Hey, all! This week is Jen writing the recap with Karyn coming in on the indented comments.
When you see this, it’s Karyn.
Karyn has been kind enough to carry the recapping duties while I’ve been on deadline. I appreciate this so much and I offer apologies in advance when I can’t help but make said recap about me in spots, which Karyn is not prone to do. BUT THEY’RE GOING TO MY OLD SALON IN THIS EPISODE, HOW CAN I NOT?
A prediction to begin, if I may? Joan’s gonna find a way to bum out everyone with her grief. Prove me wrong, Joanie. I’m not saying she can’t or shouldn’t have grief, and maybe that’s ABC’s intent to rachet up the drama. But ol’ Gary was grieving at the get-go, but the second he saw a fresh new meal-ticket, he was all, “Widower what?” I feel like there’s a happy medium here we’ve yet to achieve. All the fun has been overly laden with feels and I’m unsure I like the balance of it.
We open on Joan talking to somebody’s kid who’s gonna make somebody’s orthodontist rich. (I suspect this comment is going to upset Karyn who really does try her hardest to keep me from cancellation. Thank you, Karyn.) Tooth asks if she kissed her grandpa. Good thing it’s not after overnights week if the kid’s going to insist on probing questions about whose lips touched what.
Kids are fair game; I’m totally cool with this comment. (I’m watching this with my sister, a mother of three, who strongly disagrees with me.)
Joan talks about how odd it is to be meeting her suitors’ families. Last time she did this was 1983. She says she’s not at the love station yet, but the love train is a-chuggin’.
Lake Tahoe with Dr. Guy
Joan starts in Lake Tahoe with Dr. Guy who is growing on me. He gets her on a boat—his boat? Not sure. He seems to know how to drive it. He’s got that “casual boat guy lean” while he drives. Clearly not his first rodeo, so I suspect yes. I like them together. They look like a Metamucil commercial and I mean that in the nicest possible sense. He has a pleasant blandness to him, like a Snack Pack of tapioca pudding, easy and tasty and unremarkable.
Not all fibers are created equal. Metamucil.
Dr. Guy gives her some lore about wishing on Lake Tahoe and they exchange tapioca wishes, followed by a tapioca kiss. But I’m already worried about bringing boats into the equation. Captain Kim? Gone. Mark after the yacht? Gone. Based on this conjecture alone, I fear for Dr. Guy.
I one hundred percent thought he was giving her some kind of Viagra pill before realizing it was something to throw in the lake.
He said, “Here, take one.”
They are at a lunch on the lake and Joan gets sad over the dead husband again. Dr. Guy talks about guarding his heart, but says Joan is worth the risk. She’s got guilt. Probably because she wasn’t ready for this. He’s sweet about it. Also, Dr. Guy has nice, straight white teeth so I think that grandkid isn’t his. Fight me.
Dr. Guy is handsome and a doctor. He’s grown on me a lot since the first episode.
They go to meet his family and his sons are cute AF. Actually, his whole family is darling. Oh, for fuck’s sake, they’re an every-letter-is-the-same family. Gary, Greg, Gwen, Gayle, and Greer. $1000 says they have Christmas photos in matching jammies. I bet they drink milk recreationally and suddenly, I have a whiff of Mormon. There’s something vaguely Mitt Romney about the crew. Guy says he needs the fam’s validation. I’m okay with this because they seem like a functional family and I appreciate Mitt Romney.
Good golly, it’s a gaggle of goddamn Gs!
Joan tells them how Dr. Guy gave Precious Charles closure about what he could or couldn’t have done with his wife’s passing. There are tears. Joan looks like she’d fit in with this family. She sits down with his sisters and they talk about dead husbands.
Good God, Lake Tahoe is gorgeous. My lake is bullshitty in comparison.
Guy talks to his daughter about Joan, and she’s proud of him for putting himself out there after his ugly divorce. Again, this feels like a functional family, like no screaming drunken fights over whether the turkey was dry or who Mom loved most. They’re gonna be pissed if she doesn’t pick him, I think. Dr. Guy’s at a 9.5 right now with his feelings for her. He gets emotional when he realizes that he can love again. Hugs all around!
Have they even ever kissed? Did I miss it? I mean, maybe they’ve pecked, but to my knowledge no deep tonguing has occurred. I feel like by the time Gary had hometown visits, he had sucked face with every woman numerous times.
He tells Joan he’s fallen for her and she says he makes her feel hopeful. And now she’s off…
Chi-Town Date Avec Pascal
(Spoiler alert—no one from Chicago calls it Chi-Town.)
Her first Chicago hometown is with Pascal and it starts in Glencoe, which is about 20 miles north of the city, located on the shores of Lake Michigan. If this town makes you think, “Ferris Bueller lived here,” you’d be right.
A quick note about the street where he’s about to have coffee with Joan? All the parking is on an angle and the police will yell at you if you cross the yellow line to park. You can only turn to the right to park, not to the left. They expect you to drive around and make a series of turns so you’re facing the direction of the angled parking and ain’t nobody got time for that. Which just now reminds me that Pascal yelled at me for doing it, saying the police would ticket me!
Wait, is this my origin story? Is this the root of my problem? Being yelled at once ten years ago for being a scofflaw? Mayhaps.
That must be it, Jen, because I’ve never understood your distrust of Pascal! Look how handsome he is! I can’t believe he’s almost 70. And I love that he wants to be in charge — it’s so sexy. And his Hermes belt and nice shoes — the man has style!
Tres chic!
Pascal and Joan do have good chemistry together, I will give them that. She seems to have more of a spark with him. He’s taking her to his salon, where my hope is he sticks her in a chair and works his magic on her ‘do, which is currently a don’t for me. Shorter and ashier with more depth and contrast, for the love of all that’s holy.
My sister and I are both screaming at Pascal to fix Joan’s hair! Run a toner through it, cut it, fix her weave — do something!
They go into his salon and everyone’s excited to see him. They used to sell a bunch of shit in the front corner—like stupid, fancy umbrellas and reading glasses with crystals on them and word art—but it looks like now it’s workspace. It’s much better this way. No one wants their salon to look like an upscale flea market. Pascal shows her around his shop, which in all fairness is a really nice place, and he makes her help wash a customer’s hair.
Okay, my sister and I are home for my uncle’s funeral, and yesterday my stepdad took my mom to get her hair done. When he came back, he said the hair salon is “really fancy and yuppie” and then said, “And they serve meat there.” We were like, “At the hair salon?” He said, “Yes, and now they have wine too.” (Selling glasses with crystals on them doesn’t sound so bad now, does it?) I’ll take some highlights and a ribeye, please.
HE’S PUTTING HER IN A ROBE, OH THANK GOD. And then… a stylist rubs oil on her hands, but doesn’t touch any of the straw on her head crying out for moisture and toner. I am profoundly disappointed.
Pascal talks about how he’s had his heart broken, so he’s guarded and he’s had to earn her trust. I can’t help but notice how fantastic his skin looks in his scene. I think they used to do fillers at his place and if he’s indicative of the work they offer, I may reconsider where I go now. Anyway, Pascal says he’s ready for a companion again. Joan says it takes a while to open up her heart.
They get into his (what I believe is) an Aston Martin. And who told you all that he drove exotic cars weeks ago? WHO? They pull up to a building in the city and illegally park. Pascal’s looking forward to his children’s opinions. The kid with the tooth is here, and his family is also cute, as are his friends. This group seems way more fun than Dr. Guy’s family who likely thinks coffee is too rowdy. Joan tells his family she thinks he’s sexy. Tooth asks if Pascal slept in a bed with other grandpas and this cracks Joan’s shit up. She’s vibing.
First, the nerve of him to illegally park after yelling at you!
Second, Pascal is so cute with Tooth! I love when he asks him if he slept in a room with other grandpas, and Pascal says he kicked out someone who snored!
Everyone splits up to go chat and I can’t help but notice there’s another gorgeous, untouched charcuterie board there. This is breaking some PA’s heart. Joan sits down with Pascal’s son Maxim and he’s WAY hotter than Dr. Guy’s kids. Like, he’s a total smoke-show. Plus, he’s charming. Joan grills him about if his dad is ready to settle down and Maxim says yes because nothing worked out with his ex-ladies. Probably because not one of them get a single one of his cultural or generational references, having been born in the USA in the late 1990s-to early-2000s.
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