‘Good Girls’ Recap: “Slow Down, Children At Play”

Are we all still alive? Beth and Rio! Stan and Ruby! Annie and Greg are BUSTED. Stop signs are being demolished! There’s plenty to unpack in this week’s episode NBC’s Good Girls so let’s get started. Here’s the recap for the episode “Slow Down, Children at Play”.

Good Girls Recap: “Slow Down, Children At Play”
Episode 202 | Airdate: March 10, 2019

Annie and Nancy: The Gal-Mance I Didn’t Know I Needed

Obviously there’s a lot of problematic issues here that should be addressed. Annie held a lot bitterness and resentment against Nancy for being with Greg after they divorced and now Nancy has discovered that Annie actually slept with him. However, between Annie trying to comfort Nancy at her gender reveal party,-failing, but trying, let’s give her a little credit- and then running to her for comfort before shit hit the fan, I truly liked what I saw. I saw two women bonding. Nothing more, nothing less. Just two women who couldn’t be more different bonding over the shared experience of pregnancy.

Good Girls is a show that has a strong foundation core of female relationships and this is one more I’d like to see develop once the dust settles. It’s unclear on if that will be a possibility in the future given the circumstances, but I certainly hope so.

Speaking of Annie, she was a firecracker this entire episode. The audience can sense the rising tension between her and older sister, Beth. Annie is annoyed when Beth decided to not shoot Boomer but instead agrees to pay him off with $20,000  they don’t have to get him out of town. After all, she would have shot him.

After Ruby takes out a payday loan, Beth sells her refrigerator, and Annie uses the only $20 she has to her name, they are still woefully short. An idea comes to her at Nancy’s gender reveal party where she’s surrounded by wealthy women: steal a car and sell it for parts. Stealing the keys from one of the purses-where she almost gets busted by Greg but instead has an emotional and slightly uncomfortable conversation- she hands the keys off to Beth and insists she do it since it’s her fault they’re in this mess to begin with.  

Beth is struggling to keep it all together. Rio has given her the orders to take care of Boomer before he can give his deposition to the FBI. She and the girls trick him in to meeting them in the woods and force him on to his knees where she hesitates on pulling the trigger and ultimately can’t bring herself to do it. She’s not a killer…yet. Being short on the payoff money she promised Leslie, she takes the stolen keys from Annie and she and Ruby use their powers of manipulation to swap the car out at a valet for a Honda that will be easier to sell off individually. After lying to Rio about killing Leslie-and here’s hoping she didn’t actually Google how to kill a man because that shit is traceable-and him calling her out on it she’s at a loss on what to do.

Beth finds out from Annie that Leslie took the money but didn’t actually leave town like he was supposed to and she reached her breaking point. Between lying to Rio, not being able to kill Leslie and having him take advantage of her, and Dean not being able to forgive her for not shooting Rio/her infatuation with him, his wound reopening and him passing out at work, she loses her cool. Slamming on breaks at a stop sign, she jumps out of the car and beats a stop sign and tears it down. The one on her street has been stolen and it’s the one thing within her control that she can actually fix.

 She’s tired of lying to everyone. “My family, my friends, the FBI. You. And I can’t kill a man.” Luckily, she has a willing teacher in gang friend.

“Are you going to kill me?”
“I’m going to teach you.”

It’s a ship!

Stan and Ruby have hit a rough patch in their marriage due to Ruby robbing the groccery store and lying to him. He says he doesn’t know who she is anymore. However, Ruby reaches her own breaking point in this episode. As much as I love Beth and Rio-and you all know I do- the best part of this episode was Ruby calling out Stan.

“You say you don’t know who I am. Well, let me introduce myself. I’m the crazy ass bitch who robbed a grocery store to save her child and her family. Your child and your family. I’m that bitch. And you’re welcome.”

BEST. PART. HANDS. DOWN. She took responsibility for what she did but she made damn sure that the reasons were clear. Stan finally has his come to Jesus moment and realizes that she’s right. She is still the woman he married and the mother of his children who did what she had to do to protect them and keep them safe and alive. The beginning of the episode has them at odds but by the end, Stan is back in their marital bed and has forgiven Ruby now that he understands why she did what she did.

Leslie. Leslie, Leslie, Leslie. He is just not a good person. We can see that Mary Pat is hating the situation she has gotten herself in to, not only for herself but also her kids. She shies away from Leslie and submits to his wishes at every turn to keep herself out of prison. Leslie also exhibits behavior that could lead to an eventual abusive relationship, if it’s not one already. However, just because that’s the way he is with Mary Pat doesn’t mean he’s that way with all the women in his life. Leslie is a Grandma’s Boy, through and through.

After agreeing to flee town with the money the Good Girls have given him, he goes to visit Miriam to give her a new iPhone so that she can face-time him anytime. Miriam saying that she doesn’t have time to learn a new gadget and that her friend died a week after her grandkids gave her one, he changes his mind. To keep himself safe, he confesses to butcher Carl butcher that he made him work overtime and docked his pay for something he did just to have himself get injured and could go in to protective custody with the FBI. NOT A GOOD MAN. Do not let the love he has for his grandmother fool you.

Say tuned to TV Source next week for our light spoiler preview of Good Girls next episode “You Have Reached the Voicemail of Leslie Peterson”.

Good Girls airs Sundays on NBC.