This is it, the season finale. There is no backstory spotlight. The focus is entirely on the present. Just about everyone who has played a role in this season makes an appearance or two. The big story revolves around Vee and Red but there are a bunch of other little ones that also get some screen time and some resolution.
Chapman is locked up in the SHU for taking documents from Figueroa's office. Caputo goes to see her. He wants to know what she was up to and who her connection is on the outside is. She promises to help him and tell him what the documents were that she stole if he can get her transfer canceled. He agrees so she tells him, but that part isn't on camera.
Investigators from (presumably) the Department of Corrections (DOC) arrive to investigate the attack on Red. They question a lot of inmates. Some try to point the finger at Vee. Some (Black Cindy, Watson) are coached by Vee to point the finger at Suzanne "Crazy Eyes" Warren. Vee doubles down by talking to Suzanne and talking her into taking the hit. The piece of hard evidence that points toward Suzanne is her lock. That's what was in the sock with which Vee hit Red.
Caputo finds Figueroa in her office, on the floor, crying over how things are going with her husband. He tells her about the files he has from her office. She tries talking him into not handing them over but he won't budge. She offers to blow him. He accepts the offer but after she's done blowing him he tells her that he already handed over the files to the warden.
Doggett (Pensatuckey) quits the support group. No one else shows up. Healy closes it down, frustrated. She was too busy getting her hair cut short. It is sort of implied that this is because she is now buddies with Boo, even if she isn't sleeping with her.
Vause comes to visit Piper. She tells Chapman about how bad her life has become. She is planning to skip town even though that would be a violation of her parole. She also mentions that she has a gun. Chapman is heartbroken. She doesn't want Alex to leave her. She doesn't know what to do. Polly and Larry also visit Piper. They want her blessing but she isn't about to give it. She gives them a hard time over what they did.
Nickels shames Boo into telling her where Vee hides the heroin. Nicky takes the drugs and then leaves Vee a cryptic message letting her know that her heroin is gone. Vee loses it. She comes very close to taking her anger out on Black Cindy, the first of her girls to walk in after she discovers that the drugs are gone.
Sister Jane is still in the infirmary. She refuses to eat but she is being fed intravenously. Red is badly banged up and put in the bed next to the former nun. The investigators talk to Red but she claims to have no idea who did it. Sister Jane tries talking Red into giving up Vee but she won't budge, at first.
Mendoza sees that Romano is up to something and offers to help. Together they make something which I thought was supposed to be poison but in retrospect I think it was a hex. They combine all sorts of weird ingredients in the process of creating a powder. Romano blows the powder on Vee as she is walking down the hallway. Things do go south for Vee but I kept waiting for the powder to have some sort of effect but from what I could see it didn't.
A group of nuns start a protest outside Litchfield in solidarity with Sister Jane. They demand to know what's going on. Caputo, who is replacing Figueroa, doesn't have time to deal with the nuns. He deputizes O'Neil to handle the situation. O'Neil spends a lot of time by the gate arguing with the nuns. These were some of the funniest scenes of the episode. My favorite part was the songs he sang to them. Usually it is the protesters that sing songs, but not this time.
The investigators decide that it must be Suzanne who attacked Red. She can't remember exactly what she was doing but it was her lock. She gives them all sorts of confusing answers to their questions. They didn't exactly strike me as the most dutiful investigators, and that's putting it mildly. They just want to get the job over with.
Sister Jane gets Healy to come visit Red. She has agreed to end her hunger strike if Red will tell him that it was Vee who attacked her. He listens and then he talks to Suzanne. It is clear that she is confused about the whole situation. He decides to do something about it. He talks Luschek into forging a work order that will prove that Suzanne was busy elsewhere when Red was attacked.
Chapman calls Larry and Polly. She asks them to rat out Alex to her parole officer. They do and it looks like Vause is probably headed back to prison. She had a handgun which was almost certainly a violation of the terms of her parole.
Bennett finally decides, after much prodding from Dayanara, to fess up to the fact that he is the father of her child. He tells Caputo who is trying his best to put on a good impression as the new assistant warden. Caputo doesn't want to hear it. He's had it up to here with scandals and threatens to have Dayanara transferred to another prison if Bennett doesn't drop the issue, which he does.
Vee's girls turn on her. She has already pushed them all away for one reason or another. They recant their testimony and say it was Vee who attacked Red. Vee sees the handwriting on the wall and decides to make use of the tunnel. She escapes through it to the outside world. When it is clear that she is nowhere to be found the prison goes on lock down.
Miss Rosa makes another trip to the hospital. She gets bad news, she only has a month or two to live. She arrives back at the prison just as it goes into lock down. The van is outside the gates. Morello is the driver. The guard that is with them leaves the van and tells them to stay put.
The two inmates in the van wait for a while. Morello gets out of the van. Miss Rosa gets in the drivers seat and takes off. She almost runs over the nuns. Caputo is beside himself. He thought he finally had everything under control. He even talked Sister Jane into making a statement to the nuns.
Miss Rosa, in the van, beyond the outer gate of the prison, crashes through the final flimsy wooden barrier and goes barreling down the road. Vee emerges from the woods just as Miss Rosa is approaching. Miss Rosa doesn't hesitate. She hits Vee with the Van and keeps going.
Thoughts
There were two two things that got me a bit misty eyed towards the end of the episode. The first was the moment when Suzanne realizes that Vee has abandoned her. She really looks like she is about to lose it. It is a crushing blow to her. The other is the look on Miss Rosa's face as she drives away from the prison. She's free. She's on the run but free. There was something about the look in her eyes that really got to me.
I didn't really expect Vee to survive the end of the season but I had no idea how she would exit the show.
Overall I am very pleased with this season. There were a few dud episodes but on the whole I was very impressed. There was no real slump. I am not ready to dive into season 3. I need a break but hopefully it will be a shorter one than the two year break I took between the first and second seasons.
No comments:
Post a Comment