," Dr. Dr. Sloan Rose DeWitt Bukaters. MacKenzie finally gets a word in: "I need you."
Dr. Dr. Sloan says she's always free for her. "Get it together!" MacKenzie says nonsensically. She explains that Dr. Dr. Sloan is needed to help ACN win Shelly back again. She's hoping a financial expert pretending to pay attention to OWS's woes will make everything okay.
Oh, look, they're shooting on location to a Shake Shack that thinks it's as good as In-N-Out Burger. It's not! Dr. Dr. Sloan tells Shelly it's okay to be sad about her disastrous talk show appearance but it's time to help Neal out now, because she's sure his story is just that important. Shelly seems willing to give in, asking Dr. Dr. Sloan what Neal's story is. Dr. Dr. Sloan admits that she has no idea. Neal claims that's on purpose so Dr. Dr. Sloan will be able to help them find holes at the end. He also has to admit that he very much doubts that the story will make it to air in the first place.
Fed up, Shelly says she knows that Dr. Dr. Sloan is only here because Will refused to come. And that makes things worse. Dr. Dr. Sloan tries to smooth things over, telling Shelly that everyone at ACN is very sorry her appearance didn't go well. Shelly doesn't care. She calls Dr. Dr. Sloan a "Money Honey." Dr. Dr. Sloan takes great offense. So did Shelly. "I teach college!" she says.
So now everyone's intelligence has been insulted! Well, except for Neal. "You guys are condescending," Shelly huffs. With that, Dr. Dr. Sloan finally loses it and says she's not the one bragging about how she teaches college. Shelly asks if Will refused to apologize to her, and Dr. Dr. Sloan says she wasn't there, but she's pretty sure he said "hell no" and "who the fuck is Shelly Wexler?" Shelly leaves.
Neal calls the office to report his latest failure. "Sloan was smug," he explains as Dr. Dr. Sloan semi-smugly finishes her milkshake.
For some reason, we have to go back to Maggie. She says the kid in the corner of the classroom with the book was named Daniel, and she noticed that he didn't associate with the other children even during lunch. I noticed that Maggie is helping herself to the orphanage's food, as if they have enough to go around. Pastor Moses says Daniel's not actually an orphan, but he's staying there for a few days because his parents are afraid of cattle raiders in the area, who steal cattle and also kill everyone. His parents think Daniel will be safe at an orphanage, but they didn't count on Maggie stopping by! She decides to talk to Daniel, offering to read his book to him. Shouldn't she be reporting or something? Daniel's not even a real orphan.
Daniel lets her read to him as long as he gets to hold the book. She does. She tells Marcia she only read it to him three times, but her flashbacks indicate that it was many more than that. Meanwhile, aren't the orphanage kids trying to learn nearby? Aren't they in school right now? And there's loud-ass Maggie reading the same book over and over again in the corner while I'm assuming Gary Cooper does his actual job.
So Maggie reads the book like 800 times and Daniel seems to like her, even playing with her hair. Pastor Moses explains that Daniel's never seen blonde hair before. "It's nothing but trouble," he tells him. Also troublesome? How late it's getting. Gary Cooper tells Maggie they need to get back to the city, but Ronald says it's too late. They'll be stuck on the roads at night, and that is dangerous. Maggie and Gary Cooper are just a little annoyed with Ronald for not giving them a warning or anything.
Maggie asks the army for a ride back instead, but that's also a no-go because they're apparently flying to Djibouti. Africa expert Maggie asks if that's close to where they're going. Ronald laughs at her and says it isn't. Because it's another country. Meanwhile, is the army just going to leave that orphanage addition like that? It's not even half-done. But at least Maggie gets to spend more time with Daniel.
MacKenzie Skypes with Jim to ask him if he could please do his job and be near the campaign he insisted on covering. Jim claims that he is. MacKenzie asks him to get a comment from Romney about his church. Jim doesn't think that's possible. MacKenzie warns him he'll have to justify his existence soon.
So Jim finds Taylor and asks her why Romney thought the name of Rick Perry's hunting camp was offensive but lead his church during a time when Mormons weren't allowed to be black. Taylor says people can belong to a church and disagree with some its rules at the same time. She points out that Joe Biden is Catholic and no one's attributing every bad thing Catholics have ever done to him. Jim asks if that's the official comment of the Romney campaign. It isn't. "Go fuck yourself, Jim," it turns out, is the official comment.
Jim just smiles, because now he has Taylor. Unlike the Weiner campaign, which lets its communications directors call people "slut bags," the Romney campaign is a professional outfit. Taylor asks what she has to do for Jim to make that comment go away. So what differentiates Jim, a good journalist, from Maggie, a bad one, is that Jim annoys people to get information from them. Maggie just annoys them.
Cut to Hallie sitting nearby. Taylor walks up and tells her that she just won a 30 minute one-on-one with Romney in a few hours. Hallie smiles for the first time ever.
Don is the ACN person forced to try to make Shelly feel good. He's pleased to be chosen for this task even though Neal makes it clear that Don was not a choice so much as a default. They catch Shelly coming out of her college teaching duties. Don offers her a spot on Elliot's show that will be "much gentler" than her appearance on Will's. Shelly wants to bash Will on the show, and Don's not on board. "I can't produce your revenge fantasy," he says.
Shelly tries to leave, and Don says they need her help for this "very important story" that he doesn't know anything about. Shelly tells him this can be a lesson for journalists not to look down their noses at people. Whoops! Don gets mad and tells her she has a "debilitating persecution complex." Shelly does not respond well to that.
An excited Hallie types up her Romney-view and says her Vassar-ness surely got her this interview. Jim and Stillman are hanging out nearby since they have to share a room, and Jim gets a Skype from MacKenzie, who says she got a tattle-call from Taylor about how Jim gave an interview away to Hallie. Ha! Taylor still kind of wins. Or not, if Jim turns around and prints her "go fuck yourself" comment in revenge. Hallie overhears this as she's walking out of the room, and her visions of Vassar connections go up in smoke.
MacKenzie accuses Jim of giving an interview away to a girl just to score points with her. Jim says that wasn't why he did it, but he's sorry. MacKenzie says his time with the Romney campaign is over, and Skype-hangs-up on him. Jim sighs and lets Stillman and Hallie back into the room. Hallie shoves her notes at him, saying he can write the interview. Stillman may or may not be furious with Jim for giving the interview away to Hallie and not him.
Jim defends himself, saying that he pissed off a favor out of Taylor and gave it to Hallie because of the way her boss spoke to her earlier. Hallie says she's insulted by Jim's favor because she's experienced enough to get these interviews without his help. And now Jim has made an incorrect snap judgment about her boss. Jim says he knew Hallie might find it insulting but he was banking on her never finding out. "Am I suddenly a fucking receptacle for every women who's pissed at a guy?" Jim asks. But … Hallie's the only one, and the only guy she's pissed at is Jim, so, I don't know. He says Evan sucks and he thought this was the right decision. And he still does. He storms off.
Shelly teaches a class. Her students are bored and don't know the answer to her question. A voice from the hallway, however, does (it's Narmada Dam, by the way). Yes, it's Will, having finally arrived. Shelly walks out of her class to get her apology, but it's not forthcoming. Instead: "your movement sucks, Shelly." Shelly says it probably looks that way from "the outside." Will says how the outside sees it is the most important thing. Also, all the great movements in history had leaders. No one is courting the OWS vote like the Republican candidates are trying to appeal to the Tea Party.
Shelly admits that, yes, she sucked out loud on Will's show, and it was embarrassing. She wishes that she'd gotten a chance to talk about corruption and stuff, but Will says she isn't qualified to do that, though he'll try to fit them in more often. He admits that he was so harsh on Shelly to make himself look good. "You were a handy prop and I'm sorry I embarrassed you," he says, adding that he's not smug, he's in the midst of a "crisis of confidence."
Shelly suspects he is having girl problems. Of course. And she offers to take Neal to the NGO guy. Will says that won't be necessary; they already found him. Will's here because he genuinely feels kind of bad about Shelly, saying "the interview was kinda fun for me, and it shouldn't have been." With that, Will asks if he can audit Shelly's class. She accepts. Hooray for new friends!
Elliot's trying to broadcast. He gets to the Rick Perry news and decides to just go for it, naming the ranch and saying the n-word in its entirety.
"WHAT the HELL, fellas?!" Charlie screams. Elliot offers to let Don answer, only for Don to lay all the blame at his feet. Charlie asks what Don would have had Elliot say had the rock said "motherfucker" on it. Don says that would be a "much different story." Charlie says it's really not, as he expects one of those family first foundations to be calling up and threatening to boycott his show any second now.
Yeah, I'm so sure those anti-gay Family Matters associations are concerned about the feelings of black people. He sends them away so MacKenzie can come in. On their way out, she gives provides them with an instant alternative to saying the racial slur on the air, as if she hadn't just said it herself in the rundown meeting.
MacKenzie and Dantana inform Charlie that they've been interviewing the NGO guy, named Leon, for over an hour now. He gave them a copy of the report that got his NGO shut down, and it says that villagers reported seeing people in the throes of what sounded a whole lot like exposure to sarin gas. Charlie takes this seriously enough to take off his glasses and lean back in his office chair with concern.
Jim finds Taylor swimming in the hotel pool. As she gets out of the water, he asks if she really had to go and tell on him to his boss. Taylor says that's exactly what someone in her position is supposed to do (other than, I suppose, not swearing at a reporter in the first place), which he'd know if he was at all experienced in it. She says that the Romney campaign is "doing this thing" and running for president, so "it's on."
"It's a big hard thing and we understand," Taylor says, that the evil liberal media is going to crap all over them no matter what. And that was her way of telling ACN (or Jim, really) that the Romney campaign was to be around for a while, especially now that Perry is on his way out. She says she expects to see Jim again. "Take it easy," she concludes. "Take it easy, Taylor," Jim says. Well, that's better than telling each other to fuck off.
Hallie appears to tell Jim that what he did for her was a big deal, as it apparently got him in trouble and kicked off the campaign. Jim says that's about it, yes. Hallie admits that she'll miss him. Then she kisses him. "I'm the rebound. And I went to Vassar," she says. Jim notes that she mentions Vassar a lot. They make out.
That's nice for them, but we have to go back to Maggie, who asks Marcia what she's supposed to look like for Dantana's lawyers not to think she was too "messed up" to know what the general really said. Marcia says that basically anything but the way Maggie looks now would be a start. With that, Maggie says they had to sleep over at the orphanage, thus mooching even more of its supplies.
During the night, she hears gunshots in the distance. So did Ronald, who grabs a gun and heads outside to see what's going on. It's dark, and a man is yelling at him in another language. Maggie and the other adults try to wake up the orphanage children to prepare them for a quick getaway. Ronald yells at thieves that this is an orphanage and has no cattle to steal, but it turns out that he knows one language and the thieves know another. When they shoot at him again, Pastor Moses decides it's time to scram. They round up the kids and get them on the bus, take a headcount, and realize that one is missing. Yes, Daniel is hiding under Maggie's bed.
Maggie can't drag him out from under the bed because it's too low to the ground and bolted to the floor, which probably wasn't a great plan in retrospect. They have to pry the bed off the floor while the raiders get closer and closer. Gary Cooper, hero, manages to get the bed off the floor. Maggie grabs Daniel and he rides on her back to the bus.
She tells Marcia that they ultimately found out what the cattle raiders were asking for in the language none of them knew: "give us the camera." Speaking of cameras, Gary Cooper is carrying it when he trips and falls just outside the bus. Here is where I was terrified that we were going to lose Gary Cooper after all. Maggie turns around to see what's going on. There's a gunshot, and she turns back around and gets on the bus. Gary Cooper is right behind her (phew!) and then the bus drives away.
"He died right away?" Marcia asks. Yes, he did. Poor young Daniel was shot in the back. Which isn't really Maggie's fault but Daniel was riding on her back and she did turn around and basically offer him up to the raiders. Also, they were only there looking for that camera at all because, most likely, they saw Gary Cooper riding around with it for 100 miles. Which was Ronald's idea. Ronald, who also couldn't figure out to tell them they should leave the orphanage in time. So it's Ronald's fault. But really, ultimately, isn't it Maggie's?
Marcia asks if that's "it." Maggie says it is. She and Gary Cooper were in Uganda for all of 18 hours and wreaked havoc upon it, killing children and destroying orphanage beds. Then ACN made them come back. Maggie never got her big Uganda story. She is not the expert of Africa. Fail fail fail.
Marcia asks if Jim Harper, who will apparently be testifying as to Maggie's state of mind, will have anything interesting to say. I sincerely doubt that. Jim arrives back at ACN in the middle of the night from New Hampshire and finds Maggie sitting on the floor in a dark newsroom.
Maggie tells Marcia that there's nothing more to the story: "It was upsetting, but …" Marcia says she went to a doctor about it, but Maggie says HR sent her to a psychiatrist, he prescribed Paxil, but she doesn't take it. Marcia calls Paxil a "very strong psychotropic," which, is it really? It's an SSRI antidepressant like Prozac, I thought? Maggie claims she doesn't need it. So … she'll take medication for panic attacks but not for PTSD? Whatever.
"What do you want?" Maggie asks, with crazy eyes that won't exactly win a jury over. She insists, again, that the general never said it happened, she can testify to that, and she's fine.
And just in case you hadn't figured out what happened to her hair and why by now, she remembers Daniel touching it and then cuts it off. She'll never have long blonde hair again! But she won't dye her eyebrows accordingly!
"I'm fine," Maggie says again. "Fuck," Marcia mutters. And you know what? Maggie sucks, of course, but she was halfway tolerable in this episode and while, as she pointed out, being partially responsible for a dead child isn't the happiest of circumstances, it's not the kind of thing that should make you unable to deal with reality six months later, as Dantana is alleging. Unless there's something more we don't know, I'm not sure what the problem is. I guess we'll find out …
To read more from Sara Morrison, you can follow her on Twitter, subscribe to her on Facebook or you can just email her at saramorrison@gmail.com.