Rumble on the Wonder Wheel
Episode 1 of The Marvelous Mrs Maisel Season 4 begins with Midge up on stage doing another stand-up routine. There’s a mean, cynical edge to this routine, which is unsurprising given what happened with Shy Baldwin last season. Susie is in the audience listening as Midge bemoans that a man has messed up her life again. After being kicked off Baldwin’s tour, she’s a mess and doesn’t want to go back to Queen’s. In he morning, Midge heads out after staying in the club with Susie. The morning newspapers do not make for good reading. Midge has been replaced by an act called Jack Ballard who has taken her spot for the rest of the tour. Midge believes all of this has been planned and that’s going to cause no end of problems for her. Why? Well, Midge has bought back her apartment after loaning the money from Moishe. Only, wirthout any money coming in and Susie unable to get her the funds, she’s in a pretty sticky position. More sticky than thee floor on the bar. As a stark contrast, Joel’s club is doing well. Really well. He shows up to see Mei but Mei’s parents are not happy. Specifically, they’re concerned that eyeballs on his club means less revenue for them given their underground gig. Mei’s role in all this was actually to make sure he fails. So naturally, the next step here is going to be increasing his rent, which Mei is quick to warn Joel about later on in the day. However, she’s still going to keep seeing him, regardless of this. Meanwhile, Susie heads off to pick up her cheque with Tessie by her side. Together, they wind up talking to Mr Bartosiewicz at the insurance company. Unfortunately, he seems to have suspicions about the arson incident and after grilling them both, Susie deduces that Tessie needs to “take one for the team” in order to get that cheque. Susie instead heads over to see Joel but he too refuses to loan her the money. Meanwhile, everything crescendos at Coney Island. Midge shows up during Ethan’s birthday celebrations (it’s not actually his birthday, her parents have switched the days) and reveals to them what’s happened. In separate Ferris wheel cages, Midge reveals she’s been fired and kicked off the tour in front of Joel, Abe and Moishe and the rest of the family. Joel is not happy about Midge buying their apartment back, while Moishe wants his money – which Miriam is quick to remind him he’ll get. That night, Joel writes a cheque and prepares to hand it over to Susie. But there’s a condition. He wants to know exactly what’s happened, right down to the gritty details of her backfiring plan last season. In the morning, Susie meets back up with Miriam and decides to take a stand. She’s going to make herself a headliner, and work to try and change the business. No more bad room service jokes – she wants to say whatever she wants, whenever she wants. And she wants Susie to do her job as a manager and make that happen.
The Episode Review
The Marvelous Mrs Maisel returns with an angry, bitter Miriam determined to make a name for herself and get back at Shy Baldwin for kicking her off his tour. The whole episode essentially riffs off this idea of Miriam getting back at the men who have wronged her and doing that by empowering herself to get up on stage and become a headline act. There’s definitely a sense of irony to all that though, given it’s Joel’s cheque that’s helping to bail her out of this sticky financial situation she finds herself in. Despite that though, Mrs Maisel delivers a decent opening chapter, with plenty of banter and quick-firing dialogue. Whether Miriam will make it in thee big-time though is still unknown at this point so we’ll have to wait and see how that materializes.
