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Kevin finds the dental floss container from that B&B trip last year and convinces himself that Jackie's back on drugs. Which she is, of course, since she never got off them. But with some quick thinking and the sobriety chip from devil-man (whose name is, apparently, Bill?) she convinces Kevin that everything's fine. This year it seems like every episode she steals somebody else's story or dialogue or something, it's a weird tic I don't remember this show ever having. Anyway, she does that some more.
Sam -- who looks ridiculously great out of his scrubs, dressed as a hipster -- recognizes Bill from AA, but apparently only knows about the "great sponsor" part of the Bill equation, and less about the "gets his rocks off overserving addicts" part. So once again you got Sam on the trail, which never ends well.
Kelly Slater continues to be insufferable, but Jackie is finally warming up to the idea of his destruction. Fitch spends the entire episode mooning over a terribly smug Mohawk Indian and then flies a kite, so he's doing about as well as you'd expect. Even God is getting tired of Coop's antics at this point, but I don't know. He's kind of adorable right now.
Because of Kevin's ongoing suspicious spycraft, Jackie's finding it harder to get out of the house and play with Eleanor and Eddie... So they have started hanging out together. I don't know what makes Eddie so magnetic but man, everybody on this show just loves him, despite having zero point zero zero percent of a personality beyond "whiny stalker."
In other news, Grace is diversifying her weirdness portfolio -- obsessing on grisly martyrdoms almost as devoutly as she usually worries about her carbon footprint -- but at least she's stopped pulling her hair out. It's interesting this week though, because one of the major patients is this ICU-bound drug addict with a pretty great teenage son, so Jackie has to think about how shitty being a drug addict makes you. Then when she's done thinking about that, she goes and does some more drugs.
Want more? The full recap starts right below!Previously, Nurse Kelly was a dude all over Nurse Jackie's business, and must be destroyed. Also, somebody on this show remembered something that ever happened on this show, when Jackie dropped her drugs in the car on their way to the Oddly Sexy Old Lady Bed & Breakfast.
2 AM (GRACE CAN'T BREATHE)
Grace: "I need a consult in the middle of the night, because my constant anxiety is giving me heart palpitations."
Jackie: "Let's have midnight cocoa and pretend to have a relationship!"
Grace: "It's not midnight, idiot."
Jackie: "I love the times we spend together."
BETTER KNOW YOUR GRISLY SAINT DEATHS
Grace: "This one had her throat cut. This one was skinned alive. And this one was rolled on hot coals. Martyrdom appeals to me, due to my role in this family. Also due to the fact that I am a needy, unpleasant basket case."
Jackie: "I don't foresee you getting less crazy doing shit like this."
Grace, cleverly: "It's not scary, it's our religion!"
Grace: "There are over ten thousand saints. If I don't memorize all of them and also count every floorboard in the entire house by sunrise, our entire neighborhood will burn down."
Kevin: "If I were a saint I would be Santa Barbara, because of my soap-opera good looks. Mental illness is clearly something I'm adept at overlooking. Let's make funny jokes and lighten the mood!"
Grace: "Honestly it's like we've never met."
Jackie: "If I were a saint I would be St. Theresa, the saint of stealing narcotics from epileptics who turn out to be devil-worshipping enablers."
Kevin: "I don't get that joke. Was that important?"
Grace: "[Even more crazy-person antics.]"
THAT ONE CHEERFUL COFFEE SHOP WHERE EVERYBODY IS COINCIDENTALLY IN RECOVERY
Devil: "My name is Bill, as in Friend Of Bill. Stop trying to scam me out of drugs."
LATER
Sam: "You're a Friend of Bill? What a great sponsor he is! Considering everybody he sponsors ends up dead or in this diner."
Jackie: "No, that would mean I was in recovery, which this show will never allow to happen."
Sam: "Apropos of nothing, here's a story about a lady who stole drugs off her boyfriend who was OD-ing."
Jackie: "I will steal that story later to pretend to be a human being; the irony of how I did that almost exact thing to Bill himself last season. Right now, I have to pretend to receive a phone call so you'll go away."
Sam: "It was nice being on this show for five seconds."
ALL SAINTS SIDEWALK
Thor & Zoey: Wait for Nurse Kelly to arrive at work shirtless, you know, like how you do when you're a working professional person. Every time they say "Kelly Slater" you must try not to imagine what if Zack Morris's girlfriend married Zack Morris's boyfriend.
Jackie: Still hates Nurse Kelly.
Kelly: Still rules all over Nurse Jackie.
Thor & Zoey: Loving. It.
NURSES' STATION
Everybody: "Nurse Kelly bought us all drinks and told us all these stories about how amazing he is and generally we are all in a cult now."
Jackie: "This sucks because I can't tell you how much I don't care without sounding like I feel left out, when the actual truth is that I do not care. I'm stuck in a box."
AKALITUS
Gloria: "Nurse Kelly, tell me more things about how amazing you are."
Kelly: "That's my favorite thing to ever talk about! You remind me of Michelle Obama."
Gloria: "That's so exciting because my whole personality is about that now. What a coincidence."
Kelly: "Yeah, but you're prettier and more competent than the First Lady. And married to many, many more presidents of the US. And a much more accomplished jumproper."
Gloria: "This is so much fun, I can't tell you."
Gloria: "Tell me spy things about Lily Chung from Bellevue that I keep yakking about."
Kelly: "She was really into acronyms."
Gloria: "Her key to success is acronyms? Just like AA. I can do that."
Kelly: "Did I mention I know the First Lady personally?"
Gloria: "Did you even have to?"
NURSING IT YO
Zoey: Works on her blog, Nursing It Yo.
Thor, reading Orchids & Salami: "Eva Gabor's Memoir. The two things she had in her fridge."
Lenny's Fridge, per Zoey: "Duck sauce and Marlboros."
Lenny: Gets more perfect all the time.
Coop's Fridge: Muscle Milk, chicken breasts, iceberg lettuce.
Zoey's Fridge: Diet shakes, Lunchables, weird ice cream.
Sam's Fridge: Whatever is super boring, but kind of sexy.
Eddie's Fridge: Severed heads of young ladies who thought they were too good for him.
Momo's Fridge: Raman noodles, soy sauce packets, gay problems.
Thor's Fridge: Splenda products, insulin, crudité that's long since changed texture.
Jackie's Fridge: Resentment, secrets, other secrets.
Kelly's Fridge: An Emmy, a Grammy, an Oscar, two Tonys.
Eleanor's Fridge: Canapés, doggy bags, Veuve Clicquot Brut.
Everybody: Gabs about Zoey's blog despite being uninterested.
Eleanor: "Jacks, will you accompany me to another ghastly open house full of free liquor and grabby Russians?"
Jackie: "I have to go watch my daughter martyr herself or something. And find lots more drugs and take them. But that last part's a secret. Let's focus on me being a parent."
Eleanor: "And referring to your husband as your jailer, despite the fact that I was the driving force behind your intervention. And making fun of Zoey's blog out of nowhere."
Baby Boomers, even as you're turning into your parents: "We sniff at the internet because we can't even handle the idea of not understanding everything better than our parents."
Sidney Poitier, once upon a time: "Not until your whole generation has laid down and died will the dead weight of you be off our backs."
PATIENT ONE
Is a drug addict, single mom, whose twelve-year-old called it in and is remarkably and sadly self-possessed.
Eleanor: "Nothing like getting trashed with your twelve-year-old."
Jackie: "Maybe I should try that, if Grace makes it to twelve. Couldn't possibly be more depressing than just hanging out with her normal."
Kelly: "Hey, kid of Patient One. Did I ever tell you about the time I taught Lisa Loeb to love again?"
Jackie: "Just you being nice to a patient or patient's family member makes me want to fucking punch through a wall. Zoey, take this kid outside for a smoke."
Zoey, awesomely: "I do not smoke, but I do have this weird gum that I get in Chinatown. It's black!"
THE CANDY-COLORED CHAOS OF GRACE'S MIND
Grace, after much bitching about this and that: Drops her ten thousand saint cards all over the car. Instantly fifty people's grandmothers drop dead, in Queens alone.
Kevin: "I'll collect your saints, Grace. You just take your mess on into school for the nuns to deal with."
He immediately finds the secret drugs from last season; furrowing occurs.
ALL SAINTS
Jackie ignores a phone call from Kevin after stopping the elevator to think about how she's totally going to ditch Grace's thing tonight so she can get more drugs, and then does some drugs. You know where phones don't work? Hospitals. And elevators. Only if this scene were taking place in the elevator of a parking structure under the hospital could you get worse reception.
Zoey, outside: "My dad's in prison.
Walker, the kid: "Is this a good hospital?"
Zoey: "Yes. I mean, in what way?"
Walker, obviously: "In the Is My Mom Gonna Die way."
Zoey: "It's a good hospital."
Neat scene continues.
Zoey: "I smoked menthols when I was your age."
Walker: "Gross."
PATIENT TWO
Is some kind of New Yorker urban legend person that is a Mohawk Indian that can climb around catlike all over the buildings of the city, and also flies kites up there. Basically these guys are like a cross between Spider-Man and the Doozers, and I feel like there's something racist about all this, but I don't know exactly what. For all I know, the show could have made them up. Mostly he exists to make Coop douche out.
Wind Walker: "Indians climb around on buildings doing soldering and stuff because we're not afraid of heights -- this is a myth. We are totally afraid of heights, we just have this Noble Savage thing where we don't have feelings like white people do. Also because we're excited about danger. Or something. It's a little unclear what the hell I'm talking about."
Jackie: "I feel like this is a speech somebody might give on Northern Exposure."
Wind Walker: "It's more like a speech somebody might write after seeing a few episodes of Northern Exposure, which is a little different. It's like a Kevin Costner kind of racism, not like a Mel Gibson."
Coop, one scene from now: "I see no problem here. I just like the idea of strange beast-men clambering around above our heads with magic powers. In the city, but not of it. Like those babies that ride the albino crocodiles around in the sewers, but even more objectifying, since those don't actually exist. And yet, you fly kites just like people do!"
BUT FIRST, COOP WALLOWS IN HIS CHILDHOOD
Coop: "Thor, come play with all my stuff from when I was a kid! My infantile behavior is a standby of this show, but in this episode suddenly signifies something different. See, my moms made me clean out my room because they're getting a divorce, but at the end of the episode Chief Ironsides is going to give me his kite. Which I guess means that I'm growing up, except for how nothing ever counts or sticks on this show, so I guess it's more like how some kinds of girls never stop coloring in coloring books or thinking that shit is adorable. If this show weren't on Showtime people would criticize it a lot harder than they do, just like almost every Showtime show."
Coop & Thor & Whoever: Engage in dialogue about the stupid Star Wars movies, in such a way as to suggest no one involved in this show has ever seen those movies.
Jackie: "Stop ignoring your pager to play with toys!"
Coop, holding a goddamn teddy bear: "Please don't yell at me."
Jackie: "You're having a hard day. You know what might help?"
Coop, for God's sake: "Ice cream?"
Jackie, awesome: "No, Coop. Not ice cream."
Coop: "A magical Indian? I saw them on the Discovery channel!"
PATIENT TWO
Dances With Roxies: "Meet Fitch Cooper. He's going to challenge your stereotypical stoic nature so fucking hard."
Little Big Dork, getting gay on him: "Is it true you can turn into a wolf?"
Wind Walker: "No."
Sacheen Littlefeather: "Yeah, well my parents are getting divorced. And I never had a dad..."
Wind Walker: "Yeah, let's talk about that instead of my giant injury on my face."
Kicking Nerd: "I used to live in a teepee!"
Dances With Roxies: Currently both teepee and wigwam.
SHE'S JUST TWO TENTS
Patient One: Apparently consumed all the drugs there are in this world.
Jackie: Stares into space feeling like a total drug addict who has turned her daughter into quite the little asshole.
CHAPEL
Zoey, without judgment: "How objectively horrifying that a person would do that to herself and her child."
Jackie: "Don't you judge her. We don't know the circumstances."
Um: Yeah, we do.
Jackie: "Apparently this is the contractually obligated part of each episode where I get totally real on you and change your life and whatever because I'm such a good nurse. This is usually the best part every week, because Edie Falco is amazing."
Walker: "I wish she would just take regular meds for being a crazy asshole, instead of doing drugs."
Jackie: "Sometimes drug addicts are good moms."
Walker: "Yeah, I don't fucking think that is actually true."
Jackie: "Then I will leave your twelve-year-old ass here to rot in sadness."
AKALITUS MAKING UP ACRONYMS
G.E.R.B.I.L.: Great Excellence Reached By Inspired Listening!
L.I.L.Y.: Loitering Is Losing, Yes!
Kelly, directly into Gloria's anus: "Almost there!"
T.I.T.: Teach Instead Of Talk!
Gloria: "...Wait, TIT? That's not gonna work..."
EDDIE ON THE ONCOLOGY DEPARTMENT
"Listen, you guys are cancer: A bunch of miscommunicating cells. I've got chemistry over here, okay? Delightful, well-behaved, healing molecules."
Does this imply, in turn, that all of our nurses are simply trainwreck emergencies waiting to happen?
EMPIRICALLY SPEAKING, YES
Fentanyl patches: 100 times stronger than morphine. Not fucking around. Kelly would have loved them in Haiti, where he helped Sean Penn give birth to Sean Penn and took nine bullets for Wyclef Jean but then missed the tenth one because he was too busy telling us how amazing he is.
Kelly: Agrees to take these magic patches upstairs, whilst Eleanor is discovered rummaging through Eddie's racks looking for a prosthetic adhesive for her heel so that she can go look at more penthouses, and suddenly -- I guess because she is drunk or because they have Jackie in common -- invites Eddie along, so now I guess they do things together, like drink at work and look at penthouses. Occasional cobbling. And I guess this makes sense because they have so much in common. And I guess this is known as "character development" because of last week when Jackie left them getting drunk in the deconsecrated chapel.
HALLWAY
Jackie: "Are those Fentanyl patches for Oncology?"
Kelly: "Yeah, I pretty much do whatever I want. I also got off work on Saturday because Gloria Akalitus thinks I can get her a lesbian date with Michelle Obama."
Jackie: "Yeah, you're a real popular guy. You should run for Class President."
Kelly: "I thought that's what I was doing."
Jackie: "Hey, why don't I take those magical drugs upstairs for you, so you don't have to figure out where Oncology is, ever. Surely they won't compare inventory and fire your ass. And I know you won't question my motives because of your blind male privilege."
Kelly: "On this show, it really could go either way. More than likely they'll realize it's missing, and there will be a big cliffhanger where we're both about to get fired, and then the episode will start with us pretending none of that ever happened."
Jackie: "Look, I just want some drugs. I am as addicted to drugs as this show is to setting up false expectations and then refusing to meet them, in a manner so aggressive it almost seems spiteful."
AKALITUS
Gloria: Literally snipping at a bonsai tree, like this is a 1989 sitcom. I was going to write something like, she's playing with a Zen garden or cutting a bonsai tree, and then was horrified to remember that she actually is.
Jackie: "The fact that you gave Nurse Kelly Saturday off is going to cause a riot."
Gloria: "No, it's not. Everybody loves him. This is about you."
Jackie: "I want Saturday off."
Gloria: "You want Saturday off?"
Jackie: "No, like I want the idea."
DANCES WITH MOCCASINS
Coop: "I tread softly on that line between how straight guys actually behave, and how gay dudes actually do."
Wind Walker: "You do it well, generally."
Coop: "You are testing my abilities here to their utmost."
Wind Walker: "Sorry about your moms, and your bunion."
Coop: "Wait, did you just read about my bunion from my soul or something?"
WW: "No, I have had a bunion."
Coop, honestly he says this: "Moccasins."
Sigh, Whatever: "Here is a kite."
Coop: "That's literally all it takes! Thanks, Chief!"
Wind Walker: "Um."
Coop: "Not like Indian Chief, like um, I want to be Chief Physician Chief. And I call everybody Chief. I think I'm having a stroke."
Wind Walker: " I get it, you're a douchebag, already knew that, we're cool. See you on the flipside."
Coop: "Okay, Tonto! ...Oh, God damn it."
He reaches out to give Wind Walker's nipple the tiniest of tweaks. Just kidding. Same difference.
OUT ON THE STREET
Coop: Hobbling around like a grinning dorky maniac, with the kite. It's hard to watch.
God: "Against the wind, you moron! You'll never get this high!"
Coop: "We had a connection!"
Jackie: Has less and less to say in response to Fitch's antics.
Kelly: "Is that Eddie getting into Eleanor's Towncar?"
Jackie: "I'm just kind of going to lose it now, a little bit."
PEYTON PLACE
Kevin, angry and whatever: "Hey, I found all these drugs in the car and now I'm like twice as tall as usual. On the other hand, my clothes get tighter every episode so you can really see what I'm working with."
Jackie, jittery and awful: "Oh yeah? Well I'm going to talk as fast as I can and lie about all kinds of shit, just like in every episode where this happens, only this time I'm basically telling the truth, but it's mostly just a coincidence."
Kevin: "I'm not buying it, Jackie! You always do this! Our marriage is in trouble!"
Jackie, producing Bill's 30-Day chip from last week: "[Tells the story Sam told her that is actually about her, to prove she's been going to meetings, so quickly that it seems nearly logical.]"
Kevin: "Well, I guess I believe you suddenly, again. Thank God you've been carrying that chip around all week since last episode."
Jackie: "Um, thank God I've got this patch on my arm that's 100 times stronger than morphine or I probably would have just beat it and run my ass through the screen door."
But you know what would be awesome is, what if that happened. Or what if Fiona found the dental floss in the car and used it, or almost used it, or totally used it and then totally died. Or what if Eleanor and Eddie started fucking and Jackie had to deal with forgiving Eleanor for something instead of continually setting it up for people to forgive Jackie for no real reason. Or what if Zoey found out about one of Jackie's trillion misdeeds and was led to compromise her own morals in order to protect her heroine? That would just kill.
Or what if Fitch Cooper wasn't a complicated joke about the emotional life of cardboard? Or what if Eddie had a storyline other than "Dating somebody, just kidding"? Or what if Kevin was more than a boltnecked Frankenstein with a single on/off switch? I've seen this season. There is exactly one game-changer I can think of, and it happens in such a way that it might end up not mattering just as much as anything else that ever happens on this bizarre pillow dream of a show.
And I'll be damned if I can figure out why, because what? You want to hold onto your viewers so you don't do the truly edgy stuff? And so it's this bullshit compromise of being exciting and seemingly edgy without actually being either of those? Or I mean, is this about not wanting to watch female characters do the kinds of things male characters regularly do on black comedies? Is that a note you can see getting from the network? Because it makes sense: Some people spend their entire lives online bitching about how Nancy or Jackie or Cathy or Tara are worthless assholes, although I think that says more about them than it does about the audience. So what, then. Is this about failure of gumption on a level so deep that it scarcely matters? These actors are so brilliant, it's a bummer even when it's as funny as it gets.
Because if you're committed to being toothless, the least you could do is pretend that your episodes -- in a season that basically amounts to six hours of footage for the entire thing -- are actually acquainted with one another, telling a serial narrative, rather than what we're getting, which is a few big white-board ideas (MICHELLE OBAMA, PHONY NURSE KELLY, DEVIL BILL, FAT KIDS) established at the beginning of the season, which everybody's remembered to include in their episodes, but don't do much more than that.
They don't develop, or move, so much as they appear and disappear, at random, which just makes the whole thing seem like busywork or, worst case scenario, putting in time on a smaller show so you can get into a better room -- or development deal -- down the line. Which is shitty to even contemplate, because I do like the show, I like all these shows, despite this syndrome of telling us the arc instead of having one. But then, considering you see the same complaints about this show -- and practically every other Showtime dramedy, even Tara which is miles away the best-crafted -- I can't help but think maybe I'm onto something. Which sucks, because how lucky are we just to be watching these women work?