Dark Brown Waffles

The Good

-Goddamn this show for twice making me love brief storylines that involved characters I usually endure. Sonny’s trip out on the oyster boat at the behest of Cornell - as a mechanism to avoid the overwhelming temptations of Mardi Gras - was a stroke of genius. Sonny not only went willingly when Cornell told him to pack a bag, but he barely complained. And when Cornell’s uncle offered Sonny a beer before recoiling to ask, “Are these your problem or are you a dope fiend?” A highlight of the season. Sonny’s begrudging, “Dope.” and then being offered the beer to sit and joke with the other fishermen was a brilliant moment for the show. And then again later, when Cornell arrives to ask Sonny how it went, and say that he goes fishing too, mostly because there’s nowhere on the boat where you can get fucked up? Somebody in my living room was bemoaning the lack of big action but that was enough for me. 

(Cornell’s intervention was reminiscent of Bubbles and Waylon, even if went completely differently. That’s the weight of having created The Wire I suppose. Guys like me are always seeing similarities, even when the circumstances and mechanisms are different. Maybe I’m always looking for that stuff because I’m stone cold sober and no more fun as a result.)

-Davis’s words to Toni, after noticing Sofia at Tipitina’s being hit on by a sleazy guy (how old is Sofia?), were enough to make you forgive the other things that he does. He bailed on Annie. He acted the fool at numerous parades in the shameless pursuit of various…what’s the polite word here? Trinkets? Prizes? Things? But that he tried to talk Toni down, that he was inclined to understand Sofia’s emotional state without knowing the specifics of her situation? With apologies to Godfather III, everytime I’m out on Davis, he pulls me back in. 

-Just as he promised, Albert was the prettiest. He was resplendent in his huge white suit. And lest we forget, he still has some game in those bowed knees; Delmond caught him in bed with somebody (presumably the documentary filmmaker). Go on Albert.

-Is Nelson Hildago being corrupted by the city he came to corrupt? It certainly seems that way. He’s going to have a hard time robbing the place blind if he keeps making friends and enjoying himself. Perhaps he is a commentary on a new form of grifter, one capable of making a buck while being more outwardly appealing. Perhaps he’s a part of a heavy-handed mechanism illustrating the city’s ability to overwhelm. Perhaps he’s just a character. Point is: it’s getting hard to dislike him personally. That makes me nervous.

-It was a brief moment, but at the water, when Toni was deciding to dump Creigh’s ashes into the river, a man went before her, pouring his ashes out of the familiar yellow can of Cafe Du Monde coffee. I liked that.

-Poor Antoine - he had LaDonna last year, but this year? Nothing. LaDonna’s husband leaves the kids with him (he returns to Baton Rouge to be with her), he’s forced to watch the parade with his students at the school, his date for the second half of the day can’t be sweet-talked. Instead, he ends up asleep on the couch with his two sons who have just been shown a hell of a Mardi Gras day. I’m not sure he ended up thinking it was so bad.

-Terry’s intervention with the flasher - in which he advises parades she’d likely have better luck showing off her goods - was oddly sweet. That he declared that he’d convert to Catholicism after Mardi Gras witnessed only a single murder was funny. In a lot of ways, Terry is an afterthought to the show, but he makes his moment’s count. David Morse brings the goods. 

-I love Albert singing “Indian Red” when he arrives in full costume. That song is fantastic.

-Good song. (Hat tip to the all knowing Copeland.)

The Bad

-The entire Cajun Mardi Gras felt forced and strange to me. It a celebration of Mardi Gras beyond the city’s exteriors, a place we’ve only rarely spent time. Yes, Delmond and Janette have been in New York City (amongst other locations), but I felt as if we would never be returning to any of the places shown in Annie’s and Harley’s daylong excursion. The entire story had a very foreign feel to it in a way that the New York City shots haven’t. What can I say?

-I’ve entirely given up on the restaurant storyline. Until Janette gets back to New Orleans, which I think everybody is collectively hoping will happen, I just don’t care. Not about her roommates, not about her kitchen, not about Eric Ripert, not about any of it. Just get her home. And ideally, get Jacque in there somehow. 

The Ugly

-Somewhere deep in my brain, I kept thinking that maybe LaDonna had told her husband about the rape and we just hadn’t seen it. But after seeing the trailer for next week’s episode, I now know that she definitely didn’t. There’s pain coming. Serious, considerable pain. 

-Toni turns on the music for Mardi Gras. Sofia harrumphs. Toni is devastated. Her dream from last week wasn’t a reality. That was quick but brutal. Even after Toni sits at Davis’s house, confessing that she’d mislead Sofia (who is passed out) and acknowledging that her daughter has every reason to be angry as hell, I didn’t get the impression we were done. Sofia will be exacting a pound of flesh if I remember my teenage years correctly.

-Overall, it was a good episode, rightly seeking to accomplish nothing more than capturing a Mardi Gras day all over New Orleans and beyond. The good notes outweighed the bad ones. Who can ask for more? 

-Sorry about tonight’s recap. I’m gassed. My notes are no good. My memory isn’t there. And I’m exhausted. I’ll do better next week.