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Bloodline: Part 19

"Everything you told us about family is a lie."

A problem has to be openly addressed before it can be solved, which is why the Rayburn family is always in such turmoil. No one in the family wants to be the one to come clean and address their issues, to point out what is really wrong. It's why things with Danny turned out the way they did and it's why they're all falling apart now.

Yet it is still easy to empathize with them. Because each of them knows that if they confront their real issues, the family could end up irrevocably broken and tarnished forever. Their tranquil, prosperous life that they've worked so hard for will spiral into oblivion. Most people would not have the strength to face that. Most people would find it easier to keep lying. To themselves as much as everyone else.

But the lies only serve to delay the inevitable. So when the truth finally comes to light, it will be all the more devastating and harder to recover from. That's what happens when Janie, the youngest of the Rayburn clan, learns of her family's dark secrets.

Wanting what was promised to her and no longer wanting to be ignored, Eve seeks out Janie and feeds her curiosity about Uncle Danny and what her family had against him. We viewers know enough to know that those secrets don't look good in any light you put them in.

Janie apparently learns everything: Danny's years of mistreatment by the Rayburns, Sally trying to persuade Eve to abort Nolan, maybe even the events surrounding Sarah's death. She's especially outraged since she had bonded with Danny prior to his death. Janie lashes out at Sally during a family dinner at the end; when Sally confronts her on this, Janie lets her have it. Confronted with her demons and being told her dead firstborn hated her, Sally is provoked into slapping her granddaughter. John can only watch, stunned.

Needless to say, this dramatically changes the mood within the Rayburn family. It forces everyone else to confront these issues as well. It's at the core of all their other problems.

This kind of drama is the last thing Kevin wants. In this episode he faces a business foreclosure and a false alarm pregnancy scare from Belle. He also continues feigning sobriety, chugging booze in private. In the end, Kevin has another crisis. He had been overjoyed to learn that he and Belle were having a son, until Janie's outburst at dinner and the slapping incident. Then he does a 180, telling Belle he shouldn't be a father in light of his family history; I can't say I really blame him at this point. He seeks shelter with a fellow AA member who had reached out to him earlier. It feels more like he's just running from the pressures of his life in general, though.

His sister Meg has an even more complex battle. With Roy Gilbert's direction, she begins digging up dirt on Sheriff Aguirre. With Chelsea O'Bannon's reluctant assistance, Meg finds evidence that suggests Aguirre covered up the violence he inflicted on his ex-wife. This show certainly loves its hidden domestic abuse.

Meg leaks the information to the press, putting Aguirre in hot water. We might initially think it's justified, since Aguirre very likely abused his ex. Roy Gilbert definitely wants Meg to think so, even hinting that her father did shady things in order to build his kingdom in the Islamorada. Still, for someone trying to put her family history to rest, Meg is right to be feeling uneasy about exposing someone else's dark family secrets. It turns out badly for her anyway, since John expressly asks her not to exploit Aguirre's controversy, not knowing she's the one who started it. Even worse, Ms. Ortiz, Aguirre's ex-wife, reveals that the responding officer who helped cover up the incident report was none other than her ex, Marco Diaz.

This may be why Marco is a top detective in Aguirre's department, and the two have clearly got history. While Meg susses out their guilt, Aguirre and Marco begin to look into the Red Reef Inn killing again. Aguirre thinks Danny had help getting the drop on Wayne Lowry's hitman, suspecting John, leading Marco to wonder who else might have been there to help Danny.

John does some detective work of his own here when he finds out Ozzy made some thinly veiled threats to Diana. He learns that he and Danny were accomplices after running his prints, and warns him to leave town. He doesn't, and John later finds a Red Reef Inn matchbook with a message from Ozzy in his house. This guy's audacious, I'll give him that. Unfortunately for Ozzy, this is after the family breakdown at dinner John was helpless to prevent. So John confronts Ozzy at the Red Reef Inn, and silently decides that the blackmailer would be a convenient outlet for his great rage. He lets it all out, beating Ozzy's face into the ground. Again, I can't say I blame him, but this was obviously not a wise, healthy choice. If blackmail is what Ozzy is after, John might have just done him a favor.

Bits and Pieces:

* Ozzy's full name is Osvaldo Delvecchio.

* The show likes to draw parallels between its scenes of violence, perhaps to display how its all connected. John beating Ozzy was filmed in a way that mirrors not only the way Ozzy beat a man's face in during his introductory episode, but also the way Robert had beaten Danny as a kid.

* There is a meaningful story about Kevin teaching himself to ride a bike when he was six. He kept forcing himself to keep getting on the bike and falling off until, bloody and battered, he finally got the hang of it. Sally brings it up in an attempt to raise his spirits, saying she's always been confident in him after seeing his stubborn resolve. When he tries telling the story to Belle, she doesn't see it the same way. She wonders why his parents weren't there for him. I'm with her. What parent just lets their child get all smashed up instead of helping them learn?

* I like green, but yeah, probably not a good color to paint on your walls. I imagine it being the baby's room would only lead to thoughts of vomit and other nastiness, "calm" color or not.

* Roy Gilbert is shadier than a solar eclipse.

Quotes:

Eve: (to John) Your father made promises that affect me and my son. And nobody in your family seems to care.

Marco: None of this makes sense, alright? I've known John a long time. John's a good man.
Sheriff Aguirre: And a good man does what he's got to do to protect his loved ones.

John: What the fuck are you doing down here?
Ozzy: Well, your brother told me this was paradise, and I had to see for myself.
John: What else did my brother tell you?
Ozzy: Gosh, you know Danny. Always telling stories about his family. The crazy thing is you never knew which ones were true.

Roy Gilbert: No drug in the world like winning.

Roy Gilbert: You seem ambivalent.
Meg: I... What if Aguirre is telling the truth?
Roy Gilbert: Well, what if he isn't?
Meg: Even still, it doesn't sit right with me.
Roy Gilbert: What do you know about how your father bought the inn?
Meg: Well, he was getting out of the Navy and he found a piece of property that he liked, so he bought it. Then he called my mom, she came and they built it together.
Roy Gilbert: That's what they told ya, huh?
Meg: What do you mean?
Roy Gilbert: How can a young man, just out of the service, no money, no job, afford to buy oceanfront property down here? Your father was a principled man, but he was also determined. It may not have sat well with him either, but he knew what he wanted for his family. And he did what he had to do.
Shaaaaadyyyyy!

Three out of four illicit yellow envelopes.

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