The L Word: Generation Q season 1 episode 3 review: Introducing Megan Rapinoe
This week’s episode of The L Word: Generation Q dives further into conflict and friendship, and Megan Rapinoe also wears an amazing suit.
Last week’s episode of The L Word: Generation Q helped us get to know the new Gen Q characters better (while also casually revealing what happened to Jenny Shechter!). This week, we begin with Dani and Sophie back on solid ground as they discuss their wedding attire and other planning details. While Sophie has a big planning group to help with everything, Dani’s relationship with her dad is strained, and her mom has apparently died.
Dani’s dad reaches out and tries to make up for his poor reaction to his daughter’s engagement. He tells her he wants to walk her down the aisle and offers to pay for a fancy venue. Reluctantly, Sophie’s family, Dani, and her dad walk through the Biltmore, a super fancy hotel, and Sophie quickly becomes uncomfortable. It is not her style or her and Dani’s style.
But, Dani’s dad books the Biltmore without asking them. Sophie freaks out at how their wedding is snowballing out of their hands and Dani will have to choose between her dad and Sophie. This conflict does not appear to be going away any time soon…
As for Finley, she and Rebecca (Olivia Thirlby, Juno) wake up in bed together (with gratuitous shots of Jacqueline Toboni’s luxurious armpit hair), but Rebecca soon has to leave to go to church, sending neurotic Finley into a full tailspin.
Sophie convinces Finley they should go check out Rebecca’s church. (Sophie can also see if it’s a suitable wedding venue.) Finley is horrified to discover that Rebecca doesn’t attend the church but is actually a preacher there.
That night, Finley goes back to a Catholic church for the first time since she was a kid and texts Rebecca to meet her. It’s very emotional, and Finley has a lot of baggage. Whether it’s the general queer baggage with organized religion/Christianity or something more specific remains to be seen.
Meanwhile, Shane did the damn thing and actually bought Atlas with the intention to turn it back into a lesbian bar. In a very understated Shane way, the couple from last week’s episode, Tess and Lena, show up for work to discover the bar is already unlocked.
They find Shane is inside with designers working on the new plans. Shane casually asks Tess if she’d like to run it and the two are excited with the huge gift that Shane is giving them.
Later, Bette shows up at Atlas with flowers for Shane to apologize for judging Shane’s decision to buy the bar as impulsive. They discuss Shane’s divorce and we learn about what happened to Bette and Tina. Tina fell in love with someone else and left Bette, and Bette still isn’t over it. Shane shares that she and her wife still love each other but have problems bigger than that.
It’s a really sweet and funny scene, too, as Bette complains about menopause and night sweats. The show obviously has to deal with the Generation Q in the title, and the new characters are fun, too, but my favorite scenes on The L Word have always been the ones with the women talking as friends.
Right now, there’s still so much exposition, both with telling us what’s happened since we last saw Bette, Shane, and Alice, and with introducing the new characters, that we don’t get enough of the characters just sitting around and being friends like we did on the original series.
After, Shane is drunkenly texting her wife in the bar office when Lena comes in and hits on her. Of course, even though Shane knows it’s a bad idea and tries to stop it, they hook up. Classic Shane!
As for Alice this week, that morning, she gets ready to leave to meet Bette and Shane for breakfast, and Nat tells Alice she doesn’t have any friends because Gigi got them all in the divorce. (But also, the kids are school-aged. Can’t Alice invite Nat along with her to do stuff?)
That afternoon when Gigi drops off the kids, Alice tells Gigi that Nat misses her. Gigi thinks that Alice means romantically at first because Alice is so awkward! Naturally, Nat is annoyed with Alice for interfering with her relationship with her cheating ex-wife.
Alice’s plan goes a little too well when Nat and Gigi become all giggly and reminiscent. Alice is really good at friendzoning herself in her own relationships. Shane asks Alice about it, who is so proud of herself, she can’t see she’s sabotaging her own relationship.
Once Shane points this out, Alice quickly gets jealous and unsubtly asks Gigi to leave. Nat then basically shrugs the whole thing off, saying it was weird anyway. As much as I love Stephanie Allyne, do Nat and Alice actually have any romantic chemistry?
On the Porter front, things are not getting any easier for poor Angie Kennard-Porter. A gross girl at school is bullying her based on the salacious things about Bette on Twitter, and Angie punches her straight in the face.
Angie gets suspended, while the girl who bullied her gets away with a stern talking-to — because she’s white. Bette reminds Angie that the system doesn’t work the same way for them as it does for black women. It’s a touching scene and really goes to show how good of a mom Bette is.
Though she can be tough, she’s also completely understanding of the circumstances and challenges that her daughter lives in. Bette’s life continues to leak into the campaign. Dani and Pierce (Brian Michael Smith) want Bette to consider public schools because of optics. Bette is firm on Angie attending private school, but Angie wants her to consider it. She’s tired of being the token at private schools.
That night, at the debate, Bette announces that Angie is enrolled in a public school and owns her old white opponent (who is pro-charter school) on education. Like seemingly everyone on The L Word, Bette can’t resist self-sabotaging, though. Even though she got the highly-sought-after Teachers Union endorsement, she invited the woman she’s having an affair with to her hotel room. Thankfully, Dani saw it happen, so hopefully, she’ll lock it down in next week’s episode…
As for the ridiculous taping of Alice, it features none other than Megan Rapinoe as a guest! And therefore we get so many good suits. Alice’s red and green suit with the floral cravat and pom pom heels is so fun while Megan Rapinoe’s brocade copper suit with nothing underneath is a stunner.
Sidebar: Finley having to be held back from attacking Megan Rapinoe is a mood.
The actual segment with Megan Rapinoe is pretty cheesy and rote, but if the Alice portion of each week’s episodes allow us to have queer fan service with the likes of Megan Rapinoe, that’s just fine.
dark. Next. The L Word: Generation Q season 1 episode 2 review: Old habits die hard