Dot Dot Dot
Episode 5 of Hightown Season 2 starts with Daisy returning to see Jorge. Sporting a nasty black eye, Jorge makes some excuses, claiming he’s been stressed. Handing over expensive jewelry to sweeten the deal, he promises Daily he’ll never hit her again. For now, it seems she’s on board, deleting messages from Jackie. Alan continues on the hunt for Charmaine, intending to track her down before it’s too late. Osito though rings Char and learns she’s got a “flurry” coming in. As Osito gets off the phone, he continues his physical therapy with Janelle. Thanks to his progress, Osito asks Janelle for more yard passes, which of course is so he can work the drug shipments into the prison. Foolishly, Janelle approves. Ray and Alan feed back what they’ve learned to Jackie, who in turn mentions Daisy. With all three guys working together now, Jackie receives a call regarding a “great white” down on the docks from Ed. A boat owned by the Scrodfather has intercepted the package. It seems the plan here is to load the drugs onto a truck bound for New York and then off-load it at a processing plant in Brooklyn. Ed though intends to intercept the package before that can happen. Jackie is invited along for thee ride. Alan runs into trouble at work when his superior learns about Ray smacking up Frankie. He warns Alan and implores him to cut ties and let it go. With his words still stinging his ears, Alan heads back to Ray and warns him not to get involved. Despite Alan throwing him a bone in this, it’s now got to the point where if he continues on, things are going to take a nasty turn. So naturally, Ray ignores that and winds up in deep trouble with Ethan. The play here was initially for Ray to meet Ethan and get intel on Charmaine but he has a big grudge against Ray, especially since he put him behind bars. In a secluded parking lot, Ethan and his father both beat Ray down to a pulp. Meanwhile, Renee gets cold feet about her abortion and decides to keep her child after all. At the club, she continues to act in denial, clearly wound tightly and wearing thick layers of makeup. When Frankie shows in his office, Renee broaches the idea of kids with him but he simply walks away, too busy to discuss this now. Elsewhere, Jackie heads on her stakeout but she’s distracted, constantly messaging Leslie. With Ron in the back and Ed driving, Jackie receives a photo and follows it up with the message “I love you so much.” Tellingly, Leslie doesn’t message back. Oof. Jackie does her best to play damage control, ringing her lover and playing it off as if she loves all of her friends. However, they’re all distracted by the truck arriving at the warehouse. Ed and the gang intercept the truck but all of the packages are completely clean. Jackie hits out after and claims Ed is slipping up and losing it. That’s pretty rich though coming from a woman who nearly killed someone. Ed is quick to remind her of this fact too, as they head back emptyhanded. That evening, Frankie shows up at Jorge’s new place and puts a bullet between Daisy’s eyes. It’s a shocking moment, and one that comes off the back of her admitting the truth about Jorge’s abuse to him. Frankie lays down the law, keeping his brother in line. If that wasn’t shocking enough, Jorge heads back to see Renee in her office, flaunting his stuff and threatening her with a gun. Renee grabs a gun of her own though and accidentally fires, shooting Jorge right in the chest. She thinks twice about ringing Frankie though, instead letting him bleed out. With Jorge dead, Renee strikes a deal with the two cleaners at the club, agreeing to pay them 30k each in exchange for cleaning up Jorge. With the deed done, Renee shows up on Ray’s doorstep and tells him she loves him.
The Episode Review
Two shocking deaths and a whole lot of drama; Hightown returns with a very dramatic episode that blows this case wide open. Osito getting back into drug dealing is perhaps obvious, although Janelle letting her guard down and giving him yard passes is not. Surely she would suspect there’s something afoul here but nonetheless, it’s a pretty stupid move. Meanwhile, Jorge and Daisy both dying is a great way to shake things up and are bright patches in what’s otherwise a bit of a frustrating episode. The reason I say that is because Jackie, who was doing so well up until this point, has slipped back into old habits. She’s completely unprofessional, messaging Leslie the whole time she’s supposed to be on a job. And even worse, she then takes out her frustrations and anger on Ed when he follows bad intel. Maybe it’s just me but her scenes were dreadful this episode and really paint her in a negative light again. However, that blemish is not enough to dampen what’s otherwise a very enjoyable hour of TV. This has definitely been a better season than the first, and that ending hints that we’ve got a dramatic flurry of chapters coming up.
