“You’ll Never Get Away From Me”
Previously, on Desperate Housewives: Gabrielle and John are over as Karl and Edie begin their relationship, and Rex’s mother gets Bree in trouble with the insurance company when she calls in a false report of being overly friendly with George the Pharmacist. Lynette is a working woman, which means she doesn’t get to spend time with her kids anymore, and the Applewhites are keeping their husband and father in the basement of their new home.
I still hate the narrator. Mrs. Rex and Bree walk to Rex’s gravestone as Bree reflects on her mother-in-law’s forgetfulness, and then asks when Rex’s mother is intending to leave. She doesn’t know, though. And that’s when they get to Rex’s headstone and find an empty hole. Seems Rex’s mother forgot to mention the insurance investigator being suspicious and raising questions about whether Rex really died of a heart attack or of poisoning.
You’re watching Desperate Housewives, and so am I. Shame.
Some little girls have an imaginary tea party, engaging in a fantasy as Gabrielle does the same, imagining John coming in to sweep him off his feet, but seeing the new gardener Ralph in his place. So Gabrielle walks off and goes “shopping”, which is slang for watching John mow the lawn in a creepy manner. I mean to say that she’s watching creepily.
Susan is getting impatient waiting for Karl to return Julie, as it’s a quarter after 6 and the custody agreement states that the visits are only until 6. She grabs Mike to powerwalk over to Edie’s house, in case they have to peel Julie away by force. After all, who knows what could be happening in there while Julie’s there. Maybe an orgy? Or maybe they’re having a happy family sing-along as Karl tapes the whole thing. Does anyone else find that a little weird? Anyway, Susan’s just paranoid. Scene.
Tom’s playing ball with one of the Scavo kids, as Lynette brings home school supplies and a really cool backpack. And then she breaks the bad news that Tom is going to be the one who takes the little boy to his first day of school. Lynette would be there if she could, but her boss is very mean and this means putting food on the table. But the little boy pitches a fit and doesn’t even want the backpack unless Lynette agrees. So, she breaks down and offers to talk to the boss.
Bree can’t believe that there is going to be an autopsy on Rex’s body, but she can’t get too many details because…well, she might be a suspect. Bree thinks that it’s irrational to think she would be capable of hurting Rex, but the investigator isn’t so sure, and that’s when Bree realizes that this man has talked to her mother-in-law. Bree tries to reason with the investigator and explain that Phyllis blamed Bree for all the problems in the marriage, and the investigator wonders if she’d like to record that down as a statement. But Bree has a statement only saying that Rex died of a heart attack and she loved him very much.
Phyllis awakens the next day to grab a cup of coffee, which is just enough distraction for Bree to spring into action and have all of her bags packed before she can return to the staircase. Phyllis is rushed into a cab and taken away as Bree waves goodbye.
Carlos and Gabrielle have another visit, as Gabrielle hands over an anniversary card, as Carlos forgot about that. Even when he was locked up in a cell all day looking at a calendar. Carlos notes that she never apologized without an excuse, and Gabrielle counters that the only man who truly loves her for who she is is John, and Carlos finds that to be unlikely. She lists the ways that he loves him, which gets Carlos riled up. A guard steps in, thankfully.
Julie is going to be in an act with Edie at a local church, and Susan is just surprised that she didn’t ask her to accompany her first. After all, Julie should know that Susan plays the piano. But she doesn’t. Susan finally agrees to let Edie do this with Julie.
Over at the Applewhites, the Applewhite son wants to get out and do something instead of staying in the house all day, and he grabs the gun as he goes to open the basement door, but the man is free and he pops out and attacks the Applewhites, before he’s finally pinned down and pistol-whipped by Mama Applewhite. Susan arrives just then, ringing the door bell and asking for some piano lessons. But she doesn’t give lessons, and as Mama Applewhite wipes her hand on her shirt, she has blood on it and Susan notices this, but she’s just baking cherry pie. The Applewhite son mentions that this is going to prevent a low profile, being rude to everyone, and she agrees that they have to fit in.
Lynette goes to see Nina in her office to ask about coming in a little late for the morning meeting, and Nina just isn’t going to listen to her requests about her children anymore, because this office is all about fairness to the childless by choice. As Lynette leaves, she notices the teleconferencing video system they just installed, so she decides to buy one for herself so that she can be with Parker on his first day of school. Parker is unsure, however.
Gabrielle goes window shopping again, and then notices that the housewife in the house John is working at invites John in for some lovin’! Hypocritical by nature, Gabrielle decides that she wants to have a peek, and noticing that John and the housewife are consumating the work relationship, Gabrielle decides to grab the hedge trimmer and go buck wild on all the flowers in the yard.
Mike brings some flowers over to Ms. Tillman, as Mike notices that Ms. Tillman has her bags packed. She’s going back to Utah for a few weeks since the recuperation is taking longer than expected. Speaking of her attack, she wants to know if anyone’s found Zach yet, but that’s what Mike was going to ask about, but Ms. Tillman wouldn’t know anything about Zach’s whereabouts, as the last time they spoke, he beat her and threw her down the stairs. They just don’t keep in touch. Zach is surely still looking for his father, but Mike mentions that he didn’t kill Paul, he just let him live a life of running from the police. But since Zach is the only link to Paul’s dead wife, he’s definitely going to come looking for him. In all fairness, Mike probably should’ve killed Paul Young. Awesome scene.
Bree and the remainder of the family eat dinner, as Bree announces the news about Rex, and the kids immediately get suspicious about whether or not Bree may have murdered Rex by poisoning him. After all, she did wait to make the bed before taking Rex to the hospital after his second heart attack, but Andrew doesn’t think Bree is capable of murder: It takes guts to kill someone.
Mrs. Applewhite has changed her mind about the piano lessons for Susan, and notes that she was having a bad day before. Susan plays a little tune on the piano and Mrs. Applewhite recommends that she lay off the pedal since it doesn’t make it sound more professional or anything. Susan then notes the loud hip-hop coming from the basement, and Mrs. Applewhite notes that it drowns out the sound of the dryer. But in the basement, it’s drowning out the sound of him putting new screws into the door keeping the man locked up.
Julie and Edie finish another practice session, and Susan pops out of nowhere to applaud their performance, bringing good news: Since she has been practicing with Betty Applewhite and she was wondering if they could become a trio. Edie doesn’t dig trios, so Susan notes that since the church is sponsoring a family talent show, Edie isn’t family. But talent trumps family, right? Susan wants Julie to pick which one she’ll make a duo with, and Julie feels so pressured but she eventually chooses Susan. Edie wants her pitch pipe back, then.
Gabrielle goes to get her mail as John arrives, immediately accusing her of going buckwild on the hedges. Gabrielle then reveals that she saw John with the lady, Joan. She’s 41, which would make her old enough to even be Gabrielle’s mother, let alone John’s. John doesn’t see what the big deal is since they are broken up, but Gabrielle mentions that that was just a “morning period”, and what happened to John loving only her? John mentions that he’s starting to have feelings for Joan now, and Gabrielle gets a pit feeling in her stomach because she was fantasizing about this relationship with John working until recently. John offers to break up with Joan if she wants to get back together, but Gabrielle seems to have her fill of gardeners. John thinks that the relationship should end better than it seems to be ending, but Gabrielle finds this ending to be perfectly appropriate considering how stupid they were.
Bree wants a lie detector test, and her only stipulation is that the kids are present to see her answer the questions. Everything goes smoothly until the lie detector man brings up George the Pharmacist. Bree faulters and when she has to answer the question of “Are you in love with George Williams?”, she lies and the kids see it plain as day. Uh-oh.
Betty and Susan prepare for another piano lesson as Susan really wants to use that pedal, but Karl speeds up in front of the Applewhite house to have a talk with Susan about kicking Edie out of Julie’s performance at the church. Susan goes with the old excuse of Edie not being family, but Karl notes that she could be some day. Karl brings up Manslaughter Mike and how he seems to get into family events, but this is different because Mike doesn’t live with Susan and he really DOES care about Julie. Karl thinks that Edie does too, but Susan thinks that Edie caring about anyone but herself is ridiculous, and the only reason she’s pretending to care about Julie is to mess with Susan’s head. Karl thinks that’s crazy and self-absorbed, and goes back to his car, with some parting words: Ask Julie about her relationship with Edie. Karl speeds off as Susan apologizes to Betty for having to witness that. Betty has been in plenty of run-ins like that, and Susan hopes that it wasn’t as bad as that. But Susan would be surprised.
Lynette has the video conferencing thing all set up for Parker’s first day of school, but Nina wants her in the staff meeting right now. Parker is getting all kinds of distressed, but Lynette can’t think of any way to get out of the meeting, even when she makes the excuse of nature calling. But Lynette finally sees an opportunity when Nina puts her coffee on the edge of the table, and Lynette causes just enough commotion to get it to spill on Nina, cancelling the staff meeting so Nina can cool down and Lynette can make Parker happy.
At the pharmacy, Bree arrives (and it’s awesome that she’s pretty much wearing black ALL THE TIME now) and wants to speak with Curious George. Bree gets straight to the point and asks for George to clear her name and prove that they both didn’t conspire to murder Rex. Bree now has to explain the story to George, but George finds that absurd that he was poisoned. But the polygraph test didn’t prove her innocence and even incriminated George, even though it meant that Bree had a deep-down love for George. Bree wants to move on, so George has to take the polygraph test.
The church family talent show is underway as Julie and Susan arrive to play piano and sing. But Susan takes a timeout and tells Edie that she wishes that it was her up there since she knows how much she cares about Julie now. Edie reveals that she plays piano as well, so Susan agrees to make the switch. And Edie stinks up the joint almost immediately, since the song has so many flats, and it’s obviously a terrible performance, so Susan makes sure that Karl gets it all on the camera.
Another visit for Gabrielle and Carlos, but this time Gabrielle is somber and tells Carlos that she was selfish and stupid, and she’s sorry. Gabrielle even sheds a tear. Carlos thinks that’s the best anniversary gift he’s ever received.
Final montage shows Lynette being forced to keep working and not think of her kids, Gabrielle ignores John as she jogs down the street, the Applewhites preparing to feed their prisoner again, and Bree and the investigator watch George’s polygraph test.
“You start by lying to yourself. And if you can get others to believe those lies…you win.”
George is asked if he poisoned Rex Van De Kamp, and he lies. But it is not detected.
Breaking down the Wives:
Bree – Great. Anytime you get George involved with Bree, great stuff happens and the ending to tonight’s episode was just very well done and the narration actually added to it instead of doing the usual subtraction. Bree makes a strong case of why Marcia Cross was likely robbed of her her Emmy.
Lynette – Good. Speaking of the Emmy, you have to realize that it was given based on comedic situations and not dramatic situations. And Lynette provides those comedic situations, with just a hint of drama. Nina is a wonderful character for Lynette to play off, as I was rooting for Lynette to knock that coffee on that witch. I prefer Lynette to be deep in drama more often than not, but you can’t doubt her strengths here in this episode.
Gabrielle – Good. Quite the range of her character in this episode, as she goes from lusty fantasies to teary eyes in the course of 40 minutes. I always loved the John/Gabrielle storyline, but something’s telling me it’s not even close to over yet.
Susan – Average. Bringing up the rear once again as it’s just hard to care about Susan’s problems with Edie and Karl in regards to Julie. Of the Housewives this season, Susan has definitely been slacking.
Mike and Ms. Tillman had an awesome scene this week, and the investigation into Rex’s death was just some fun stuff.
