Episodes 3 and 4 show Midge Maisel starting in her latest career path while Susie is faced with a terrible loss and Abe Weissman encounters some troubles thanks to work.
Episode 3 recap: Everything is Bellmore
Midge Maisel has begun serving as an Emcee at a cabaret bar. She’s being paid to talk in front of men who want to see anything but talking.
Susie gets home one morning to find out that her roommate and dear friend, Jackie, has passed away. She’s completely distraught and begins obsessing over death which ironically kills the mood wherever she goes and starts talking.
Rose’s matchmaking business has caught on like wildfire, with her motto that there is someone for everyone quite funny since she looks at all the ways she can change and ‘improve’ her client to find her a mate. Yet again, being a woman, in general, is just extremely tough.
Abe is tasked with reviewing a broadway play created by someone from their very own congregation. He takes the whole family out for the opening night and they all have a jolly good time.
However, when Abe is brutally honest about how he thinks the play is bad, he’s met with severe pushback from his community and gets lectured about loyalty. There is no love lost in the life of an honest critic, that’s for sure.
Susie and Midge attend Jackie’s funeral but when no one else shows up, she goes to the adjacent funeral to say a few words about Jackie in front of that audience. She gives an impassioned speech that probably had more emotion than Jackie ever showed in front of Susie before.
Midge is visited by Lenny at her dead-end gig and he gives her a lesson on tuning out distractions and then sits to watch her set while being a distraction throughout. She truly starts to get through to the boneheads that frequent there looking for a different kind of show.
Episode 4 recap: Interesting People on Christopher Street
Midge gets to doing what she does best and turning the screws on the bar operations as well the performers’ acts, trying to get them to perform better. If you gave this woman bunch of planks and some rope, she’ll have it back in the form of a raft ready to sail the Atlantic.
She then attends a date that goes terribly before having Susie bail her out before her date bored her with his Spanish inquisition. Midge then takes an unnecessary interest in Susie’s love life because there is no pie she will not stick her hands into.
In his last review, Abe mentioned a little anecdote from his youth where he and his friend Asher got into some shenanigans at a federal building which unfortunately caught the attention of the FBI.
He lets Asher stay with him while they get the whole thing sorted but Asher is as jumpy as Tigger the Tiger because of how they could potentially end up in jail. Abe assures him that it’ll all be fine.
When Asher has dinner with the Weissmans and Midge, they reminisce about old times and how Asher dated Rose for a while when she and Abe had broken up. I guess the bro code did not exist back in the 20s.
Susie finds a new place to call home which doubles up as her office. She’s all excited about it and doesn’t realise the Midge has taken her to a lesbian bar. She storms off leaving Midge by herself to contemplate on her constant meddling.
Susie gets a visit from Sophie who asks her to secure a gig as a game show host. She’s been struggling for income and shows that without all of her hired help, she’s a baby deer that would be eaten alive on the streets of New York.
Abe’s habit of tuning people out comes back to bite him as he claims not the remember that Asher and Rose dated. His jealousy almost causes him the sell out his best friend to the FBI. Abe tends to bring out the inner child in him when he wants his way quite often.
Midge seems to do a lot better at the club and soon the performances start to get cleaner and crisp. Clean and crisp, two words you wouldn’t expect to hear when describing a cabaret bar, that’s for sure.
Review
- Susie’s rowsing words in honour of Jackie were magnificent. Her words, the delivery, every single aspect of that monologue had you hooked on to the screen.
- The camera work whenever Midge Maisel walks around the bar is superb. The way it follows her, always keeping her as the central focus while also providing a glimpse of the surrounding areas is astounding.
- The way Midge stands up for the cabaret performers is brilliant. It’s the kind of attitude that needs to be seen more around professions of that ilk, even in the modern world.
Rating: 3.5/5
Also Read: The Marvelous Mrs Maisel season 4 episodes 1 and 2 recaps & review