S05.E08: Episode 8

[LoveLeigh]

Allegations against Noah surface and he seeks guidance on how to handle the situation. Helen celebrates a birthday and protects Sierra (Emily Browning) during an extremely trying time.

Original air date 2019.10.13

[LoveLeigh]

I loved the episode and for the first time this season I was glad there was no Joanie segment. 

There are three episodes left. They are wasting a lot of time introducing new elements instead of wrapping up dangling story lines. 

That baby Eddie looks like the adult EJ!

Also, why shoe horn in this story about Noah and Audrey and Eden? It will not be resolved but will probably be left dangling. 

The writing for this season is soooooo bad. I see this series trudging to a real bad disappointing end. 

[Stad15]

2 hours ago, DakotaLavender said:

That baby Eddie looks like the adult EJ!

Haha I noticed that too.  I was hoping they would reveal that Eddie's middle name is James, Johnny or Jameson, lol.

Episode was definitely an upgrade over last week.  I was somewhat surprised his lawyer Gottlief met with Noah considering Noah didn't listen to him the last time and "admitted" he ran over Scotty.

Helen was great and Sierra was tolerable.  I loved how Stacy hates Sasha and lets him know it.

In Helen's POV, she smiled at Noah when he brought over the birthday lasagna!

And the Noah-Helen reunion starts....

[cardigirl]

I always (usually) enjoy the Helen and Noah POV episodes, so I liked this one. But, why, oh why, does Noah not listen to anyone?  I know he feels he is being accused/convicted of something he feels he is completely innocent of (at least his intent was innocent?) and he is frustrated, but he has really f'd things up for himself, AGAIN. 

Loved that after all Helen put herself through to stand up for Sierra, Sierra turns to her and says, I'm going to go lie down now.  I'm really tired.  Not thank you.  No good deed goes unpunished, Helen. I mean, I probably would have felt the same way about poor Sierra, and most especially about poor little Eddie, my god that baby is cute, but I wonder how this will all play out. 

And the differences in the birthday celebrations was interesting, too.  In Helen's there are no decorations or cake.  Just the kids making dinner for her.  In Noah's, the house is decorated, there is a cake and he presents the lasagna in a bag.  The birthday celebration is much bigger in his recollection.

[mxc90]

Sierra is not allowed to name Vik's parents as helpers because they weren't  married or did the writers forget about them?

Everyone wants or is getting a piece of Noah with the movie, the student's book, Eden and Preta. Only the lawyer is missing out (Noah has no money).

Edited October 13, 2019 by mxc90

[scrb]

A few episodes left and they're spending more time on Sierra, Sasha's daughter and now Eden.

Of course the Joanie story is also tacked on too, isn't it?

Only fitting for a tacked-on season.

Just confirms the suspicion that the series was done once the main relationships ended, which would be around the time Noah cheated on Alison and Alison cheated on Noah.

About the only story which might have made sense is closure on Helen and Noah.  But instead, you have Helen getting involved in Sierra's business, after getting involved in Noah's business by dating Sasha.

Looks like more of Whitney and Furcat to come in the final couple remaining episodes.

If there's some common theme which link the stories of these minor characters to each other or to Noah and Helen, maybe it would be worth it but no, they're pretty much little independent arcs, even if they do involve Noah and Helen.

Oh and that's not to say they gave Alison and Cole a proper closure either.  Seriously, they got rid of those actors to feature stories about these other minor characters.

Only thing noteworthy to me about this episode is that Helen was friendly and happy at the end of Noah's POV, whereas he always see her as bitchy.

[LydiaE]

What is up with them constantly messing around with the timeline on this show?!?

According to the fixer/PR lady that works with Noah’s agent, the experience Noah has with Eden was “over ten years ago”. If Stacy is supposedly twelve years old now, that would’ve made her, like, two years old in season one. That makes no sense. 

[nara]

I really enjoyed this episode—after a very long time. 

I am glad that Helen took charge of Sierra, though it’s not her job to do so. (Might explain future EJ’a interest in the Lockhardts, because he might have heard about them while growing up with Helen.) However, this would have made more sense if Vik’s parents had rejected the child because he is illegitimate and half-white. What happened to Sierra’s movie role???

I do like Helen standing up to Sasha. At the same time, Christianna is questionable IMO...Helen and Sasha’s relationship is not long for this world...

Stacey continues to be an MVP! 

I watched most of the Noah part through my fingers like a horror movie. He is so incredibly stupid, I can’t imagine it! I literally yelled at the TV a couple of times. At the same time, I don’t think he did anything with Eden and I don’t think his relationship with the student was quite what was described. I feel bad for him, but I think he’s digging is own grave. 

[preeya]

The title of this episode should have been "FUCK UPS"

[preeya]

Best line ever:   "I don't care if you fucked her, if she fucked you, if you shoved carrots up each others asses and ate them, do not reach out to this woman."

And of course, Fuck-up Noah runs right to confronting this woman. Such an asshole.

Edited October 13, 2019 by preeya

[LibertarianSlut]

Hold up, Noah and Alison were married? To each other? Where have I been, and what have I been smoking?

[T Summer]

I enjoyed this Joaniefree episode but also agree they're flinging too much stuff at the wall. Too many unrelated story  lines with minor characters  that can't possibly be sewn up  in what, four more episodes.? Or maybe they want more seasons for all these dilemmas to play out? Oh dear God, no! Not from this team of writers.

Is Gottlieb the ONLY attorney in Montauk? Amazing! He handles family, criminal and entertainment law.

In the real world Priya would be  helping out with Eddie taking the pressure off Sierra. She'd be over the moon doing it too! No doubt Eddie would be in her care whenever Sierra was working on the film.  Sierra would have a cleaning person come in and a babysitter  if she still needed it. How in the world did the writers turn one rich adult lady with a baby into this morass?

I think maybe Helen had a rare smile for Noah at her door because Whitney said he'd been so helpful to her with  all the  wedding plans.

[Guest]

Eye rolled at the foreshadowing accomplished by Stacy's astronaut story. 

[nara]

15 minutes ago, Giant Misfit said:

Eye rolled at the foreshadowing accomplished by Stacy's astronaut story. 

I thought that she was deliberately creating a story about people reuniting to annoy Sasha and confirm her loyalty.

[LoveLeigh]

5 hours ago, nara said:

What happened to Sierra’s movie role???

Now THAT really made me laugh. Just goes to show you how messed up this season is to the point that the writers forget the plots they created and drop them and discard them as if we are total idiots and will just go along for "the rocky mixed up make no sense" ride. 

[ScoobieDoobs]

Er, is Stacy by far the only nice one on this show or what?  Team Stacy!

Noah, you are a jackass & an idiot!  Idk, is this Treem giving Noah a much deserved comeuppance (before the end of the show) for his past actions?  I kinda like it.

Does Treem have an ax to grind with Vanity Fair or investigative reporters in general?  I got the definite impression the reporter was being made to be seen like the enemy, with suspiciously sinister ulterior motives -- as in, she's only driven to writing a hit piece.  I didn't care for this.

Wow, Trevor didn't bug me in this ep!  Poor sulky Martin has indeed vanished from the show, but at least he got a momentary mention.

Loved the way Helen was looking at Sasha when he was interacting so uncomfortably with the kids.  Her look said to me -- WTF am I doing with asshole?  Or -- did I trade one asshole for another, with a (sorta) nice guy (who died on me) in between?

Yay, JJL is back!  She was effectively creepy & annoying, but I still say Sharon Stone or Michelle Pfeiffer woulda been better cast in this part.

[Guest]

1 hour ago, nara said:

I thought that she was deliberately creating a story about people reuniting to annoy Sasha and confirm her loyalty.

Could be! I read it, however, as a the child being used to foreshadow her parents' eventual reunion.

Then again, it's this show. They might just forget all about that next week.

[Razzberry]

Loved it. Between Helen's i-zoom on Noah, Stacy's subtle and moving story and Noah's warm reception at Helen's (about the only place he seems welcome these days) could a double wedding be on the menu?  Or does Whiney change her mind at the last minute and Helen once again wears the vagabond tramp dress?  Cheesy but I wanna feel-good ending for Helen dammit!

Then again, I would've bet money Sasha had woody allened his step-daughter. 

[weaver]

I enjoyed the episode; the acting was superb, including the smaller players like Janel Maloney , Noah's publisher, and the fixer who gives him such good advice that he ignores, Sasha's daughter.  Then there was Richard Schiff and  Jennifer JL.  But it was ruined a bit for me by Noah's being so incredibly stupid that it was not realistic.    Now Noah's even been accused of being potentially responsible for Alison's suicide then making a fool of himself at Eden's party, what next? 

If JJL is supposed to be such a famous actress why did the social worker not bat an eye when her name was brought up?   And again, why no mention of Priya.  Did Sierra complete her role in Madame Bovary in spite of post partum?  

How could Helen have decorated so many homes in such a short time.  And if that business was going so well why would she have wanted to work at a firm where people were so snotty?  That "interview" was ridiculous.  

I don't see how anything will be successfully resolved in the three remaining episodes, but I'll settle for the good acting, if that continues.   Not looking forward to any Joanie/Ben scenes.  

[stormy weather]

11 hours ago, nara said:

 However, this would have made more sense if Vik’s parents had rejected the child because he is illegitimate and half-white.

This has been bothering me since episode 1 this season. Why has the relationship between Vik's parents and Eddie never been clarified? I am 100% sure that, if she had been given the chance, Priya would've come round and happily helped out with Eddie. 
Also, I might be biased about the subject because I've worked with children for many years and I have very little tolerance for negligent parents, but I don't think Helen did a good thing covering up for Sierra with the social worker. That baby is not safe with her. If she really wanted to help, she could've probably talked to the social worker and work out a plan where she (Helen) takes temporary custody of Eddie and makes sure Sierra attends post-partum depression therapy sessions while living with her. I don't know if that's feasible but it would've still been better than leaving Eddie alone with drowsy Sierra and her kitchen utensils. 

May I say that, 3 episodes from the finale, I am ZERO interested in Noah's #metoo lawsuit? There's not enough time to approach the topic in a decent manner, they are digging up a plethora of characters I can't even remember and I don't care about in the least (Noah's blond friend, his lawyer, the publisher, the publisher's attorney, Eden, Audrey - who is she, btw? -, the Vanity Fair lady...), and we already know none of the things he's accused of happened. And now he has to explain everything to Helen and how the accusations are not true and Helen, who might have been thinking about getting back together with Noah, is gonna think again, but then in the last episode he's going to be proven innocent and the series is going to end with both of them smiling at each other which leaves a glimmer of hope for their future. Booooring! 

I really do wish they would have spent more time on relationship we already know existed, like Joanie's relationship through the years with the Lockharts, with Noah, with Cole (how did he die? Were he and Joanie close until then?) and with Luisa, or Noah's attempt to rebuild his relationship with Helen, if that's where the show is going to end, Helen's parents and her role in helping out, and so on. I'm also (hardly ever, but still) wondering what happened to Martin, the one that got away. He's just off to school forever somewhere? I think this season he's been mentioned fewer times than Eden (or Audrey).

[weaver]

Does anyone suppose that Noah will go out "screaming into the canyon at the moment of my death."  At this point it would not shock me.   Will he be in jail with all these accusations?   We know what happened last time he was in jail.  Is Brendan Fraser still available to play the guard?  

[TexasGal]

15 hours ago, nara said:

I watched most of the Noah part through my fingers like a horror movie. He is so incredibly stupid, I can’t imagine it! I literally yelled at the TV a couple of times. At the same time, I don’t think he did anything with Eden and I don’t think his relationship with the student was quite what was described. I feel bad for him, but I think he’s digging is own grave. 

Me too!  (#)  Don't go talk to the reporter!!  Don't go to that reception!!  don't grab her arm!!  NOAH!  You're a moron.  At least they didn't have the new PR lady instantly act all flirty with him too, while giving him advice he wouldn't take. 

I can see why the bloom is off the rose with Sasha for Helen, but I don't get why she is suddenly willing to go back to Noah.  Other than, I guess, he's like comfortable old slipper when she is stressed about everything else. 

2 hours ago, stormy weather said:

Audrey - who is she, btw?

They conveniently included a scene with her in the previouslies.  

[weaver]

5 hours ago, TexasGal said:

Me too!  (#)  Don't go talk to the reporter!!  Don't go to that reception!!  don't grab her arm!!  NOAH!  You're a moron.  At least they didn't have the new PR lady instantly act all flirty with him too, while giving him advice he wouldn't take. 

I can see why the bloom is off the rose with Sasha for Helen, but I don't get why she is suddenly willing to go back to Noah.  Other than, I guess, he's like comfortable old slipper when she is stressed about everything else. 

They conveniently included a scene with her in the previouslies.  

Is Noah going to jail again for something he didn't do and is Helen going to rise to his defense by publicly saying she did it?  Course then she'd have to go to jail, I guess.   Maybe they could find an implausible way around that pesky detail.  Is Noah going to commit suicide?   His character's actions are so bizarre that it would not be unlikely.   With Treem, anything is possible.    There will be so much left dangling at the end; there just isn't time anymore.  

Oh, I FF'd the previouslies, so I missed Audrey.  Thanks for the tip.   She is in my recollection but very vaguely.  

Edited October 14, 2019 by weaver

[ScoobieDoobs]

Hey Helen, when your bf forgets your name . . . uh, maybe it’s time to move on?

[LoveLeigh]

2 hours ago, weaver said:

There will be so much left dangling at the end; there just isn't time anymore.  

I think there will be a lot dangling because the writers forget half of what they have created in story lines. I would not be surprised if we do not even see Joanie again. 

[hoodooznoodooz]

I guess every time they need a new episode script, they tell a different bunch of high school students with ADHD to take care of it. 

[ScoobieDoobs]

The 2 millennial idiots interviewing Helen?  Guess they were dumb caricatures like Joel?  Fail, Treem!

So could Eden really be telling the truth?  This was clearly Noah’s POV cuz it screamed — I’m a victim, victim, victim here!  The way he confronted Eden was aggressive & scary.  And yet she seemed more creepy than strong & brave to stand up to him.  Their confrontation was a weird scene.  I didn’t know what to make of either of their motives.

Edited October 14, 2019 by ScoobieDoobs

[HC87]

The acting/writing this season is just so cliched.

Countless examples but imperious actress (JJL), placing a baby next to a knife a quick 2 top of my head.

[LibertarianSlut]

I think Helen is shouldering too much responsibility with regard to Sierra and Eddie.  You know how yawning is contagious?  I think being tired might be contagious, because every time I see Helen, she looks so damned stressed and tired with high, defensive shoulders, downcast eyes and a brooding pout, that I want to take a nap.  I wish Helen would have just let Sierra go off with her mom.  And where is Sierra sleeping now that she and Eddie are staying with Helen?  Last time Sierra was over-tired, she was told to lay down in Stacy's bed, which implied to me that there was not a guest bedroom.  So, what, is Sierra going to take over Helen's bedroom and Helen will sleep on the couch?  What about Helen's minor children?  Don't they deserve some stability after what they've been though?  Plus, Helen is having cash flow problems.  She might have to sell her house if she can't afford her kids' tuition.  I have a strong feeling that even though Sierra theoretically has money, Helen taking them in is going to cost a lot.  And when Helen feels like they've worn our their welcome?  Good luck evicting them in Los Angeles!

I like Helen, but I wish she were more normal.  If Sasha wants to whisk her off to San Fran for her birthday, she should go and enjoy it, so long as Noah is there to watch Stacy.  

That whole bit of the episode with Helen meeting Christiana at the coffee shop was a nonstarter.  First of all, I hate when they do this on TV:  in order to show how poor and desperate someone is, they take meetings while they are actively on their shift at work.  Nobody does that in real life (and I've worked at these places).  Even if you have two jobs, as Christiana reported to have, you still have time to meet someone when you are not working.  There are 24 hours in a day, and if this is important, you willl schedule it in.  Worst case scenario, you'll schedule it for your break.  Breaks are governed by state and federal law.  I think it's federal law that no break is less than 10 minutes, and those women were not talking for ten minutes, so it was just stupid for that boss to be knocking on the window, other than to get an emotional "oh poor Christiana" response form the audience.

Also, the dialogue was not on point during that convo or later with Sasha.  I have never in my life heard of someone withholding money so that someone doesn't write a book about them.  It's not incentivizing.  It doesn't make sense.  Christiana gets the full trust in four years when she's 25, so Sasha has four years to convince her not to sell the fictional book that will "ruin" him?  Why wouldn't she just write the damn thing when she's 25, and add in withholding of funds to boot?  Why not go to court, hold up your copy of the trust in one hand, your bank statement in another hand, and say your trust hasn't been paid in contemplation of the agreement?  Why involve Helen?

And just one more thing about Christiana's trust:  her story, which Sasha seemed to verify--that he is holding money in a trust for her--flew in the face of everything that happened in the last episode where Christiana was on, where she was supposedly "shaking down" Sasha for money, and he'd thunder, "how much is it you want this time??"  That episode totally made it seem like Christiana was exploiting Sasha's guilt. If it was her money from a trust, wouldn't Christiana be like, "um, well, according to the trust, you have to pay me..."?  I think the show is just jerking around the storylines.

------------------------------------------

Noah's story was much ado about nothing to me.  Going back to last episode, when Noah replied to the allegation, "it's fucking shit!", wasn't there some heavy-duty accusation, like Noah had raped Eden or done something really bad to her?  If he remembered a kiss after the fact, which he immediately euphamized as "a flirtation," that's not contradictory.  It can be "fucking shit" that someone coerced someone into sex, and at the same time, the two people in question could have shared a kiss, a flirtation, or maybe they had consensual sex.  The word "seduce" was coming up a lot.  I don't think there's sex without seduction.  Even animals do mating dances.  I don't know why it turned into such a crisis.  Why couldn't the lawyer or the spin doctor of whomever from Noah's publishing house just call over to Vanity Fair and say that there was "x" between Noah and Eden all those years ago, and Noah wanted to add that detail in the name of transparency, and, no, Noah will not be available for further questions, and if you need anything else, please emailme.  And if the Vanity Fair reporter had more questions, refuse to answer, and let her kill the piece?  

I think everyone making such a big deal about it to Noah made him panic and do such extraordinarily dumb things (even though he's an adult and he should be thinking for himself).  For Gottlief to be all like, "tell your family" about a "flirtation" he had when he wasn't married to Helen seemed a little dramatic to me.  Then again, I don't have my pulse on exactly how bad it is out there.  If it's really the French Revolution, as Gottlief said, and your career can be killed for having a flirtation with one adult woman, and for being a sarsastic, frustrated professor to another woman, then...that situation is fucked.  Everyone should pack up and go home, and not have any interaction with the opposite sex.  

[ScoobieDoobs]

1 hour ago, HC87 said:

The acting/writing this season is just so cliched.

Countless examples but imperious actress (JJL), placing a baby next to a knife a quick 2 top of my head.

Seriously, was that overkill much? OK, Treem, we get that Sierra is a crap mother!  We don’t have to be knocked over the head.  Was expecting Sierra to accidentally almost dump a bucket of acid on poor Eddie.  Jeez, Treem, enough!

And yeah, the cliches are coming fast & furious this season, but we got a bunch just in the first few minutes of this ep.  Eye-rolling, annoying millennials who think they invented social media & the dumb shit that anyone over 40 has never used social media & needs their kids to navigate it.  Ugh, why perpetuate this dumb shit, Treem?

Edited October 14, 2019 by ScoobieDoobs

[Snewtsie]

Minor point- but Helen stated in an irked tone that Vic had an affair with Sierra... did she forget she also had sex with Sierra?

[preeya]

2 hours ago, LibertarianSlut said:

And just one more thing about Christiana's trust:  her story, which Sasha seemed to verify--that he is holding money in a trust for her--flew in the face of everything that happened in the last episode where Christiana was on, where she was supposedly "shaking down" Sasha for money, and he'd thunder, "how much is it you want this time??"  That episode totally made it seem like Christiana was exploiting Sasha's guilt. If it was her money from a trust, wouldn't Christiana be like, "um, well, according to the trust, you have to pay me..."?  I think the show is just jerking around the storylines.

↑ I had the same thought. He made it look like he was caving to her demands for $25k in the previous episode. But I guess that was just because Helen was witnessing the confrontation. I haven't trusted Sasha Mann since he first appeared on the scene. He comes off as being just a rich entitled jerk.

And speaking of jerks, Noah Solloway has got be one of the biggest jerks ever.

[PrincessPurrsALot]

Noah Fucking Solloway, always a victim, whether it's his interpretation of how people are treating him or he's imagining big bad Brendan Fraser.  I was waiting to see villagers with torches and pitchforks shouting "Kill the monster!" at the bookstore.  The show was so subtle having him walk out to hear sirens and have red light flashing on his face. 

People who are shocked that Sasha Mann is a jerk - no one.  Why does everyone always say his full name?  When Sierra's mother saw him, she announces his full name.  Wouldn't most people just say Sasha?  

Ooh, Noah almost blurted out that he went to jail for Helen.  Oooooooooh!  Shocking.  

[AngelaHunter]

23 hours ago, Giant Misfit said:

Eye rolled at the foreshadowing accomplished by Stacy's astronaut story. 

Yeah, not heavy-handed or anything.

8 hours ago, LibertarianSlut said:

 If it's really the French Revolution, as Gottlief said, and your career can be killed for having a flirtation with one adult woman, and for being a sarsastic, frustrated professor to another woman, then...that situation is fucked.

Pretty much, and there's no way to prove a negative for something that allegedly happened years ago.

It's all too much. It's like everyone Noah knows, or has ever known spends their lives trying to fuck him up. Is he really so important he's on the forefront of everyone's mind? I have no memory of Ariel or Audrey. Is every woman he spoke to or might have a bit of a dick to going to crawl out of the woodwork and accuse him of everything short of being another Bluebeard?

8 hours ago, HC87 said:

Countless examples but imperious actress (JJL), placing a baby next to a knife a quick 2 top of my head.

Wasn't it Sierra who plunked him down on the kitchen counter with a knife lying while she talking a mile-a-minute (and seemed wired on something) to the social worker? I can't help wondering why Helen doesn't butt out of all this and tell Sierra to call the child's grandparents and ask for help.

[Razzberry]

JJL has a whole new career playing ghastly mothers!

I think Patrick Melrose has to take the prize though.  *SPOILERS*

And it's no wonder Sasha Mann was so eager to go to the French Laundry.

[AngelaHunter]

1 hour ago, Razzberry said:

JJL has a whole new career playing ghastly mothers!

Even now that I know who she is and looked carefully at her this time, she is not recognizable to me.

[T Summer]

24 minutes ago, AngelaHunter said:

Even now that I know who she is and looked carefully at her this time, she is not recognizable to me.

Same here. I recognized only her voice.

[ScoobieDoobs]

Well, I'm not gonna pull an EJ & start rolling off lines from great JJL parts, but suffice to say she is a proven terrific actress.  And here she has an interesting presence.  She is great at playing creepy & she does it here to the max.  I still say she doesn't quite pull off the supposed aspect that she's a famous hottie.  A former hottie?  Maybe. 

Idk, when Adeline flicked off that line to Helen about Sierra fucking her "husband"?  Jeez, I got chills.  Thought she was gonna stick a high heel in Helen's eye like JJL did in Single White Female.  Creepy, creepy, creepy.  Oh Helen, stay far away from these 2!

So after Helen talks to the Vanity Fair reporter, will she toss Noah out -- for like the 500th time this season?

Hmmm, so will Eden get a POV?

Uh, a friend told me she noticed Sierra mentioned her last name is James in this ep.  I didn't notice it -- did anyone?  Er, Eddie James?

Edited October 15, 2019 by ScoobieDoobs

[Otherkate]

Is there someone out there clamoring for more Whitney and Furcat??

[AngelaHunter]

9 hours ago, ScoobieDoobs said:

Well, I'm not gonna pull an EJ & start rolling off lines from great JJL parts, but suffice to say she is a proven terrific actress. 

I agree. I've always really enjoyed watching her in anything she was in. Seems she inherited her father's amazing talent. I still think she's good, but she just looks like a different, unknown person now to me.

1 hour ago, Otherkate said:

Is there someone out there clamoring for more Whitney and Furcat??

I swear it's not me!

[MaggieG]

Ok, so that Audrey chick. I vaguely remember her at that dinner party at Professor French's house. Was that her and Noah's only interaction? I'm assuming they interacted when she was in his class, but I don't remember. I don't think he ever hooked up with her. That was the time he and Professor French were starting their relationship. So she wrote an entire book about an abusive relationship with a professor based on a few conversations with Noah? Oy vey.

Eden was unusually creepy when Noah confronted her.

[preeya]

10 hours ago, ScoobieDoobs said:

Uh, a friend told me she noticed Sierra mentioned her last name is James in this ep.  I didn't notice it -- did anyone?  Er, Eddie James?

Good catch ↑

The social worker said her full name when she first confronted Helen. Here's the quote:  "I'm a social worker from the Los Angeles Department of Children and Family Services. I'd like to ask you some questions about your neighbor, Sierra James."

Edited October 15, 2019 by preeya

[Double A]

19 hours ago, Snewtsie said:

Minor point- but Helen stated in an irked tone that Vic had an affair with Sierra... did she forget she also had sex with Sierra?

Yeah there's that. But I'm more trusting of the writers than most here. I think Sierra is a classic tragic Hollyweird figure that is used and abused by everyone around her. So the fact that point is 'minor' in the grand scheme of her world kinda rings true. 

[T Summer]

Yes, very good catch! I heard Sierra James and didn't even relate it to E.J.

If grown up Eddie is E.J., what would be his connection to Joanie?  Even if Helen ends up caring for Eddie or just stays in his life as Sierra's friend, I highly doubt she'd talk to him extensively about Alison and doubt even more she'd talk to him about the Lockhearts.

She might remember Cole's name (and obviously Scotty's) and possibly Cherry's since she was at her house over the Whitney Scotty thing. Beyond that, I don't think she could name the other family members (the two other brothers... I know I can't). Nor does she know  that the father committed suicide or about the Grandpa Silas baby curse etc.

I don't think she'll talk to Eddie about Alison, her fragile state of mind when she slept at Helen's and Vic's California compound post air-arrest,  or her having (apparently) committed suicide.

1. because Noah broke the family apart to be with Alison 

2. because she doesn't know Alison and her inner conflicts like that.

I'd be surprised if Helen even knew about Gabriel's death. It was never discussed with her on the show?

So how would E.J. (if he's Eddie) become interested in Joanie or Cole Lockheart, Cole's former wife Alison who committed suicide or anything  about the family? He didn't have Ben in his sights until he saw Ben's pic among  Cole's possessions in ep 6. I wrote extensively on that thread about how absurd the whole Joanie-E.J.  meet up was... including him spewing facts relating to Joanie's mom's death faster than he does movie trivia.

Facts she would have never known or acted on  (confronting Ben). Still hoping everything involving E.J. and Ben  in 6 +7 were  Joanie's hallucinations.

[car54]

Well if somehow EJ is connected to Helen--maybe that means Noah is in his life as well and in reading Noah's books he gets interested in the real life things that happened.

[T Summer]

Yes! Just thought of that while in the shower, the only place I get a quiet moment to think.

Maybe E.J. read the book or saw the movie Descent  because the author was his mom's friend and neighbor Helen's ex. [She could be his adoptive mom by then to if Sierra doesn't straighten up.]  Helen could have said the story was based on real people Lana was Alison and the Lockhearts were (I forget) the Cartrights or Heartwells? Cole said it at that Thanksgiving dinner that he brought the book to and talked about it. That much she would know.

[Milburn Stone]

On 10/14/2019 at 12:09 PM, ScoobieDoobs said:

The 2 millennial idiots interviewing Helen?  Guess they were dumb caricatures like Joel?  Fail, Treem!

I think the show has always been a comedy as much as it has been anything else. (And it has been a lot of things else.) Except for the grimmest of the episodes, practically every installment has had several moments of intentional humor. I'd almost go as far as to say that practically every scene has contained moments of intentional humor. (Sometimes, as with Helen's mom, the characters are so awful to each other that you can't do anything but laugh.) That's made the drama easier to take. I agree the millennial idiots and Joel are caricatures, but I'd call them amusing caricatures.

[AngelaHunter]

Every show, no matter how dramatic, needs some humour. Take a show like "Six Feet Under", that centered around loss, death and dying yet had many moments that were truly howlingly funny. We need this to balance out the grimness because unrelenting grimness is nearly unwatchable.

10 hours ago, Milburn Stone said:

I agree the millennial idiots and Joel are caricatures, but I'd call them amusing caricatures.

I'd add the wedding dress ladies there, and totally agree they are all caricatures. I just don't find them amusing. We don't know them, we saw them only a few times and it felt as though they were just randomly (and often awkwardly) shoehorned in there for laughs, but I just found them one-dimensional irritants. It's different when, e.g., Margaret acts like a loon, because we've known her since the beginning. When she said Helen "looked like a vagabond whore" in her dress, I laughed because that's the kind of thing we expect from her. When two anonymous salespeople illogically acted like rude bitches for no reason, it just annoyed me. JMO, but people can be funny without being turned into cartoons.

[cardigirl]

16 hours ago, T Summer said:

Yes, very good catch! I heard Sierra James and didn't even relate it to E.J.

If grown up Eddie is E.J., what would be his connection to Joanie?  Even if Helen ends up caring for Eddie or just stays in his life as Sierra's friend, I highly doubt she'd talk to him extensively about Alison and doubt even more she'd talk to him about the Lockhearts.

She might remember Cole's name (and obviously Scotty's) and possibly Cherry's since she was at her house over the Whitney Scotty thing. Beyond that, I don't think she could name the other family members (the two other brothers... I know I can't). Nor does she know  that the father committed suicide or about the Grandpa Silas baby curse etc.

I don't think she'll talk to Eddie about Alison, her fragile state of mind when she slept at Helen's and Vic's California compound post air-arrest,  or her having (apparently) committed suicide.

1. because Noah broke the family apart to be with Alison 

2. because she doesn't know Alison and her inner conflicts like that.

I'd be surprised if Helen even knew about Gabriel's death. It was never discussed with her on the show?

So how would E.J. (if he's Eddie) become interested in Joanie or Cole Lockheart, Cole's former wife Alison who committed suicide or anything  about the family? He didn't have Ben in his sights until he saw Ben's pic among  Cole's possessions in ep 6. I wrote extensively on that thread about how absurd the whole Joanie-E.J.  meet up was... including him spewing facts relating to Joanie's mom's death faster than he does movie trivia.

Facts she would have never known or acted on  (confronting Ben). Still hoping everything involving E.J. and Ben  in 6 +7 were  Joanie's hallucinations.

We don't know how much Helen would know in the future, or if E.J. will get to know Noah and the rest of the family as he grows up.  He said he was studying the effects of trauma on families and how some people become resilient and others become self-destructive (or something to that effect), and if he grows up knowing Helen, then he would know about the trauma of the divorce and what caused the divorce. That alone would propel him into finding out more about Alison, which could lead him into all the other information about the Lockharts. He told Joanie that he had spoken with Cole, so he might have gotten much of the Lockhart history from him.  It's not a giant leap. At least not to me. 🙂

Edited October 16, 2019 by cardigirl

[T Summer]

After writing that post it occurred to me E.J. could have been interested  in the fact that his mom's friend and neighbor's ex husband wrote a book and that there was a movie based on  it. Car54 suggested it too, about the book  As you say, he would be even more interested if Noah was in the picture as he was growing up.

My biggest problem with the writing and the thing I think was a giant leap, was when we were at the point where we met grown up Joanie who thought her mother committed suicide by drowning and we had to get to the point where she began to suspect she was murdered instead and    had Ben in her sights as the culprit. That chance meeting with E.J. in ep 6 and all that information he imparted  to Joanie was what I personally found  totally implausible. YMMV. Did you find any of this problematic?

E.J. was at the cemetery, why? Does he live in Montauk? If he'd been researching the Lockhearts for years as he said no doubt he'd already have any info like names, dates, birth places  found on head stones.

She was uncomfortable in that remote setting w/ a stranger and trying to get away from  E.J.. Her bike tires went flat so she couldn't extricate herself.

 Giving her a ride home they stop at the beach where hard working Joanie is  planting nano-sensors  or something when E.J. says you're so resilient to be calmly working  here when  your mother drowned off this jetty. Total revelation to Joanie!

 He shows her  he has police records relating to Alison's death and crimes involving the Lockhearts going way back.   He acquired them from the flooded Montauk police precinct. Really? Official police records just left for the taking?    At a time when he happened by so he could take them for his research? Some  records he has are badly damaged (he said), but not the ones relating to Alison's death  apparently.

At her Dad's house he saw and asked if he could have a discarded box that had been Cole's. Visable now   because raccoons had torn  off the bags Joanie put them in. Why didn't she care what happened to it or who had it?

Later that night he calls her cell phone(how?.. he said you're like the 5th Joanie I called) to show her something; the  super moon. Seeing it  she remembered there was a super moon the night her mother died and checks the tides and finds out the water was very low at the time her mother was said to have drowned.

Joanie returns home and obliterates her marriage and her husband tells her to leave. Where does she go? To E.J.'s place. Not a friend's  nearby or Luisa's to see if she can talk to her husband Paul the next day, but to E.J.'s.  Of course, because how else can E.J. show her that news paper clipping w/ Ben's photo that he found  in her Dad  Cole's box?  She sees Ben's photo  and remembers having seen him, someone her  mom dated when she was 7.