Posted by Janie Logan Nov 5, 2010, 5:15 GMT
The tenuous friendship that Hank (Donal Logue) and Gretchen (Kimberly Quinn) have had of late is broken in "Pimp Daddy." Photo courtesy of FX.
"Pimp Daddy" took the strongest feature of Terriers--the chemistry between Hank and Britt--and proved that it could be just as good without it. Together or apart, Donal Logue and Michael Raymond-James are a couple of very fine actors whose performances are reaching new heights with every subsequent episode.
"Pimp Daddy" provided that same mixture of heart and humor, light and dark, that makes Terriers so compelling. It was the first time the writers gave the dynamic duo separate storylines, with Hank looking into a point of concern in Jason's past, mere days before his wedding to Gretchen, and Britt helping a transvestite hooker find out what happened to her murdered friend.
With Hank's shoulder injury from "Agua Caliente," Britt found himself working the case-of-the-week alone (not to make it sound like a typical procedural--it's so NOT that). He tracked down a prostitute who had stolen money from a teenage boy before, uh, fulfilling their business transaction. He was not expecting to find Michaela, a sassy "tranny ho" played by Shangela from Ru Paul's Drag Race.
After that job was finished, Michaela asked for Britt's help as she sought closure for the death of her friend, Crystal, who had been brutally beaten by a john years before. Old police records pointed them to the likely perpetrator (not that it mattered, since the guy was dead), so instead Michaela found her peace another way--by visiting her friend's parents to give them some peace, too.
They never knew what happened to their son, Trevor, after he ran away from home. In a sad, but beautiful, act of kindness, "Michael" told them what they so desperately needed to hear--that their son had been a good man, and that he loved them.
Britt was touched by the whole experience, especially since he's dealing with the possibility of impending fatherhood. After finding a used pregnancy test in the trash, he starts thinking about what a baby will mean for his life, and it's the push he needs to propose to Katie.
Her drunken night with her professor is even more of a burdensome secret now that she's pregnant and doesn't know for sure who the father is. I feared her guilt would be so strong that she would turn Britt down, but he laid his heart open to her and she couldn't say no.
Meanwhile, because he can't let go of his love for Gretchen, Hank digs into a buried secret of Jason's (he changed his name after his parents were accused of molesting kids in the daycare they operated). I like that we don't find out the details of what Jason did or didn't do--whatever the truth is, he already disclosed that part of his life to Gretchen. Because of Hank's misguided efforts, he does serious damage to his relationship with his ex-wife. Their words to each other are so cruel, it's hard to fully comprehend the pain they've caused each other to get to this place.
"Don't tell me you're protecting me," Gretchen says. "You're the live grenade in my life." Hank throws it right back at her when he walks out the door: "Maybe it's a good thing we couldn't have children."
Damn.
After that, I was afraid Hank would go right home and hit the bottle. He didn't, but I'm sure that's what's on his mind and what he will be struggling with in the days ahead.
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