In a hurry? Read the recaplet for a nutshell description! Finished? Click here to close.
What a stressful hour! But in a good way. The whole thing centers and hinges on Daryll's first big fight, at Terry's club's titular Fite Nite, where he will be fighting some kind of champion of boxing. As far as I can tell, boxing is just white people paying minorities to beat each other up, but from the crowd's reaction it seems he does a great job. That is the beginning, and absolutely the end, of the good news for the Donovan clan.
Mickey is called away by a "closure"-seeking Rosanna Arquette, who thinks she might have unconsciously caused him to accidentally try and rape her that one time. He assures her it was just a coincidental miscommunication, and while she does not agree that it's hilarious, she does decide to have sex with his gross old penis, I guess just to make sure.
At this point, Sully and his henchmen kidnap the pair, terrifying Arquette and shooting her in the head, before we learn that Sullivan's sentimentality about dead Colleen -- which we saw briefly in Boston -- goes so deep that he would have shot Mickey for free. The irony -- that Mickey didn't even kill Colleen -- does not escape them, and so Sullivan takes Ray's money (which is actually Ezra's money, from Ruth's foundation) and flips, joining Team Mickey. They go to Sean Walker's house and murder him -- making the loss of my beloved Van Miller all the more cruel and unnecessary -- leaving Ray Sean's mystery baby as a kind of calling card.
Meanwhile, Ray is all about getting Abby pregnant, and you can't tell if he's just trying to change the subject -- Abby intuits that he's setting up a hit on Mickey, like, immediately -- or it's some kind of life/death mortality man thing, or both. I think both. Definitely cools his jets once she finally admits she's been in contact with Mickey since like the '90s, and invited him to LA in the first place. Either way, now Ray has an extra awesome baby. I hope Abby doesn't bitch at it too much, I've heard that can sour the disposition.
So we leave the episode with Daryll on a high, Abby once more convinced that her husband is a mahnstah, Mickey finally convinced there is no rapprochement possible with his eldest son, and Bunchy... Oh, drunk and jumping off roofs just like his dumb dead sister. Although I think there may be a parallel in play where Bunchy thinks his molester is in LA, and everybody tells him he's crazy, but then it turns out he's right, just like Mickey is only Ray's bête noir and everybody else thinks he's awesome (even I, at this point, find him 87-92 percent adorable), but then it will turn out Ray was right and actually Mickey will attack Abby or something. I'm still on that theory.
Week: Bunchy goes priest-hunting after all, the cops come after Mickey for Sean's murder, and Abby gets a bodyguard because everybody is going to die because Team Oldboy is on a rampage. Maybe they'll do poppers and go to a gay bar, you never know with this show. James Woods is single, having strangled his girlfriend in a motel, and Mickey is eternally single, but especially now since Rosanna Arquette just dropped dead. Actually, maybe it's just better to not have your girlfriends around James Woods. He seems to have a thing where he kills them. Pray for Deb! And Chloe.
Want more? The full recap starts right below!PREVIOUSLY
As part of his induction into the family's sad way of life, Daryll "Black Irish" Donovan has been training for tonight's boxing match since he showed up. It also provides an alibi for Ray, who's finally gotten Sully to LA from Boston to kill Mickey tonight while the Donovans are cheering on their newest member. Van Miller is no longer with us, meaning that Ray, Ezra and Sean Walker are the only loose ends surrounding Mickey's early release from prison, not to mention the three people responsible for the frame job that put him there. Presumably, despite his clear affection for all three men, Mickey is still after them; what he doesn't know is that Sully is in town and ready to take him out before he can do anything about it.
HOME
While Tiny -- an imported Sully-henchman who is of course anything but -- shovels Mickey's grave, he's at the Fite Club helping Terry train Daryll. He's happy about the event, and even happier that his off-book FBI handler is no longer troubling him about that early release. Plus, he's got this development deal with Sean Walker, so that's probably got him pretty jazzed.
Upstairs in the closet where basically everything happens, Ray is feeling morose and Donovan-ny about the whole thing. Fathers and sons, fratricide and infanticide, dead Bridget and fucked-up Bunchy, misremembered abuses, all in a box of keepsakes Ray's taken down to look through just when his son Conor -- the only male Donovan left mostly untainted by both Mickey and the Holy Roman Empire -- wanders up there.
Conor: "Hey, I was just looking for somewhere to barf. Got any expensive jewelry?"
Ray: "No, just these priceless old photos of the man I will soon have murdered. Also, some boxing gloves."
Conor: "You know what would be adorable? If I put those on real quick."
Ray: "Oh my God, that is adorable. You know, I've been wary of you turning into violent creeper trash like the rest of us up until now, but seeing you in those boxing gloves on the day I'm having my dad murdered makes me weep Irish tears anyway."
Conor: "Tell me some horrible story about your treatment at his hands."
Ray: "He exercised a sort of prior restraint protocol on us being pussies by beating us before we got beat up so we would be okay with getting beat up when we got beat up."
Conor: "Yikes. Did that work?"
Ray: "In that we are all permanently beat up, I guess. I certainly never feel safe."
Abby: "Ezra Goodman, what are you doing here with a gym bag full of money?"
Ezra: "Just saying hi. Even though apparently I've never come to your house before."
Abby: "Calabasas!"
Ray: "Why do you even want to learn to fight?"
Conor: "Because the sins of the fathers are always visited on the sons, duh."
Ray: "Speaking of, I need you to have lots of male children. As discussed previously, you are the only person that can do that. Daryll's will be black for many generations yet, Terry's unlikely kids will all be half-goblin, and Bunchy hallucinates during blowjobs."
Conor: "Fine, I will have many male sons. Hopefully they won't murder me."
Ray: "It is kind of our Donovan thing."
Abby: "Ezra's here for the first time ever, so I'm guessing it's gangster shit."
Ray: "Conor, be adorable upstairs while I take tea with my demented surrogate father."
SULLY
Tiny: "Man, it is hot in LA when you are digging graves."
Sully: "It's 106 degrees in the Maldives, where we're going after this. But it's a dry heat."
After an impenetrable Southie conversation about the Maldives, Eddie from Boston shows up to bitch about how LA is full of tofu and Venice Beach is full of crazies and other things that are probably funny if you live in LA and love talking about LA and love on TV when they talk about LA because it's like watching yourself on TV. Mostly I just can't believe that Eddie also made it down here. He is like the most available-for-hire henchperson in all of Boston, or possibly America.
BUNCHY
Bunchy's staking out the priest of whom he took notice that time Terry decided to go to confession in the middle of the night -- drunk, on his bicycle -- you realize he wasn't just noting the (possibly imaginary) telltale signs of sexual abuse, but the priest (again, maybe) in question. We know he got shuffled to another diocese, but it does seem like a bit of a stretch that it would be this particular church in bike-riding distance. However, I do like the suspense of Ray possibly being right about Mickey and vindicated in the last minute, and this would parallel that in a nice way (and a big one). Mostly, I would just like Bunchy to have something other to do than just be sad as hell, because I don't know if you've noticed this but the entire show is just people being sad as hell.
HOME
Ezra: "Here's a huge amount of money for Sully, which I stole from Ruth's foundation that I started about five minutes ago."
Ray: "That's pretty compromised, homie."
Ezra: "I'd rather go to hell for borrowing from a charity than endure the ranting and fucking raving of Lee Drexel if I took it out of the business."
"Listen to me. You got out of Boston. You built a good life. You have a beautiful family. Don't let Mickey poison this. I saw something in you, Raymond. Don't let me down."
My emph., of course. Anyway, they reiterate for purposes of the episode's structure that Ray will be spending the evening at Fite Club watching Daryll's Fite Nite and that -- somehow -- Mickey will be elsewhere getting murdered, providing not only a fun nite for the family but also a great alibi. I suppose there is some ballsiness to calling in not just a hit man but the FBI's Most Wanted Person to do the deed and then disappear, but it also makes more and more sense. Plus, the emotional manipulation of being there for his brothers when Mickey can't be arced to make it, just because his deadbeat ass is too busy getting murdered.
"We did the right thing then," Ezra intones on his way out, "And we're doing the right thing now. For everyone."
The amount of this episode that Abby spends suspended in some kind of Schrödinger limbo Carmela Soprano place of knowing-but-not-knowing is: Most of it. But it's never unbelievable, and -- amusingly enough -- that's because she's so irritating. She will ask questions she doesn't want the answers to, not because she is particularly interested in the truth or legalities of anything, but just because she sees no real difference between interrogation and intimacy.
I really didn't grasp it at the time, that her investigation into the Man Cave would so utterly undermine her complacency, but I am impressed and inspired to see how every discovery she makes urges her forward. Not because it's about the things that are going on, but because everything she learns opens up entire pieces of real estate within Ray himself that she wants to explore, because she loves him so much. It's a really cool dynamic, if you think about the ways this kind of crime-adjacent marital relationship – Carmela Soprano, Skyler White, even Betty Draper in a way -- has been explored.
Normally the gateway to misogyny lies in the fact that we are rooting for the antihero, so the wife (be she conflicted by her own greed, morally sophisticated in her own right, or willfully ignorant and a wretched person) exists purely to be an obstruction, which means even making the right call is still a woman interrupting the flow of the show, and should sit down and shut up. But something about the way Abby's written and performed -- in this instance, although when she's not doing this particular thing she's intolerable -- makes her interest in Ray's unsavory activities less accusatory, sometimes, and more fascinated.
Like they both understand what she means by "emotional honesty" is actually more like, "I can handle knowing what the hell you do all day." Because what she can't handle is not knowing -- and frankly, probably a big reason she only communicates in screeches. Even the Calabasas thing: They left Boston together, but only one of them ended up in LA. If you felt unheard (left out) to this degree, you'd caps-lock everything too.
BUNCHY
Bunchy: "Hey Priest! Remember me?"
Priest: "Not really."
Bunchy: "It's me Brendan! You can tell I'm drunk and off the rails, yes?"
Priest: "Yeah, and I bet I know why, but I'm not the guy you're thinking of."
Bunchy: "At some point I'm going to be high enough it won't matter."
FITE CLUB
Terry's working with Daryll when Mickey comes in, all happy and excited about the thing. His cute monologue as he shadowboxes toward Daryll is a chilling foreshadow, all about how the guy is going to get you but then you slip past his defenses and boom! Right when he thought you were out, you turn the tide and come at him twice as hard.
"What is this bullshit, pasta? Back in the day we used to chip in so the contender could eat a fucking steak! Rare!"
He takes the carbs away and presents Daryll with some black boxing shorts that say BLACK IRISH in a lovely teal. They are very exciting shorts!
Mickey: "I have to go do Mickey stuff, but I'll be back."
Daryll: "I am going to make a big deal of that for no reason other than my narrative for the rest of the episode is to act like I'm Dumbo and you're the magic feather."
Mickey: "You have secretly been my favorite son since you rode a bus to Walpole at fifteen and declared yourself my son. Plus, you're the only one that will do crimes with me."
He takes a call that is at least as surprising to us as it is to him: Linda, as we'll find out, who was last seen fleeing the site of her accidental sexual assault. He does a little jig, but then as he's rushing out the door to find her, Bunchy appears and rains on his parade.
Bunchy: "Well, it's official. You killed the wrong guy."
Mickey: "I have no idea what you are talking about!"
Bunchy: "Father Danny is here now, in LA."
Mickey: "That seems highly unlikely. Perhaps your memory is faulty like your brother's. In any case, I am too distracted right now to even notice how crazy you are going, much less pretend I am not totally fed up with your sexual trauma."
Bunchy: "The fact that I am hallucinating the priest that raped me should be a sign that I need a little fatherly attention, though, wouldn't you say?"
Mickey: "Honestly I have had it with this whole thing. Just fucking grow up."
...So that's it for Bunchy, then.
HOME
Abby: "Why did Ezra come here?"
Ray: "You are gorgeous!"
Abby: "Um, I asked you a question."
Ray: "Let's have another baby. Let's have many babies!"
Abby: "Wow, you are doing a crappy job of this. You really want to inflict another eighteen years on me?"
Ray: "It might assuage my guilt at murdering my dad, in the long term, and definitely shut you up in the immediate. Win-win."
Abby: "A Band-Aid baby won't do it, but I am open to discussing a house."
Ray: "I know, right? Southie Girl's got expensive taste."
Abby: "Seriously though, what is going on with you? You're pulling out all the stops but they're the weirdest stops."
Ray: "Going on with me? Since when."
Abby: "Since your dad showed up. He'll be at Fite Nite, rite? How's that going to go?"
Ray: "Perhaps he will be there. If he makes it, I promise not to shoot him."
Abby: "I believe none of this. But just promise me my kids won't get hurt in the crossfire."
Ray: "Yeah, last time caused me a lot of hassle. I promise not to expose them to what I am going to do."
Abby: "Then I don't really care what you're doing, at this point. I just want it over."
LINDA
Mickey: "It is weird, but nice, to see you."
Linda: "I need you to understand that what you did to me was heinous."
Mickey: "Honestly, I do understand that. I was fairly traumatized by it too."
Linda: "I can believe you that it was an accident that you almost raped me, but I'm not really interested in that, or your karma or whatever. I want to know what kind of a person I am that got myself into that situation."
Mickey: "I mean, it was a miscommunication. I consider myself a feminist."
Linda: "Lol. Actually I kind of think that's possible. In any case, this is about me. I am kind of suspicious about my motives there, and I think it's maybe possible that I asked for it in some way. I recognize that I have a shadow side and possibly I was using you to do something dark."
Mickey: "I think about the same thing a lot. We have that in common, the very dark shadow. I just have the privilege of it never being about blaming myself for violations like we're talking about."
Linda: "I've gone to some very bad places in my life, trying to be brave."
Mickey: "Yeah, I hear you."
He reiterates that he really was trying to follow her lead, and she lets herself consider the situation from that perspective. They laugh, but it's tentative -- not guffawing, or anything, just a sort of embarrassed and awkward Missed Connections-type of weirdness. It's funny to see her back, honestly, since the story itself was pretty baldly told in the first place. I liked it, and I appreciate the ambition of having her play out this conversation with him in this way.
EN ROUTE
Ray gives Abby and Bridget some priceless Tiffany diamond earrings in the car, I guess because he's still at a loss about how to connect with them, and we finally get to talk about Daryll and why today is special.
Conor: "How old were you when you started boxing?"
Ray: "I was wearing gloves before I could walk."
Conor: "Did you have a boxing name?"
Ray: "If I had my way, I'd have no name at all. You do your talking in the ring."
Bridget: "Come on, you must've had a nickname or two..."
Ray: "Nope. I was always just Mickey's Boy. Heir to the throne."
I don't know if anybody in the car can see exactly how important that is, but it's interesting enough that they all shut up. Ray seems determined to make tonight's whole shit show as Shakespearean as possible, doesn't he? And as Oedipal.
FITE CLUB
The Boys: "You're actually here? With your family? That's both exciting and confusing."
Ray: "I said we would come. I always follow through on my promises and validating support of you guys, not like some jerks I could mention."
Conor: "Where's Mickey?"
Ray: "Go introduce yourself to your uncle."
Conor: "Which one is he?"
Ray: "The one that's waving to us."
Conor: "All I see is a black guy."
Bridget: "Oh my God."
Conor: "I don't... Is he behind the black guy?"
Abby: "Honey, pull it together."
LINDA
And so just as Terry's pouring Ray a glass and they're worrying over Bunchy, as is their wont, Mickey smokes a post-coital roach back at his place, and whispers sweet nothings.
Mickey: "I'm surprised I could fuck you!"
Linda: "Oh my God we get it, Mick. On the other hand, my tits are real -- and my bony white ass was not quite the success-limiting factor you first imagined."
Mickey: "Life can be surprising. Hey, can we hang out? You seem like you're in a hurry."
Linda: "Okay, again: I only did this because it was the least nihilistic option."
She doesn't make it out the door, though: Gets grabbed as a hostage immediately, in Mickey's living room, and then Sully knocks old Mickey to the floor, bloodying up his face, before kidnapping them both. It's so crazy because you thought it would never happen, never actually come, but then also what could possibly happen after this?
FITE CLUB
Ray's stashing Ezra's bag of funds in the office when Terry's mood goes sour. He wants to give Ray money, as usual -- this time, part of the admissions -- and, denied, remembers that he's suspicious about Ray's motivations for this.
Terry: "But seriously why are you here? You never come to Fite Nite."
Ray: "Whatever, I'm here for Daryll or something. A good dad, a good brother. Speaking of bad dads who aren't here -- while I am, in front of witnesses -- where is Mickey?"
Terry: "He went off with some chick, I think? He'll come."
Ray: "Don't be too sure."
Terry: "Why, because you are having him murdered?"
Ray: "No, because he sucks and will never love you as much as I do."
Terry: "That's the thing, he's actually changed. Don't let your idea of him poison what we've all been building."
EN ROUTE
Mickey: "Is this because I screwed you on our robbery and gave the money to a lady?"
Sully: "Not really, but here is a n-bomb just to remind you that I'm horrible."
Mickey: "Well, what if I said it was because we have a son together? That's touching."
Sully: "Whatever. My mom would say that."
Mickey: "How is your mom? I always liked that old bitch."
Sully: "Yeah, she's cool."
Mickey: "What a blessing that she's still with us!"
Sully: "This is the least manipulative manipulation you have ever tried on a person."
Mickey: "Valid. I feel kind of obsequious for doing it. How did you find me?"
Sully: "I didn't. Ray brought me in."
Mickey: "That hurts my feelings! On the inside secret cupboard where men's feelings go, I mean."
FITE CLUB
Ray: "You and Daryll seem friendly."
Abby: "Yeah, we were dropping off your dad after our day out shoppi... I mean, I met him before, no big deal."
Daryll: "Ray, can I talk to you about feelings and shit?"
Ray: "You may not."
Daryll: "I worry that you resent me for existing, like that's why Mickey left your quote 'moms.'"
Ray: "This is just my face, Daryll. Don't overthink it."
Daryll: "Then why did Avi beat me up?"
Ray: "You know why. You were doing crimes with Mickey and I needed to send him a message. The important thing is that after tonight, you become another one of my many responsibilities. So here's some boxing advice that makes it seem like I give a shit about you."
Abby: "Ray the Rocket."
Ray: "What now?"
Abby: "You did have a nickname, once. That's what me and the girls used to call you."
Ray: "That's cute. Why are you telling me this?"
Abby: "Because hating your father is not an identity. If you can't be contained by being a husband, or being a father, or being a brother -- if all those things are poisoned, or even just too small to hold you -- then come back with me to where I spend most of my time: In a romanticized, Dire Straits, a historical version of our love story."
SULLY
They march Mickey and Linda to the grave site. Linda, well, home girl is not doing well with all of this stuff. And worst of all, this dark place has nothing to do with her bravery. You want, just because she has this idea about herself, you kind of want her to try something stupid and die that way, bravely. But as it is she doesn't even get to enjoy being suddenly part of the gangster movie she's wanted to fuck out of him since day one.
Which I guess is the point, on the LA meta-level of this show: she turned him into a doll and got burned, once with the blowjob and now again, when she was almost out of the story altogether. Maybe she was right after all, and everything that has happened since she left the spa with him that day has been one long descent into the dark places.
Sully: "One thing that I am holding onto, among a litany of things I am angry about, is how you ratted out my whole family in the process of stealing our stolen money."
Mickey: "I know you're gonna say it's my fault your brother got AIDS and died in jail, but I want to remind you that we all technically knew he was having unprotected sex with men long before I ratted you all out."
Sully: "Yeah, I walked in on him once with a guy and I didn't know what the fuck they were doing. Scared the shit out of me."
Mickey: "It is confusing. True."
Mickey: "Uh, I'm still working for the FBI?"
Sully: "Duh. Also, not a compelling reason to let you live."
Mickey: "I am part of an FBI sting to bring down Ray and Ezra Goodman for setting me up..."
Sully: "For what?"
Mickey: "I am not going to tell you that right away because it might make you jumpy."
Sully: "Whatever, why are we talking about this?"
Mickey: "He knows the Feds are watching him. Maybe this is another twist, to get all of us out of the game including you."
Which sounds like BS to Sully, and really I guess period, but the supreme irony is that even with all of his co-conspirators and paid-off authority figures, Ray still doesn't know the details about Sean, Van Miller, Van's death, or any of that. So he was bringing in Sully at the exact time the problem was solving itself, so now there's at least one more problem to solve. I mean, I can see him setting Sully up in some kind of trap -- maybe one not unlike this one -- but only if he thought Sully was going to turn, because he stands by his word. Unlike some jerks.
FITE CLUB
Eddie sidles up to Ray, ready for that bag of cancer cash he's got locked in Terry's office.
Ray: "Why are you here? I was going to bring it to you."
Eddie: "He'll text when it's done. Or he'll text that it's done, regardless of whether or not he has a last-minute change of heart. Then I will take the money and run."
Ray: "Whatever. Sully's pretty paranoid for a guy who has lived under a rock forever."
Bunchy: "[Blubbering; darkness.]"
Ray: "Oh, hell. Bunchy, what is wrong now?"
Bunchy: "I wish Dad was here. He's always so horrible to me when I need it least."
Ray: "Well, the thing is that he doesn't care about us. Like even if he just dropped dead or something, would you really notice? I think not."
Bunchy: "I'm the youngest so I don't remember much of it. I remember him being awesome."
Ray: "Uh, no. And apparently you don't remember Terry and I raising you and Bridget pretty much from childhood on, while Mom was dying on us and he was across town with Claudette."
Bunchy: "To be fair, I don't remember a lot of things from that time period. And when I do, it's kind of erratic."
Ray: "You and me both, buddy. At least you have a legit reason."
SULLY
Sully: "Miss Linda? On your knees, please."
Mickey: "This is so tacky. You kill women for passion, not business. It's chivalry."
Linda: "Sully, would you like a great deal of money from my ex-husband?"
Sully: "Like how much? Like a hundred thou?"
Linda: "...Uh, sure, Doctor Evil. Aim for the stars."
Sully: "Okay, go for it."
Tiny: "She's a witness?"
Sully: "I know, but watch this sick shit."
He comforts her, calls her honey a bunch more times, sends her down the hill to the car -- "Now sweetheart, do you know the way? All right" -- and then blows her head clean off as she's gratefully hopping back down the hill, mountain-goat style. Mickey is aghast!
...That they're going to throw his dead body in the same grave as her!
Mickey: "Come on, Sully. I hardly knew the broad! I fucked her for the first time today!"
Sully: "Valid. Tiny, dig a second grave."
Dude's got a lot of weird rules for this situation. Is Southie really such a Dystopian society that you have these like, agreed-upon, Regency Era social rules like this?
"A gentleman only ever murders a woman for reasons of sexual jealousy or lost temper. Never over a business matter. Strangulation is the preferred method for unsanctioned long-distance telephone use, while a gunshot to the back of the head during doggy-style intercourse -- otherwise known as the 'Donkey Splat' -- is a must during cocaine-fueled orgies."
"Make your guests' corpses feel at home in their unmarked graves! Only pair up people who have been fucking for at least two weeks. Anything less would be uncivilized!"
FITE CLUB
Conor: "I have trouble recognizing danger signs. Let's chat, Uncle Bunchy!"
Bunchy: "You are lucky your father is a better man than I am."
Conor: "Is he really that tough? He seems far more mannered and genteel than the rest of you."
Bunchy: "The rumor was always that he was going to end up tougher than Mickey."
Conor: "Really pounding home this whole Heir to the Throne thing, huh?"
Bunchy: "I think Daryll's Donovan-ness will make him plenty tough. Me, I'm the worst."
Conor: "You have the biggest most wonderful body, though. So cuddly!"
Bunchy: "It contains a frightened child. Speaking of frightened children, do you mind if I get right the fuck up in your face with my whiskey breath and yell at you some incomprehensible shit about how I got molested and you should never get molested?"
"I feel like part of our family's problem is being unable to uncouple our ideas of personal power, and self-respect, from certain outdated gender norms. You think you're weak because you're not a man, and that you're not a man because somebody interfered with your development, but the truth is that you have it backwards. You're not weak, you're just stuck. You're not less of a man because you got messed with, you're less of a man because you're still a child. You're not less powerful or weaker than your brothers, you just got swindled out of an easier way to get there. You got robbed."
Bunchy: "Just don't get raped."
Conor: "Every time one of you tells me that, another angel gets it in the ass."
SULLY
Mickey: "Okay, so murdering me was really Ray's idea? That's for real?"
Sully: "Both. He didn't want your grandkids to see your body on the news, and he knows I'm great at murdering."
Tiny: "I am fucking tired. Let him dig his own grave."
Mickey: "I do appreciate the extra grave. Hey, remember that one guy we murdered that time?"
Sully: "Saul fuckin' Hardy! What a dick."
Mickey: "Stray dogs got to him, remember?"
Sully: "They found some kids in Dorchester playing stickball with his femur."
Mickey: "God those were some good times."
Okay, I'm being serious now: Is Boston a real place?
FITE CLUB
Bridget: "When the girl brings the card around to say what round it is, she is mostly tits. You can't even see her face."
Abby: "It is part and parcel of boxing, a sport that says the worst things about us all. But I wouldn't worry about it. You have achieved peak bitterness so early in life I doubt very much anybody will ever want to degrade or objectify you."
Bridget: "Thanks! That's actually excellent news."
Abby: "Hey Ray, who's that old dude?"
Ray: "Eddie? Don't worry about it."
Abby: "So what you're saying is, insert myself into this situation as intensely as possible."
(Boxing. Daryll begging for Mickey so hard it takes Potato Pie, Terry and the crowd-glowering Ray just to equal one magic feather.)
Abby: "Hi, I'm Abby Donovan!"
Eddie: "Sure."
Abby: "Good fight, huh?"
Eddie: "Whatever."
Abby: "How do you know Ray?"
Eddie: "From around."
Abby: "You from Southie? You a friend of Mick's?"
Eddie wanders away without so much as answering the question! (No, for the record, is the answer.)
SULLY
Sully: "It's been great catching up, Mick, but I really need to just kill you now."
Mickey: "Can I just ask why my son would hire an old friend to murder me?"
Sully: "I would assume it's because he is so wounded from childhood that he thinks removing you from the equation is the only way he'll ever be happy, but who knows. I do think it's important to note that I am not doing this for money, or a ticket out of the country. I would do it for free."
Mickey: "That's hurtful. Care to elaborate?"
Sully: "Besides the embezzling and the death of my entire family? Actually it was Colleen Dawson, Ray's old girlfriend that you shot in the head."
Mickey: "Oh my God, why is it always Colleen with everybody?"
Sully: "Like everyone else on earth, I was very in love with her. That's why I was so deferential to her memory back in Boston."
Mickey: "Then this is ten times stupider, because I didn't kill her. I can't believe I'm getting screwed yet again on this girl."
Tiny: "Don't ask don't ask don't ask..."
Sully: "Tell us more about how you didn't kill Colleen, please. Also, who did?"
Mickey: "Well, it's actually a very funny story. It all started on a film set, back in Boston in the '90s..."
FITE CLUB
In private, Ray does his TKO move of grinding on Abby while telling her who she is and what she wants -- "You don't want a house in Trousdale. You're Abby Kelly, from Mercer Street. And you just wanna get fucked" -- and as usual, he is right on the money... Until she remembers what is going on.
Abby: "What are you doing? Where's Mick? I am not stupid. A bag of money plus an unsavory, rude character from Southie?"
Ray: "I'm really sorry. I am so fucking sorry and so fucking drunk..."
Abby: "Uh, look at me. Abby Donovan, looking you in the face. Stop crying and face me. Your wife. Do not ruin it."
Don't let Mickey poison this.
Eddie: "Okay, Sully just called."
Ray: "It's done?"
Eddie: "He's done, anyway. Give me the money. And cheer up!"
Ray: "I don't actually have to be happy about my dead father."
The walk to get the money -- past his family, past Abby -- is a very long one. But for once, he's not the one making the decision, he's no longer the threat or the poison, he's a hero: The deed has been done. He doesn't have to think about it anymore. It's a long walk but he feels like a rocket.
SEAN WALKER
Sean is watching cartoons with his baby in his lap when Mickey appears on the CCTV, begging to come in. He is hopping around with excitement about his latest inspiration. Sean whines and the baby gurgles up at him: his "Me Time". But part of their deal is about making sure Mickey's happy. He is afraid of Mickey, and so he lets him in.
A little bit later, Mickey shows him the new ending of their movie: The action star's daughter becomes an orphan. Justice is served. Colleen is avenged.
And the sequel is this: two of the scariest criminals in the world have come from Boston to LA, and have no allegiance to anyone. They have incredible funds, nothing to lose, and a few people left who have hurt them.
FITE CLUB
Daryll is quaking backstage, unable to go on. Pie yells at him -- "It's not the same, Pie! You don't even like me!" -- and Terry yells at him, and through it all they don't equal Mickey.
Ray: "...Fuck Mick. You don't need him. Are you a Donovan or not? Because get used to that prick letting you down. You get off your ass, and go show those fucking people who you are."
For a coronation speech, it's fitting. But it's not just the boys who need reminding: He needs reasons, now, to be stone. Until the dust settles, and he can mourn, he must be electric.
But outside, just as Daryll's finally pumped, there's a Gossip Girl-style news blast where everybody (and maybe, I mean, this is LA) gets the news on their phones at the same time: Sean Walker, America's beloved aging action hottie, has been gunned down at his home in Bel Air. Ray freezes, trying to do the math on that one -- Has Sully gone rogue? Did Mickey never make his appointment? Was Ruth's money just stolen? -- and then hears a voice behind him that nearly drops him to his knees.
"Shame about Sean Walker. Hear there's a lunatic on the loose!"
Ray: "What did you do?"
Mick: "What did you do? Raymond, what did you do? Did you know Sully was fucking your little girlfriend Colleen behind your back? He found out who killed her. And he knows who covered it up. I'd watch your back, kid..."
Ray runs, like a rocket. Like a scared little boy, waiting for the blow.
Abby stops him in the stairwell, asking what happened -- asking what he's done now -- and Ray flips on her.
Ray: "Why don't you trust me? Huh? I'm your goddamn husband! Why are you always taking his side?"
Abby: "First of all, nobody is ever always anything. That's a sign that you're projecting some serious stuff, when you universalize like that. You're making me part of the problem, an outside element adding to your misery. But second of all, you're being crazy. You are wrong about Mickey Donovan."
Ray: "That's so bullshitty that you would condescend to tell me about a man I know and you don't."
Abby: "We've been pen pals since the kids were born, Ray. I've been writing to him... I know him better than maybe anybody does, at this point. Me and Daryll. And we love him. I sent him money, I sent him the kids' pictures. I was the one that invited him to LA in the first place, Ray. I told him we could make a family here."
Ray: "Good move, asshole. You have no idea what you've done."
BUNCHY
Bunchy's walking a rail, up above the city. Drunk, and high, and fucked up and lonely. He cut off her pigtails, afraid of Daddy loving her too much. He put the gloves on Daryll himself, when Bunchy was falling apart. They made such a smell, and Mom never figured it out. But where she ended up?
He's not pregnant, but he's ruined just the same.
FITE NITE
Mickey: "Abby, me darlin'!"
Abby: "Don't even try, Mickey."
The Boys: "Why do you look like hell?"
Mickey: "I am always getting into scrapes! Don't worry about it."
Daryll: "Now I just know I can win at boxing!"
Mickey: "You're a fucking Donovan, boy. Do me proud!"
RAY DONOVAN
As he's driving to the motel, and Bunchy's wavering on the roof -- and thanks to Dad, Daryll's winning his first match -- Ray steps back from the throne, and calls Ezra.
Ezra: "What happened, Raymond."
Ray: "Sully. And Mickey's still alive. And Ruth's money is gone."
Ezra: "How are we gonna fix this?"
He doesn't know. The motel room is cashed, empty, a mess. The men are gone. All that's left is Sean Walker's daughter, giggling alone on the bed. She's looking up at him, both sweetly and friendly. It's not a son but it's something.
WEEK
With Sully in the shadows and Mickey on the loose, Ray scrambles to protect his family, while the Fite Club goes into crisis mode and the cops start their high-profile murder investigation. Two episodes left. What do you think will happen? I think Ray will do something awesome, but I can't figure out what it will be.
JACOB CLIFTON is a freelance writer and critic based in Austin, Texas. He currently recaps The Good Wife, Homeland, Hostages, Ravenswood, and Masters Of Sex for TWoP. Jacob can be found online at jacobclifton.com, Twitter, and Facebook, as well as a regular column for Tor.com, Geek Love.