Paul's doctor at the ER tells him he's possibly dying of antifreeze poisoning, but since he's a doctor, there's simply no way to find out for sure, so Paul takes a casserole to some science lab somewhere to get them to check it out. Susan's suddenly begging her creepy old headmaster for that teaching job she lost back during her time as a pornographer; this is the entirety of her reasoning: "I deserve a second chance." Headcreepster guy sics Susan on the PTA, so you can start the clock on when she's gonna be forced to lay down the old dialysis card... Or, as it turns out, murder all of them.
Meanwhile, Felicia "Fingers" Tillman is like, "Susan, just keep feeding him all this poison and everything is going to be okay," and Susan just keeps turning her back so Felicia can put more poison in the food -- and Paul can stew in his illness and suspicion and the one million travails of being him, until hopefully he's gonna lose his shit and finally just BTK her.
But then the two Susan storylines combine, because to earn the trust of the PTA she gives them all poisoned cookies, and she actually has to ditch Paul in the middle of him accusing her of poisoning him to go steal everybody's poisoned cookies. Nobody notices that she is being super spazzy and weird, because it is Susan being spazzy and weird... And then Paul brings some gay cops to arrest her for poisoning him, just as she's admitting to poisoning everybody else!
Filter that through your deformed kidney, Delfinator. Deal with that, the only person on earth who might literally be unable to connect the dots of how a person so fucking crazy she chopped off her own fingers has suddenly started showing up every time she turns on the oven to feed the man she's been poisoning. Dramatic Irony, you are just one of the many big guns this show regularly brings to the table. And I mean that.
How's Tom overcompensating this week? Oh, by getting Hawaii tickets for the whole family without discussing it with Lynette, which of course turns her into a fun-hating camping-Nazi harpy, who starves her family and forces them to watch bullshitty slideshows and withholds sex, rather than even considering a compromise. As you'd have assumed. Which is when things get stupid and it all turns into some bad parenting and whatnot, you can just fast-forward that part honestly because it's embarrassing. Tom starts doing this weird menacing hissing mean creeper Parseltongue talk, and Lynette is just her usual squawking monster self, and Teeny starts crying -- or whatever the hell her name is -- which causes them to once again not get divorced (and/or murder-suicide), so, thanks to Teeny for that.
Dreamy Detective Chuck Vance is getting frozen out by old Bree, because apparently -- just like everybody that dates Bree -- he gets off on being treated terribly. Since Renee and Bree are best friends, this week, she gets all involved and investigates, discovering that Chuck Vance is a still-married father of two. Of course, Chuck's been looking into Bree's FVPD files as well, so they're both sneaky hypocrite creeps and making them, I guess, the new Tom and Lynette Scavo. Then Detective Chuck Vance stops their date so they can give a gold-hearted hooker a ride to the shelter. It's weirdly one of the most realistic things that's ever happened on the show -- and the awesomest, once he starts spinning Bree into this amazing, inspirational ex-prostitute story, and that's what turns Bree around on him.
Carlos lays down the law when he discovers Gabrielle and Juanita watching movies he hasn't previously approved, including horror flicks that result in Juanita having nightmares. What could make this worse? That stupid gay guy from down the street, who manages to scare her twice as badly. They end up camping in the front yard for some reason, and getting menaced by Gabi's stepfather -- I mean, I'm assuming this based on the fact that he's played by Betty Suarez's dad, the only Latino man ABC has ever heard of, but also the subtle hint of him wearing a sombrero, in the middle of the night -- but either way.
This again? Already? We haven't taken enough trips down SVU Lane this season? Was it really necessary to prove me right, literally, about the connection between disobeying one's husband and sexual trauma? I reject your reality. Let's just say they get murdered instead, yeah, Juanita and her mother are chopped into one million bloody screeching pieces on their own lawn -- while the rest of the neighborhood watches uncaringly, while Mitzi or Karen or Lynette says some on-the-nose shit about "It's not my problem! Why should I care?" -- and Mary Alice nods and talks some mad-awful shit about We see them every day, getting chopped into pieces on their own lawns, but we don't REALLY care, do we? And they probably deserve it. And they're Mexicans anyway. Amen.
Next week: Detective Chuck Vance is mistaken for gay -- which I know what you're thinking, surely this show won't fuck that up horribly -- and Paul has to go on dialysis six hours a day four times a week, and Susan is given the death penalty for poisoning the entire town and becomes an infamous figure of Fairview legend and haunts them with her bony hips and bony face and bony ghost, and then Gabi's stepfather molests everybody on the show except Detective Chuck Vance, and then... I don't know. Ten minutes of Andrew Van de Kamp singing "Old Time Rock & Roll" in briefs and a pink button-down.
Want more? The full recap starts right below!
"HEAVEN"
Mary Alice: "You know what I hate about Susan Delfino? Her compassion. She's always doing nice shit for people. I wish she would just quit. Helping people doesn't help."
FAIRVIEW GENERAL
Susan: "Paul, why were you on the floor dying last week? What are we doing in the hospital?"
Paul: "I don't know, I feel bad. I've been feeling bad for a while. Maybe the writers didn't actually retcon you into a competent cook after all?"
Susan: "I brought you magazines and water. They don't have those in hospitals."
Paul: "It's funny how you are the only person being nice to me, and yet I nearly punched your teeth in last week."
Mary Alice: "That is because compassion is for suckers, Paul."
Susan: "No, I shouldn't have suggested taking possession of my own home, that was mean. Especially since you own dozens of other homes, and only moved into mine to torture me."
Doctor: "Well, Paul, it seems like there's nothing wrong with you, besides the renal failure and heart palpitations consistent with antifreeze poisoning. You can go home and keep eating tons of antifreeze."
Paul: "Looks like I have to yell at Susan some more."
Susan: "What can I make you for dinner tonight?"
Paul: "I don't know, I guess more poison."
"HEAVEN"
Mary Alice: "I wish Susan Delfino would poison herself, so she would stop being nice to people. It offends me personally."
Jacob: "Mary Alice, where is it that you are lovely-bonesing us from?"
Mary Alice: "Oh, I'm totally in heaven."
Jacob: "For real? Are you sure?"
SOLIS
Carlos: "Ladies, I'm home! I hope you're behaving yourselves in a way that I approve!"
Juanita: "Mommy and I are watching a slasher movie! It's the only time we've ever spent together in my entire obese life, please don't fuck this up."
Carlos: "Oh, I am going to fuck it up. How dare you share a single moment with your daughter?"
Gabi: "Oh, for God's sake, it's just a movie. I'm going to end up being wrong, aren't it?"
Carlos: "Have you ever seen this show?"
Minutes later...
Juanita: "I can no longer discern the difference between fantasy and reality, despite as recently as minutes ago clearly delineating my understanding of that difference!"
Carlos: "You know what, fine. I'm going to go sleep in Juanita's bed."
Juanita: "Celia is in there. Because she pissed her own."
Gabi: "I'm not concerned about that at all. Go to sleep, everybody."