Episode 18: My Two Young Men
Bree:
Andrew doesn’t take the news of his new half-brother very well. He walks out of the room, telling Sam, “If you don’t mind, I’ll hug you later.” However, Sam looks pretty thrilled about this whole drama. Meanwhile, Bree is keeping busy by planning a family dinner party.
Orson is shocked about Bree’s desire to maintain a relationship with Sam. We thought that Bree just had a heart and wanted to provide Sam with some sense of family, but it turns out she’s “ashamed,” guilty about how Rex basically screwed Sam over. Sam listens to Bree’s conversation with Orson and smiles He has an agenda, but what is it? Does he want Bree’s money? Her company? Vengeance for Rex’s actions?
Danielle attempts to flirt with Sam. Awkward—they are related now. And she is married. Anyway, Sam proves at dinner that he is the dictionary definition of a perfect child: he put himself through school to get his Master’s while taking care of his sick mother, built wells in Micronesia, et cetera. The whole well-building thing took it a little far. He’s got to be making up at least part of this story.
Sam mentions his love of playing the guitar, and Bree gives him Rex’s old guitar after Sam plays it for a few minutes. Andrew flips out at this. He takes the guitar from Sam and smashes it against the mantel, saying, “Hey, I got an idea: why don’t we split it?” Andrew is the only one who gets a weird vibe from Sam.
Bree, on the other hand, is beyond furious at her son. Andrew’s comment stuck with us though: “Yeah, I know he [Sam] is the perfect son. The problem is, he’s not yours.” Bree needs to realize how difficult this is for her family. She and Andrew have had many issues over the years (leaving him on the side of the road in season two, anyone?), and that is just making their strained relationship even worse by doting on Sam.
When Bree goes to talk to Sam, she mentions that she misses Rex. He cheated on her! She watched him die and didn’t call an ambulance in season one! Meanwhile, Orson is sitting in the background, creepily observing this scene. Orson goes to Andrew with a plan: they’re going to figure out about Sam’s background and why he wants to develop a relationship with Bree.
Susan and Gaby:
There’s a candy selling competition at Juanita and M.J.’s school. M.J. always loses at everything and Susan promises that she will make sure M.J. wins.
Susan tells Mike her plan and relays the struggles of M.J’s young life. Susan can relate— she’s as much of a loser as her son. As she begins to tell a story about losing a jump rope competition in sixth grade, Mike mouths it along with her. All we remember about Susan’s rant is that her competitor had an allergic reaction while jumping rope and the girl’s mother gave her an antihistamine shot “which is technically a steroid so she was juiced!” Mike agrees to support Susan’s quest as long as she never tells the jump rope story again.
During the housewives’ weekly poker game, Juanita comes in, with a prewritten speech, to try to sell the chocolate. The speech says, “I’m selling candy so I can stay in school and not wind up on the streets selling drugs.” Hmm, sounds like something that Gaby would come up with. Lynette and Bree have already bought candy from M.J. though. Here we go, another mother feud. Susan wants M.J. to win because he’s having “a self-esteem crisis.” HE’S 8! How is that possible?
Gaby wants Juanita to win because she isn’t making friends easily, and the winner of the contest gets a party. Honestly, we don’t care. This is about Gaby and Susan’s never-ending competition. We’re glad Gaby learned so much from her time in New York last week when she found out that everyone hated her.
At Mrs. McClusky’s cancer-free party (that’s right—one episode later, she’s totally cancer-free!), Susan is selling candy. When Gaby tries to call her out on it, Lee, in his only appearance of the night, yells at her, “Speedo season is a month away, and you have the nerve to sell this to my husband!”
The women take it to the next level. Gaby really out-does herself at a construction site to sell candy, so Susan puts M.J. in a wheel chair in front of the hospital. The focus of the competition is on the women, who care more about outdoing each other than seeing their children succeed.
By the last day of the competition, Juanita is winning by two bars. Susan gives Juanita a detention for no reason so she can’t go and sell any more, so, in retaliation, Gaby kidnaps M.J. The easiest solution would be Susan and Gaby encouraging M.J. and Juanita to be friends. But logic is never really an option in Desperate Housewives.
Susan takes the high road and tells M.J. not to sell the candy and to let Juanita win. Okay seriously, it seems like Gaby always comes out on top.
Gaby hears from the woman running the contest that Juanita sold 40 bars the last day and M.J didn’t sell any, so she knows that something is up. When she confronts M.J, he says, “My mom says it’s only a good deed if you don’t tell.” Touched, Gaby replies, “You should listen to your mother because she’s a winner just like you.” Let’s give him a gold medal then.
Lynette:
Irena and Preston are snuggling in bed when Lynette knocks at the door. Preston hides in the closet, but Lynette suspects that he’s in the room anyway. Mother’s instinct. Staying in the room, she slams the bedroom door. Preston, thinking she’s gone, walks out of the closet and tells Irena that that was a close call, only to find his mother waiting for him.
So it’s against his Christian upbringing. Immoral, but not the worst sin he could commit. Lynette’s got to get over it. They’re getting married—unless Lynette can find a way to end it before Preston makes what she believes is a big mistake.
Anyway, Lynette and Tom have a talk with Preston about not sharing a bed while they’re living at home. Preston and Irena’s grand idea is to find their own apartment. Instead of shooting down this idea, Lynette approves, but only because she recalls how she and Tom almost didn’t get married because they fought so much when they lived together pre-marriage. Finally getting his wife’s plan, Tom says, “You are devious and evil, and I have never been more in love with you.”
Unfortunately, Preston and Irena catch on to what Lynette’s trying to do, so they retaliate and announce that they will be getting married next week. Oh, and Preston has decided to put off college. He informs his parents that he got a job at a meat packing place—Irena is proud, but that’s the last straw for Lynette. “Maybe in Russia it’s every mother’s dream to see the inside of a cow, but not in my house,” Lynette says. The two women exchange words, and the scene ends up with Irena—who had been making dinner for the family—throwing a pot of sauce all over Lynette.
Is Preston too blinded by love to see how horrible Irena is? And why didn’t Tom kick Irena out of his house right after she dumped sauce on Lynette? Anyway, we don’t think this marriage is going to work out. If it even happens. We’re hoping that Preston will come to his senses and realize Irena isn’t in the relationship for love—but then again, if he did, we probably wouldn’t be watching DH.
Katherine:
What episode would be complete without an awkward Robin-Katherine scene? Well, we’ll skip over that scene and pretend we never saw it.
At Mrs. McClusky’s party, Katherine—who is still afraid to come out—mingles with the other guests and flirts a bit with McClusky’s doctor. Katherine’s either not a lesbian, or she’s just afraid to admit it. Regardless, it seemed a little forced. But Robin certainly noticed Katherine’s interest.
Robin takes Katherine outside, and they argue about what just happened. Oh, what perfect timing for Katherine to start yelling about their relationship and her sexual tendencies. Just as Mrs. McClusky asks her guests for a moment of silence to remember those who have died, everyone in the room hears the women’s argument.
After the party, Mrs. McClusky gives Katherine some advice, telling her that she shouldn’t care what anyone else thinks. Cut to a scene where Katherine and Robin decide to leave the neighborhood together (for good?). No, no Katherine! Robin can go, but Katherine our girl cannot!
Robin suggests they move to Paris. Eh, alright never mind, they can go to Paris. Katherine—husband stealer and resident psycho—has caused way too much drama during her stay on Wisteria Lane.
Angie:
It turns out that Nick isn’t Danny’s father, and the father issue is the dilemma that Nick and Angie are facing at the beginning of the episode. “You’re the only father he needs to know about,” Angie tells Nick while playing with an unloaded gun. Well, what about for the rest of us? We’d like to know who the real father is! Patrick Logan, perhaps?
Nick wants to tell Danny anyway. One night, he finds Danny in the garage working on his bike, and he tells his “son” they need to have a chat. He hands Danny what appears to be a beer. Where are their solid gold standards? Unless, maybe Danny is older than we think?
We see Patrick Logan for the first time. He’s not Mike Delfino, but he’s slightly attractive anyway. For an older guy. We were sort of hoping that Sam would turn out to be Patrick, but unfortunately that’s not the case. That would have been too easy.
Anyway, Patrick meets up with Angie’s mother’s neighbor, and he basically implies that he will hurt Angie if necessary. “She took something of mine. I want it back,” he says to the elderly neighbor. Could he be referring to Danny? Up until this point, Patrick was pretty charming. But then he randomly punches out a window—to show his strength maybe?
We didn’t really find out anything new and exciting about this mysterious Patrick Logan character, but that was expected. The writers of the show are really taking their time with this mystery, letting out as few details at a time as possible.
Predictions for next week:
No previews again. It figures that next week is just a rerun. We’d like ABC to know that we are sick and tired of these two to three week breaks in between episodes.
Jenny Hottle can be reached for comment at [email protected]
Kate Froehlich can be reached for comment at [email protected]