Su-Su-Sucio

Weeds brought some of the funny back in last week's episode, as Nancy could only play Esteban's dutiful slave for so long and had her fun when the hard-nosed Cesar gives up on babysitting and lets the more easily swayed (and less English-speaking) Sucio deal with Nancy's daily grind.  Nancy eventually realizes that she can twist Sucio into making her life a little easier, although he does have a nasty habit of pulling a gun on each of her family members as they return home from various places, back to Nancy's flock.  But by the end, Nancy has Sucio so under her thumb (as she eventually does with all men) that she convinces him to shower -- finally -- which does not end well for Sucio. 

Jennifer Jason Leigh is back this week as Nancy's estranged sister Jill and in between her renewal of sack time with brother-in-law Andy, we get some interesting insight into the man-controlling ways of Nancy, which began at least way back in her youth, when she used a teacher's crush to get good grades before the lovelorn professor got shipped off for lusting over a 14-year-old student.  We also learn that Nancy was always criminally self-centered and selfish, as she fled town in the midst of their parents' divorce and left Jill to deal with not one, but two lengthy death watches for their mother and father.  Jill was the responsible sister who handled all the funeral arrangements, while Nancy was out being Nancy, or at least a younger, less drug dealery, version.  But Nancy has no time for Jill's pity party (or for her relationship with Andy), especially after Sucio's mid-shower mishap left blood on the patio and a Mexican henchman missing and Nancy, Andy, Shane, and Jill on the run -- again -- from whoever wanted her (or at least Sucio) dead.

In other news, Silas is back to kiss up to his mom for the funds to open a legitimate medical marijuana store and Nancy inexplicably has the funds (and stupidity) to agree.  Silas and Doug have an amusing encounter with a county clerk to try to obtain the necessary permits and then an even more amusing encounter with a cheerful local cop who shakes them down for either a monthly payoff or a percentage of their profits, whichever is worse for them, as Silas and Doug stupidly agree to.  Celia is kidnapped in Mexico again, but this time placed on a bus back into the United States, both because her revolutionary kidnapper has gotten sick of her presence and because that storyline was going nowhere.  And lastly, Andy makes several attempts to turn Sucio's name into an amusing Phil Collins song, but Sucio isn't having any of it and doesn't last the episode anyway.  His name, though, will live on in infamy in the season 5 episode title lists.

All in all, it was a solid transitional episode that remembered to find the humor that made this show great while continuing to ratchet up the tension of Nancy's enforced slavery to Esteban.   Some viewers have been turned off to Nancy's descent into hell that has marked recent episodes, but in my mind, the writers had nowhere else to go with Nancy's story.  She continued doing more and more dangerous things to less and less effect, her sense of morality and family and hope becoming completely obscured by a lust for power or action or feeling or -- something -- that would save her life in the years after her husband's death.  Obviously, she couldn't find it in the drug world, but she didn't know that, and she was too selfish to ever think of the way her descent affected those around her, including her sons.  Finally, when she saw the kidnapped girls being shipped through the tunnel in her storeroom, the immorality of the life she's chosen became too much for her to bear and she turned rat on her employers.  That was a logical progression of the storyline that the show had chosen to pursue -- for better or worse -- since the start of season 2, when it stopped being a sarcastic view of suburban life and more a story of Nancy and the drug world.  In my opinion, that story became compelling enough that season 4 was the best since the stellar season 1 and it ended perfectly.  Of course, it also left Nancy as a drug-dealer's rat, and the repercussions of that action are what we are still dealing with in season 5.   The writers couldn't let her get away with it (Esteban never would have just let her live), but couldn't kill off Nancy, so we're left with this -- Nancy paying for her mistakes through the loss of everything she still values (her family, their safety, her own safety, her body, her sanity) with only a lucky chance pregnancy keeping her alive, a pregnancy that is now more a burden and/or death sentence than anything fortunate or blessed.  The show's writers have handled all of this well, as usual, the acting is superb as always, and I can't wait until the next episode to see where Nancy will take us next.

Comments

[coach outlet]

We cannot always build the future for our youth, but we can build our youth for the future. (Franklin Roosevelt , American president

[taobao]

Never too old to learn.*

[Justin Bieber Shoes]

Now I do understand more how music is related to our lives.I well remember the people stolidly, stubbornly walking everywhere, albeit sometimes given lifts by passing car.The recipe sure looks like it would produce a tasty muffin.