I saw there wasn't a topic on this episode. Apologies if I missed it.

I'm new to the show, having it only just come to the UK, but I really enjoyed this one. I liked the scene between Tommy and Paige with him encouraging her to get into the pool again. Justin's relapse at the end made me sad though. Holly's got me intrigued. I'm not sure if its the actress' choice or a character trait, but I'm finding her just a bit unhinged and, at times, a bit pathetic in a sympathetic way. It's clear she's spent most of her best years keeping her life on hold for a man who was never willing to give her everything he had.

Anyway, I'm definitely into this show. The cast is great, and I really enjoy the chemistry and writing. And I've been hearing that later episodes are even better than the earlier ones, so I'm looking forward to them,

Welcome, Shattered Life. There is no thread for this episode because B&S didn't have its own forum when this episode originally aired in the States and it hasn't been rerun here yet. (Or, if it was, it was before the forum started.) ABC has decided to rerun random episodes, out of order, during the summer. So it may not be rerun at all. If you want to read more discussion about it the original B&S thread is at the end of the "General Gabbery" subforum. The talk about "Affairs of State" starts at the bottom of page 24.

I love your description of Holly. "A bit unhinged." LOL

I'm watching at UK pace, too. Not sure if I like this show. As much as I like Rachel Griffiths, I find some of the writing and the use of music to be really grating. I can't take Callista Flockhart entirely seriously as a Republican pundit either.
I'm rooting for Kevin and Scotty to get together.
I don't hate Sally Fields despite the whole ER nightmare.

What, pray tell, is "the whole ER nightmare"?

Just Sally Fields...in it. Heh. She played Abby's mother and I found her scenery-chewing acting was partly responsible for putting me off the entire show for a while.

Well, clearly you're in the minority considering she won an Emmy for her role on ER. (And in my opinion, it's one of the finest performances I've ever seen.)

I don't mind being in that minority: Field's performance may have won an Emmy, but it was played (and written, it seems to me) way, way over the top. I kind of think that she won not on the strength of that particular role, but because of the fact that, c'mon, it's Sally Freakin' Field! (I could be wrong about that, though.)

I'll share the minority opinion. The performance reeked of showoffy acting for the sake of showoffy acting.

On the topic of the episode, I still can't understand why Kitty slept with Warren. Talk about sacrificing character for plot.

You're all certainly entitled to your opinions, but the reason I question it is this: John Wells himself wrote the role, based on a member of his family who is bipolar. So the story was very close to home for him, and he specifically sought out Sally and praised her performance endlessly on its accuracy. Maybe it seemed "showoffy," but people with bipolar disorder aren't exactly subtle to begin with.

(Also, I don't think it's safe to say she won the Emmy on account of her name alone--she's been nominated for Emmys at least five times and has only won twice.)

And MarkC99, I agree with you about Kitty. That made very little sense. Kitty goes from being distraught about her father's adultery to committing adultery herself. Ridiculous.

I am glad it got rid of her boring, controlling NY ex. (Kitty's one night stand, that is).

Great re-cap Couch Baron.



While I would normally gloat (or just look smug) you have heard of our Prime Minister? The bible thumping, doughy looking Bush wanna-be from Alberta. Except you know, he's actual got a bit of a clue (which makes him all the more dangerous)

I finally realize why I like this show so much. I come from a wasp-y boozy family (albiet a smaller one but still)

I still wanna refer to Justin as "hot junkie" even though he's supposedly off whatever it was he was on. Speed? Coke? Meth? They never really specified his high of choice.

Gin & Tonic (or the Gin Martini) is a proven panty remover. Trust.



Oh barf. I'm going to remember this everytime I want to eat something I shouldn't as it will kill my craving faster than anything I could take.



Is that just a Hollywood thing that you have to sacrifice something to prove you love someone? I'm not excusing William's behavior at all but it smacks of the "how am I supposed to live without you" co-dependent vibe that the media in general passes off as reality.

Snarf, great description; heaven help us, but it could be worse!

I'd like to think that she was just refering to him screwing other women, in which case yeah, you kind of have to give that up.

I love that Couch Baron loves Kevin Walker as much as I do.

Also, I'm still on Team Scotty. ♥ Yay Scotty! ♥

Am loving the recaps of this show!

It's interesting to go back and watch previous episodes knowing now what happens in the rest of the season. At this stage when I was watching, I would never have guessed that Holly would still be around 20 eps later.

I think this was the first episode where I liked Tommy - his helping out Paige while being mad at Sarah melted my cold heart. It doesn't hurt that Paige is quite possibly the cutest little child actor i've ever seen. I love how they've made her a "natural" part of the storylines with interesting and relevant plots that don't detract from the main story (the diabetes and christmas storylines).

I think Sally Field is excellent in this show. As per her past acting, I do giggle when they give her big dramatic emotional scenes, if only because those scenes have been ruined for me by her awesome performance in Soapdish. And Brothers and Sisters is nothing if not completely soapy.


I'll defend Kitty a little and say that she and her father's situation were very different. But I'm confused, I thought adultery only occurs when one party is married, did I miss something? To me, Kitty was simply unhappy in with her NY boyfriend, and rather be an adult about it and break it off, she slept with someone else with the secret hope that it would wreck her relationship. It was very stupid of her, but it wasn't adultery.

Sally Field is indeed solid in this. I find I prefer all the male siblings to the female ones, so I want to like her at least.
Liked the recap. Kitty's men are indeed pompous or dull at the moment.

I still say Nora's kick-ass speech "outing" Holly at the dinner table is one the most series' most brilliant moments so far. The way Sally launched into the tirade was simply awesome.

I loved that scene. And I loved the show even more for not taking the cliched route with the child with Paige thinking she would also die if she went in the pool. She was mature enough to know that wouldn't happen, but she wouldn't go in the pool because the whole thing just made her sad. It was a perfectly mature, rational response from a kid her age, and consistent writing of that maturity continued to when she cut through the bullshit of Sarah and Joe trying to explain why they weren't living together. I agree with what Sars said in the episode recap that that scene was in. They should have explained it to the kids seperately to tailor it to their different ages.

I found the whole Christmas thing with her a little sacchrin though, with her thinking she got sick because God thought she didn't love him (I'm a little fuzzy on the reason as I haven't seen the episode in a while, but I'm pretty sure that reason was something like that.). Although, seeing as how it was an episode for the holidays, I'll let it slide.

I really enjoyed this episode which is definitely an improvement on the last two. Sally's performance in the backyard dinner scene pretty much won me over since she was so convincing as being oblivious. Even just blurting out that Holly was William's mistress in front of everybody was just the icing on the cake.

The only thing I really didn't like was Kitty sleeping with Warren. Maybe because I like Kitty + McCallister more together but I don't think those two shared any chemistry and then Jonathan resurfaces. Yikes! It makes me relieved that they didn't even consider making Matthew Settle a regular.

This one kinda sold me to the show. The first two were great but this was the one that kinda sealed it.

Saul/Nora/Holly - Nora really knows how to name and shame and as much as I don't particularly care for Holly, I actually felt a bit bad for her for being humiliated in the manner she was. That being said, if I were in Nora's position I would've found it a bit satisfying too.

Kitty/Warren/Jonathan - Kitty finds out her dad is a cheat and cheats on her boyfriend. Apple doesn't fall far from the tree then, eh? Anyways I couldn't care too less about this triangle because while I can take Warren, I find Jonathan to be a gigantic bore so I was hoping he was a goner after this episode.

Justin/Fawn - Anyone else find Fawn a bit bland? Justin like everyone else in his family is unable to keep a secret (one of the most relatable elements of the series) and him spiralling at the end was a bit sad.

Tommy/Julia - Tommy isn't one of my favourites but I absolutely loved him for the sensitive way in which he managed to get Paige to finally get back in the swimming pool. Poor Julia didn't get a bit of a dialogue unfornately.

Kevin/Scotty - Wasn't Scotty super annoying in the last episode? Talk about 360 because now I really really like him and the flirtatious manner between him and Kevin was a joy to watch. Guess Kevin wasn't that ticked off with Sarah after all.

Sarah/Joe - Hated Sarah for trying to force Paige back to swimming and Joe seemed a little spineless too but her scenes with both Kitty and Kevin show much of a great actress RG is. Sarah just needs to ditch her shrew like tendencies.

What was that song at the end of the episode when Nora threw herself into the pool?

"Easier to Lie" by Aqualung.

Thanks. It took me ages to get that song out of my head.

CouchBaron in his recap wrote:

I'm not sure what the protest would be. For me, I find it totally implausible that there could be a lawsuit from a supplier regarding the firing of employees of Ojai foods. There is this regular BS on so many shows as soon as business comes into the picture. Is this just another instance?

And the whole background is off. Ojai gets a sweetheart deal from their printers (Petersens) because Ojai agrees to keep these two Petersen hangers-on on their payroll? Technically this would be illegal in France. Don't know about the US. And in the case of B+S, what is the advantage for Petersen? It would be much easier to up the cost of the work done for Ojai, and put the brothers on their own payroll.

(Posting now, because last week was the second week of broadcasts here in France... two eps a week, so last week was 1.3 + 1.4.)

Yeah, that was...exactly my point. I would protest the preposterous existence of the lawsuit, except I didn't think anyone would care.

As you see, I would! And did! And do!

And it wouldn't have been hard to find a less preposterous dramatic situation for Sarah. The Petersens are giving them a good deal on their printing. Let the Petersens cancel the contract. Does Ojai need the hassle of finding a new supplier, and can it afford the extra cost over the long term? Kevin could still have his bit to do with regard to the Petersens breaking the contract.

It was an unrealistic plot point, certainly, but it was only meant to highlight the Sarah-Tommy tension over the running of the family business. In the grand scheme of things, it didn't bother me.

I watched the DVD of this episode and had forgotten just how haunting this montage was. I am not a montage fan, but this one worked really well, especially the scenes with Kevin and the closing scene with Nora.

The commentary was lots of fun and also informative.

Calista did not want to do the scene where Kitty fell into the pool, because she was afraid it would be like Ally McBeal, but she did it anyway.

The script originally ended without any other Holly scenes following her leaving Nora's party in disgrace. Patricia Wettig said she wanted some scene from Holly's POV, so she asked the writers and they gave her that little scene with Saul back at her house which she considered critically important for Holly's role on the show.

They originally planned to have Nora find out about William's adultery much later in the season.