I’m not sure what they’re smoking over at Ringer but they seem to just be running on all cylinders, throwing it all out there, anything goes style, in case they don’t come back. I’m going to hit the character highlights of the last three episodes (“P.S. You’re an Idiot”, “You’re Way Too Pretty to Go to Jail”, and “What We Have is Worth the Pain”) because if I put it all down in sequential order you might think I was recapping Passions.
Siobhan The entire ruse about switching places with Bridget was so that Andrew would kill Bridget and Siobhan (and Henry) could jump with Andrew’s money. When she confesses all this to Henry, he rightly suggests that maybe that’s a tad bit excessive revenge for losing her son, but Siobhan doesn’t think so. When things aren’t going fast enough in that direction, she pays Andrew a visit, hiding her pregnant tummy inside a huge coat, and winds him up enough about his guilt that maybe he’ll head home that very minute and kill Bridget in a rage. The very matter of fact way she’s going about all this business is downright creepy.
Andrew confesses to Bridget that he and Olivia were behind the Ponzi scheme and he was scrambling to make it right, which conflicts with Siobhan’s version of flashbacks (which we have to take at face value as truth) showing a vengeful Andrew threatening to kill her if she told anyone what she knew. This was the threat on tape that she shared with Henry at the bank. When Bridget confronts him and backs out of their vow renewal, he seems like he could actually kill her, but then turns around and jumps in front of a bullet to save her. It also looks like he may have killed Tyler, who had been summoned to New York by Olivia when they got wind of his SEC deal. I seriously don’t know whether he’s a good guy or a bad guy. At times they’ve had him lit very Hitchcockian and in others he seemed genuinely remorseful.
Malcolm is MIA after getting fired and helping Bridget steal evidence that points to Andrew’s role in the Ponzi scheme. Bridget and Solomon trace Malcolm’s phone and find it with a homeless man so that’s not good.
Catherine not only orchestrated the bilk-Andrew-for-millions scheme, she was also sleeping with Mr. C and she arranged for Tessa to be roughed up. She gets Carter out of her hair by leading him out of town and threatening to leak the video from the hotel if he returns. When Juliet figures out Catherine’s role in the beating up Tessa part, she tells her mom they’re done and that she wishes Siobhan was her mom.
Juliet meets the guy who beat up Tessa at Catherine’s hotel but is clueless about who he is until Tessa sees his picture and freaks right the hell out. Separate from that, she has a heart to heart with Andrew that they need Siobhan/Bridget in their life because she makes them better, and she tells him to go fix whatever it is that’s tearing them apart. She also seems to be softening up as her own character, finding the relationship with Bridget that had eluded her with both Catherine and Siobhan.
Bridget has spent the last few episodes alternately lovey-dovey and joyful about a vow renewal with Andrew and then terrified of him when she suspects, and has it confirmed, that he’s not the dreamboat he appears to be. Solomon calls her out on her true ID and she’s relieved that somebody else knows. Last week’s cliffhanger had her going to supposedly see Malcolm and instead finding Andrew at the loft. While he spins her a maybe-truthful version of why he’s there, somebody fires a gun at them and he saves her from being hit. Tonight, she and Juliet wait to find out whether he lives.
Chatter has already started that Ringer may not get a second season, and honestly, I get it. I never seemed to know what the end game was here, and I do hope that we end this season on some sort of closure of any of the arcs, but I mostly want Bridget to know Siobhan has played her the entire time.
The cast, especially Sarah Michelle Gellar—who has busted her ass on this—have really gone all out to sell the world of the show, even as it’s become almost silly trying to discern who knows what and who’s bad and who’s good, and who knew what when. There are some shows you can’t miss an episode of because they move too fast. You can’t really miss an episode of Ringer because when you do, you find out they switched directions on who was running which con and why. That’s a lot of work for the viewer, and the hook isn’t there here to make us want to sort it out. I’ll be disappointed for SMG if they do cancel it, and I’ll hope that she comes back again sooner.
There are six episodes left this season, including the episode airing tonight at 9 pm ET on The CW.
Photo Courtesy of The CW