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Wednesday, September 25, 2013

Review : 'Nashville' : 'I Fall to Pieces' [Season 2 Premiere]

Mess with Maddie and I will hunt you down. 
Oh man. I've missed you guys so much. This morning, this was basically how I felt about getting back to writing Nashville recaps:


It's been a long summer, so let's just get this going. When we left Nashville (Well... I've been here the whole time, har har) Deacon and Rayna flipped the car. This week, the episode opened mere seconds after the accident. Deacon wakes up in enough blood and awkwardly bent body parts to suggest a Walking Dead tie-in. He manages to drag Rayna out of the car, which magically cues FLASHBACK BACK Back back back back... A far less wrinkled Rayna and Deacon scope out their dream house and talk about how happy they are and how beautiful she is. Sadly, she's actually in a coma and thanks to younger daughter Daphne's expert exposition skills, it's been two weeks. This will be the first of many scenes at Rayna's bedside. Lamar even spends some time there, weirdly not in a suit. Tandy happens to walk in and it's awkward because Tandy quit last season. The TV is on and News 2's Ann Holt better be getting some extra scratch for delivering fake news about how weird it is that both Rayna and her mom were involved in car wrecks. Lamar laments not having been there when Rayna's mom died. In another flashback, Deacon proposes to Rayna. They get frisky on the floor because that's just the kind of rebel Deacon is. Funny thing, though. Turns out that Deacon was smashed when he proposed and Rayna realizes it the next morning. Meanwhile in the real world, Lamar basically tells Teddy he wishes Teddy had been spicier or something in order to hold the attention of Rayna so she wouldn't have gone back off with Deacon. BECAUSE THAT'S TOTALLY WHAT HAPPENED.


A bunch of alarms start going off and George Clooney rushes in with the crash cart. Not really. That would have been weird, though, right?


Meanwhile on Juliette's TV, Ann Holt is still talking about Rayna. Juliette is watching with her manager Glenn, the only character with a normal name, and she is so frickin' inconvenienced by the fact that the world is buying Rayna Jaymes albums and will probably continue to do so, thereby screwing with Juliette's soon-to-drop album. You know, the one that's supposed to establish her as an adult and an artiste. Let's move the date! No can do, Edgehill got bought out so Marshall's not the decision guy anymore. Also not around is assistant Emily. (Let's pour one out for assistant Emily, folks.) The possible new assistant is some fresh-faced dude and Juliette beds him and dismisses him faster than you can think of a Southern idiom to insert into your episode recap. Still watching TV, Juliette hatches a plan and orders 1000 candles. Fast forward to her release concert in front of the Parthenon. Before the show, Scarlett shows up to ask for a loan to bust out Deacon, who is in jail (more on that later) and Juliette advises her to let him go because once an addict, always an addict. That night, Juliette lays it on thick about how much she loves Rayna and then performs a Rayna song. Avery, who still moves like some type of wraith, trapped in a shadow world, doomed to look mournfully and knowingly at the actions of others, plays his guitar with a look on his face that says "I'm going to have to shower later to get all this bullshit off me." Juliette tells everyone to take their glow sticks (guess candles are too dangerous) and go pray in front of Rayna's hospital. Upon arriving, Maddie see Juliette and Juliette has to be a human for a hot second instead of walking straight out the back door. Maddie spills about Deacon being her dad. Juliette seems to gain some understanding and then gives Maddie her phone number in a hopefully sincere move. The poor kiddo blames herself for setting the whole mess into motion. At Rayna's bedside, Juliette tells Maddie that she and Druggie Mom used to listen to Rayna's music all the time. It's possible that Juliette's actions have merely been 70% self-serving. Rayna flashes back to telling Tandy she's pregnant while Deacon drinks and prowls in the house like an angry cat. Later, Juliette cries with a Rayna CD and calls Scarlett to offer help with Deacon.

Speaking of Deacon, he's decided to claim he was driving and go to jail for possibly 10-30 years if Rayna dies. Why? Because males on television do stupid, self-flaggelating things like this. Luckily, his court-appointed lawyer is like CUT THE SHIT. He is snippy with everyone, including niece Scarlett, who is made from one thinly-cut sheet of balsa wood. "I'm no good to anyone!" he wails. She tells him he's been like a father, and he freaks out and tells her to get lost. At this point, this episode feels to me like this:


All this soap is getting in my eyes. Later, Deacon's lawyer, who does not care about your self-assigned hell, figures out that Deacon wasn't driving because of some CSI-type trajectory/cuts/bruising/can you run ballistics/ evidence from a hospital report. OBVS, he was not driving. She tells him, were you reckless? Yes. Did you commit a crime? No. But sad Deacon is sad.

You know what else is sad? How much I don't care about the Bluebird brigade. In short, Scarlett said "no" to Gunnar's proposal and moved out, leaving him and Luke from the O.C.  Luke wants Gunnar to party away his heartache, but Gunnar tells him "I can't party my feelings away!" (After having a party, almost making out with a girl, and then setting the couch on fire because that couch was the first place he and Scarlett *COUGH* Anyhoodle. Luke had a weird-ass scene in the laundry room with some guy who was at the party. After the party, Gunnar goes to the shindig that the Bluebird is throwing for Scarlett because she's leaving. They wind up performing and that either does or does not mean something. Avery stares moodily from the back because someone always does.


Toward the end of the show, the doctor takes Rayna out of the coma. No brain damage. She recognizes the fam. The next day on the roof of the hospital with Lamar, they talk of moving forward, which probably means that Deacon's burned her for the last time. Though, she does confirm he wasn't driving.

And there you have it. Nashville moved its characters far forward, but sadly we didn't really get to see it. We just met up with them on the other side. But that's ok because in the teaser for the rest of the season, seems like it's going to be hella stressful. Maybe we'll get some stuff done this year. Stay tuned!

Stray Observations: 

+ Lamar might have killed his wifeWHAT?!
+ Peggy miscarried but is pulling a GLEE and not telling Teddy about it.
+ Does Teddy live under the bridge by the stadium? He's ALWAYS there.
+ So... What did you think?

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