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Maxine reveals to Barbie her nefarious goings-on: All of a sudden at the cement factory there is a black market with a little fight-club action going on, where people barter away their batteries and salt for booze and eggs and a little piece of the action, of guys bare-knuckling each other while the occasionally upstanding members of Chester's Mill place bets.
Seriously, this has sprung up in just a couple of days and is packed, but none of the main cast know anything about it, even the people like Linda and Junior, whose job it is to know. When Junior catches wind of it, he hilariously undertakes an ill-conceived undercover mission and is soundly rebuffed because the bouncer knows who he is and knows he's a cop, after all (what with there being only a couple hundred people in Chester's Mill, three-quarters of whom are letting their bets ride on some buff dude with the eye of the tiger).
But Maxine didn't bring Barbie here just to boast; she wants him to fight, against some guy he collected from once. Since she's holding over his head the Julia-boner-killer revelation that Barbie killed Dr. Shumway, Barbie fights, but he throws the fight. Except Maxine knew he'd try to screw her (figuratively), so she bet against Barbie, even though she's the house and doesn't really need to do that.
Meanwhile, Big Jim goes out in search of Maxine's insurance policy, which leads him to a house on an island owned by Maxine's legitimate real-estate company. There he finds Mare Winningham, who we learn in short order is Maxine's mother, and the two of them have a grudge against Chester's Mill for ostracizing Mare (named Agatha at first, but is actually Claire) when she became pregnant at 16 with Maxine. Big Jim quickly realizes that Claire — with her knowledge of every detail of Maxine's dealings — is the insurance policy, and he kidnaps her to bring her back to the mainland. Her ill-advised escape attempt involves her jumping into the water, hands bound and all, from his boat. Big Jim realizes that letting her drown would solve the problem he has, and he leaves her screaming in the water. But come on, you're not bringing in Mare Winningham and then leave her to die but not actually see her to die. She's still alive and she'll be back.
Linda and Julia keep digging into the Rapture thing, with Linda discovering that yes, Duke was a part of it, but his part was to be involved so that Maxine would keep Rapture and all other drugs out of Chester's Mill. That raises the question of why people in Chester's Mill are suddenly going crazy for the shit, but whatever. And their investigation takes them to the safe-deposit room of a local bank, where Julia finds her husband's insurance policy…
…so that when Barbie comes home from Fight Club and confesses — presumably to negate the power Maxine has over him — to killing her husband, she's already figured it out, due to the absence of her husband's gun, but no bullets. She's already figured it out: her husband provoked Barbie into killing him so she'd clean up on insurance. Too bad the local economy is salt-based after a goddamn week.
Oh, and Junior is the fourth hand. Because of course he is.
Daniel is a writer in Newfoundland with a wife and a daughter. First Rob Lowe is really mean to Mare Winningham, and now this. Follow him on Twitter (@DanMacEachern) or email him at danieljdaniel@gmail.com.
Want more? The full recap starts right below!The Seizure Triplets are sleeping in the barn around the mini-dome, oblivious to the caterpillar crawling around on it (or in it, as it turns out), until Norrie wakes up and notices, with approval, that Joe has tethered their wrists together to prevent him from sleepwalking. She’s almost too freaked out when she sees the caterpillar (given the dome comes with a hefty helping of forest dirt) but wakes the other two to show them. It’s Joe who points out that the caterpillar is the kind that turns into a monarch butterfly, and we remember that Julia is the one who heard "the monarch will be crowned." His resolve to not tell anyone else about where the mini-dome is doesn’t even last a day, because he wants to bring Julia in on it, figuring she’s the fourth hand. The girls are more skeptical, given that Julia hasn’t had any seizures -- Note: not that they know about -- so they decide to just go around finding out who’s been having seizures, I guess. (After they all put their hands on the dome for the cool little light show).
So off they go… only Dodie is apparently watching them and she immediately goes into the barn after they leave and pulls the blanket off the suspiciously dome-shaped object in the middle of the barn. (And it’s not like those stupid kids even came up with a blanket that covered the whole damn thing anyway).
Speaking of Julia, she’s coming downstairs in her home to find a note, presumably from Barbie, that says "BACK LATER" and weighted down with a coffee cup so it doesn’t blow around from the gale force kitchen winds.
Barbie has gone over to Big Jim’s place to talk about Max. "Sounds like someone’s not too happy to see her yesterday," says Jim, who admits that Maxine is "a piece of work." They dance around finding out how each other knows her, but neither is talking. They do agree, though, that something needs to be done, but they need to get rid of her supposed insurance policy first. As to where it would be, Barbie thinks Maxine’s too smart to keep it at the house she’s staying at, and Big Jim tells him about the legitimate real-estate company she’s got, the Osiris Corporation, which has a few houses in Chester’s Mill. Big Jim decides to mosey over to the town clerk’s office, where they’ll have records of which houses they are, but Barbie doesn’t trust him to go alone, figuring Big Jim will just bury his own secrets. "You think I’d screw you over?" says Big Jim. "You’re a used-car salesman, Jim," says Barbie. Big Jim doesn’t react with anger to the insult or point out that Barbie isn’t exactly Captain Ethics 2013, but says Barbie can come along.
At the clerk’s office, they find a dozen houses bought by the Osiris company, but most of them were renovated and flipped, except for one out on Bird Island, a nice little spot for vacation homes, and wouldn’t be bad for hiding. And then Max walks in, breezily asking if she should be "worried" about their little powwow. Big Jim points out that there’s town business that has nothing to do with her, although Barbie looks more than a little shady with the way he hastily stashes the documents they were looking at.
Anyway, Max has a shopping list for Big Jim -- espresso, dark chocolate and silk-infused conditioner. Are those three separate things or is hair care even much more fucking nuts than usual in Chester’s Mill? "I’m not doing your shopping," says Barbie, but Max doesn’t want that anyway; the list is for Big Jim (or "Jimmy," as she calls him), and she’s got other work for Barbie to do. When the men hesitate, Max suggests she can just reveal all their dirty laundry instead, so they reluctantly start moving their asses.
Over in the barn, Dodie is taking video of the dome, and then decides to put her hand on it. Her palm glows blue for a moment, and then she’s zapped backwards. I guess the moron triplets weren’t so far away yet that they didn’t hear it, because they come rushing in to find Dodie unconscious on the ground, some sort of burn on her palm.
After the commercial break, the three of them are wheeling a groggy Dodie through the hospital, where we quickly learn that Dodie doesn’t remember the dome at all. "I remember… electricity," says Dodie, who asks if something happened with the generator outside the radio station. The idiots seize on that convenient explanation and tell her that yes, yes she did zap herself on the generator, that’s the ticket. I realize Dodie’s all groggy but maybe the three idiots could at least stop making furtive glances at each other. Then a nurse arrives to actual look after Dodie’s best interests, and Angie decides to ask the nurse if anyone has been having seizures lately, because that’s information a nurse is going to give at any time, but especially when she’s got an actually injured person to look after. "Not since your tenth-grade dance, Angie," she says, and wheels Dodie away. Angie goes running off down the hall, ignoring Joe and Norrie wondering just what the hell that means.
Julia strolls into the empty town hall and into Duke’s old office (as we see that Mare Winningham is a name in the credits and we haven’t seen her before, so let’s just keep adding characters). Linda’s there, looking through files. She tells Julia she hasn’t seen Barbie, but Julia is remembering to have the curiosity of a reporter this week so she asks Linda what’s up. Linda, like all cops everywhere, is only too happy to blabber her unproven suspicions of her hero/father figure Duke to the town’s only journalist, and shows Julia the video of Duke pulling up at the propane warehouse where a mysterious woman (Maxine) gives him money, and Linda explains to Julia about the propane-based Rapture. She thinks Coggins burned down Duke’s house to destroy evidence, but is looking for anything else. She contrivedly says the only things Duke cared about was fly-fishing, bourbon and his hat, and then eliminates fly-fishing and bourbon but his hat is over on the hat rack so she takes it off and finds a key tucked inside. Fortunately, Julia has one that looks just like it, so she knows it’s for a safe deposit box and the Bank of Chester’s Mill, which is probably useless when it comes to using a debit card anywhere else. "I’ll drive," says Linda, because sure, bring the reporter along while you investigate drug rumors about your dead hero/father/boss.
Elsewhere, Big Jim is out on the water in a boat, presumably heading to Bird Island…
…and Junior is driving around looking for people to harass. He gets his wish when someone walking along starts high-stepping it when he sees Junior’s car. He eventually chases him down, throws him on the hood of his car and finds out that he shoplifted a canister of salt from the convenience store. Junior’s puzzled about it, so the thief happily explains: "You kiddin'? Better than cash if you want to get into the cement factory."
The cement factory is where Maxine and Barbie pull up, as Maxine warns him about collaborating with Big Jim since you can’t trust him. Barbie’s all, like I can trust you? And Maxine looks genuinely offended as she says she’s never lied to him.
They get out of the car -- Max’s door is opened by some thug -- and the cement factory is goddamn busier than Hamsterdam in The Wire all of a sudden, because Maxine is offering "adult entertainment," and she takes offense to the "brothel" part of Barbie’s sneer that she’s offering her "usual booze, cards, brothels," and she snaps that she doesn’t deal in prostitution. (Which kinda makes Barbie’s use of the word "usual" strange, but it’s also weird that he’d act all superior to Maxine’s dealings, considering how he works for her collecting her money.)
Anyway, inside, we see this black market that deals in… salt? I guess? With some bare-knuckle Fight Club action going on. "Welcome to my brave new world," Maxine tells an uncomfortable Barbie, as he looks around at this implausible scene that has sprung up in, like, a day. Seriously, now that Breaking Bad is back, Dean Norris’s surroundings here are suffering from conspicuous comparison.
Speaking of Hank, Big Jim arrives on Bird Island and docks at the pier for the absolute mansion powered by a couple of generators. Is this the same lake contaminated with methane? And there's just this giant house on it undisturbed by the looting and rioting, despite being well within the parameters of the dome and easily accessible by boat? Could the writers maybe have made a map of what actually is under the dome and work within those parameters rather than just pulling shit out of the air whenever necessary? He makes sure his gun is easily accessible and starts walking the grounds, where he finds Mare Winningham tending to some plants. She recognizes him from his car commercials, which she likes, because he doesn’t "scream from the TV like the rest of them." She happily introduces herself as "Agatha," the caretaker for the place. Not for any Maxine, but for Oliver Loughlin, who’s on the other side of the island, tending to his boat. He explains about being a councilman and says he’s checking up on residents in this time of crisis. She admits to being relieved to be here in the peace and quiet. Let’s go inside for some tea, shall we?
Over at the Thunderdome, Maxine is bragging about how eventually she’ll have the whole town here and some of the people now working here owe her from before. (And Barbie should recognize some of them from his collection duties.) So say someone comes in because they need eggs, and they've got batteries. They bet. If they win, they trade up. If not, Max wins. Barbie points out that people are already bartering around town, and Max says, "Yeah, that's for needs. In here, it's about vices." Of course, that's right after her example of someone coming in because they need eggs, that damnable vice. "You realize survival’s at stake," says Barbie, and Max is all, "Duh! Mine!" She says if she’s going to be trapped in "this hellhole" she might as well live as well as she can.
Elsewhere, Angie is still stomping around town with Norrie and Joe trailing her, urging her to level with them about what’s up. "I think Junior is the fourth hand," she says, surprising Joe and Norrie and absolutely no one else. She explains that Junior had a seizure at the tenth-grade dance. Joe thinks it can’t be Junior. His reasoning? "That guy weirds me out." Angie angrily asks if they think she’s happy about this, "after what he did to [her]," but of course she hasn’t revealed that to them, so Joe is all, "What does that mean?"
So she asks if she remembers how Joe couldn’t find her after the dome came down. You mean a few days ago? And when Joe wasn’t actually, you know, looking? Yeah, he remembers.
She fills them in on the kidnapping, and I’m not sure if I’ve ever seen anything as hilarious as Joe attempting to depict "filled with rage." He threatens to kill Junior, and Angie is all, "No, I’ll do it," and then Norrie shuts them up by saying, "…if he’s the fourth hand?" So the McAllister siblings manage to simmer their raging asses down. Norrie asks Angie if she’s sure about Junior’s seizure. She is, but there’s more: "I have to show you something," she says, and then she takes off, Joe and Norrie following. Or, since there’s probably at least a little urgency, you could just tell them right now?
Julia and Linda are over at the bank, which was apparently abandoned immediately by people when the dome came down, leaving money just lying around all over the place because they instantly knew that money was going to be no good. Meanwhile, other stores continued operating, and like YESTERDAY Angie was talking about keeping the Sweetbriar Rose going, and yet nobody at all thought, "Well, maybe I’ll just take some of these bundles of cash just lying around in case?" But Julia and Linda are already all, "Hey, remember money?" and Julia makes it all about her and says, "To think it was money that ruined my marriage and forced my husband to run off." Yeah, it was the money and not your husband or anything. While Linda actually looks for what they’re there for, Julia blathers on about how she knew deep down that something was wrong, but didn’t want to see it. Then they find the safe deposit room, and Linda needs to bust open the locked door with a fire extinguisher.
Then, in an absolutely glorious scene, Junior attempts to go undercover at the cement factory by taking off his cop clothes and walking up with a can of salt… but then pretending at first not to know what’s going on. The bouncer tells "Big Junior Rennie" to beat it, but Junior won’t and gets punched in the face for his trouble. And his salt stolen to boot! Hey, that salt is a week’s pay for a deputy in the new economy!
Over in Thunderdome, we watch an absolutely brutal brawl between a couple of extras that ends when one man doesn’t get up. Barbie looks either disgusted or constipated. Maxine gloats to him about everybody has fun and collects their winnings, and she skims a little off the top. Barbie wants to know what she needs him for and she tells us that while she was, you know, hiding out to avoid being seen but also setting up this whole thing over the past few days, all she kept hearing over and over again is, "That Barbie is a real badass." Barbie’s the main event. He protests, of course, so Max has to be all, "Remember, though? Remember how you killed Peter Shumway? And remember that I know that and I told you I would tell his wife -- who you’re currently banging -- and that she wouldn’t like that? We discussed all this. About how much your banging buddy wouldn’t like to hear about how you killed her husband. So to sum up: If you don’t do what I say, I will explain to Julia that you killed her husband, and she will be very cross with you." Then she tells Barbie to think of it as a reunion with Victor Rawlins, who "gambled his life down the drain" a couple of months ago, and Barbie was on collection duty. Remember, Barbie? Remember this guy who you already know about, because you collected for me? So you already know about him? Like you know that I know that you killed Peter Shumway, but I also know that Julia doesn’t know that and I know you don’t want her to know? Remember? Rawlins lost everything and would probably like some revenge, although this time Barbie doesn’t have a gun.
Over at Midlake Mansion, Big Jim is loudly rummaging through drawers and cupboards in the living room while Agatha takes hours to prepare tea in the kitchen, which sounds to be about a quarter-mile away. He does find a picture of a younger Agatha with a young woman. I don’t know if we’re supposed to recognize it as a young Max, but it doesn’t matter because the thing we know, Agatha’s got a gun on him, telling us that’s her daughter, Maxine, and ordering him to lose the gun he’s got tucked into his pants. When he’s slow to react, she fires a bullet into a nearby lamp. "Maxine didn’t learn to be the way she is from her father," says Agatha.
Back in Thunderdome, Maxine asks the crowd if they’re ready for the main event. Judging from the cheering, they are. Maxine introduces Victor and "Special Forces veteran" Barbie. "The rules are simple -- there aren’t any. There’s no rounds, no time limits. You fight ‘til you lose." As Barbie prepares to enter, she whispers, "Disappoint me at your own risk."
Then Barbie the Idiot falls for Victor’s faux-friendly fist-bump opening gambit and gets clocked in the face with a solid right. He goes down hard, and Victor preens for the crowd, at least until Barbie recovers well enough to wrap his legs around Victor’s and bring him down, and the fight is on.
At Midlake Manor, Agatha and Big Jim sit down in the living room. Agatha says Maxine will be back after sundown or "maybe tamarrah" and Big Jim grumbles that that’s a long time to hold a gun on a person. Agatha says she hopes she doesn’t get drowsy and accidentally pull the trigger.
But it’s boring story time! "You don’t remember me, do you?" asks Agatha. She tells Big Jim they were in the same high school, when she was called "Claire," until she dropped out due to the scandal of getting pregnant (with Maxine) at 16. People treated her like a pariah, like her life was over. She couldn’t support herself, "Except by starting to let men in my bed. Men who would turn around and publicly shame me for being the immoral one." Big Jim notes she stuck around. "Far enough away to keep the stink out of our hair," snaps Agatha. Sure, all the way out to this lake that’s enclosed in the dome. Real far. She says she and Maxine will never forget the real Chester’s Mill: Sharp teeth behind the friendly smile. Big Jim weirdly says that the sharp teeth are the only way to get things done, like WHAT ARE YOU TALKING ABOUT, and I shouldn’t really get upset because it’s just a line contrived to lead Agatha into revealing that she knows all about Big Jim’s doings. Maxine tells her everything, all the evidence she needs. Big Jim manages, by pretending he knows Barbie’s secrets too, to wrangle out of her that Barbie breaks legs and killed Pete Shumway.
Then when Agatha starts in with Chester’s Mill being a magnet for the worst of humanity -- like Junior, who she says is turning out to be "just as crazy as his momma" -- Big Jim gets mad and starts making fun of her "sob story" and launches into that television and film cliché of telling someone with a gun on you that you don’t really think they could pull the trigger -- even on a rifle that somehow cocks itself without Agatha needing to do it. "Even with all that hate in your eyes, I’m not seeing what it takes to kill," says Big Jim, and when she blinks, he grabs the rifle, saying now they’re going to do something about her family.”
The Moron Triplets are at Junior’s mom’s studio, where Angie shows them the hilarious painting with the pink stars, and Norrie and Joe look suitably horrified at how Junior’s mom ever qualified as an art teacher. Joe is still threatening to throw a pissy hissy fit in Junior’s general direction, but Norrie is all, "It’s not what we want, but what the dome wants," and then in walks Junior and Joe "attacks" him and Junior quickly puts Joe in a headlock and he’s pissed at Angie because she wasn’t supposed to tell anyone about the kidnapping. True, but on the other hand IS THE ACTUAL KIDNAPPING, so I can’t say you’re exactly even, Junior. Angie tells him he’s got to help them, because they’re all connected to something amazing.
In Thunderdome, Barbie and Victor trade blows, until Barbie starts to get the upper hand and knocks Victor down. Max looks pleased and Barbie notices, and then starts goading Victor to get up: "No wonder your wife and kids left you!" This pisses Victor off enough to make him get up and he grabs Barbie, who quietly tells Victor to hit him as hard as he can. Victor obliges, delivering a thundering hit that sends Barbie sprawling. He’s not getting up. A suspicious-looking (implausibly so, given what we will soon learn) Maxine heads out onto the floor to declare Victor the winner and about half the crowd cheers while the others are booing.
"Guess the best man won," mutters Barbie, after getting to his feet. But Max knows he’s full of shit and tells him he threw the fight, just like she knew he would. He denies it, but she’s not buying it: "Everyone here bet on the hero and lost their asses," she says, adding that she bet on Victor, because she knows Barbie would do anything except let her win. Barbie stares at her, not denying it anymore. OK, two things: From the reaction of the crowd, clearly some of them bet on Victor. But let’s chalk that up to a show that can’t be arsed to worry about little things like "consistency" and "believability" and assume some of the extras were instructed to root for Barbie and the others to root for Victor -- who did Maxine bet with? She’s the casino. She’s the house. And if everyone did bet on Barbie, betting on Barbie is unnecessary because that’s what happened anyway?
Oh god, over at the bank Linda Law Enforcement actually says, "There it is. Duke’s safe-deposit box," just in case Julia or the audience has forgotten what the point of this is. She opens it up, and inside is a little toy sheriff’s star, which she gave to him after his heart surgery, joking that the doctors found it where his heart should have been.
There's also a letter, one that Linda can’t bring herself to read, so Julia does. It’s Duke’s confession, explaining that he did what he did because Chester’s Mill is the only place he could ever call home. Julia reads of Duke’s son, "swept away" by a drug addiction 19 years ago, and the only thing that kept him from eating his own gun was making a "deal with the devil," i.e. Maxine Seagrave. "That’s gotta be the woman in the video!" says Linda, all conclusion-jumping (although correct). The deal Duke looking the other way while supplying the propane, and for Maxine to keep her drugs -- and all drugs -- out of Chester’s Mill. That doesn’t really fit with the Maxine Seagrave Will Have Her Revenge on Chester’s Mill subplot being brewed up on Midlake Island, but OK. Duke also fingers Coggins and Big Jim as the other people in on it. Julia’s not surprised that Big Jim’s part of it, but Linda can’t believe Duke didn’t tell her. Can’t believe he wasn’t open about his involvement in a scheme that saw money paid to Chester’s Mill while supplying drugs everywhere else? Funny how he never mentioned it. Julia has a reason: "'Cause he loved you." And makes it about her again: "Probably the same reason Peter never told me."
Then Julia gets out a key and pulls a long, rectangular metal box out of a wall lined with them, but says nothing. What is that thing, Julia? I’m completely lost. Opening her own safe deposit box, she finds a life-insurance policy worth a million dollars. "I need to talk to Barbie," she says.
Elsewhere, Big Jim has put Agatha -- her hands tied -- on his boat and is heading back to the mainland. In response to her asking what he plans to do, he mutters something about the universe usually revealing the right course of action, and she gets mad about how he thinks the world is looking out for him, that someone behind the curtain is pulling strings. Working herself up, she for some goddamn reason stands up, the better to yell at him, and then winds up losing her balance and going into the water. And at first Big Jim is all, "Agatha!" and then pulls around so he can fish her out, but then he thinks better of it and drives off, leaving Agatha to drown on the assumption that she’s too dumb to realize she can just float on her back and kick her way over to the shore that’s like twenty fucking feet away. Sure, Mare "St. Elmo’s Fire" Winningham came in for half and episode and is being killed off. Sure, that’s what’s happening.
Over at Thunderdome, Maxine is being supremely annoying about how she won tonight and Jim helped her win, and she gets all turned on as she tends to his face wounds. She starts making out with him, until he gets disgusted and turns away. She starts talking about her weird pyramid barter scheme thing that’s going to make her dome-rich or whatever. Barbie wants to know what happens if she doesn’t get what she wants. "Then I’ll burn the place down," she says.
Barbie gets up to go do something he "should have done a long time ago," and Max says he’ll do what she tells him because, as she points out for like the eightieth time this episode, he killed Peter Shumway. He comes back to grab her arm, turning her on so much that he just walks away. "We’re finished, Max," he says.
Linda waits in the dark outside the Rennie place for Big Jim to show up. He’s surprised to see her, and when she says they need to talk he invites her in, offering to cook up some dinner. "Actually, let’s do this at the station," she says, stopping him short. They stare at each other and he says he’s had a hell of a day, so whatever it is, he’s earned enough respect here to let it wait for the morning. She tells him to come by first thing or she comes back, and this time the cuffs stay on her belt. So the point of this visit was just to warn him and/or give him the chance to, I don’t know, destroy evidence and/or kill you, Linda?
And Julia is waiting inside for Barbie. "I need to say something," he says. Julia makes this hilarious face like, "Oh God, what is it now?" Instead, she’s all, "Like why your face is all cut up?"
She goes and sits in the living room and Barbie tells her that what he said about Peter being a no-show at the cabin wasn’t true, and starts to explain about Peter pulling a gun on him, but she’s already figured it out. She shows Barbie the gun case she just pulled out of the closet, which is missing one gun, but all the bullets are there.
They look at each other for a moment and Barbie is all, "So, you know." She nods, and says she didn’t want to believe it. "He needed you to kill him," she says, showing Barbie the life-insurance policy. Barbie, looking at it, notes it would be void if he committed suicide. Yes! Like literally EVERY LIFE INSURANCE POLICY.
He says he’s sorry for everything, and she says she is too. Not in that passive-aggressive way the "me too" would normally apply, but she is actually sorry for Barbie, who has sacrificed so much for total strangers. "But in the future, there can be no more lies." Barbie’s all, "'In the future?'" And Julia’s all, "Yeah, we’re gonna keep bangin'. Why should I stop? I’m still not grieving for my husband who’s been gone a week and a half ago and who I just realized actually came up with a way to pay off his debts and set me up nicely?" All she wants is for him not to lie to her. "You sure?" he asks and she says, "Maybe." I have no idea if he’s asking if she’s sure about not wanting him to tell any more lies. It sounds like it, but that would be a super-stupid thing to say after finally coming clean about KILLING HER HUSBAND. Anyway, it’s great that this big secret that’s been held over Barbie and Julia all season turns out to not mean anything at all, because Julia is implausibly blasé about the whole thing, managing to be OK with both her husband and Barbie now that she knows Barbie killed her husband. But lie to her, Barbie, and you’re done!
Over at the barn, the Moron Quartet gather round the mini-dome. "Is that an egg?" asks Junior. Yes, Junior, it’s a giant solid-black egg. Norrie notes that the caterpillar is in a cocoon now, and Joe is all, "It’s actually a chrysalis," and somehow Norrie doesn’t kick him right in his annoying balls. Norrie, Joe and Angie all kneel down and put their hands on the dome, which starts its glowing, and the handprint lights up in front of Junior. "You think I’m supposed to be a part of this too?" he asks. No, shithead, they’re setting up a fantasy fucking football league, and that’s what they want you to be a part of once the three of them are done here.
He kneels down and tentatively puts his hand on the handprint that outlines his hand perfectly. He and Angie gasp, the pink lines on the egg start moving fast, and then the barn light goes out. It’s black for a moment and then zap! The pink starts start projecting and swirling around them, forming constellations, in the barn. "It’s beautiful," breathes Angie, and Junior says, "But what does it mean?" fittingly ending the episode on one more clunky note.
Daniel is a writer in Newfoundland with a wife and a daughter. He's said "Oh, come ON!" so many times to his television so far it's lost all meaning. Follow him on Twitter (@DanMacEachern) or email him at danieljdaniel@gmail.com.
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