Excuse me I mean Carson meets Vi, who looks hot as hell in a suit (Rosie’s Silver Fox era is epic), and owns this bar.
It’s one thing to reboot the subtextually gay A League of Their Own and bring all of its queerness front and center. It’s a whole other thing to have Rosie Fucking O’Donnell herself come down from Mount Olympus to grace us with her presence. We’ll go on about Vi, but I want to say that between this and Generation Q, I have adored every minute Rosie’s well deserved victory tour across queer television. A legend walking among us, and I hope those flowers are felt by her with the deep, profound, and sincere love that we give them.
Ok! So Viv owns the bar and she wonders if Carson has “come back down to earth, yet.” Jo and Lupe play a game of arm wrestling (love them) while Viv gets in a perfect dig, “I can’t believe they make you guys play in skirts!” before introducing her wife, who was the fan the Peaches met earlier outside of The Wizard of Oz, when she was out with her beard.
The next day in the locker room, Carson’s head is still spinning. Breathless, she tells Greta, “everyone was like us” and while Greta knows about underground gay bars, she just worries that it’s dangerous to go to one so close to home. But she’s been thinking about it, and on their next night off she’s gonna take Carson out on that date.
PS: The locker room smells, because no one is changing their socks or underwear on the count of the *knocks on wood* ssshhhh streak. Speaking of which, Carson decides that the Peaches will be taking turns giving the motivational speech before the game — an absolutely hilarious montage cut in between the Peaches win streak — we are doing this!! We are really doing it!! Kiss Jo’s arm for good luck! Shirley says we don’t need to be afraid of death! Esti screams VAMANOS PEACHES! And the next thing you know, the Peaches are on the verge of playoffs!!
Greta, a woman true to her word, takes Carson out for a fancy pizza date night (I didn’t catch it until my rewatch that Greta says “I had it for the first time last year!” — the 1940s! Can you imagine!!) and the twins behind the counter send shots on the house because they’re big Peaches fans, wink wink. And yes, they are the same twins from the bar. You know it.
Greta and Carson talk about what will come next and if they’ll be back next year. Will Charlie even let Carson return? Will Greta be a big movie star? Will they be the kind of people who are only each others memories? Could that ever be enough.
(At one point, D’Arcy Carden reaches over to Abbi Jacobson’s face, pokes at her cheek, and says “Dimple!” in a tone that I cannot describe as anything other the intersection of “aww that’s adorable” and “this is so sexy, I can no longer breathe”)
If the Peaches win two more games, they go to the playoffs. Carson asks Greta for a bet, if the Peaches win those last two games — Greta has to go to the bar with her.
At home, Max finally opens up the box from Uncle Bertie. It’s suit. Just like Bertie’s suit that Max admired the night they all went out bowling.
Max tries it on. And out of respect — out of respect — for her very serious emotional journey, I’m not going to say what I’m thinking. I am NOT. However and also…
The last time they saw each other, before Carson ruined it, Max wanted to ask: “What it was like being with… her?”
Her name is Greta, and it’s… ok with Charlie, Carson’s husband.. it’s fine. It’s bread. Have you ever had bread? But then.. have you ever had pizza?? Right. Greta is pizza.
Max has had pizza. She first had pizza (they are no longer talking about pizza) when she was 17. But the woman she was with, she wanted Max to be tougher, more hard than she is. “Everyone wants me to be some way.”
Carson knows what Max means. She just went to this bar (she literally cannot stop talking about this damn bar. Do you remember being a baby gay? Do you remember when you just could! Not! Stop! Talking! About This Damn Bar!) and now she knows all about the ways of butches and femmes, but she doesn’t know if she’s either one. Max feels like they need a new word, something for in between (I would like to point out to any readers feeling similarly that Autostraddle sells both Soft Butch and Tomboy Femme shirts, that support indie queer media, in case you feel a calling). Carson, still very geeked about this here pizza, says it could even be pizza related!! but smartly, Max suggests staying away from food.
Carson wonders why Max hasn’t been pitching, and the truth is Max has been holding on so tight, tying herself into knots that she doesn’t know how to untie. And really, it doesn’t matter if there’s baseball or not. She feels like there is no version of herself that makes sense for the world.
Carson takes a long pause, “I’m sorry Max.”
More than anything, Max needs someone who will just sit and be quiet with her for a while. And that, Carson can do.
It’s the last game before the playoffs, and (imagine me in my sports announcer voice) it all comes down to this. Maybelle forgot Tommy and Jess freaks the fuck out — Tommy’s the GI who gave Maybelle his picture right before the *knocks on wood* ssshhhh streak started and she’s been carrying it around in her brassiere, which sounds like a sex thing but is really a baseball thing or maybe it’s both things. Anyway now it’s gone and they are going to lose.
Carson says that Greta is going to give the motivational speech this time. She looks her in the eyes, “talk about luck.”
Greta: Alright fruits, I hate to break it to you, but we are not winning because of our socks… or our panties. Or because of Tommy, who, to be honest, never deserved to be in your bra in the first place, okay?
Maybelle: But now he might die.
Greta: And that’s his problem.
Greta tells the Peaches the truth, that a couple of weeks ago they were supposed to be broken up for parts. They already did the thing that no one thought was possible, they were so goddamn good that they couldn’t be torn apart. They already did it. So tonight’s nothing. Greta doesn’t believe in luck, she believes in her Peaches.
The Peaches win, by the way. (Shout out to Lupe who calls Carson to the mound mid-game just to talk about if the bar is gonna be fun tonight, and to the love of my life, Jo De Luca, the Bazooka, the hottest woman on the field.) Was there ever a doubt?
And yes, that means that tonight — tonight — Carson and Greta are going out to the bar.
After the game, back at the house, the gay Peaches 🥺 all sit together on the couch🥺 smoking and drinking beers. Carson and Greta try and convince Jo (Greta calls her Joey!!) to come with them, but even though Jo was the one who said “what if we forgot the rules” — there’s a line between carefree and careless, and going to a bar like that, this close to home, is certainly the other side of that line. But Greta promised Carson, and Greta needs her wingwoman. And honestly we all need to see the gays together because this scene is like oxygen in my veins.
Esti’s nowhere to found, according to Maybelle. Jess and Lupe are going to go look for her, but Carson reminds Lupe… don’t take too long, “the twins are waiting” which Greta then mimes with her breasts. Gays, amirite? Gays! Gotta love them.
The Peaches aren’t the only ones going out to celebrate. Max goes to Bertie’s, having adjusted the suit he gave her with a yellow button down blouse and no jacket. She stands outside the door, nervous and a friend (not of Dorothy, well a friend of Dorothy but also of Bertie) tells Max to get inside before “people get the wrong idea.”
Inside, the great Gladys Bentley — queer, Black, and exquisite — plays and Max’s face goes from shy to wide-eyed, she’s never been to a party like this before. Max and Carson’s parallel queer coming-of-age in these spaces, of finding out that queerness is not only out there walking in the world but cherished and celebrated, is subtle but not lost. Max, true to exactly who she is, panics and just when she’s about to hit the backdoor, she hears her Aunt Gracie —
“Girl, you are always on the run.”
Truer words have never been spoken. But tonight? “Tonight you are going to have a good time. You are going to have a fabulous time. You are going to meet the family.” She goes to get Max some “communion,” taking her back into the party by hand.
Just as Max starts biting her lip (you know that thing she does) and making eyes at a woman across the party, Bertie calls her into another room. Max, looking to make small talk and a little embarrassed over how she left things with Bert, asks about life next to the train tracks. It’s loud, but it grants Bertie and Gracie privacy. Then Uncle Bert cuts to the chase.
“You know, you hurt me the other day. You hurt my pride.”
Max is sorry. She’s still figuring out a lot of things, but that’s not an excuse. Bertie silently accepts her apology, changing course, where’s the rest of the suit he made?
Max, for the first time in a long time, since she overheard Miss Toni call her those terrible words, seems sure of herself. “You know, for a long time I felt like I had to be my momma. And part of me is. But a lot of me isn’t. And now I can’t talk to her. I don’t want to go through that again with you. So, thank you. I really appreciate it. Hell, I love it. But… this is how I wanted to wear it.”
And Bert, seeing Max on her own terms, reaches out to gently rub her knee. They don’t say much else, but do they even have to? Some understandings don’t require words.
Instead Bertie looks back at the woman in the party, “is that your girl?” Max blushes, she’s never met her before. Bertie looks at his niece with pride tucked behind the knowing smile that spreads across his face, “Then you better get going.”
Max catches up to the mystery woman, who’s reaching for her coat. “You gotta dance with me before you leave.”
“Oh, I gotta?”
Max tips her head, shrugs her shoulders, bites her lip, voice smoother than butter itself. “Sorry. It’s the rules.”
They move together to the makeshift dance floor that is Bert and Gracie’s living room.
Carson, Greta, and Jo enter Vi’s bar together. Jo — a smokeshow in this white button down, by the way — throws darts and meets Flo, short for Florida. Greta and Carson move to a dance floor of their own, meeting Jo and her new date there.
All of them together, across time and place. Flo thinks Jo is the most beautiful person she’s ever seen. Max’s dance partner flirts that her name is “S” — even though she knows Max’s full name — and, she whispers in close to Max’s ear, “I guess that means I’m wining.” Carson and looks up into Greta’s eyes like she’s the universe itself.
The music swims around them, Irma Thomas sings “I don’t want to stop now” and the blues guitar wails. “Please don’t make me stop nowwwwwww.” Queer couples everywhere, holding each other, contemplating each other’s fullness. Carson wants to know from Greta, “Mmmm. What would happen if I came to California with you?”
“Please don’t make me stop now. Baby! Baby! I loooove you! Honey, don’t you know that I love you!”
Greta and Carson kiss. Max and S kiss. The camera spins, couples spin, couples smile, they touch their foreheads together, they love. How they love. How they love. Parties that are their own, but also queer time is liminal, we are all together.
“Don’t make me stop! Don’t make stop me now!”
A bang on the door of the club, loud and violent.
Vi moves first, “Oh shit. The police.”
Vi and her wife try to hold the door, everyone runs. Greta looks for Jo. “Joey let’s go. Jo! JO LET’S GO!” But there’s too much happening, there’s too many bodies. Flo pulls Jo in the other direction, Carson grabs Greta. Greta screams for Jo. The police break the makeshift barricade.
People fall down the stairs back into the alley, face first. Carson takes Greta’s hands, the movie theater is right there. Greta wants to know where Jo is, Carson opens the door to the back of the theater and shoves her inside. The police are crawling the alley now, there’s no more time. They can’t wait.
The police throw Vi against floor of the bar she owns — of course it is Vi, of course using Rosie to ground us in this moment makes it even more visceral — glass is broken everywhere, the screams echo, the cries, Vi yells “get off me!”
Carson and Greta sit together in the dark movie theater, but Greta’s not really there. In her mind, she’s still looking for Jo.
And you know what is still playing? The Wizard of Oz.
Glinda promises, no matter what, “There’s no place like home.”
Every episode of A League of Their Own is streaming on Prime Video. Editor in Chief Carmen Phillips and Senior Editor Heather Hogan will be trading off recaps, one a day, every single day, for the whole first season. See you back here tomorrow!
