Lip Service Episode 105 Recap: Like a Strap-On Without the Strap
Hi! Welcome to the Lip Service Episode 105 recap, which I turned in about five days late. Just in time for the next episode to air! Some of these screencaps are from the Lip Service Fansite. Big up to those ladies. OKAY LET’S GET STARTED WE’RE RUNNING OUT OF TIME!
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Heyyy Good morning Frankie!
Frankie is always Tumblr-Ready
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Last night, in case you don’t remember after all that coke and booze, you slept with Jay, and Tess saw. Before getting out of her bed and sitting on its edge in her standard thinking-hard-about-my-life pose, Frankie takes some time to flick through some photos on her camera, which is a great way to remember what happened when you don’t remember what happened. Frankie sees a picture of Jay and um, remembers what happened. I hope she doesn’t get preggers, you know how men are.
O-O-O-KLAHOMA WHERE THE WIND COMES RUSHING DOWN THE SOMETHING!
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And, in the age old tradition of this show, we are showed some early morning cunnilingus within the first 30 seconds, followed by Sam telling Cat that she loves her and Cat telling Sam that she has to go to work, which is slightly off topic.
This Almost Looks Like Dana Fairbanks Kissing Jill Bennett
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So there you go. Sam loves Cat, and Cat likes that Sam loves her. At least Cat didn’t respond: “I think I could fall in love with you.”
So, Ed wrote an alien book about his unrequited love for Tess and Tess doesn’t realize it’s about her because she’s distracted by her fit neighbor — you know, the one who so far has no dialogue and is the only butch and/or woman of color on the show. Do you want to know how butch she is? She’ s an electrician, and she drives a truck! (Hot right)
I See You Baby. Shaking that Ass.
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When Tess asks Frankie about her romp in the hay with Jay, Frankie delivers possibly the best line of the season, re: “having sex with a dude”
“What? It’s just like a strap-on without a strap!”
Tess tells Ed who promises not to tell anyone which means he will. Meanwhile Frankie and Jay have a pissing contest over who can be the bigger morning-after asshole and agree to pretend it never happened.
In happier news, Tess’s 30th birthday is coming up! In addition to the cowboys-and-indians themed surprise party he’s throwing together, Ed has made her a present to add to the towering pile of glaringly obvious evidence of his glaringly obvious love for her:
This is the picture I picked out for January, just wait til you see JUNE!….
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Tess: Look at your pasty little chest.
Cat & Frankie snag a suspiciously convenient Important Architectural Assignment, which involves taking photos of their old high school so it can be converted into condos like Melrose Place.
Remember That Time You Said You Were a Falcon and Jumped off the Roof? That was Weird
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They’re getting increasingly flirty with each other as the writers try to convince us that they were actually once a bona fide couple with chemistry (they’re actually mildly successful with this), resulting in lyrical gems such as:
Frankie: I remember it being even bigger than this.
Cat: I think we were just smaller. Well, I was.
Frankie: I remember you being pretty well developed.
So now we get it — Frankie is the hot bad girl, and Cat is the good girl, and together they probably have really important sex.
Smize For Me Baby
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They scope out the places where they used to perv on each other from afar, where they met in detention and carved their initials into a door frame, and amidst all the distraction of the nostalgic montage where Frankie takes photos of Cat in hallways with the happy guitar music, they forget to put out a cigarette and properly smoke out an old classroom.
Remember the time the nuns told us we were all going to hell?
I Used to Have a Life Once
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Tess is trying to get her life on track in time for her thirtieth and Ed is getting a big Literary Contract. This is highly upsetting for Tess because she wants to Make It Big, too, so she lies about having a gazillion auditions.
The Alley of Our Discontent
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Sadie’s unimpressed with Frankie because when a girl gets high in the bath with you and then lets you watch her shave, that means forever. It’s like diamonds. But Frankie doesn’t invite Sadie in, so Sadie is sad. Also Sadie is getting progressively more good-looking, has anybody noticed that.
Rear-View Mirror Symbolism
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Cat is having relationship issues with Sam ’cause Sam said I love you and Cat did not say it back. As Sam explains to her police partner while they’ re staking out a factory and doing other important police work:
“ Saying ‘ I love you’ is like a gun fight. If you draw first, you better not miss.”
Got that? Got it.
another scene where frankie doesn’t make out with anyone
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In the land of family issues, Frankie follows the trail left by key chains and boxing gyms to a purdy little suburban block of flats, where the boy from the estate with the marijuana lives. Her uncle is there and he’ s angry, apparently about marijuana boy getting high with Frankie and Jay that one time. It’s a mystery, but maybe there’ s a connection to Frankie’ s past. “Who am I?” she thinks. “Am I Francesca? Am I Shane? Am I really really really good looking?” Really you can see the wheels turning in her brain, she’s thinking really hard.
Remember that incident with Jay and the Hot Intern and the ketamine in the bathroom? The big angry homophobic boss is giving Cat a hard time about it, and now she’ s gone and set a building on fire. Frankie sees her chance to get in Cat’ s good books/vaginal canal and ends up taking responsibility for everything, including the high intern. Such a Shaney move. She gets fired, obvs, and Cat looks good now b/c she warned her boss about Frankie.
Speaking of fire, Tess manages to lure the butchy electrician into her apartment on the premise of having blown a fuse of some sort. This seems like an ill-fated plan.
Yeah I think i have a spark plug up my vadge if you could fix it for me?
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And yes, just as our Lesbelectrician gets into the apartment, Tess’s ex-girlfriend Chloe calls and Lesbelectrician picks up.
I’m K-K-Kinda Busy
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Remember Chloe? She’s the Gabby Devoux of Lip Service and in the first episode she was giving her girlfriend head while Ed and Tess hid under the bed? Yeah she has big news for Tess, it’s heads-or-tails at this point if it’s going to be an engagement, a wedding, or a baby, or all three. And the potential New Girlfriend is outta there because ex-girlfriends are like anthrax.
It’s Friday, Tess’s birthday! THE BIG 3-0! LOOK AT THIS HAPPY FACE!
I wish there was an Autostraddle Meet-up in Glasgow so i could meet a new girlfriend
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The special day has arrived! All of her friends have cleverly invented tales of work, concert tickets, etc., to convince her that nothing, absolutely NOTHING is happening on her birthday, not a cake, not some drinks, not a flat full of cowgirls and sexy Pocahontases, just a lonely thirty-year-old on her way to see her ex-girlfriend.
This would be a good moment to say “BUT I SLEPT WITH A TV STAR!”
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Chloe doesn’t want to say happy birthday or anything, no, she just wants to flash her big fat engagement ring in Tess’ s face and recommend botox.
This is definitely the worst birthday in a while, but it gets worse. On top of the engaged ex, the turning thirty sans friends and the non-starter acting career, Tess decides to get some birthday botox and gets a teeny lil’ reaction to it which makes her face swell up so she looks like she’s taken a beating. Ouch.
Dirty Thirty
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Ed chases down a teary, bruisy-eyed Tess and at the sight of her being upset and vulnerable, is overwhelmed with the need to express his unbridled, heterosexual love for her. He’s inspired by Frankie’s sexual fluidity.
Ed: I love you.
Tess: Aw, I love you too, Ed.
Ed: No, no. I love you like a man loves a woman.
Coincidentally, Tess wrote off being loved by a man like a man loves a woman about fifteen years ago. She takes this badly, because she’ s very emotional and now she thinks that the only reason Ed is friends with her is because he wants to get into her pants, and her pants are homosexual pants, and so she runs off towards home.
You know, home. Currently occupied by a lot of dressed-up, liquored-up gay people. Frankie is ostentatiously snogging Sadie, interspersed with dark, brooding looks in Cat’ s direction.
Cat looks supercute, and Sam makes a rather sexy sheriff.
Howdy.
Little do they know everything is about to go, horribly, horribly awry, or as they say in Glasgow, tits up. Becky struts right up to Frankie and asks if Sadie is the one who stole her necklace way back when. She throws in some gratuitous snark about how Cat is taken now which is interrupted by Ed calling to say Tess is on her way, though he leaves out that she’s in a really terrible mood.
SURPRISE YOU ARE GOING TO HAVE TO DO A LOT OF DISHES TOMORROW
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They do the whole “SURPRISE!!” thing anyway, which sends Tess scurrying to her room to lie on her bed and lock the door, Angela Chase style. Ed rushes in after her and declares that he has declared his love. Then disaster strikes:
Jay: No wonder you never pull. You do realize she’ s gay?
Ed: Didn’t stop you with Frankie, did it?
Becky: Is that where you were the other night?
Hi I’m the Other Straight Guy On This Show
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Becky is understandably upset/done. But so is Cat, who shoots Frankie a sad look across the room, like the look Carmen gave Shane when she brought home those two blondes. What a floozy.
But They Already Put You on the Cast Poster, There’s No Backing Out Now
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Sadie’s no fool either ’cause she knows Frankie wants Cat, not her, so she pushes Frankie away from her and eventually leaves in tears.
Cat goes home with Sam to finally say “I love you” back, but in a way that we can tell is insincere. Not the best circumstances really.
I Won’t Be Left Dancing Alone To Songs From the Past
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So, to sum up, Jay and Becky are breaking up, Frankie broke Cat’ s and Sadie’ s hearts, Tess is crying in her room and hates Ed, Becky hates Frankie, Jay hates Ed, Sam still deeply dislikes Frankie. Basically every character is crying or seriously pissed off just in time for the last episode! See you next week folks I MEAN TOMORROW BECAUSE I TURNED IN THIS RECAP SO LATE.
Next Week: