Wynonna Earp Recap, 2.05, “Let’s Pretend We’re Strangers”

What. The. Holy. Freaking. Hell. Just. Happened.

You guys. YOU GUYS.

I can’t…

What…

THIS EPISODE BLEW MY FREAKING MIND. GAME-CHANGER! GAME-CHANGER! THIS EPISODE IS A GAME-CHANGER! And I mean that in terms of the Wynonna-verse and also in terms of Wynonna Earp’s personal character arc and the arcs of the other characters.

Before I forgot — *grabs paper bag and breathes into it for a few seconds* —

SPOILERS SPOILERS SPOILERS SPOILERS SO MANY DAMN SPOILERS DO NOT READ IF YOU HAVE NOT SEEN THIS EPISODE AND YOU INTEND TO WATCH IT!

Okay. So we left off with the goo transferring from Waverly to Wynonna, and the goo is now lodged in Wynonna, where it seems quite pleased. We’ve also got the mysterious 1952 Purgatory Fair plate to figure out, and the overhanging “they’re coming” houseguests creep-out still in the mix. This week’s episode did not revisit the Tucker/Mercedes/Beth axis of evil, but holy shit there was so much else going on that it’s okay.

Let’s get to this.

The episode opens with a man being dragged down a dark corridor by his legs. A group of robed figures in involved with this seeming abduction and there’s an axe and oh, shit we know where this is going…

And, yep, it goes there. The axe-man cometh and chops the guy’s head off. Turns out the kidnapped dude is a demon and this group of robed figures are…demon-hunters? Demon-slayers? Both? And after the axe-man takes care of the demon, he takes his mask off and says, “Who wants nachos?” Who the hell ARE these guys?

Next scene we join Wygoonna in the Earpstead kitchen humming and behaving very non-Wynonna-like (kudos to Melanie Scrofano for how she portrayed Wygoonna), making a delightful breakfast smoothie with a dead rat and acting like she’s all Snow White up in here. She’s got our beloved Waves tied to a kitchen chair and tries to entice her with the nasty-ass smoothie, but Waves isn’t interested (for obvious reasons).

Interesting aside — and something for further pondering — the goo had a much, much harder time while in Waverly because there was “too much goodness,” while in Wynonna, it’s a little easier. So who is our dear Waves? Is she perhaps the Purgatory version of Wonder Woman?????? But also, let’s ponder characters knowing who they are. Wynonna has never been sure of herself, doesn’t feel up to the task of what being a hardline demon-slayer is all about, and the goo took root pretty easily in her. Waverly, however, has a strong sense of who she is in terms of her role in the world as a woman. She may not be entirely sure about the Earp-ness, but she knows who she is intrinsically.

Anyway, Wygoonna is about to do some nasty crap to Waves with a hacksaw, but Wynonna’s in there fighting the goo, and she stops what’s happening and you can tell she’s trying to fight that nasty possession when Doc shows up in his “new car” which appears to be a 1978 Trans Am (which has a cassette player and he’s so stoked about that later on!)

and Wygoonna puts a gag in Waves’ mouth to keep her from alerting Doc about the new goo situation. Wygoonna makes inappropriate comments to Doc — that is, they’re slightly out of whack for how their relationship has been lately — about gettin’ a little somethin’ somethin’ and he seems puzzled. He asks about Waves, but Wygoonna says she’s sick. Which is, again, a red flag for Doc. Hmmm…

Wygoonna has the plate case (that damn case from last episode that has everybody all bent out of shape and got a few people all dead) and Waves, meanwhile, is trying to somehow alert Doc but she can’t and her chair topples over and oh, this is so sad…I can’t even.

Wygoonna and Doc head on down to Nedley Central where Wygoonna continues her weirdness. Jeremy is working on things and Doc has the plate for him to inspect and Jeremy being Jeremy, he licks the plate and determines that there is lead in the paint, which makes it from a certain era. But then he does a scan on it and determines that there is an image beneath the paint and Wygoonna recognizes it as appearing on the town firehouse. She’s also eating donuts, but taking a bite out of each one and not finishing it. SO NOT WYNONNA.

Now we have to go figure out what’s going on with Waves, who is still lying on the Earpstead kitchen floor crying out for help SO SAD I CAN’T EVEN when Dolls shows up! YAY, DOLLS! Except he thinks Waves is all goo’ed out, still, and he won’t untie her because he’s just not convinced but then he seems to be more convinced and he at least sits her back up and joins her for a sit-down at the table though he doesn’t untie her.

Back at Nedley Central, our fave law enforcement officer is doing some administrative law enforcement-ish things IN HER NEW UNIFORM, PEOPLE…

when Wygoonna wanders in and says really shitty things about the WayHaught relationship and Nicole is horrified that she would do that and gets kind of teary-eyed. I’m really hating the goo right now. Bee-yotch goo. OH, and Wygoonna also makes a comment about how her bra doesn’t seem to be fitting her quite right…FORESHADOWING KEEP THAT IN MIND. And then Wygoonna has a momentary battle with Wynonna and Wynonna scribbles “possessed” on a piece of paper and then RAMS THE PEN THROUGH HER FREAKING HAND but Wygoonna takes over and slides her hand right off that pen and heals it right up. omg and then Wygoonna and Doc run off to do things.

Meanwhile, back at the Earpstead, Waves and Dolls are still having a chat but Dolls still hasn’t untied Waves, so I’m thinking he’s still not sure about her but OH NOEZ Lucado suddenly shows up and she’s got a gun!

Cut to Wygoonna and Doc at the diner where Wygoonna McPancake Face is outta control with the butter and syrup and Dolls is watching her with this strange but almost knowing expression, as if he’s already figured shit out but he’s not going to tip Goo McAsshole off. And Wygoonna again tries to put her swerve on Doc again, which Doc just isn’t feeling because it’s out of recent character for her. Plus, Wygoonna is super shitty snarky, not funny snarky like Wynonna, so the red flag of doom is flying way high and flappin’ in the Purgatory breeze, y’all.

Back at the Lucado-Dolls throwdown at the Earpstead…

Waves manages to escape…omg, you guys, she says, we just got that fixed! as Dolls and Lucado crash around. Waves finally gets their attention with the handy shotgun blast (one wonders about the hole in the ceiling) and this epic line: “Quit it, you assholes. Wynonna’s possessed and we don’t have time to go all UAF!” I love her. And then she grabs Peacemaker (which she can because NO GOO) and Lucado asks for a sit-rep and AGAIN with an epic line: “Frankly, the situation is balls!” Waves. WAVES I LOVE YOU!

Back to Wygoonna and Doc, who are down at the local fire station where sure enough, there’s the image from the plate. And things are weird and tense and Wygoonna feels queasy…demon-slayer fireguy Nacho-man Ewan explains that the firehouse is built on consecrated ground, which apparently does not sit well with demons and Wygoonna is feelin’ it. Then she actually tries to pull a knife on Nacho-man Ewan and Doc is all, whoa there and explains it away that she hasn’t been feeling well. He takes her out to his car, opens the trunk, then shoves Wygoonna on in there because WHO THE HELL IS THIS PERSON WHO LEAVES THE HOUSE WITHOUT PEACEMAKER AND IS NOT DRINKING HER COFFEE BLACK LIKE WYNONNA?

Then back at Nedley Central, Dolls and Doc are wrestling Wygoonna to a cell and the goo makes itself known. Lucado is on site, too, and they have a meeting about what to do about all this cray. Looks like Doc and Dolls are gonna do some Breaking Bad to mix up some kind of elixir to cast the demon out of Wygoonna. But they need a goo sample. So Docs and Waves are going back to the arch where the tentacle monster was to see if they can score some goo while Dolls has another idea. He and Lucado have a little chat and Dolls knows this demon, y’all. He knows its name. Which begins with an M (OMG it’s Mictian! And it surfaced in 1.04!), but I’m not sure of the spelling, so once I have that, I’ll insert it. So Dolls makes a decision about getting some goo from Wygoonna. And folks, it’s not going to be pretty. But then, this entire episode has been un-pretty. LOL

We check in again with Nacho-man Ewan who, it turns out, is in league with Juan Carlo. Ewan is busy doing his bench press/shoulder press because that’s what demon-slayers do, apparently, is bench press and eat nachos.

Back at Nedley Central, Dolls and Wygoonna have a moment when it becomes clear that Dolls is literally going to snip one of Wygoonna’s fingers off for a goo sample (since the goo can clearly regenerate human limbs, why not). For a brief moment, Wynonna surfaces and tells him to do it — she’s in there, after all, listening — and he does, but OW OW OW OWOWOWOWOWOWOWOOWOWWWWWWWWWWW OWWWWWWWWWIE WOWIE.

The goo regenerates almost immediately, and Dolls has his sample, which he turns over to Lucado and tells her basically not to contact Black Badge and let’s get on this analysis and find out what’s going on. And Doc and Waves are over near the arch looking for goo when Juan Carlo shows up with his usual enigmatic words and then he disappears. We fling back to Nedley Central where Lucado is doing her version of Breaking Bad. Dolls comes in with his research results and he realizes that Lucado is not entirely with us…THE GOO HAS TAKEN HOLD YET AGAIN and Lucado realizes it and she tells Dolls to get the hell out RIGHT NOW and then…

omg.

OMG OMG OMG.

Lucado’s head literally explodes in a slimy horrid mess of goo and blood.

And I’m incredibly sad about this, actually. And it makes me think about Lucado and the bad place she was in. The goo trapped her easily. Way easily. But perhaps Lucado, in the end, came through, because she took herself out of the mix. I don’t think the goo killed her; I don’t think the goo wants to kill its host. Because then the goo dies, right? We’ll have to ponder the physiology of goo another time.

Doc and Waves return to Nedley Central where Dolls is busy cleaning up Goocado and Doc takes his hat off in what I thought was a nice show of respect for our now-gone Lucado. Dammit. Kate Drummond, I’ll miss you! So then Doc, Waves, and Dolls have a research moment. Waves leaves to go see Wygoonna. And she’s got Peacemaker…uh-oh…what is she up to? Well, she’d never shoot Wygoonna because she’s in Wynonna. So instead, she uses Peacemaker (puts the barrel against Wygoonna’s face) to dislodge the goo and she TAKES IT BACK, people.

Somehow, Waves knows Wynonna is not strong enough to handle the goo, so she takes it upon herself to save her from the goo, and also, she knows that Wynonna is the only one who can wield Peacemaker, so OBVIOUSLY she has to take the goo back so Wynonna can send the goo — somehow — back to whatever hell it’s from.

And…there’s a storm comin’, people. A real storm. Thundersnow storm. With lightning and thunder. And the thing about this storm is that Gooverly built herself a big ol’ lightning rod in the Earpstead barn and when the lightning hits it, Gooverly plans to have her hand on it so that the goo will forever be fused to Waverly. Which is why our posse has to get their asses to the Earpstead. Nicole, however, is in the barn and Gooverly shows up and Nicole buys into her story to protect her from Wynonna. Nacho-man Ewan and his crew from the fire station show up, too, in their bathrobe regalia to take care of the Earps, but Wynonna’s snark is back and she proves she can’t be Wygoonna because she drinks a whole bunch of holy water with no ill effects. Nacho-man decides to let her go into the barn, especially since Doc sweetens the deal with the sacred Purgatory plate.

And when Wynonna goes in there, Nicole is being all super-protective of Gooverly…

Note the lightning rod there that Gooverly built. And there’s a moment here between Nicole and Wynonna that is really heartfelt. Wynonna’s not a total Haught fan, but she says straight up that both of them love Waverly, and that Nicole wants to do the best thing for Waves. And Nicole realizes Gooverly is not Waves because Gooverly tells Nicole to shoot Wynonna and Nicole knows that Waverly would never, ever suggest such a thing if she were in her right mind but OH NO GOOVERLY FLINGS NICOLE AWAY, something else Waverly would never do, leaving Wynonna to try to force Gooverly to drink the demon juice Doc and Dolls cooked up.

Wynonna gets that nasty shit down Waves’ throat and IT WORKS in the worst possible way, as Waves then pukes out so much nastiness of black goo that I can’t even. POOR THING. And the goo coalesces into a nasty little tentacle monster that Wynonna takes care of right quick with Peacemaker.

Goo-gone, y’all.

And the storm immediately disperses and Nacho-man and his crew head out and at least we have a WayHaught moment.

You’re welcome.

Back at Nedley Central, Dolls is thinking he’s gonna get Black Badge back in order but Jeremy tells him that BB is gone. As in taken away. Wiped clean. NO MORE BLACK BADGE. We’ll see how that plotline works out and what it means for our gang.

Wynonna then has a weird little moment with Nacho-man at the fire station. Seems he’s interested in a little more than just friends. Guess we’ll see how THAT pans out, too.

And then Andras freaking went there, everybody. THIS is the game-changer aspect, friends. Right here. Wynonna goes back to the Earpstead and Waves is there and Wynonna wants to know why she’s not spending the night with Nicole and Waves is obviously upset about something and she tells Wynonna that after she took the goo back, it told her some things about Wynonna that she doesn’t think even Wynonna knows. And she hands Wynonna a brown paper bag and we all can guess what’s in that bag…

Wynonna goes and does that pregnancy test and…

So the next question is, who’s the daddy? Because the goo tipped Waverly off that the baby was already present, so it’s not the goo’s (THANK GAWD). But might it be some kind of supernatural thing? Things to ponder (most are probably leaning Doc) as the season continues.

And let’s close with how freaking important it is to show a strong woman character like this PREGNANT. The story behind this is that actress Melanie Scrofano actually was pregnant, so Emily Andras decided to incorporate it into the show, which is both amazing and risky, in this business, but for those of us who have followed Andras’s work, we know there’s not much she won’t risk and for a female-friendly show like Wynonna Earp, which has such strong, complex women characters and complex relationships between characters, it’s a no-brainer in some ways that a pregnancy would be incorporated.

Read this interview at Variety that Maureen Ryan did with Melanie Scrofano and Emily Andras for the behind-the-scenes story about the incorporation of the pregnancy.

And now we’ll see how the pregnancy is going to affect Wynonna’s character, how it will affect the enemies she still has to face, and what it means for the men in her life. Waverly is already on board — she and Wynonna have a very strong bond, but there are still some things that Waves has to figure out, and hopefully we’ll get some more Nicole backstory. We shall see!

All right, Earpers. What do YOU think about the new addition?

Happy watching!