Good Trouble – Broken Arted

By: Marnie Faith

There’s a lot to be said about this week’s episode of Good Trouble – from Callie’s (Maia Mitchell) love triangle looking as though it’s about to crash and burn right in front of her, to Sumi (Kara Wang) finally admitting she’s still in love with Alice (Sherry Cola), to Malika’s (Zuri Adele) continued heartfelt attempts to bring both publicity and justice to the Jamal Thompson case. However, all of that feels almost overshadowed by the final four minutes of the episode. Those final few minutes were like something out of an awareness campaign where you’re forced to sit and rewatch all the obvious signs you missed. Only this time, it involved a character we’re all growing unimaginable soft spots for and the news that he may have just taken his life and not one single person noticed.

Starting at Gael’s (Tommy Martinez) art exhibition the Coterie gang are going through their usual individual dramas. The Jamal Thompson case is only days away now and Malika is doing all she can to rally support for an organised protest to help bring the case as much publicity as possible. Despite having recently been taken off the case by Judge Wilson (Roger Bart), Callie does everything she can to try and help Malika. Away from the looming case, Malika has a whole other host of personal problems to contend with. Isaac (Sarunas J. Jackson) is absent from this week’s episode, under the pretense that Malika “doesn’t have time for relationships.” Not only that, but the invitation she sent to brother Dom (J. Mallory Mcree) is returned due to being delivered to an invalid address and his number is also no longer available. As every sister does, she worries about him. When she eventually manages to make contact with him it doesn’t look good. She pushes him on whether he’s okay and all we get to hear is a resounding “no” before moving on.

Back at the exhibition, Malika has rallied up the Coterie gang to assist her in handing out flyers for the protest. Under strict instructions to “not come back and find a pile of them on the bar,” the group are sure to make the effort to actually network for her. Away from flyering, Callie is using Jamie’s (Beau Mirchoff) connections in the legal world to dig deeper into why it was Tate Wilson’s (Zachary Gordon) charges, including assaulting a police officer, were dropped without another word. Though the investigator doesn’t manage to uncover anything groundbreaking surrounding Tate’s freedom, he does unearth something Callie was definitely not expecting. It comes out that “the former Police Chief when Jamal was shot, he didn’t decide to retire, he was forced to. There was an [Internal Affairs] investigation going on about some comments he allegedly made to officers, one of which was that it’s easier and cheaper for the department to let victims of police shootings die.” This revelation is something that could understandably impact the case entirely; however, it leaves Callie with the task of figuring out how to get this information out without losing her clerkship with Judge Wilson.

Some good does come out of the group rallying together to support Malika though; it gives Mariana (Cierra Ramirez) the inspiration she so desperately needed for her upcoming pitch. Though the basis of her app pitch is something that “organizes the organizers,” she understands that this isn’t what Speckulate is about, thereby must come up with something new before she meets with Evan (T.J Linnard). In true Good Trouble stylet though, Mariana quite literally runs into Evan who encourages her to make her pitch there and then. Much to Mariana’s surprise Evan absolutely loves it! He assures her he can’t wait to get on board with developing it and that she did a good job. Never allowed to bask in her successes for long, Mariana’s victory is shortly clouded by Raj (Dhruv Uday Singh) voicing his concerns. He relays the fact he believes Evan is only approving her pitch due to the fact he has feelings for her. Obviously, this doesn’t sit well with Mariana. She understands that Evan has social anxiety,and believes they just get each other. Putting an end to their fight with the gentle reminder that the only man at Speckulate who’s proved to have unfair intentions so far is in fact Raj, Mariana heads straight for the bar to help her continue celebrating her victory, sans men.

Elsewhere in the exhibition, Alice and Joey (Daisy Eagan) are sharing a look of confusion at one of the installations. When Joey offers to go get her another drink, Alice is quickly joined by Meera (Briana Venskus). She apologizes to Alice for being so stand-offish towards her, explaining that it comes from a place of jealousy due to hers and Sumi’s history. Of course, it would typically come across as a very heartfelt moment in which reconciliation looked promising if we didn’t find out a scene later than Sumi has finally faced up to the fact she’s still in love with Alice and consequently doesn’t want to marry Meera. 

Continuing the theme of questionable romances, Davia (Emma Hunton) comes to the gallery with Jeff (Chris Sheffield). Trouble in paradise is already looming for the pair, it would seem. Though they appeared to be having a good night to begin with it looks as though Davia finally remembers the premise of her “re-birthday” and wises up to her situation. Whilst Jeff is busy waxing poetic about how great their lives will be once she moves back to Wisconsin, Davia seems to realize that isn’t the life she’s dreaming of. She gives Jeff an ultimatum that she isn’t moving back to Wisconsin to continue being a mistress. Breaking the news that she’ll only be moving home once he’s divorced his wife, it seems as though Davia’s finally remembered that the most important person she has to love in her life is herself!

We’ve previously learnt that Dennis (Josh Pence) getting divorced as a result of his marriage falling apart following the death of his son Jacob. Last week saw him tell his soon to be ex-wife that he wants nothing more than half of the money from the sale of the house and the rest she can keep. It all seemed as though things may start looking up for him. However, this wasn’t to be the case. Despite his business friend promising an investment in Jesus’ (Noah Centineo) tiny house project a few episodes ago, his reluctance to back down from his ex-wife has meant that the offer has been pulled. From here, we’re really given a unique insight into how he’s feeling. We see the mirroring of real-life sufferers of suicidal thoughts as he’s isolated and feels as though he has no one to reach out to.

The morning after the gallery exhibition we see Jen (Annie Little) arrive at the Coterie, worried and looking for Dennis. It’s Davia who she finds and she explains the fight the pair got into last night. A flashback montage shows viewers Jen telling Dennis that he was an awful father, awful husband and was too consumed in his work life to notice her and their son. She adds one last blow, telling him that it took Jacob getting cancer for him to finally pay attention. Following this we see Jen play Davia the voicemail he left. Viewers are offered a flashback of Dennis, alone in his car sobbing. He tells her that he wishes it was him who died, not Jacob, and he wants nothing more than for her to be happy.

From here the cogs in Davia’s mind start turning. We see her piece together all of his goodbyes to the Coterie gang; him telling her to be good to herself, his secret handshake with Alice, him hugging Mariana, etc. He’s sure to have his farewells bid to every single member of the Coterie. Davia, understandably, starts to freak out frantically ringing him and begging him to pick up his phone. Though the episode ends with Dennis’ welfare unclear, it did such an excellent job of portraying how it feels to live as though you have nothing left.