Good Trouble – Swipe Right

By: Marnie Faith

For Mariana (Cierra Ramirez), the success of her date remains ambiguous from the opening scene of this week’s episode, which shows her waking up in someone else’s bed before quickly scrambling to retrieve her belongings to get out after a very angry girlfriend walks in on her and her hookup. However, as the episode develops, we learn it wasn’t all a complete fail on her behalf. Meanwhile Callie (Maia Mitchell) is facing a starkly different set of issues from the rest of the Coterie girls. Whilst they’re all trying to rid their dry spells, Callie is desperately trying to maintain one. With the news of Rebecca (Molly McCook) passing her bar exams serving as a wake up call that Callie needs to get her act together if she wants to pass hers too, she suggests to Gael (Tommy Martinez) that they shouldn’t see each other until her exams are over and his art exhibition is done. That way it will allow them both to be productive. 

Davia (Emma Hunton) is left with Malika’s (Zuri Adele) phone, who quickly discovers that men on the Shipper app are less interested with getting to know black women than they are exploring their fetishization’s of black women. Alice’s (Sherry Cola) phone falls into the hands of Malika, who’s set on finding her someone to help her get over the fact her best friend Sumi (Kara Wang) with whom she’s secretly in love and is getting married to someone that isn’t her. Alice draws the short straw of finding Mariana a date. It turns out her ability to pick men isn’t quite as good as her ability to pick out women, which leads her to suggesting a man who’s got six cats. Not that there’s anything wrong with homing six cats, it’s just not very…Mariana. Finally, Mariana is left with the task of finding a man to keep up with Davia’s incredible self-confidence whilst simultaneously distracting her from the fact she’s sleeping with Jeff (Chris Sheffield), a married man who fleetingly visits LA to sleep with her whilst his wife is left in Wisconsin, blissfully unaware. For the purpose of their experiment, they all arrange for their dates to meet on the same evening at the same bar and see how they all pan out.

All of the dates have varying levels of success. Whilst Mariana’s left me wanting to claw my hair out from the secondhand embarrassment, the outcome of Davia’s actually pleasantly surprised me! From the outset, Davia’s date Paul (Joe Burke) didn’t look as though he was going to be a match for her. His most interesting facts about himself is the fact he buys his pants from Costco, he doesn’t have Twitter nor Instagram and believes it’s acceptable to upload solely boat photographs to Facebook. Ultimately, Paul is chalk whilst Davia is cheese. Admittedly, I felt for Paul when he admitted he had little self-confidence! However, a few shots later, Davia is scrolling through Facebook and learns that Jeff is in fact in LA despite telling her that he wasn’t. The result of finding out that Jeff lied to her is largely unsurprising, but she takes Paul home to have revenge sex. She then texts Jeff following said sex asking how the Lakers game went, which is followed smoothly by a photo of her and a sleeping Paul next to her. Even better is that Paul actually turned out to be able to keep up with Davia’s needs in the bedroom, even if he was a little overbearing on the reassurance in the process. 

We learn that Malika backed out of the experiment due to the fact that the man Davia swiped right on for her didn’t swipe back. So whilst the rest of the Coterie ladies have their respective dates, Malika works a shift behind the bar assuming a fly on the wall position for them. Shockingly, the said failed right-swiper later walks into the bar Malika is witnessing her friends dates occur. She does her best to avoid Isaac (Sarunas J. Junior) and is largely successful in her mission until he makes his presence known at the bar to order drinks. He’s clearly attracted to her, adding the request for her number onto his drinks order, but even his knowledge of rom-coms isn’t enough for Malika to let her guard down.

Evidently enjoying the chase Malika is putting him through, Isaac stays at the bar until last orders where he once again attempts to pursue her. When questioned on why it is she won’t give him her number she explains that she doesn’t feel comfortable “giving my number to someone who, subconsciously or not, wrote me off.” Isaac pursues her, intrigued by what she means. It is during this exchange that Malika tells him that he swiped left on her and on further inspection of his matches Isaac discovers his clear preference for lighter skinned women that he wasn’t completely aware he had. Understanding where Malika’s hurt is stemming from, Isaac pays his tab and leaves the bar. As Malika later shuts down the bar, Isaac reappears with a basketball in hand. He tells her that he figured out what her favorite movie was – Love & Basketball. When she informs him that he is actually correct, he challenges her to a basketball game. If she wins, he’ll never step foot into her bar again, but if he wins Malika must give him a second chance and allow him to take her out on a date. The game appears to be going quite smoothly, until Isaac decides to take his top off and Malika joins him. It would only be fair after all. The final score remains unclear, but given the fact that the pair smugly walked out of Malika’s room the following morning I’d say it was a victory for the both of them.

For Alice, the prospect of going on a date seemed to be a lot more daunting than it was for the rest of the ladies. Granted she’s spent the last few episodes coming to terms with the fact her best friend who she’s also in love with is getting married to someone else, as well as the fact she admits she hasn’t dated in years. So, it’s understandable. Her and Joey (Daisy Eagan) have an awkward start, but they finally find their rhythm in conversation with each other and things progress nicely for the pair. It goes that well that they surprise everyone by being the first couple to leave!

Back at Alice’s apartment things continue going well for the pair. They’re making out. Joey loves her apartment space and the pair seem happy. Of course, that’s precisely the moment that Sumi shows up at Alice’s door in tears due to the fact her fiancee has called off the wedding. Despite Alice’s kind-hearted nature doubled with her undying love for her best friend, she calmly lets Sumi down, telling her that she can’t be there for her as she’s with company. Sumi surprisingly understands and everything picks back up where they left off. Joey and Alice’s connection is short lived. Sumi is clearly the only one on Alice’s mind and Joey knows this, thus she politely excuses herself and Sumi replaces her in Alice’s bed.

Though we know very little about Sumi at this point in the season, we’re lead to believe that she must have some redeeming qualities to keep Alice around for this long. She must have something good about her, right? Whatever those redeeming features are they certainly didn’t shine the next morning. Despite their exchanges of “I love you” last night and the fact Sumi told Alice she always sleeps best in her arms, she’s ready to kiss and make up with Meera (Briana Venskus) the second she calls to apologize. Unlike the Alice we saw at the start of the season;however, she takes this as an opportunity for a second chance with Joey. She calls into her radio show to request a song for “a girl who messed up on a first date and would do anything for a second chance.” Thankfully, a second chance is what she gets and the girls are left celebrating in the kitchen.

For Mariana, her date ends up a total disaster. He’s obnoxious, ignorant and attempts to play normal due to the fact he “pulls his pants on two legs at a time like everyone else.” All hope seems lost for her when he invites her back to his place to show her his portfolio, until a man from the opposite booth interrupts, pretending to be Mariana’s ex asking for a second chance. She takes this opportunity to exit her awful date and instead pursue her mysterious savior. He turns out to have a girlfriend, but that doesn’t stop her going home with him…to meet said girlfriend. The couple fall in love with Mariana over copious bottles of wine and it’s after this scene the biggest plot twist in Mariana’s entire character development takes place. She initiates a kiss with the girlfriend, which eventually turns into a threesome! Going back to the opening of the episode, it appears she’s quickly kicked from their home the next morning due to the fact Mariana and her mystery savior from the night before spent the morning making out. The couple apparently only pursue other people together, thus she understandably wasn’t too pleased.