The Affair recap episode 205. The Hotdogs.

Alison and Robert The Affair



Please let the baby be Cole's.
Just saying.

Alison's and Cole's double feature is my favorite episode of this season. Let's call it the slut and the ranch hand.
Rita Hayworth used to say that men went to bed with Gilda and woke up with Rita. A bit strange, because if those men ever really payed attention to Gilda, they already would have seen the real face of the seductress. Gilda herself, is never as bad or as sexual as men want to see her.
The dilemma of the beautiful is a story that is not told very often. It is difficult, even for writers and directors to dig behind their own projections. In most minds beautiful people are not real people.
' I dont think anybody really sees me.' says Alison at the end of this episode. ' Sometimes I worry that I am not a real person, just a figment of peoples imagination.'
Talking about Noah, she may be right.
But we get to see her.
First of all, Alison is somebody who's instincts are off. She isn't the savvy manipulator of Noah's versions. Noah may be manipulated by his own desire. No, Alison is somebody who thinks it's a good idea to work for a stuck up b. as Yvonne and a guy who calls you kid and peeps at you when you have sex in the pool.
Alison is a women with no father. She thinks Robert meant it when he said: ' We get along so well. '
She is kind, and hardworking and she was a nurse, she could make an ideal assistant, but even before she enters the main house this morning to start to work, the phantom Alison already wrecked havoc.
This Alison made Yvonne jealous and cautious and Robert horny. How? Well this little thing called Descent. Yvonne is devouring Noah's book, and it clearly effects how she perceives her new assistant.

Yvonne belittles her, criticizes her clothes. Won't you be chilly in those things. Still Alison has the trust to open up her heart to Robert and tell him the real story how she met Noah. Only to arouse him.

Alison is somebody who needs friends.  But these people are not her friends. They will never be.
The affair is a love story, a crime story and a story about class. Cole and Alison, even though he had a ranch and she was nurse, will never be seen as equals by the city folks. We are reminded again and again, how they are viewed. See the scene with Bruce in Cole's taxi where he takes Cole's experience, of being somebody who really belongs in Montauk and annexes it. They come, they screw, they conquer . The question is how will the city monsters leave these two? And what do Alison and Cole have to do to get theirs?
After leaving Yvonne and Robert's house, Alison rides her bike to the village. For just a sec, she lets go, almost raising her arms. Remember when Meg Ryan did that, she crashed and died. Is it the feeling of freedom Alison looks for, or is it her self destruction rearing his ugly head again?
Alison is also somebody you can count on, cause she still goes back to serve lunch to these two awful people. Yvonne continues with her passive aggressive ways. I kind of hoped that when Yvonne said: 'Alison, I don't see the hot dogs.'  Alison would reply: 'Well ask your husband where he put it. '

Later Robert comes over her house, I felt icky when he entered, to fire her in a miserable, cowardly way. ' I just don't understand. ' Alison says. ' I think you do.'
It's the question that gets put before us again and again. How aware is Alison of her sexuality?
If you guess, a lot, she is a hot fox and she knows it, you are yourself putting your own insecurities or attraction on this character.
Finally Alison does the smart thing. Well not entirely, first she wants to confront Yvonne, but when she doesn't find her, she gets her hand on the manuscript, who waits for her on this fiery red desk,  and starts reading.
' She was sex personified. The reason the word was invented.' First of all Noah's book sounds kind of cheesy, the kind of writing that he detested so much in Bruce's books. But hey, if you want it to sell.

' Do you like my pussy.' In the scene where Alison reads, with Noah's voiceover giving us the pornographic details, we get closer and closer, till we are as close to Alison as we have ever been, her green eyes glowing in horror.
And that is how he sees you kid.
The words destroy her.
Frantic she calls Noah. He doesn't pick up. She heads to the city, and goes to Helen's house, asking where he is. Helen has a great litany for her. 'You think he is a great guy, till all his disappointments become your fault. And then you become the enemy, just because you know who he is.'

Wow, I had to stop watching for a sec just to catch my breath.

Is Noah responsible for Scotty's death? I don't know. Is Noah an asshole? Well, he has really to pull off some kind of seismic shift not to be. The showrunners said that Noah will be the character who will change the most this season and I can't wait what will happen. Is this the direction they are going with him, revealing more of his narcissistic ways,  or can he still redeem himself?

Then Alison does what she should have done ages ago. She heads home, to Cole.

 Now, Alison is not the only one, who get used as a sex object this episode. Remember the lady slipping her card, to Cole in the cab. Well she is married, and she told all her friends how she has her own ranch hand, Cole the stallion, who fucks her when her husband is golfing. Ride me Ranch hand. Shut me up.
And who works for her? Luisa, Cole's future wife.
When later that afternoon Cole discovers that Luisa is having her own smutty hook up with Scotty, you can see the relief on his face. Now they are even, you see him thinking.   Scotty, who wants Cole to sell the house, because he wants to buy a nightclub, but is still selling drugs, warns Cole not to hook up with Luisa.
As an aside, when Cole visits Scotty on his boat and it becomes obvious Scotty had a girl there, I presumed it was Whitney. It was great surprise to see Luisa. And it makes Whitney a suspect in Scotty's murder. Jealousy is great motive.

Cole never listens to Scotty, so when he gives Luisa a ride to the End, the club where Scotty is now the manger and she works, follows her in and spends the rest of the night, drinking, eating and flirting at her bar.
They hit a snag, when Luisa  makes a joke about his kid. Dating is awful when you kid is dead. But he heads home with her phone number.
And there she is, Alison sleeping in his bed.
' Are you alright?'
' I don't know.'
These two are so comfortable with each other, so intimate. In the whole series, they seem like two lost kids in a big world. Watching them confessing, consoling,  kissing and making love, the first sex scene this season that is tender and real, I really wished they could make it. But we know they won't. Cole doesn't even erase the phone number on his hand. So please, let the kid be Cole's at least.



In the future Noah's lawyer, Jon Gottlief and detective Jeffries meet in a diner. Everybody wanted Scotty dead, Jon says. He wants to know why Noah was singled out.
He implies and we know that Cole had a pretty good motive. Jon thinks that it could be business rivalry, Cole stole Scotty's idea. The diner they are sitting in is Cole's. We know that Scotty warned Cole not to sleep with Luisa. She is mine, he warned, enraged.
When Oscar, who is serving coffee in  Cole's diner!!! introduces himself to Jon, we know in which direction he will point. Very soon. The Lockharts of course.



The inconsistencies of the week: Alison wakes up in the lake house. She is not in Jersey, at Noah's hotel. Was she waiting for his outside with a six-pack? Highly unlikely.

In his novel, Noah mentioned that he should go back and thank Alison for saving his kid in the diner. So we can put that one to rest.

Helen is dressed up, chic, majestic in Alison's version. Next week I am sure we will see her looking more disheveled.

Alison heading home, means that all the nastiness we saw coming from Cole in a previous episode is probably exaggerated. She would never head home, if that version was true.