S01.E05: 5

[Higgs]

A picture is worth a thousand words.

Just the facts, ma'am.

Things they absolutely did NOT tell the detective:

N: "Before that summer, I wanted to pick up a young chick at a swimming pool but couldn't get my wedding ring off in time."

N: "Oscar told me the Lockharts were 'dirty as dirt'" (preview of next episode)

A: "I had anal with Cole once."

A: "I'm involved in the drug trade."

N/A: "I really like cunnilingus."

[Milburn Stone]

Things they absolutely did NOT tell the detective:

N: "Before that summer, I wanted to pick up a young chick at a swimming pool but couldn't get my wedding ring off in time."

N: "Oscar told me the Lockharts were 'dirty as dirt'" (preview of next episode)

A: "I had anal with Cole once."

A: "I'm involved in the drug trade."

N/A: "I really like cunnilingus."

 

That is a fun list, and it supports Pallas' (and my) view that the flashbacks contain much material of an "internal monologue" nature that could not possibly be getting relayed to the detective. The question is whether the flashbacks consist only of such internal monologue material--or whether some of the material in the flashbacks is being relayed to him for ass-covering or other exculpatory purposes.

[JenE4]

I'm thinking that maybe Allison's new city look could be a result of the Lockharts selling the ranch and becoming millionaires. Her marrying Noah and moving away is the more obvious choice, but I just thought I'd throw that out there.

I think you're right. If she left Cole for Noah, then she'd have NO money because Noah has no money--he'd no longer have his in-laws' cash flow. I think she stays with Cole and they have the $6M share of the ranch sale. I suppose she could have divorced Cole and got $3M, but I don't think she ends up marrying Noah because he looks all disheveled--unless it's like a conscious protest that he's not taking money from his next wife. But, regardless, I don't think these two end up together. Edited November 16, 2014 by JenE4

[Boundary]

I think you're right. If she left Cole for Noah, then she'd have NO money because Noah has no money--he'd no longer have his in-laws' cash flow. I think she stays with Cole and they have the $6M share of the ranch sale. I suppose she could have divorced Cole and got $3M, but I don't think she ends up marrying Noah because he looks all disheveled--unless it's like a conscious protest that he's not taking money from his next wife. But, regardless, I don't think these two end up together.

 

So who's she hissing to on the phone that she's at the station being interrogated (about Noah)? It can't be Cole, surely?

[bunnywithanaxe]

Wouldn't it just suck if she married Oscar?

[Higgs]

The detective refers to the club "The End" as being "out in Montauk", not a phrase he would use if he were a Montauk cop. So where is he and why is he on the case?

Not only has the detective told Noah he was divorced, single, and had lost custody, he doesn't wear the wedding ring he has on when interviewing Alison. (It worked, at least to the extent Noah refers to having given him details about his fights with Helen.) That very strongly suggests Noah is not married to Alison. And the detective's interest in his past relationship with Helen? She's a Butler, and while her parents were the first investors in Oscar's restaurant, they no longer patronize the place. Hmmm.

Alison is not alone. After the wedding (whose?), "WE left first" she tells the detective.

Noah appears to have had a reasonably successful second novel. That would have made him some some money and perhaps prospects for more. He dresses like an author and/or off-duty high school English teacher.

Edited November 16, 2014 by Higgs

[outtosee]

I know, I know... tv shows aren't supposed to be realistic. But I still don't understand why for the life of people on this show aren't portrayed with NY accents. As a native New Yorker (City) with a summer home in Suffolk County, you'd be hard pressed to find someone anywhere on Lawn Guyland without an accent, especially out on the End. 

 

Which brings me to my next point: on this show they act like they're in the middle of nowhere removed from civilization. Granted, Montauk really is the end of the island but they're hardly in the middle of nowhere. They're free to leave at any time, especially since their property values are so high they could just sell.

[Milburn Stone]

I know, I know... tv shows aren't supposed to be realistic. But I still don't understand why for the life of people on this show aren't portrayed with NY accents.

 

I've thought of that, and I have a theory that makes a whole lot of sense to me. Both the leads are English. Both do an amazing job sounding American. But I can easily imagine that doing a convincing New York/American accent might be a little beyond them. The American-born actors in the cast are probably capable of it. But how would it sound if all the secondary characters had New York accents and the two leads didn't? That's why all the actors have been directed to simply sound "American"--so that the two leads won't stick out.

Edited November 16, 2014 by Milburn Stone

[Heathrowe99]

I live in NJ now, but spent quite a bit of time in my 20's out in the Hampton's and I don't really remember the LI accent being rampant out there.  My dad lives in Huntington area, I hear a lot of  Lawn Giland accents there, or sure. I wouldn't say the accent cuts out in a certain geographical area but I would say-accents are often more based on class than geography. Cole is a townie, but he's sitting on a 6 million dollar property, so it's not like he's lower-class. Allison is a waitress, but really she's a pediatric nurse-she's well educated. Noah's family is definitely not going to have an accent.   Class is kind of a sticky comment to make, so my thought is just one way to interpret things-where I live in NJ there are a lot of strongly accented people who have plenty of money-but the accent here usually suggests that they're not educated, or that the money is a relatively new thing to their generation. 

 

Also, most people would find a LI or NJ or NYC accent more comical than sexy...and this is a sexy show.

Edited November 16, 2014 by Heathrowe99

[Boundary]

Alison is not alone. After the wedding (whose?), "WE left first" she tells the detective.

Alison indeed is not alone, so many clues point that way. The question is who's she with? There are many alternatives:

 

1. Cole; I don't think this works, considering the affair. She's admitted not to loving him anymore and I don't think he'd forgive her for the affair. Also, whoever she's with, I suspect it's the same person she was calling outside the police station, it didn't sound like Cole. If she's divorced from Cole, that could account for her present appearance. But is she that much of a gold digger? And would the Lockhart ranch be really sold? Unlikely is the answer to both, to me anyway.

 

2. Noah; very plausible. She's got a kid, it makes sense that it's his and she'd want him at the station if she's going to be grilled about him. If he's now a successful writer it'll make sense why she looks moneyed. What counts against him is the feeling I get that they are referring to the affair in the past tense. There's the possibility that his second novel is not a blockbuster, so he's not the source of her new appearance. 

 

3. City Hotshot. At first I dismissed this when it was suggested on these forums but now I'm beginning to wonder. After the scandal in Montauk it makes sense that she'd get away, divorce Cole and break up with Noah, to start her life afresh. He is rich and they are married with a child together. It's a completely new life and this investigation  is just a reminder of an old life she wants to forget, hence her obvious discomfort. I still say it's Noah on the phone because i) she's being interrogated about him and ii) she doesn't want the detective to know, (if she was calling her new city husband, she wouldn't be this stressed) i.e. she's an accomplice to something involving Noah somehow.

 

4. Oscar. Ewww (that's enough evidence, ain't it?) She has admitted to the detective she should've been worried seeing Oscar and Scotty together i.e. she doesn't mind if he's a suspect somehow. She doesn't seem to be in a hurry to protect him which would be expected if she was with him. Besides, her dismissal of him in the flashbacks doesn't suggest that she was going to end up going for him but who knows.

 

Whoever this person is she brought him to the wedding (whose? I ask as well) which suggests 4 is unlikely (he was mentioned in that conversation but the context separated him from the "we".) It also increases likelihood of 1 because it most likely was a Lockhart wedding, going with Cole would be natural (maybe it was before the affair exploded). Taking Noah or the new guy would both be unlikely because they aren't Montauk natives and wouldn't be welcome at a Lockhart wedding.

 

But this is assuming the wedding is a Lockhart affair. It could be a Butler (unlikely, considering Helen's attitudes to the "other woman") or a Solloway (maybe, if it's a Whitney/Scotty wedding - you just know those two are heading for some drama ahead) but why would Oscar be there? 

 

I don't expect answers to these questions but sometimes a summary might help when watching future episodes.

 

 

Noah appears to have had a reasonably successful second novel. That would have made him some some money and perhaps prospects for more. He dresses like an author and/or off-duty high school English teacher.

 

 

I think so too.

Edited November 16, 2014 by Boundary

[Pallas]

Wouldn't it just suck if she married Oscar?

 

Penance, 21st-century style.  The Ginger O.  

[Higgs]

If Noah and Alison were still together, they would each know the other was being questioned. What we"ve been shown (e.g., detective's opposing self-descriptions, questions asked and not asked, Alison's cell call) make thet scenario virtually impossible.

The questions the detective asks Alison about Scotty at the wedding make it extremely hard to believe he was the groom.

If one of the couple being married is an important single person we've already met, then the Lockhart matriarch comes to mind.

Edited November 17, 2014 by Higgs

[Lemons]

I liked this episode a little better because it wasn't just all Noah and Allison. Still lIke COle and Helen better, I hope the two cheaters do run away together. Then I don't have to look at them and their no spark affair.

Oh and I figured out why Ruth Wilson's lips bug so much. First she has no upper lip and on top of that what little upper lip she has sticks out like Howard the duck!

I think the upper lip looks ducky because of injections. That makes it look worse than just leaving it alone, makes people notice the weird upper lip even more. She also has too many front teeth making her whole mouth a disaster. I know that sounds small of me, but her mouth really is a distraction.

[HumblePi]

I know, I know... tv shows aren't supposed to be realistic. But I still don't understand why for the life of people on this show aren't portrayed with NY accents. As a native New Yorker (City) with a summer home in Suffolk County, you'd be hard pressed to find someone anywhere on Lawn Guyland without an accent, especially out on the End. 

 

Which brings me to my next point: on this show they act like they're in the middle of nowhere removed from civilization. Granted, Montauk really is the end of the island but they're hardly in the middle of nowhere. They're free to leave at any time, especially since their property values are so high they could just sell.

Long Island Accent, now....go sit down, relax, turn on The Affair and fix yourself a nice cup of cawfee. :)

 

http://youtu.be/fepgtXjFo7Q

Edited November 17, 2014 by HumblePi

[izabella]

I feel like the wedding is Oscar's wedding.  Mostly because when Alison was being questioned about Oscar (past episode), that's when the detective was asking her "if that's why she was at the wedding" after she had said something about Oscar being at her son's funeral because the town folk are connected to each other other and there for each other even though they aren't friends.  If that makes any sense!

Edited November 19, 2014 by izabella

[JAndy]

On the whole accent thing, I'm glad that they don't do it. I'm from Long Island and I usually find that they exaggerate the New York accent a lot on tv. It's sometimes commical

[outtosee]

I agree it's also comical. The accent is actually very nuanced (little things like "ahrange" instead of "oarange" for orange, etc.). I'd like to see, for once, someone get a real NY accent right and not exaggerate it for comic effect!

 

But I digress. I totally agree with whoever said Ruth's mouth is distracting. I feel awful for saying it but sometimes I get so distracted staring at it, that I have to rewind.

[jeansheridan]

Poor Dominick! He gets no love here. I think he is dishy and good at playing dim & sly. And this is such a good showcase for Ruth Wilson. I miss her real accent. Her real voice is deeper. Warmer. Amused.

 

I love Joshua Jackson but he feels the same in all versions. Nice, small town man. He is Pacey grown up and respectable. I really want to see him around Noah' s sons. I think his innate warmth would threaten a frustrated father.

 

I wish the children were written with more depth. The daughter does give GREAT attitude. Brat personified. Even her walk of shame/apology was annoying.

Edited November 29, 2014 by AmandaPanda
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[truthaboutluv]

When Helen offered to return to the city immediately, you could see his principles vaporize at the thought of leaving his little fuck buddy.

 

 

This. I'm already admittedly not a fan of Noah (yes the in-laws are assholes, the wife seemingly is dismissive about his career but considering his wildly varied view of Alison in his recollection of how they started that seemed to put her in some scarlet/temptress light, I am wary to believe much of his account and instead think he's someone who plays victim to justify his shitty actions) but that moment was where my dislike reached a new level. He's lecturing about the in-laws lack of principles for wanting to throw money at things, demanding that the daughter realize there are consequences to her actions, etc. etc. but when Helen suggests the reasonable option of cutting Witney's cushy vacation short, he balks because it means no more opportunity to bang Alison.

 

So banging Alison took precedence over what may be best for his daughter - father of the year there. Not to mention his snapping at his son because he had to get to his quickie booty call. Again, I don't care how much the narrative tries to set him up as a man smothered by his life and emasculated by his shitty in-laws, I just can't see Noah as anything but a selfish asshole. I actually found myself enjoying Oscar's toying and fucking with him. And I completely concede that Oscar's shady and creepy as fuck.

 

Whereas I'm sure his mother took very good care of Alison when she was a complete wreck, it's wildly unfair to use her real distress as a bludgeon to win an argument or silence another person.

 

 

I didn't see the scene that way. Athena was the one who started with the low blows and basically criticizing and disrespecting the guy's mother in HER house. And he basically rightly told her where the hell was she when her daughter was basically crippled by her grief from losing her son and yet she feels right in insulting his mother in her own house? And Athena's response that Cole didn't want her there was complete and utter bullshit in my opinion.

 

Who the hell cares what Cole wanted. Alison is her kid and she lost her child and was in immense pain. She should have said "fuck whatever Cole wants and whether he likes me or not" and be there for her daughter like a real parent would. I didn't like Athena because she was the type of character of people I can't stand - always think they're "wiser" and "more honest" than everyone else while not really owning their shit. I mean she even said Alison chose Cole over her by refusing to go with her and staying with her grandparents, until Alison had to point out she was a kid back then. And so god forbid as a kid she didn't want to go gallivanting all over and instead wanted to stay in the place she knew with the people she knew and loved.

 

Now Noah and Allison are adults, realizing the choices they made might not have been the right ones.  Both of them feel like aliens living someone else's life.

 

 

I totally got that some impression particularly from this episode with more insight into Alison's background. That said, it still didn't make me like or sympathize with them too much. I will say that a show like this is always tricky for a person like me because I'm all about owning one's choices and mistakes and decisions. And so I always balk at anything that reeks of blaming others or making excuses for one's shitty actions.

 

So again, while I totally get the emotional tale being told here and especially with Alison, a woman who was all but crippled with grief, I still find it hard to truly sympathize and empathize with either of them. Like with Alison, while I understand her pain, I always think "but yeah, there was someone else who lost a child too..." So to me while objectively I can sort of get what prompted their actions, it's still shitty actions and it still sort of reeks of "the other people are awful" - poor Noah and his horrible emasculating in-laws, unsupportive wife and horrible children and poor Alison trapped with her preachy husband and clingy mother in law. Yeah no...sorry, still not buying it.  

 

The other interesting aspect of all this and why I hope at some point there is POV from Helen and Cole is because I'm sure told from their ends they could be viewed as the sympathetic figures. Like Cole's POV may show a man struggling to reconnect with a wife who has shut down completely from grief and won't let him in no matter how much he tries. And Helen, funny enough, Noah showed himself to be an insensitive asshole to her in one of his own recollections where he basically mocked her memories and basically told her in so many words he was basically bored with her because apparently she repeated the same thing and he'd heard all her stories. So I can only imagine how a POV from Helen would look like and how she sees Noah's attitude towards her. 

 

The moment when Cole came back and found Alison dressed up was so awkward it didn't seem quite real to me.  I expected her to babble a little something about realizing she needed to go shopping or whatever.  Just staring at each other made me rethink their whole relationship.  Just how open is it?  Would moralistic, traditional Cole go for that?

 

 

I'm pretty sure they don't have an open relationship. I think Cole's reaction matched up perfectly to how his mother was talking about him to Alison, later in the episode. It seems like he's not one for opening up much and even when he made a speech at the town hall meeting, he said he doesn't really like talking much. So the way I took that scene is that he clearly realized that Alison was lying and there was somewhere she was heading that she didn't want him to know about and Alison clearly knew he knew but wasn't even going to waste either of their time by trying to lie about it. Honestly, in my opinion, the scene just further emphasized the massive distance that's built between them. They clearly don't talk about what either is really feeling.  

Edited December 31, 2014 by truthaboutluv

[Chas411]

Was it me or was there a massive shift in Helens personality or moreso Noah's perception of it. It was more like the Helen from Allisons version..

[SlackerInc]

I can't say that was my take on the reiki scene. Mary Kate seems kind of spacey to me; I could see her going nuts over something new agey, even if it wasn't actually doing anything.

 

That said, I think we were probably meant to believe that it really was effective. Athena instantly realizing that Alison and Noah had just slept together seemed like a validation of her abilities.

 

I would split the difference and say that Athena is, like most "psychics", perceptive and intuitive.  These are essential skills to be able to manipulate even gullible marks.  (Unlike a "cold reader" such as John Edward, though, I suspect Athena actually believes her own bullshit.)  But I definitely think the reiki only "worked" in the placebo/power of suggestion sense, due to Mary Kate's personality which you correctly judge as "spacey".  And I think the writers intend us to roll our eyes at Athena for the most part, although stillshimpy makes some good points about how she was not entirely at fault in the dinner confrontation.

 

That scene was marvelous, although I take a little bit of exception to the way the rich are presented in this and perhaps it's just supposed to be Helen's parents.  I grew up in one of the poorer areas of the country and then moved to one of the more affluent in my late teens and I have to say, there was not a denser population of jackasses based solely on socioeconomic differences.  It's just a little Evil Cartoon-ish to have gramps and grandma just brush aside something like that, when they'd just as likely be appalled without the pearl-clutching over assets.    

 

MMV.  My paternal grandfather and step-grandmother were of that Northeastern moneyed elite, and they were awful, much worse and more blatant than Helen's parents if you can believe it.  So were their friends, from what I could tell.

 

But this raises the more central question of how we are meant to take Noah's and Alison's flashbacks. Are we meant to understand that everything we're seeing in their flashbacks is material they're sharing with the detective? Or are the detective's questions merely prompts that cause them to dwell on their own reflections of events, to which we are privy but not the detective? Although for a while I thought it was the former, I think it really has to be the latter.

 

It's interesting, the different takes on this.  I am with you where you ended up (at least in this thread): there are things shown in the flashbacks which were not told to the detective, but also things told to the detective that were not heard by us.

Edited October 3, 2015 by SlackerInc

[stillshimpy]

MMV. My paternal grandfather and step-grandmother were of that Northeastern moneyed elite, and they were awful, much worse and more blatant than Helen's parents if you can believe it. So were their friends, from what I could tell.

It can, and does :-) You ought to get a laugh out of this, SlackerInc as we know each other elsewhere, but I am an actual DAR (of the non-practicing variety) on my paternal side -- and was only ever in the the poorer areas of the country because my father's very blue-blooded relatives were devoted to the concept of Noblesse Oblige (as he was) -- and then moved to the more affluent area because my mother's side (just a generation removed from the poorest of the poor, Scottish coal miners) after he died...because both of my parents were academics (and since we do know each other elsewhere ...that's why I am fairly certain you'll get a chuckle out of it).

So my experience was very much that the people of the Ivy League town were actually quite lovely....and so were the people of NEPA...not across the board, but in no way determined by money.

However, just as my experiences are entirely valid and true to my own walk through life, I trust that yours are too.

I just think that the factors that determine, "this person is a complete and total buttmunch" have so very little to do with the amount of money that they do, or do not have.

Good to see you here, by the way :-) We don't always agree, but I always have fun exchanging views with you.

As it pertains to this story: Oddly enough...it does appear to be holding at least a little bit true: Yes, the people with money tend to be insensitive and uncaring jackasses....but in the spirit of equal opportunity? Often the people of fewer means are too.

Everyone dons a grey hat in these parts :-)

Edited October 3, 2015 by stillshimpy

[SlackerInc]

Something I love about it.  :)

 

And yes, I enjoy exchanging views with you as well!  It was 90% of the reason I kept watching Colbert after the initial curiosity...but now it looks like maybe you've faded out of that one?

Edited October 5, 2015 by SlackerInc