Episode 3.21: Search For Liz
Let me begin this recap by saying that I am unable to find a suitable unit of measurement (metric or otherwise) that accurately conveys the awesomeness within. It's one of those trippy fantasy ones, like my all-time favourite Uh-Oh Seven, except instead of spy novels, they're spoofing soap operas. I love everything about it.
Before we get into any actual plot, let's meet all the characters' soap counterparts:
We open with Delilah, lying unconscious on the floor of the Wakefield house, and Jessica yelling at her to get up. Out of nowhere, Rodd the PI comes in and tells her to freeze. Apparently he's only recently returned to Bittersweet Valley.
Jessica: "Didn't you go to Kathmandu to find yourself?"
Rodd: "I did. [Dramatic pause] But I wasn't there."
Rodd finds Delilah on the floor, seemingly dead, and accuses Jessica of the murder. Jessica counters that she would never hurt Delilah, as she's been there for Jess through everything, "including three bouts of hysterical blindness and a bad perm." Rodd demands an alibi, and Jessica claims that she was unconscious at the time of the murder after hitting her head on the door. He thinks this is a little far-fetched. Methinks this will be important later.
Because Rodd is the worst detective ever (a side effect of really being Todd) he gives Jessica 24 hours to prove her innocence before calling the cops. After Jessica leaves, Delilah comes back from the dead for no other reason than to tell Rodd to ring for an ambulance, and call him a moron.
Rodd, seen here going to great lengths to prove her right.
Just to confirm that this is definitely not real life, we cut to a hospital where Shred is a doctor. Apparently in this universe, there is no God. Handy to know. Delilah gets wheeled in, and an orderly gives us some background on her -- she's heiress to a corn dog fortune, and her first husband died when he accidentally donated both of his kidneys. Dr. Shredley becomes infatuated with the comatose Delilah, which pisses off his girlfriend, Nurse Cher.
Liz, always getting the best roles in these things, is a gum-chewing, attitude-laden waitress at the Gloom Beach Cafe. Spoiler: she is evil. You can tell from the very first shot that she's evil. And also, evil Liz is really freakin' hot. Rodd comes in and immediately falls in love with her, which is understandable, as she is really freakin' hot. He even stares at her ass as she walks away, which is only the most risque thing I've seen on this damn show so far.
Lowdown Liz (as she's called) tells Rodd all about her sordid past, being switched at birth and ending up being raised in the Middle East where she stowed away on a cruise ship and finally made it back to America. Kudos on learning to speak with an American accent in one day, though, Lowdown Liz, you sexy little strumpet. Rodd is listening intently, and occasionally saying dolt things, like:
Lowdown Liz: "I landed on these shores only yesterday."
Rodd: "Let me guess -- you're new in town."
Rodd decides to tell this clearly evil stranger about his new case, the attempted murder of Delilah Fowler. Lowdown Liz grabs him and is all, "you mean she's not dead yet? Whaaaa?" Rodd doesn't think this is at all suspicious, but then again, this is the guy who just put salt in his coffee. He suddenly realises that Lowdown Liz has the same last name as his prime suspect, but Lowdown assures him that they're not related. And they're definitely not twins.
"Miss Wakefield...your story checks out."
Jessica goes to her husband Winslow's office and tells him about Delilah's coma. His response?
Winslow (smiling): "Really? I mean...(frowning) really?"
Jessica: "And I'm the prime suspect!"
Winslow (smiling): Really? I mean...(frowning) really?
Jessica: "I only have 24 hours to solve the crime, or I'll spend the rest of my life in jail!"
Winslow (smiling): "Really? I mean...(frowning) really?"
The best thing about this exchange is that Winslow is wearing a suit, and he's looking fine. Jessica repeats her alibi about getting the shit kicked out of her by a door, and Winslow doesn't believe her either.
At the Gloom Beach, Rodd is interviewing Nurse Cher, who reveals that she too used to suffer from a little case o' the comas until Dr. Shredley saved her. Apparently Dr. Shredley has a thing for unconscious girls, so I suppose we can chalk Bruce Patman's rapey ways up to some kind of genetic predisposition.
Endora shows up in her biker chic best, takes Rodd aside and whispers to him that she knows that Jessica Wakefield has an evil identical twin. Lowdown Liz comes along and tries to eavesdrop, so Endora tells Rodd to shush. His response? "SO, WHAT DOES HER IDENTICAL EVIL TWIN LOOK LIKE?" Endora gets mad at his lack of discretion and huffs off, and Lowdown asks Rodd what's going on. He says, "I just found out that Jessica Wakefield has an identical evil twin. [Scoffs] Like that's important to the case." Best. Todd. Episode. Ever.
Winslow goes to the hospital and asks Dr. Shredley if he can see Delilah. Dr. Shredley responds with, "No problemo, Winston." Winslow has to correct him, and I am thoroughly amused at all these fourth walls being painted today. Once Winslow is left alone with Delilah, he starts strangling her, revealing to us that he had an affair with her and she's using incriminating photos of them to scam him out of his millions. Nurse Cher comes in, gives Winslow a huge lecture about hospitals being a healing place, and then the second he leaves she tries to strangle Delilah herself for daring to be attractive to her horrendously unethical doctor boyfriend. Thankfully, Jessica comes by and stops all the murdering in its tracks. I love how Jessica is the only decent person in a town full of dirty rotten scoundrels for the first time ever.
Unfortunately, Delilah flatlines just as Rodd comes by. He sees Jessica standing over her no-pulse friend, and has Manno the sheriff arrest her by yelling "Book her, Manno!" Rodd is looking particularly hot in this scene, too. I love how the nerd actors finally get their day of glamour.
As though to prove my point, the opening shot after the commercial break is...well, it's a bizarre close-up of Enid's breasts. I mean Endora's breasts. Homegirl is taking the puppies out to play today.
Not a screencap anybody ever excepted, I'm sure.
Endora's sharing a cell with the newly incarcerated Jessica, so she takes time out of her busy being-Faith-from-Buffy-before-there-was-a-Faith-from-Bufffy schedule to tell Jess that she thinks her evil twin (whom Jessica has never heard of) is responsible for Delilah's murder. Apparently Endora met Lowdown Liz on the wrong side of the tracks (in the Middle East?), and lists her many crimes, including, "murder, attempted murder, parking in a handicapped zone" which is a line I love because it completely embodies one of my favourite TV Tropes. Now I just have to go to the website and link it for you, and...oh, damn. Oh, no. Oh, damn.
Phew, okay, I'm back. Thankfully, I stayed away from anything Simpsons-related, or this recap would never get finished and my dinner would be wicked burned. Let's get on with the story.
Lowdown Liz comes to visit Winslow, introducing herself as "your wife's separated-at-birth evil twin." Lowdown feeds Winslow some bullshit about how Jessica's the one who killed Delilah, and she plans to kill him too. Winslow falls madly in love with Lowdown and they make out. Really make out. They even end up partially horizontal on Winslow's desk. This episode, man. I don't even know where all this sexy has come from today.
Liz can only get her kicks in someone else's dream.
Dr. Shredley is in the OR, ready to operate on Delilah. So...she's still not dead? Nurse Cher is handing him all sorts of cartoonishly large mallets, axes and secateurs, hoping that he'll accidentally kill Delilah so she can live happily ever after with him. She even tries to knock herself out again, because she knows comas get Dr. Shredley hot like nobody's business.
Oddly, this is exactly how I imagine surgery with Shred would go.
Meanwhile, in the pokey, Endora has decided to escape. Thankfully, Sheriff Manno is in love with her, so he bakes a file into a cake. No wait...it's a jackhammer. He's baked a jackhammer into a cake. Hells yes he has.
At the Gloom Beach, Rodd has found the (attempted) murder weapon -- a gun, with the words 'Property of Liz 'Evil Twin' Wakefield' sticker-labelled onto it.
It's prop humour all round today, but I buy it.
Rodd shows it to Lowdown Liz and says, "A nametag! And Jessica's name spelled wrong!" Rodd further explains that there were some weird, large left footprints at the scene of the crime, and Lowdown bends over to tie her shoes. One guess what they look like.
Jessica's evil twin sister is apparently Sideshow Bob.
When Rodd suddenly gets the feeling that something's not right, Lowdown pulls a gun on him. In actual fact, he was just suss that the milk in his coffee might not be non-fat. He is in no way close to solving the actual crime, so way to jump the gun there, Lowdown. (Pun oh-so-intended, by the way.) She breaks into a confession, telling him that she meant to kill Jessica out of jealousy, but Delilah got in the way. Rodd is still more interested in what kind of milk she gave him.
"So what you're saying is, you're out of non-fat?" -- Actual Rodd line.
Just as Lowdown is about to shoot Rodd in the head, Jessica comes in, having escaped with Endora. She cries, "My long lost, separated at birth, identical evil twin sister!" and joyously rushes over to hug...Nurse Cher, who calls her an idiot and points her in the direction of Lowdown. Rodd exclaims, "Twins! I don't see it." Endora solves the case, Manno books 'em, and Rodd just stands there, still holding his bastard fatty latte.
At the hospital, Delilah finally wakes up, looking fabulous as usual. Dr. Shredley is by her side, eagerly awaiting the fruits of his labour, and by fruits, I'm talking about all the hardcore thanks-for-saving-my-life sexy funness he's surely owed. Delilah is all, "You're my doctor? Get a haircut, you freak!" and Dr. Shredley is disappointed that he saved her life for nothing. He cheers up when the orderly wheels in Nurse Cher, who's had a head-on collision. With a door. Heh. Dr. Shredley falls back in love with comatose Nurse Cher, and Delilah gets moved to a padded cell, because I guess not falling madly in love with Dr. Anti-Handsome is some sort of psych evaluation fail.
Cut back to the real Sweet Valley, where Jessica is lying unconscious from her run-in with the wicked door. Jessica is refusing to believe Liz when she says that it's all been a dream, and Lila comes in and tells Jess that she'd previously thought being knocked out by wayward doors is something that only happens in soap operas. That's it, that's the entire link to the rest of the episode, in all its tenuous glory. Did you really think it would be anything more meaningful?
As Lila's saying this, Todd enters, opening the door and saying, "Jessica, what's this about you getting hit in the head by a door?" and knocking Lila out in the process. Ha ha, oh, Todd. The other three girls look to Jessica, and the here-we-go-again music plays.
Todd Wilkins: Rendering people unconscious since 1983.