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Boyfriend long forgotten, Latrice won't stop banging on the bathroom door. Nancy gets her in a headlock, while outside the room the social services people are still trying to figure out why Andy peed on a baby. Silas shows up and curses the lady out with his mad ASL skillz, so they split. Well, it was a nice cliffhanger nonetheless.
Nancy heads off to make the eponymous exchange, Stevie for Shane, but instead of Stevie -- a baby -- she brings weaponry -- that crossbow they're always treating like a baby -- and shoots Cesar in the thigh. That part was awesome, as was the part where he tried to kill her with a skee-ball. She calls Cesar's wife, thinking that maybe her Lady Curse isn't in effect today, but of course Cesar's wife tells him to kill Nancy and come home for dinner, because women are the enemy.
Also men. Esteban refuses to talk to Nancy altogether, which it turns out bothers her almost as much as the various abductions of her kids, because he didn't even have the courtesy of asking to be released. He just released himself, and sent thugs.
Ignacio takes Shane and Doug to a Hungry Kuntry Buffet, where the latest in a parade of crazy-looking guest stars is also serving Silas, Andy and Stevie on the other side of the restaurant. Ignacio and Shane have a sort of silly competition to see who can eat the grossest things, because Shane's been looking for Ignacio's Pilar-approval the entire time, while Doug just zones out on how hungry he is.
The best part of all this is when Ignacio asks if Shane ever sees Pilar's face and Shane says, "Only when I jerk off." For some reason that was the most amazing part? Also, Nealon does a pretty good job with Doug's epiphany where he decides not to escape, because it would be abandoning Shane or whatever, considering what a fucking cartoon Doug is. Finally, Andy tries to start shit, but of course that pusses out immediately so then they are all hostages together.
Nancy shows up with Cesar's gun and there's a short standoff with Ignacio which only ends once Shane takes the gun from Nancy, impressing Ignacio with his very clear capability of shooting a man in a crowded restaurant without blinking. So apparently Shane's crazy is a resource now, of which I sort of approve. As Silas suggests, perhaps he will become one of those serial killers that only kills serial killers, serially.
Ignacio takes off in Kimmie's car after a heartfelt goodbye to his son-in-psychosis Shane, and Nancy packs up her boys -- plus fucking Doug -- and leaves town in Cesar's towncar, with a sad final voicemail for Esteban that in no way seems like an actual final voicemail for Esteban but is sad nonetheless.
Want more? The full recap starts right below!Deaf CPS lady would like to know, naked Randy Newman, whose baby he is holding. And more interestingly, "Why did you pee on it?" Randy assures her their pee only intersected; that the pee did not actually get on the baby. "Most of the pee" he clarifies, "Did not get on the baby." Randy swears to the many people at the door that, despite Nathalie's stray crossbow bolt, still twing-twinging in the closet door, they're totally capable of a nurturing and infant-friendly environment. This last punctuated by -- zip! -- the jeans he's now put on.
Park Mommy Rebekah's confused when Randy says baby Avi is his son's kid, so he corrects himself: "Stepson, he is." As Randy's mouth continues to run, he realizes that he's getting himself into trouble and calls out for Nathalie. Where is she?
Locked in the bathroom door, Latrice bashing the door in, having a nice little deadpan chat with Cesar on Shane's phone. "Bring his son. I bring your son. Then we trade. A shoe for a shoe." Cesar hangs up and, still distraught, Nathalie grabs Latrice in a headlock -- torn earlobe pressed against Nathalie's angled collarbone -- and pulls her into the bathroom. "You're too loud," she explains lightly.
You never know which Nancy you're going to get: Nancy or Lacey or Nathalie; Price or Botwin or Reyes. It's a part of her pathology, is all that really comes down to, it's how she keeps them coming. They fall in love with Daredevil Girl, you have to stay a daredevil. Sometimes behind the door, it's a lady; sometimes it's a tiger. And if that means she'll never really be known, which in turn means she'll never be loved truly, well, she was never expecting that anyway. There's only one man in the world that loved rollercoasters as much as she did.
Out in the parking lot, completely unaware of any of this, Mike and Kimmi are calling each other awesome and that guy is calling him a faggot and then Kimmi's calling him a faggot and then the guy's giving him a lewd gesture. This line made me feel sorry for Mike: "It's a Guy Thing," he explains, as if Kimmi's the one that dropped out society back in high school and hasn't had more than like one conversation with somebody her own age since. He throws out more Youth Culture shibboleths -- "I'm gonna kick his ass in Ultimate!" -- and promises to pick Kimmi up in her car at six. He feels guilty but at this point his guilt is what he's bringing to the table.
Cesar tells Nathalie to drive east and he'll call her in twenty; Latrice offers to bend her teeth back and she hands her a towel for her freshly bleeding ear and heads back to the other situation. "Yeah, my son's been kidnapped? I can't fight with you right now." Nancypants is unfailingly polite in this episode, it's really funny. The lady, the tiger. Mama Lion.
Ignacio rips off Doug's mouth tape and explains, over Shane's reflex lying, that they split from Ren-Mar because Shane killed an evil bruja. As usual, Shane grins proudly. Ignacio, who is and eternally will be on Shane's wavelength, giggles. "Hey! Remember that time that I brought you with me to collect from the guy with the hat? And then after I kneecapped him, you stepped on his hat?" Ignacio chuckles, nearly rocking, at the good times they've shared. "Would you really put a bullet in me?" Ignacio admits that he would, without pause. Doug asks if Shane can breathe some food breath on him. Lord, the only thing worse than a van fry would be some teenager's Hot Cheeto breath. He is in a place.
Randy bullshits the people until they ask where Shawn, you know, actually is, and right then Mike comes in from the parking lot, pissed and looking to fight. When they ask who he is, he signs, "Who the fuck are you?" Randy giggles and remembers the deaf girl back in Agrestic; Mike and the deaf lady trade insults in which he snarks on her saggy tits and then invites her to blow him. You cannot talk that way to the deaf lady from Sesame Street, it's just too weird.
Nathalie, very close to losing it completely, introduces Mike and asks if they can't just back off and let them go do something very important right now. She's sufficiently horrified by Mike that she lets them go, demanding a follow-up visit the day, and Rebekah leaves with them, still flirting with Randy. Just as the boys are sighing in relief, Nathalie squeaks out that Cesar nabbed Shane, and they all jump in the car.
Nancy leaves a pretty sad voicemail for Esteban that begins with, "Boy, am I sorry I ignored your calls. I see now that that was really wrong." There's a bottom-line, self-aware lilt that she always brings to Esteban stuff that's really telling, like, insofar as she had to get herself out of the situation once Pilar was dead and frankly before, she doesn't dislike Esteban in any particular way.
She misses him, kinda hopes they might get back together one day when she gets caught. Her apologies are real, and then on top of that they're a joke about apologies, and then on top of that they're just a phone call, one acquaintance to another, like she's setting up a lunch date. Like he'll open the box and she won't be a traitor and she won't be a kidnapper, just his wife that loves him so much -- that it was the other woman who tore them apart. She was right beside him all the time.
As Andy plays with the switches and dials of the car, pissing her off more and more, she continues in this almost under-control tone: "Um, I'd love to talk to you about it and apologize directly. And I'd also really love to talk to you about Shane. You knew that was gonna get my attention. Boy, you were right!"
As Andy turns on the A/C, blowing her hair back like a movie monster, she slips a little. Then a lot. "Kidnapping your baby boy's brother? Really? Solid move, Padre of the Year! Shitty fucker! You macho cowboy asshole!" Andy waves at her words like they're gnats, and she calms down again, back to the hatefully sweet tone: "Hope to hear from you soon. I'd ask Shane how to disable the caller ID, but -- oops -- he's been kidnapped. So, um, please call this off. Please call me back. Okay? And I'm... Sorry."
She's sorry. But Shane's gone, and he did it. Mike asks if they're allowed to talk about handing the kid over, and Andy -- applying mascara to his cheeks like a linebacker -- assures him that would just be crazy. She assures him the warpaint isn't necessary, because they're not invited to her showdown and besides that, he looks like Rum Tum Tugger.
Andy's not impressed. "Cesar and I have a rapport. He's got his icy stare, I've got my melty eyes... We're frenemies." I don't remember Cesar hating Andy quite as much as Ignacio did, but I also don't remember Cesar showing much more emotion than a pet rock at any point, so maybe that's not the best measure. Mike's still on the whole kick-the-kid-loose plan. "I could go to college... Shane could become one of those good serial killers, who only kills other serial killers..."
Nancy tells him to open up, fine, fuck it. Mostly just to tell him he's being an ass, but also because she's thinking. Not happening, but they could discuss the possibility. "Parallel universe: A boy and his father? We could stop running." Andy, voice very serious, points out that Stevie's their brother. Mike corrects him: "Stevie's a timebomb." A little knife, that keeps them on the run. If not for Stevie, they'd have been dead a long time ago; but if not for Stevie, there would be no Audra. Nancy would still have all of her men lined up, just where she likes them, if it weren't for Stevie.
Nancy sends the boys and Stevie off to find a place to eat while she does whatever she's going to do, and heads into the Skee-Ball Hall Of Fame & Museum: "Closed Due To Budget Cuts And General Lack Of Interest." Inside, she's carrying what looks like a baby but clearly isn't a baby; she is unfailingly polite to Cesar for awhile before he tells her to put down the baby. A few seconds later, there's a crossbow bolt in his leg and she's apologizing.
"I know you were gonna shoot me first," Nancy explains, before she starts screaming for Shane. It's part of her pathology. Because if you never know who's behind the door, then you'll just keep opening the door. And as long as the door is open, she'll know where the exits are. Andy said it last time but it's true every time: Giving men her love is the same as giving them her hate. Either way it's drawing a line under it, calling to accounts, shutting a door, saying goodbye. And that can't happen. But if there's no such thing as endings, and she'll never commit to being just one girl, then the logical assumption is that he'll shoot first. It's one of the reasons she does what she does, because experience bears this out.
The boys are getting bored, at the Hungry Kuntry Buffet, and more and more nervous. Kimmi sends Mike a picture of her boobs, at which Uncle Randy stares a little too long. At some point the ADD and general anxiety get to them and they start working their way up to heroism. "Shane's our Shane, too! We don't always have to do everything she says!" They agree to go along, hide in the bushes, play backup... Just as soon as they eat, and have their coffee.
Across the restaurant, which is not a huge coincidence because like I'm so sure the Skee-Ball Museum is the center of a really thriving cultural oasis, Doug still has not eaten. He tries to order either the Tilapia Torpedos or the Meat-Lovers Moose Tracks ("entrée size, not the app") but Ignacio says he's still not allowed to eat. The intensely weird waitress speaks up, suddenly: "I tried the one where you only eat cotton balls soaked in gelatin. I lost six pounds but it killed the fetus. Coffee?" Ignacio orders his coffee white, Shane black; Shane laughs at him for it, begging for approval. Of all the dads on this show, Ignacio always looked the most like Judah.
Nancy still has bloody nose-blood on her face, so think about that as she beats nominally on Cesar and, having made sure there's no Shane in his trunk, trying to get Shane on the phone. Of course Cesar answers Shane's phone -- "What is up," he moans -- and when she demands it he throws it away across the floor. "That was bratty," she grumbles, and when her back is turned Cesar pulls out a quarter. Luckily Nance notices, otherwise she'd have a skee-ball upside the head. She drops the quarter into the machine and it lights up: "You are a champion!" It would be sort of ironic; skee-balls and croquet balls are essentially the same thing.
Nancy doesn't even have time to admire Cesar's ingenuity; she calls Esteban from his phone and her face lights up when he finally answers. It's pretty sad; he hangs up on her immediately, which is worse. "How did that go?" asks Cesar, loving every second. How did it go? Something died. Something broke, inside her, like a little machine or an apparatus that always knew where he was and what he was doing, even when the where and what were just "far south" and "missing me." He was like the cat in the box, neither alive nor dead, which is how she gets to keep them, both at once. And when he hung up that little thing cracked, inside her, like a phone slammed down, like a door slamming shut. That's how it fucking went, dude: I lost another husband.
Doug is eating his napkin, and doesn't even bother to lie convincingly about it. Ignacio offers him some artificial sweetener, but of course Doug's not having it: "It's rat cancer! It'll turn your bladder into a squishy pit and it'll slowly and painfully slide out your shit shaft!" Ignacio takes it away, and tells him he can go to the bathroom.
Ignacio swears Shane's death isn't really up to him; he calls him pequeño diablo, lovingly, and asks about the efficacy of a croquet mallet. As talk turns to one's first kill -- Ignacio's was stepdad Ramon, a miscommunication regarding cookies that ended with his pocketknife, his navaja -- Doug stands outside the restaurant, ready to get away, and then has some kind of stupid discussion with God about why and how he's still alive, and dejectedly comes back in, cramming rat cancer down his neck.
"You ever close your eyes and see her face staring back at you?" asks Ignacio, and remembers how much he's always loved the little devil: "Only when I jerk off."
Things that have been done to Cesar over the course of his service: Playing cards shoved under the fingernails, which probably sounds slightly worse to ladies than men. A piece of my ear cut off, and later reattached. Three Colombians once took turns shooting gasoline up his culo with a turkey baster. I wonder what that would do? I mean, not really. I don't really care to know what that would do, or what it's like. That's probably the worst one. In any case, there's nothing Nancy can do.
Except make the same mistake she always makes: Thinking that the sisterhood she spends half her time denigrating and all of her time ignoring is going to save her ass when it counts: "Hi, is your mommy home?" she asks the little girl on the phone, who takes it to her mother.
At the Buffet they're worrying about Nancy so Mike calls Kimmi, putting her off with traffic lies and lies and lies. Andy's more concerned with his french toast, so when he runs to catch the waitress, it's him that sees the table full of villains.
Nancy apologizes to Cesar for forgetting his last name, and kicks him when he won't tell; her smile is glittering bright when his hot wife gets to the phone. "Hi, Mrs. de la Cruz! It's Nancy Reyes, Esteban's wife?" Cesar's wife is just as pleasant. "Yes, hi! How are you? How's the villa?" Nancy is always so bad at faking it that she's like a spectator sport: "It's good, it's good! Esta bien!" The whole time, mom's totally ignoring her, yelling at their daughter about the way she's dressed. "Sorry, go on?" Cesar's wife is the coolest. She sounds like a lady on the phone, but Cesar would only marry a tiger.
Nancy's getting less chill by the second: "I know that Cesar might not share with you everything that happens at work? But today he kidnapped my son. And now he's threatening to kill him?" Cesar can't quite get it together to laugh, but he does have a sort of mordant humor as he says to tell his wife about the arrow. Properly ashamed as usual, for asking for help, Nancy asks her -- as a fellow mother -- to speak to her husband about that. A few mumbles later, of course, he's like, "She said to kill you and come home. She's making albondigas for dinner." Meatballs, skee-balls, lady-scrota; Cesar passes out and she kicks at the skee-ball machine. "You are a champion!"
Ignacio and Shane get into a thing where they're pouring hot sauce on their food and competitively eating it. Eventually Shane jams his sandwich into the ashtray; it's real gross. Spitballs aimed at Doug are of no avail, as he's staring and salivating at some kid's full plate of food that he's not eating. "Pittsburgh! Pittsburgh!" Andy stage-whispers, but to no avail. "Sammy Davis, Jr.!" he says, as a last resort, which is hilarious: What else does Shane like, besides Pittsburgh and naked pictures of his mommy? Ignacio.
Andy heads into the breach, with just his fists and sinew -- "Andy-meat," he clarifies -- and tells Mike not to save him, under any circumstances. Which is, of course, a lie. After one brief moment and a punch that only makes him sneeze, our armed Ignacio invites them all to sit down with the group while he notifies Cesar of his good fortune.
Nancy prods Cesar conscious to take Ignacio's call, and puts it on speakerphone. "Be good, and I'll call you an ambulance, okay? English preferred." Cesar assures her she will never be safe, she doesn't care, and when he picks up proud Ignacio makes everybody say hello. Even Doug. Without revealing her presence Nancy runs, weeping, to steal Cesar's car and save everybody.
Fun facts: Cesar drives like Ignacio's grandmother. Said grandmother, on her left hand, has two ring fingers. Q: How does that affect her driving? A: It's just a fun fact.
Shane wonders if maybe Cesar's just having trouble getting Nancy into the trunk, getting big laughs from Ignacio, just as she walks in and delivers a loopy little monologue to the effect that Cesar's had "a little accident" and that Ignacio is free to visit his friend, post haste. She's even willing to rescue Doug right now. Doug, himself, is still obsessing on this kid, whose wastefulness is driving him mad with a blurry rage.
Shane's eyes briefly close as he leans against his mother; he's had a long day. Nancy notifies Ignacio, who's not going anywhere, that she is pointing a gun at his scrotum; not to be outdone, he admits he's got one pointed at her "lady-scrotum" as well. When the weird waitress shows up, there's an interminably long and all-too-real conversation with Nancy that goes: What do you want? "Uh, nothing. Water." Lemon wedge? "Uh, no. Water? Ice." We're out of ice. ("How can you be out of ice?" The ice machine broke.) "Okay, then lemon?" So no water?
It's the perfect tension breaker because it is its own tension. This is quality we've not seen in awhile. I love this season so much. I hope everybody comes back and starts watching this show again because it is awesome. Doug starts ordering everything off the menu and Nancy tells him to cram it; he passes out on the table. "Ignacio, you really think you can successfully transport an infant two thousand miles by yourself?" He does. "What exactly does a three-month-old eat?" Chicken, crackers...
Although it is adorable, Nancy still pronounces this incorrect. Ignacio offers to kidnap her as well. Also, he notes, her hands are shaking. She swears she'll actually shoot him and kill him, here in this crowded awful restaurant, and he giggles at her almost tenderly. "Don't get me wrong, you're a toughie. But this?" Shane gently takes the gun from her hand, under the table, and she gently lets him. Ignacio wonders if Shane will put a bullet in him; they both know he will. But they keep staring. Ignacio smiles, impressed, and nods.
Outside the Hungry Kuntry Buffet, Ignacio holds onto Shane tightly. "Follow your dreams, mijo! Follow your dreams." He kisses both cheeks; Shane waves goodbye as he drives off in Kimmi's car. From the window, the rest of the family waves goodbye as well. Shell-shocked, sure, but I'm positive also because they love Ignacio as much as Shane and I do. How could you not?
While Mike calls Kimmi to let her know that somebody stole her car -- and that he's dumping her and vanishing -- Nancy calls Esteban once again from Cesar's phone. "Hi, it's Cesar," she says, in a doofy sort of impression that leaves much to be desired and just makes her look really awkward and strange. Which is how she feels.
"Um, don't be mad at him. You know? I'm a... I'm a mother lion. And you can't defeat a mother lion when you threaten her cubs. You might think it's the same thing for papa lion, but it's not. It's not the same thing, at all."
Leaving Seattle, again. Shane's got Ignacio's pocketknife in his hands, flipping it over and over. Una navaja, he murmurs, and she quiets him. "No more Spanish," she begs of him. Not tonight. Because she meant every word. And with her boys in the car and the lights sliding by, she'll think about every word, again, and replay it in her head, and she'll realize she meant it when she said goodbye. That that last hope she had is gone, is dead: It died the second he hung up on her and she realized she'd released him. Somewhere along the way, Esteban had been released.
He didn't care if she lived or she died. It wasn't a mystery or an option or a possibility: She called him, begged him for forgiveness, and he couldn't give it. The Esteban in her head, who knew her dark places and forgave them, the Esteban she could work every single time because they had no secrets, the one who could get Shane out of this and give her a home... That Esteban died, fed to the lion. She opened the box and there he was, dead to her. Looking for her. Consuming her. A door closed that she forgot she left open and a million possible lives were lost.
"Esteban, I want to thank you for our beautiful boy. I will always speak well of you, and I'll always tell him how much I loved his father. And how so, so fond of you I once was. You're g
onna miss Stevie, and I'm so sorry for that... It hurts you. I know. And I'm sorry. But I'm the mom. And he needs me more. Good luck with your... Crime, and stuff... Okay. Bye."
All those words, instead of love. Instead of saying, "You were the second best at loving rollercoasters, out of all the men I ever met. I'm sorry I'm not strong enough to stay." Stevie sitting in Silas's lap, Shane playing with his knife, Andy staring at the road: Tonight she's allowed to miss him. Everybody's so tired they won't notice the tears falling, so tired she can barely feel them herself: Nobody can know it. She meant every word.
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