'Bloodline' recap: 'Part 25'
Let’s begin with a massive understatement: Kevin is not in the best of head spaces. He’s hallucinating all sorts of nonsense thanks to his panic-stricken brain, all set to the tune of “Escape (The Piña Colada Song),” which feels very Florida Keys, indeed.
Reality, as usual, is less fun: Roy Gilbert tells him to pull his you-know-what together. He has a guy waiting for him back at Marco’s crime scene whom he should go meet — hey, aren’t you supposed to not go back to the scene of the crime?
Roy’s guy turns out to be a very deceptively soft-spoken guy, one who tells Kevin everything will be fine. His manner is menacing, but his soft voice is very soothing. I’d listen to him! Kevin does too. He tells this guy everything and goes through the crime step by horrifying dolphin-bashing step. Then he admits the embarrassing truth that he peed his pants. #OhKevin. Quiet Goon sort of sighs, as he realizes that’s too much DNA for even him to deal with. He asks Kevin where the telltale dolphin weapon is — either to destroy it or plant on someone. He sends Kevin out to get it back. But before all that, they realize that one Eric O’Dirtbag has been calling Marco all night. (We know why, of course: Eric O’D was looking to spill all the Rayburn beans.)
Kevin fishes the Dolphin o’ Death out of the water and calls Quiet Goon on Marco’s phone so there is a paper (cellular) trail. He starts to drive back but continues to unravel as he relives his crime, all set to the tune of Lou Reed’s “Perfect Day.” I’d like to complain that this is a little bit on the nose, but you know what? I love it. (I also love Norbert Leo Butz. So, so much.) The human candle that is now Kevin melts pretty much all the way down to the nub, tears his shirt off, and decides to call his big brother. Patterns, as we’ve learned on this show, are awfully hard to break.
Said older brother is on a bus, still trying to decide whether or not to start a new life — these Rayburns sure love a bus trip, as we’re obviously meant to recall Danny staring out a similar season 1 window. Perhaps John’s new life on the run can include a fetching young lass (who looks quite a bit like a young Sissy Spacek) who wants to party — or he could to decide to deal with his mess back home. After young Sissy tries to be playful and steal his phone, the decision is made. He hears the panic in Kevin’s voice, hears about what happened (and that Kevin told everything to their mother), and realizes that just when you’re out, they pull you back in! He tells Kevin not to do anything, and to stay put. Stay put, he says. John, don’t you know anything at all at this point? We’re talking about Kevin here!
John then gets off the bus, and kisses the fun of a new life goodbye. A cop is waiting for him to take him home.
Kevin, duh, is not staying put, and he goes back to the scene of the crime. Again. He tells Quiet Goon that he thinks they should wait ’til John is back. Q Goon is skeptical. I mean, I see this guy’s point — time is ticking, bodies are rotting. He also starts brainstorming people to frame — like Meg, for a hot second. Kevin is not so far gone to sign on to that plan. And that’s when they come up with the master plan to frame Eric O’Bannon. Sigh. I mean, I named him O’Dirtbag and all, but still… of course, part of this great plan involves Roy’s soft talker dude shooting Kevin. This is what you call a completist vision, as it will sell Kevin interrupting Marco’s murder. Kevin begs to wait. Time ticks on.
Speaking of Eric, he’s fighting with Chelsea over money. He is frantic and telling her that he didn’t do a thing, etc. He tells her not to believe what they tell her. It’s lies. It always is.
We later see him creep through his family home, his mom begging him for more gas tanks for her oxygen. She tells him she needs it and he’s like, Sorry, I’m out. This is bad, yet I still feel for my little raccoon of a man. His mom calls him the ‘C’ word as he exits, which makes me laugh out loud for the first time maybe this whole series.
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Eric calls Ozzy and is like, Oh, we got them now. Those Rayburns are going down! Ozzy, whose face looks like a Jackson Pollock painting at this point, just wants a slushie. I’d like to give a shout out to the kid on crutches who just looks at Ozzy’s scary face and asks him what size.
Back at Dolphin Mayhem, the Earth continues to spin, Marco’s body continues to decompose, and the Quiet Goon tells Kevin to stand still so he won’t shoot him in the wrong place. Does it shock you that Kevin moves? Of course not. He ends up getting shot in two places, including in the gut, which seems bad. Kevin starts to pass out while Quiet Goon tries to get him to call 911. This really seems have been a miscalculation because QG gets a little panicky for the first time and dials the number himself and then shoots the walls a few times, which gets a neighbor to call it in. Kevin is not looking good. Not good at all.
John gets a call, sees the police activity, learns the known news that Marco is dead, and gets the new news that Kevin has been shot. He doesn’t have to act shocked. Sheriff Aguirre, our old enemy from last season, comes out and tells John what’s up. John looks nuts, and even Aguirre is like, Listen, we’ll get this guy together. John goes inside and sees Marco’s smushed head and the pile of blood where his brother lay. Man.
Aguirre is like, Maybe we should be worried about your family. Maybe you are being targeted. Oh, if you only knew… But wait, look who else is wishing him well on Kevin’s health! It’s our quiet mystery goon! And he turns out to be the county coroner. Small towns.
Diana wakes up and finds a cop at her door. She goes with Belle to the hospital, and I suppose the point of this scene is to show how out of the loop these women are. John arrives. Kevin is in surgery and they’re working — they ask if anyone has the right blood type, and Meg does, but she’s missing. Everyone yells at John for answers. He goes to Meg’s to find her in a legit blackout pass-out, and she can’t be roused.
Sally calls and screams at Roy’s voice mail. She then talks to John and tells him that Roy has vanished. John is all out of sympathy, and I’m guessing that bus is looking real good. She tells him, I know everything. Meg told me. “I don’t want to hear excuses or ask me to forgive you.” She wants one thing: for him to find out who shot Kevin. John can’t look her in the eye, but he asks her what exactly Roy told her. He quickly figures out this whole shooting thing is probably a frame job. Before they get too much further along, Belle calls from the hospital, and Kevin is awake.
John stands at his bedside and begs Kevin to say he doesn’t remember who shot him. John needs time to figure something out for Kevin. But it turns out that ship has sailed, because John is informed that Kevin already said it was Eric. The wheels of this you-know-what-show are most definitely rolling.
