The morning after – Norman leaves a sleeping Bradley like
he’s some kind of pimp boss and James Deans his way back down the highway to
the motel. Dylan is all “Congrats on the sex! Mom’s totally in jail” when
Norman comes in. They find her in the clink and offer to use the motel as
collateral for her bail. Mother snarks them a bit, saying she doesn’t need any
help and yells at them to get out. Puppy Dog Norman doesn’t understand why
Mother is being mean and not looking at him. It’s because of the sex you didn’t
have with her, genius.
If this were American Horror Story, we'd be knee deep in a haunted women's prison plot line by now.
Emma finds Norman frantically going through boxes in the
motel for the deed. She invites Norman to stay with them. Smooth, Emma. She
takes him to a bail bondsman and while they wait, Norman tells Emma about
finding the Chinese girl in the basement. Emma wants to go to the police,
apparently sailing right past the part where a member of the police is a part
of the problem. Norman says he wants to do something, but not until Mother is
taken care of first. Which is going to be a lifelong theme for poor Norman.
The bail bond comes through and Norman goes to fetch Norma
with a bouquet of flowers. Mother, however, breezes past him. “I have nothing
to say to you,” she brushes him off, preferring to walk home than drive with
him. Later, they meet with their naturally attractive female lawyer, who Mother
is also not pleased with, likely imagining her as yet another succubus who’s
going to swoop down on Norman at any minute. The lawyer lays out a case that
would defend Mother, but Mother insists no story is needed since she didn’t
kill Keith and jeez, why is everyone so enamored of physical “evidence” anyway?
On the ride home, Norman tries to talk sense into her, but
Mother insists that Norman doesn’t care about her. “You went out and you got
laid while I was crying alone in my room worried sick about all this,” she
tells him. She blames Dylan for his advise that Norman go and make with the
sexy time and she wants to know why Norman did this to her? Norman tells her
that she scares him sometimes. Mother, clearly missing the message, yells at him
to get out of her car and walk the ten miles back home. When he doesn’t, she
physically drags him out and speed off without him. Thus giving us one of the
first real scenes in this series where we start to see Mother’s psychological
abuse and hold over Norman. It actually makes a lot of sense if you consider
the movie. Norman is eventually
rescued when Dylan comes upon him on his motorcycle and drives him home. As they speed down the road, Norman
actually looks happy for the first time with a member of his family. It’s
actually really touching.
If it's possible to have a bro-mance between brothers, this is getting close.
Back home, Dylan accurately points out how Mother lives for
drama and behaves the way she does to get Norman’s attention. He tells Norman
that the only thing you can do sometimes with those people is walk away. He
tells Norman the he’s getting his own place and he wants Norman to move in with
him.
The next day, Dylan gets an infusion of cash from his
coworker Ethan for the place he wants. Ethan says the bosses don’t give this
out, but he’s loaning it to Dylan from his share because he knows Dylan is good
for it. Just then, another man comes up to the two of them, pulls a gun and
shoots Ethan in the throat. Have to say this, things never go over small in
this town. Dylan rushes him to the hospital.
That night, Mother meets with Shelby in his cruiser down by
the lake. Shelby apologizes for having brought Mother down to the jail and
tells her that it’s not safe for them to be seen together for a while. Mother
begins to storm off but Shelby stops her by telling her that he loves her and
that he went through hell knowing that she was in trouble and he couldn’t even
show his concern. This is apparently what Mother needed to hear because she
softens and begs him not to do anything stupid. Back at the station, Shelby clandestinely
breaks into the evidence room and steals the carpet fibers found on Keith’s
body.
Dylan cruises the mean streets of Whereverthehellthisis,
looking for Ethan’s shooter. He finds him down by the docks, natch, and chases
him in Ethan’s truck, running him down. Like, with the truck. Damn.
Mother is putting the finishing touches on the motel’s
website (which, fun fact, is a real
website) when she gets the news from her lawyer that the carpet samples are
lost and the police have no case. Meanwhile, Norman tries to call Bradley after
texting her two, three hundred times, but gets no answer. I will kind of love
this show if it turns out that Bradley totally just used Norman for some
distraction sex. That would not only be a cool reversal of the stereotype, but
it would explain adult Norman’s eventual distrust and disgust with sexualized
women.
Regardless, Mother is all giddy, hugging Norman and telling
him that everything’s taken care of and they’re going to be fine, thanks to
Shelby. “What’s he going to make you do for this favor?” Norman asks. Looks
like it’s his turn to be bitchy. He leaves the house and finds Emma arriving,
who has a theory on where the Chinese girl has been hidden. “Just take me away
from here,” Norman says.
Emma takes him down to the water and tells him her theory –
after googling “Keith Summers murder evidence” to see if he had any other
properties in his name, she’s guessing that Shelby may have hidden the girl on
Keith Summers’ boat and hey Norman, are you listening to me? Norman tells her
the harsh truth – he’s with Bradley now because they made passionate, tender
love even though she hasn’t called him back. Emma uses unassailable teenage
logic to defy Norman’s insistence that he’s off the market – “Did she change
her relationship status?” She asks. “Then it’s just a hook-up.” Truer words, my
friends…
The two teenage sleuths head to Keith’s fishing boat. They
break in, finding the girl basically feral and hiding in a closet. They drive
her back to the motel, which has got the be the LAST place this girl wants to
be given that she was likely held hostage there for a while. Thankfully, she’s
passed out for some reason, so she goes more or less quietly.
Mother is finishing up work in the office meanwhile and sees
Emma’s car, prompting her to investigate what this girl hussy would be doing to
her son. She finds Emma and Norman caring for the frightened Chinese girl in
one of the rooms. Norman tells Mother that this is girl from Shelby’s basement.
The Chinese girl is all “lady, you’re crazy for not trusting your son here
because I was totally that cop’s sex slave.” (Not her exact words, given that
the character speaks very little English, but that was certainly the subtext.) Mother
still refuses to believe her, getting a picture of Shelby and asking the girl
again. “He is the one,” she says, pointing to Shelby.
No comments:
Post a Comment