S01 E16 The Truth Will Out

S01 E16,

Original Airdate: January

There are some episodes I’m just not into and would skip otherwise. This would be one of them.

We open on Rose making a…maple log? Made of honey, brown sugar, molasses, sugar, and rice krispies. So she wants to give everyone diabeetus. Dorothy still tries it and Rose says people do make it with flour, but she thinks it makes it too heavy. All my teeth fell out just watching Dorothy eat this.

Rose is making this monstrosity for the arrival of her daughter, Kirsten. Oh boy, a relative is coming to visit! And Rose is taking her all over and by all over I mean to a bunch of places that are not licensed and owned by Disney.

Blanche bursts in with a newspaper declaring this man is guilty! The Duncan Osgood trial is under way and you may all say hello to the B plot of the episode. Rose asks Blanche why she’s so certain Duncan Osgood is guilty.

Blanche: His wife was found at the bottom of their private lake, clutching his dickey in her hand.

Sophia comes in with a blood pressure cuff on and a BP of 230 over 190. Holy, fucking, shit that is high. People who have strokes are at an increased risk for more strokes. Sophia has had one stroke already. SOMEONE GET THIS WOMAN TO A DOCTOR.

Dorothy says the machine isn’t working. Sophia says she shouldn’t take any chances. We all know Sophia is lying to get out of giving up her room for Rose’s family, but once again, one stroke = likelihood of more strokes. Also, why isn’t Rose giving up her room and bunking with Dorothy?

Her granddaughter Charlie is coming to stay. Wouldn’t this kid be more comfortable in her grandma’s room than some weird, old Italian Catholic’s room? Whatever, they’re moving on, so I guess we’re moving on.

Rose says she’s nervous about the visit. Sophia chimes in with her friend Maria being nervous when her daughter Theresa comes to visit. If you haven’t guessed why, it’s because Theresa is a hitman for the mob. Which probably means Theresa has some boring or embarrassing job. Sophia continues to ramble that Frank Sinatra originally titled The Lady is a Tramp as Theresa is a Tramp. Thank God Dorothy puts an end to the stories.

Rose is nervous because her daughter, Kirsten, is the executor of her will and they’re going to have to go over the documents. Rose goes on to say there are some things in her will that might surprise Kirsten. And Blanche is a gossip hungry hound and wants to know the deep, dark Nylund family secrets.

Blanche says she would want to leave some small remembrance to the men who have touched her life in some small way. *Drink for Blanche’s beaus*

Scene change! Blanche comes in from a shopping spree and she’s bought sequin socks of all things. Why was this ever a thing? How is that practical or fashionable? When are you really going to be able to show them off? Roller skating? The socks have sequins on the soles! 

We find out Rose’s granddaughter was named after Rose’s husband, Charlie. I sure hope her name is Charlotte and not Charles. This is the 80s. A girl named Charles is rough stuff. 

Blanche has a question she wants to ask Dorothy, but she takes forever to get there.

Blanche: Can I ask you something?...You don’t have to answer if you don’t want to…If you think it’s none of my business just say…
Dorothy: Oh look Blanche, you caught me one night sneaking out of the kitchen naked with an oreo in my mouth.

Sounds like a typical night in my house.

Blanche eventually gets to her question. She asks if Dorothy has noticed Rose acting peculiar lately. She thinks something is afoot with the will. And we’re back to Duncan Osgood and his wife’s murder. The day before Tippi Paxton-Osgood was murdered she had changed her will, making Duncan her sole heir. I don’t really care for this episode because of the A plot, but holy shit, I do love this B plot. Detective Blanche is on the case! This is what the Clue board game should have been about. Who killed Tippi Paxton-Osgood! Not who ate the last piece of cheesecake. 

Dorothy says the evidence isn’t enough to convict him. But Blanche says there’s more damning evidence.

Blanche: Well actually, the more damning evidence was a snapshot they found of Duncan dressed in scuba gear, dragging Tippi’s body down the stairs, wrapped in a carpet.

The silence that follows is delightful. Rose comes home with her family and we now have to go back to this dud of a plot. Kirsten is visiting to review the estate papers. I must ask, like Dorothy’s daughter, Kate, what does Kirsten do that she is qualified? I’m going to say a lawyer? Hotshot Minnesota lawyer. And like Kate, she’s at the top of her field.

While Kirsten and Charlie are in town, Charlie is going to astronaut camp. Blanche’s panties fall through the floor that such a thing exists because she thinks it’s where astronauts chill.

Rose: My granddaughter wants to be an astronaut.
Charlie: Not really, Grandma, I just want to meet boys who want to be astronauts.

You sure this kid isn’t Blanche’s granddaughter?

Anyway, they brought the gift that keeps giving for Dorothy and Blanche. The diabeetus log from earlier. Super popular in Minnesota. Dorothy and Blanche feign excitement and make plans to burn them later.

Scene change to the lanai! *Drink for being out on the lanai* Rose has made Shephard’s Pie and Sophia calls it garbage. If she said that to me about Shephard’s Pie I’d hit her with a melon baller. As much as I love the dish, it does seem heavy for Miami weather, but they’re all in sweaters, so what do I know. Apparently it was husband Charlie’s favorite dish. Blanche says her husband never requested anything special in the kitchen. Except that one time with the butcher block table. Dorothy shuts that story down quick.

Charlie didn’t eat her brussel sprouts, Sophia offers her purse to hide them. Her purse must smell terrible. She hides food in it, carries it around everywhere, and it’s Miami! It’s gotta be like the Bog of Eternal Stench.

In the kitchen Rose and Kirsten talk. Dun dun duuuun.

Kirsten expresses surprise her mom would want to live with anyone else since she can afford to live on her own. Of course, she says that meeting Blanche and Dorothy explains everything. Notice, Sophia’s name missing from that mix. Rose decides it’s time for her hotshot lawyer daughter to look at the will, which she keeps in the cookie jar.

Kirsten is flummoxed by the numbers on the will. Rose says she had them checked with a lawyer and an accountant. We learn how successful Charlie was as an insurance salesman and Kirsten expresses her disbelief Rose went through everything. Kirsten dresses Rose down for “piddling away” the fortune Charlie built. Rose says she lost it all to get rich quick schemes and bad investments. Dorothy and Detective Blanche, now on the scene, object to this after Kirsten storms out. They know Rose isn’t the type to squander money and she’s not greedy.

You know who is greedy? Kirsten. She clearly expects a windfall when Rose dies and she’s pissed she’s not going to get it.

Next scene it’s the middle of the night and Dorothy walks into the kitchen to find Rose. Who is not naked with an oreo in her mouth, I’d like to add. Blanche joins them.

Blanche: Here you are. I just spent five minutes telling your bathroom door that everything’s gonna be fine between you and your daughter.

Rose says no one should lie. Except for white lies, because those don’t count and of course this is when Sophia comes in to lay some wisdom on everyone. She says lying will get you sent straight to hell. Isn’t Catholicism fun? 

Rose asks the girls what their biggest lies were. Blanche told her sister Charmaine she was left by gypsies. But really, this sounds like something she would do to Virginia. She even tried to help Charmaine locate her real family. The g-word gets used a lot and I am not a fan.

Dorothy lied to Stan about how good he was in bed. And Rose says she lied to Kirsten and is now hated. Sophia speaks some wisdom by telling her to come clean. But there’s 9:38 left in this episode, it’s too soon for the truth. This is sitcom bread and butter, if Rose tells the truth now we’ll have to watch a montage of her and her daughter doing Florida-y things.

Rose: If I tell her the truth about the money, then she’ll find out the truth about her father. I can’t let that happen. I just can’t.

If this was Desperate Housewives or Ugly Betty or something like that, Charlie would be a hitman, murderer (due to self-defense), or in witness protection (oh wait, that’s Myles later in the series.)

Blanche compares this to the Paxton-Osgood case. When Dorothy says it’s none of their business, Blanche disagrees because they’re friends. And I am inclined to agree. Rose has no reason to keep the truth from her roommates. They know she works at the grief counseling center and that she has a fixed income. She can come clean to them at any time. They have no loyalty to Kirsten, why would they spill the beans to her?

This next scene is so dull, I’m going to summarize because it’s such manufactured drama, but not in a fun soap operay way.

Rose helps Charlie play dress-up and put on makeup. Charlie says she wants to marry someone like her grandfather. Rose questions this and learns Charlie only knew that her grandpa was rich and she wants to marry rich (once again, are we 100% this kid isn’t related to Blanche?) Anyway Rose feels guilty this is Charlie’s perception and blames herself.

Except, earlier, Kirsten comments on Rose losing the money after only 15 years. I thought Charlie was only dead for maybe 5-10, but ok, he’s been gone 15 years. Charlie is probably about ten and I’d say Kirsten is probably mid-thirties? If Charlie’s been dead 15 years, Kirsten was probably in her late teens or early twenties, plenty of time to know what kind of person her father was. Even if she’s only 30 and he died when she was 15, that is enough time to know something about him beyond “he was rich.” The failing here is Kirsten’s, not Rose’s. Kirsten told stories of how rich he was, Rose let her kids believe Charlie was uber successful when he wasn’t, but that doesn’t excuse Kirsten caring only about this supposed money. Kirsten is a shitty person in all this. Rose should have lied to her more.

Charlie: (about her imaginary date) He’s a lot like Grandpa.
Rose: Really? Does he look like Grandpa?
Charlie: No he looks like Bruce Springsteen
Rose: Oh, well, then how is he like Grandpa?

On the other hand, this shit. Rose doesn’t ask any follow up questions to tie this imaginary date to her husband. “Oh, does he like jazz?” or “Does he like to go fishing?” or literally any other part of Charlie’s personality. But no. This family thinks only looks and money matter. Kirsten is at fault for remembering her father like he was the Monopoly guy, but Rose could give the audience and her granddaughter more info about her dead husband, something more to go on here. 

Next scene is all about musical beds. Sophia can’t sleep because Dorothy is a tossing and a turning. I refer to this as Magikarping because you just flop around. My husband does it and I am with Sophia, it's the worst. 

Rose enters and Sophia goes to take over her room. Rose will now sleep with Dorothy. Rose recounts her guilt that Charlie knows nothing about Grandpa Charlie beyond his riches. You’re not helping things Rose by never saying what kind of a person Charlie actually was. Barf

Blanche busts in on the next scene to declare Duncan Osgood is innocent. Thank God, the better plot has arrived! Duncan was framed by the maid and butler. Kirsten comes in, she’s changed her flight plans because she’s an asshole who cares for money and nothing else. Blanche and Dorothy say she can find Charlie and Sophia out on the lanai, but no one actually goes out on the lanai.

Rose comes in and sits Kirsten down. We learn the truth about Charlie. He was a good, kind, and decent man. He sucked at his job, but made enough to keep them comfortable. Rose lied about the money, he left her nothing. Rose talks like Charlie died when Kirsten was a baby and Rose cultivated this lie early in her life. Unless Kirsten was a very, very, very young mother, I do not see how the hell that is possible. Rose told the lie because Charlie was away on business a lot, but, like….why? 

All is forgiven.

Anyway we end on this note, which is better than anything.

Blanche: Isn’t it amazing how things always work out? Now Rose and her daughter have reconciled their differences, and Duncan Osgood can walk the streets a free man. I guess all’s well that ends well.
Dorothy: That’s easy for you to say. You’re not at the bottom of a lake clutching someone’s dickey.

Shady Pines, Ma: 
Blanche's Beaus: 1
Back in St. Olaf: 
Picture it: 
Out on the Lanai: 2
Weddings: 
Funerals: 
Cheesecake: