Things started to pick up in a hurry two weeks ago, then the CW took a one-week breather for the US holiday week. Let’s catch you up before the new episode this week, which is also the last of the year…
In “Shut Up and Eat Your Bologna”, we get a break from the teen drama with Juliet and instead focus on Bridget figuring out (with an assist from Malcolm) that the semi-charming Charlie is actually John and not a good guy, unfortunately after she’s given him her gun for disposal (oops). Separately *we* find out that he is keeping a very-much-alive Gemma tied up in the basement of a house – something Malcolm nearly discovers. We also learn that Charlie coerced the cop who “let” Bridget go from Machado’s custody, gave her his gun, and encouraged her to run to Siobhan – so Siobhan was seriously manipulating Bridget’s arrival in the Hamptons.
Bridget finds a stash of Siobhan’s pills for anxiety and follows up with Siobhan’s shrink, where she discovers Siobhan had many an issue with paranoia. She then ransacks the files after the shrink heads to lunch and is promptly busted, but tries to deflect it that she’s just that eager to continue therapy. Also a surprise – Siobhan didn’t use her real name in her sessions. Before she’s caught, she steals a page from the file, which leads her to a restaurant where she finds a not-quite-sober Charlie swilling drinks and puts it together that that’s where Siobhan met him.
Malcolm twigs to Charlie when he finds alcohol-based mouthwash in the bathroom and Charlie laughs it off. Then he pays attention to how Charlie behaves, searches his wallet, and finds a key to a PO Box, and then a bill for a house, which he visits and searches but doesn’t find Gemma, who’s tied up in the basement.
Separately, Bridget and Andrew are super love-dovey and Olivia’s over it, but she’s also more preoccupied with getting (a genuinely adrift and lonely) Henry to drop his father-in-law’s digits on her so she can solicit an investment from him – a move Andrew preemptively shoots down but with which she proceeds anyway. She shows up at Henry’s under the guise that he needs to sign some papers and takes Gemma’s dad’s number off his phone while he’s upstairs with the kids. She also spies a cuddly picture of him with Siobhan, which she seems genuinely disappointed about.
Siobhan is only seen a couple of times on the phone when talking with Charlie and she isn’t under a bridge, so she seems to have worked out her near-homeless situation.
Bridget has a sitdown with Charlie where she asks him to return the gun and overthanks him for his help, keeping him occupied while Malcolm searches the house. Charlie plays along but goes outside afterward and immediately calls Siobhan to tell her the jig’s up.
And that’s where we pick up this week.
I like that after a really slow build we finally have some fairly quick developments. Malcolm kicked his re-addiction way too easily, but that’s a plot nit because somebody had to realize Charlie wasn’t all that he said he was. The development with Gemma’s dad seems left field but I’m guessing that’s going to dovetail into the discovery that Gemma is alive. Cliffhanger, anyone?
Photo Courtesy of The CW