Disco Shtick: Big Little Lies Season 2 Episode 4 Recap
Warning: This article contains big (and little) spoilers.
Some would consider Big Little Lies to be Game of Thrones for girls and the gays. Last night’s twists and turns would certainly live up to that standard, giving us something juicy to end our Pride month with. So much happened in the most recent episode, “She Knows,” but the fourth installment kicks off with a bang (or rather, a slap) when Celeste loses control at a pumpkin-carving party and gives Mary Louise a piece of her hand. The sneaky grandmother is never one to be left without a comeback; once she gathers herself, she responds dryly, “What do you call that? Foreplay?”
And that’s only in the first ten minutes.
Mad Men
Madeline is having no luck working through her rift with Ed. He won’t leave her, but he won’t engage with her either. Top it off with repeated aggravation from Nate, and Ed is far from a happy camper. At Amabella’s '70s soiree, he tells Madeline how sick he is of the superficiality in Monterey (to illustrate his point, everyone there is dressed in full costume.) Nate puts him in a headlock for being the only one able to make Bonnie smile, and we have all the drama expected for an eight-year-old’s birthday party. That is, until Elizabeth suffers a stroke on the dancefloor.
What’s Going on With Bonnie?
As if Bonnie wasn’t going through enough, her mother ends up unconscious in the hospital after a stroke. Bonnie is understandably distraught, and Nate is more unequipped than ever to help her through this difficult time. Even more foreboding, Elizabeth seems to have a vision at the end of the episode while in her trance-like state. Elizabeth has been intimidated to have somewhat supernatural instincts, once trying to protect her daughter with crystals and a chicken bone. Before the screen faded to black, she saw her daughter floating through the ocean, drowning. We can only wait to see if her vision comes true.
Custody Battle
As Celeste’s grip on reality becomes more and more tenuous, Mary Louise has honed in on her weaknesses, suing for custody of her two boys. Mary Louise believes that Celeste is unbalanced, citing the bottles of pills in her medicine cabinet and her recent sleepwalking mishaps. Celeste is certainly going through it right now, but separating her from her children is not exactly the remedy she needs. Jane stood up for Celeste and herself by going to Mary Louise’s house and vowing that she’ll never take away her own son, Ziggy. Mary Louise’s love for Perry has to come to the detriment of just about every member of the Monterey Five, and if she succeeds in raising the twins singlehandedly, it’s even more likely that they’ll end up just like their father.
What’s to Come:
Madeline and Ed’s cold spell is bound to break, either with a brutally honest heart-to-heart, a blowout fight, or possibly...a cheating scandal? Ed has sure been eyeing Bonnie lately (and has the bruises to prove it), and he may just be the only person in Monterey who can help her now. Cheating on your wife with her ex-husband’s new wife is a real low point, but Ed is long overdue for a bad streak. After losing the majority of her fortune and her 2017 Tesla, Renata might have to learn a bit of humility—although Amabella’s birthday wasn’t a good indication. Remember her laptop getting confiscated? Expect that to come up as Adrienne gets bolder. The season started out with the same old secret, but now there’s even more on the line. Keep your eyes on Bonnie as she struggles to keep her head above water.
