Previously, Nancy spent the first half of Season 3 degrading herself in front of a traveling carnival of underworld lowlifes, including performing the infamous "brick dance" for Guillermo. Then U-Turn took Marvin for granted once too often and got himself killed, which you'd think would mean maybe Nancy won't be laying herself down and metaphorically (or literally) spreading her legs for anyone for much longer...right?
And, okay, I know the fact that I've waited until the hip-hop version of "Little Boxes" to say this might make me look bad, but: can we go back to the original theme song? The variations on the theme were cute before, but we seem to be slipping further and further down a rabbit hole here. Anyway...
U-Turn's funeral is the most ghetto-unfabulous thing you'll ever want to see. Oh, and his real first name is "Louis," not "Lewis" and I said last week. So U-Turn is laid out in a hot tub, with his Grandmama decked out in a couture mourning ensemble. Heylia remarks to Conrad from across the room that she reckons Grandmama's going to miss the gravy train U-Turn would apparently back up to her doorway. Nancy commiserates with Clinique and U-Turn's friend "Two Strikes" (and seriously, if Conrad and Heylia weren't currently holding things up as the moral center of the show right now, here's about where I would start feeling guilty for the cheap laughs at the ghetto jesters). Of note: Clinique bitches that she's "pregnant again" by "some Indian kid I mercy-fucked for U-Turn." Oh, Sanjay! The spirit wasn't willing, but it seems the body was able. Two Stikes reminisces about the good times with U-Turn, and Nancy shares that "he taught me how to drive by." Two Stikes looks at her like she's Honky Grandma Be Trippin'. Which she essentially is...or will be once Silas knocks Mary-Kate up (you know her family doesn't believe in abortion).
Sullivan meets with the Agrestic city council to try to sell them on a merger between Agrestic and Majestic. Celia fully backs this proposal (as you might expect), but Doug vehemently opposes it (ditto). The rest of the council members are with Doug, since he's told them all that Celia got a house out of Sullivan while they all presumably got crap like immersion blenders and automatic pool cleaners, and when Celia tries to speak, they all join Doug in coughing "whore" at her. Celia tells Sullivan that they can bypass the Council by putting the merger up for referendum. Ah, the referendum. Helping misinformed, small-minded communities make the wrong decision since 1897. After the meeting, Sullivan propositions Celia for some afternoon delight, but she keeps playing hard to get.
Back at the U-Turn funeral, Nancy and Conrad approach Marvin about the status of their debt, and just as I feared, Marvin doesn't intend to let Nancy off the hook simply because she was nice to him. He's got a hardass reputation to establish, though you can tell it's all a lot of talk. Conrad presses him about the Mexicans shooting him in the ass, lying that U-Turn told him about it. Nancy gives him a side-eye for that one, but she's no match for the facial expressions of Heylia, eavesdropping from about four feet into the background. Marvin claims he's not afraid of the Mexicans, and he plans to bring Nancy to their upcoming summit, since they won't want to shoot a white lady. Nah, they have the utmost respect for white ladies, particularly the ones who shake their asses for them. Nancy says she won't be going to any gang summits, which is how we know she will.
Majestic summer Bible school. Shane is joined in his misery by Isabelle, who had to come here instead of summer camp because the divorce has left Dean light in the bank account. Paul F. Tompkins is still teaching the class with the same murder-mystery assignments he was two weeks ago, but this time Shane has caught wise. "This is a case of betrayal..." PFT begins. "Judas did it!" Shane blurts. Hee. PFT puts down his mystery envelope and tries something else. PFT: "This is the strange case of the maaaaaad scientist..." Shane: "Big Bang's a lie and dinosaurs lived during the same time as man." PFT yells at Shane and says if he's so damn smart, maybe he should be teaching the class. So Shane stands up and presents a mystery of his own: "The school that receives federal funding, yet promotes a religious curriculum in direct violation of church/state separation mandates." PFT tells Shane to sit down, as an impressed Isabelle utters "Jesus Christ." Shane: "Exactly." Holy crap, if these two ever really set out to combine their efforts, I'm honestly afraid of the havoc they could wreak.
Conrad and Nancy meet in her car, tension still thick in the air between them. He's still pissed at her for fucking up the Armenian deal, and she's still pissed at him for allowing her to become U-Turn's indentured bitch. He admits-without-admitting that he was behind Marvin getting shot, the better to ignite a gang war that would kill everyone else and leave Conrad and Nancy freed from their debt. He seriously tells her not to go to the meeting with the Mexicans. Nancy thaws a bit at being able to talk to her friend again and apologizes for knocking over Conrad's plants.
At home, Shane won't stop bitching to his mom about the right-wing crazy school he has to attend, but I'm thinking once he gets to "pedagogy," his argument is already lost. Nancy enters the kitchen to find Silas and Tara, and Shane wastes no time in ratting them out for spending last night together. Nancy tells Silas she's not going to go through the whole mom-lets-son-have-sex-in-her-home thing; "Not after Megan and Quinn." Considering how oblivious Nancy can be, I have to give her credit for at least recognizing the pattern here. Tara, however, assures Nancy that she's a virgin: "I honor God with my abstinence, until the day I join my husband in marriage." Shane starts to freak that the fundies are everywhere, like he's in Invasion Of The Body-Snatchers, but Nancy's in a much more "making the crazy work for you" frame of mind, and she encourages Tara to "keep savin' it for the Lord!" Shane and Tara get into a "debate" on evolution, insofar as that "debate" can include the statement "that's why they call it the 'theory' of evolution, not the 'fact' of evolution." Perhaps realizing that all this talk of teen sex, virginity, and monkeys has gone on for about five minutes without somebody saying something truly disgusting, Nancy wonders where Andy could be.
Andy's on the set of a porno movie. Of course he is. This would be the catering job that Sullivan promised he'd get him last week. He enthuses over male star of the film, telling this "Lexington Steele" that he's a big fan. In fact, it was the Lexington-Steele-brand strap-on that Andy got reamed up the a-hole with back in Season 2. He says it was a little too effective, as it left him with some "oose-lay oopy-pay," as the Pig Latin would have it. Aaaaaaand that's enough of Andy for right now.
Over at Sullivan's office, he asks Nancy to head on over to his construction site with fake IDs and Social Security cards so she can "legalize" his crew of illegals. He realizes it's not the most "kosher" thing to do, but if Nancy won't do it he can always fire her and get someone else to do it. Nancy's all, "You have no idea how un-kosher I can be," in a tone of voice that would fill me with dread even if I hadn't seen the previews. She then switches gears and says she'll have to do it tomorrow, since she has an appointment later today: "it's a woman thing." Celia happens by with lunch for two, and she icily brushes Nancy off, which is bizarre considering how incredibly friendly she was to Nancy last week. Celia moves on to "overtly bitchy" as she suggests Sullivan send Nancy to collect the referendum signatures, since she has "scads of sales experience." I am not thrilled to admit that I have no idea where Celia is coming from this season, and it's not good ambiguity so much as inconsistent characterization, and that makes me sad. Sullivan squeezes Nancy's ass and tells her he'll be back later. Nancy barely suppresses an urge to dance for him.
Porno set. Andy has invited Doug (limping with a crutch after Celia dropped a paperweight on his toe in the earlier scene) and Dean over to observe the festivities. It gets a little more festive than the performers bargained for, however, when Lexington starts farting like crazy from all the hummus and tabbouleh that Andy's been feeding him. Farting porn stars, y'all.
Shane's at Christian school, where the other boys are threatening to beat him up if he won't submit to being saved. "Do you want to be damned for all eternity?" the lead boy asks. Shane: "No, I just want you to go to hell." That earns him a punch to the gut. Some pretty little Christian girls calls the boys off, and when Shane looks up at her, she's kind of being beatified by the sunlight. "Don't you want to be saved?" she asks him, and from the look on his face, he does now. She offers to teach him the word of God at lunchtime. I'm sure if it'll keep him off of his mother's ass about having to attend Christian school, Nancy's all for it. After the Jesus Crew leaves, Isabelle finds Shane still crumpled on the ground and asks what happened to him. "Amelia's going to save me," he says. Isabelle follows his gaze to the still-luminous Amelia...and gets that Sapphic look in her eye. Oh, no! Don't allow yourselves to be pitted against each other, Shane and Isabelle! Unite! Unite!
Mexican standoff. (...Sorry.) Nancy tells Marvin she's not sure this was a good idea, and Marvin nervously asks if she's second-guessing him, calling her "bitch" in the process, which was off-putting coming from U-Turn but just sad coming from Marvin. Marvin offers the Mexicans everything but the weed trade, but the Mexicans shove a gun in Marvin's mouth and demand -- after several lost-in-street-slang-translation moments with Nancy -- their heroin back. Turns out U-Turn never told Marvin about the trunk full o' smack he left with Nancy, which gives Nancy some leverage: Marvin frees her, Conrad, and Heylia from their debt, and she tells the Mexicans where they can find their heroin. Or else she can let them kill the now-crying Marvin. Nancy wins this round, but Guillermo very seriously tells her that he runs all the drug trade in this city now, and he'd better not catch any of them dealing anywhere. So Nancy's all, "Back to square one, then." And does Guillermo kiss Nancy on the mouth before she takes off? Of course he does. Girl's getting passed around like a joint.
Christian school. Shane approaches Amelia and says he missed her at lunch today -- is she still interested in teaching him the cute, cute teachings of the Lord? Amelia says that God sent her someone in even more dire need of some Christian learnin' -- Isabelle, the homosexual. Isabelle sidles up to Amelia and slings an arm over her shoulder before giving Shane the "later, small fry" eyebrows. As they walk off, Isabelle slides her hand down to Amelia's waist, but she's rebuffed. For now. I've yet to see Isabelle fail when she sets her mind on something.
Nancy's at the construction site, passing out fake identification. She spots Guillermo and his crew showing up to retrieve the heroin trunk from her car. Guillermo does a mini-version of Nancy's brick dance for her...amusement? As a threat? As foreplay? Probably all three, given the way this season's been going. And Nancy smiles at Guillermo's antics, of fucking course.
Sullivan's office. Nancy comes in from the pouring rain and tells her boss that his workers have been fake-legalized and his referendum has been signed. He points her to the bathroom, where there's a towel in case she wants to get out of her wet clothes. I'd let fly with an "inappropriate" right there if Nancy weren't busy stripping down to her underwear and climbing on top of Sullivan right now. Oh, Nancy, for Christ's sake! It's just from bad idea to worse with her, and she seems to be sleepwalking through all these bad decisions without giving them any thought at all. Just serving herself up on a platter for every disgusting man she encounters. She's been all downhill since she stopped going to Heylia's every day. Miss Heylia James would have certainly advised against this course of action, and probably cooked Nancy up a panini besides. Anyhoo, Nancy cautions Sullivan that the last two guys she got involved with ended up dead, before Sullivan starts going down on her with his gross little face.
Speaking of gross men in Nancy's life who ended up dead, we cut to a drainage ditch somewhere and we see that the body of one Agent Wonder Bread has floated to the surface. More good news! Who will Nancy fuck to get herself out of this one?