‘Tis the season to lie to Jane, apparently.
‘Tis the season to get a babysitter.
And Jane’s having trouble.
It makes sense, considering the whole thing earlier in the show with Sin Rostro stealing Mateo and trying to use him against Jane, Michael, and the Solanos. Yeah, I’d be pretty reticent to let my baby stay in the company of a stranger, too.
All Jane and Rafael want to do is go on a date, man.
But that’s for later. Right now, it’s Black Friday and that means it’s time to strap on your comfortable shoes, drive to the nearest shopping center, and HIT UP TARGET.
Boy, do the Villanuevas take it seriously or what? They cut off Rafael mid-sentence to explain to him the rules of Black Friday, the most important of which is to NOT look in the family grocery carts, lest you see your Christmas presents and ruin the spirit of Christmas forever.
Sidebar: I completely forgot that Rafael doesn’t speak Spanish. Jane tries to translate Alba for him at one point, and he got the gist of it.
After last episode’s six-month time skip, Jane’s supposedly over Michael… but then he shows up at Target and is absolutely uninterested in catching up. Jane can’t think about that, though, because she has to go to her creative writing Christmas party to schmooze with a big-time author and get her to warm up to her.
Not so warm? Petra. Remember how Magda killed their former hostage last episode? Well, now he’s on ice.
No, really. Jane runs into Petra getting buckets of ice so she can freeze the body, though Petra wants to just confess to the police and get it over with. She asks her to lunch, though, so it’s not all bad. Magda gets in the way, but it does seem like Petra’s finally stepping away from the conniving ex-wife stereotype she’d been given for most of the show prior, and it’s a move I’m enjoying. Every moment of genuine friendship between Jane and Petra really helps the show shine. Unfortunately, Petra sabotages it trying to cover Magda sneaking Ivan’s body out of the Marbella… and the look Petra shoots her as she walks away is heartbreaking.
Meanwhile, Rogelio needs to go to Hollywood to sort out the rights to his Mad Men adaptation, Hombres Locos. Considering people thought it was a comedy at first, he really could just claim fair use under parody, but hey, it’s probably going to bring drama, and what’s a telenovela without drama?
Ah, drama. Drama, drama, drama. More’s on the way, because Wesley’s still around. You know, Jane’s Gay Best Friend Who Is Secretly Writing An Expose On The Solanos. He’s still around and still pretending to be Jane’s friend, but hey, at least he’s encouraging Jane. Discouraging Jane, though, is Hunky de la [Wolf Whistle]. He’s still around, too, and his evaluations are rough.
Sidebar: Jane’s nickname for him is “His Holiness the Lord Emperor of Smug Condescension”. I feel like Jane and I would get along.
But Hunky de la [Wolf Whistle] leaves a while later, and Drunk Jane decides it’s a good idea to wow author Dr. Bolton with “spontaneous, carefully-researched anecdotes”. It doesn’t work out well and she manages to smack a tray of deviled eggs all over Bolton. Whoops.
Whoops the Second: Rogelio can’t get the OK for Hombres Locos. So he’s broke. And jobless. At least, until he returns to his old production company and attempts to swallow his pride for a job. It’s the only thing he can do, because he can’t go back to eating ramen and living in a tiny apartment; he’s been there and it’s not something he ever wants to return to. The flip side to this is that, though Rogelio’s show can’t be made, the theme that Xiomara wrote is going to be used in another show. Score one for Xo!
And Whoops the Third: Nadine died protecting Michael while they searched for Sin Rostro. Oddly, it’s not really given a lot of narrative weight—it’s more of a slight exposition scene showing that Mexico resulted in her death. As it turns out, Michael wasn’t actually fired, and instead went undercover to find out what he could about Sin Rostro. It’s still strange that Nadine’s death held such little weight, but at least we get to see more of what happened after he left.
The good news is Jane and Dr. Bolton bond over motherhood, and Bolton agrees to take a look at Jane’s writing. Riding on that happy train, Jane starts interviewing potential babysitters, but none pan out; they’d either mistreat Mateo or, in the case of a particularly hot dude babysitter, attempt to sleep with Xiomara.
But they find a former pediatric nurse, Chepa (Lidia Porto), who speaks Spanish and simply misses children. There’s gotta be something wrong.
Also wrong is Wesley, because not only is he pretending to be Jane’s friend, but using the knowledge he gets from her on Luisa and her ashram, he infiltrates an Alcoholics Anonymous meeting to get to know her. Later, his lunch with her is juxtaposed with Jane and Bolton’s meeting. While Wesley has Luisa turn her volume up while he records her, Bolton tells Jane her writing has potential but needs to be turned up: it needs to sparkle.
Jane doesn’t seem so happy with her potential advisor. What exactly does she mean by “sparkle”?
Chepa doesn’t seem so happy with Jane. In fact, she walks out on her, because Jane’s a helicopter parent and won’t let her babysit her own way. “Mommy does it better” is what she’s faced before, and she refuses to do it again.
And Xiomara doesn’t seem so happy with Rogelio, once he confronts rival Esteban for taking her theme song. Finally, finally Xo gets something in her life with Rogelio that’s more about her than him, and by confronting Esteban, he ruined it. Rogelio quits his new show on the day she goes to visit him, but they love each other and it’s okay, even if they have their fights. He moves into a smaller condo, and Xiomara gets confirmation of her song being used for a novela, and things are shaping up.
So Jane realizes that as much of a jerk as Hunky de la [Wolf Whistle] is, his critiques have merit. But unfortunately, she was drunk when she tried to forward his critiques to Wesley… and instead straight-up insulted Professor Chavez to his face. She manages to get in with him by threatening to take his class; he’d rather only deal with her once a week than during each session, but man I still can’t get over how mean he is. I hope he shapes up.
Once Jane and Rafael broker peace with Chepa, he takes her to a house he’s going to buy, a smaller one than she’d expect of him. He shares a piece of his past with her, that he used to ride past them and imagine the perfection lying inside, and Jane realizes it’s something she does too. They stop, look at each other, take it all in and lean in, and they’re about to kiss before—
Well, crap.
Wesley, the duplicitous little [CENSORED], published his article about the Solanos. Rafael starts to sue him for defamation, and immediately forgives Jane, knowing it wasn’t her fault. It’s a nice moment of maturity for him, and it gives me a bit of hope that as much as I’m not on board with him, maybe their relationship will be healthy.
Hahaha.
Hahahahaha.
Hahahaha.
No.
Because when Jane checks her nanny-cam for Mateo’s first wave with Chepa, she finds out Rafael paid Detective Wu to snitch on Michael. Because Jane told him to fight for her. Because he loves her. Because he did it for them.
What a tool.
And thanks to Wesley’s article, Susanna realizes that Luisa’s missing mother might, just might, be drug lord Mutter.
And we don’t have an episode of Jane the Virgin next week.
Happy Thanksgiving, folks.
Image courtesy of The CW
