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“The Fosters” recap (2.11): It’s a Wonderful Wife

Previously on The Fosters, Stef’s dad passed away and she had a lot of mixed feelings about it. Callie got stalked by her birth father, Jack McPhee, convinced him to sign away his parental rights, only to have her half sister tear up the papers. When Callie asked him to put his old John Hancock on some new papers he said no because Callie’s life hasn’t been filled with enough drama on this show. To make matters worse, Callie decided that the best way to keep Brallie shippers watching this show deal with her heartbreak was to kiss Brandon.

We begin with Callie and Brandon sucking each other’s faces off until Brandon stops and says, “I have to think about this.” Callie says she loves him and he runs away to stare at the house next door and process his feelings like a kid raised by a couple of lesbos. The house (which is laughably small to be the neighbor to the Quinn’s castle) has the remnants of Christmas decorations and Brandon has a flashback to last Christmas (the timeline of this show remains inexplicable. Stef and Lena got married in June but they all told the Quinns that Callie had been with them for six months. I don’t know. You have to be a Time Lord to figure out all the jumping).

Last Christmas, Brandon is hanging a green ornament on the tree that is supposed to be the Grinch. Callie asks if he was blindfolded when he made it. Excellent sibling burn Callie. More of that, less sucking face. Praise be to the television gods, Annie Potts is back and she’s as sassy as ever. Mariana is cooing over her “baby’s first Christmas ornament,” which prompts the moms to give Jude and Callie their very own first lesbian Christmas ornaments, too. Jesus comes in complaining that he needs more decorations if he is going to win the ugliest house competition. Stef nixes more money and Lena tells him to use his imagination. Jesus doesn’t have an imagination, a fact Mariana backs up by letting everyone know he got her a vibrating toothbrush last year. Brandon wants to know if it was a) really a toothbrush, and b) whether it was maybe a present from Stef to Lena?

Sharon says the tree is missing presents and that Secret Santa is boring. Stef reminds everyone that they have a billion kids and not a ton of money so Christmas is about love and togetherness. Sharon has another plan.

In walks an overly nice lady with a present for Callie. She hopes Callie has a nice Christmas and that she finds a forever family soon. Callie rolls her eyes and is all “as soon as the writers find another way to torture the audience.” While everyone takes the empty boxes to the garage, Jude hangs an ornament with a picture of Lena and some dude we’ve never seen before.

Sharon chit chats with Stef about Jude finding out that he and Callie are half siblings before scurrying off to get the haul of presents she ordered from the UPS truck. Stef wishes her mom wouldn’t go overboard at Christmas and Lena tells Stef just to be grateful her mom is there. Poor Dana got hit by a van. Wait, wrong show. Dana is spending Christmas Out of Town and Lena refuses to call as long as she’s with “him.” Stef shares her sympathy and then wants to know how long she has to keep her dad’s bank statements. She won’t mind keeping them for a little longer once she discovers that old Frank had one hundred fifty grand stashed away. Lena wonders who he would have left the cash to if not to Stef? Stef has a hunch. Her hunch is standing in the living room surrounded by presents.

Callie, Jude, and Brandon are doing some last minute shopping in a antique store because they need to stay under the limit for their Secret Santa gifts. Brandon asks her if a leather cuff is her style and Callie says no (thus killing the dreams of Callie/Daphne shippers). Her taste is more the hundred dollar silver bracelet. Jude inspects the bracelet while Brandon tells Callie he would buy her a table since that’s the thing she wanted for her independent living apartment. She thinks maybe a couch would be better but Brandon reminds her of how comfy the floor was when he was serenading her about being an outlaw and making out on it. Ick.

Back at home Stef is busy interrogating her mother. She can’t understand why Frank would leave a wad of cash to a lady he was no longer married to. Stef gets all wound up and Sharon finally tells her to button it before someone’s feeling get hurt.

At the Peach Pit, Callie is hanging with Daphne. She gives Daphne a little wind-up toy and Daphne gives her an application to work with her. Merry Christmas and $2.13 an hour? What a deal! Daphne hasn’t been able to get in contact with her daughter, who is in foster care, despite doing everything she has been asked to do. Well, everything plus a little snooping. Turns out she’s seen Tasha at the playground. Not a good idea, Daphne. Callie tells her that as long as she does everything right it will work out well in the end. Wow, and I thought Jude was the optimistic one.

Jesus is trying to figure out how to win the competition with the crappy decorations his moms have. Mariana waltzes in channeling Lucy from Charlie Brown, hands him a list of acceptable gifts under the limit in case he’s her secret santa, and then starts to leave. She can’t back away from the train wreck and offers to help Jesus plan. In return she gets forty bucks, a cut of the prize money, and only blue M&Ms, white flowers, and possibly his first born. The lawyers will work out the details of her rider.

Down in the kitchen the moms are pulling out their Christmas china and Stef is yammering on about her mother and the inheritance. Lena wants Stef to just shut up already. Stef thinks her mom is throwing her money away on toys for the kids (she may have accidentally, maybe sneaked a peek at the gifts). Lena want to know what they’re getting because she’s awesome. Lena suggest that maybe Stef’s being petty and Stef flips it around and says maybe Lena should look in a mirror since she won’t call her mom because she’s spending Christmas with Lena’s brother. Lena says he’s her half brother. Stef ask if it makes a difference that they don’t have the same mom and Lena says of course, half is not the same as whole. Judicorn heard the whole conversation and runs out and get on his Paige McCullers brand Huffy bike and ride away.

When Lena gets back to the kitchen, Stef calls her out for saying she and her brother aren’t real siblings. How can she say that while raising a family of adopted kids? Lena stumbles a little and backtracks but ultimately she can’t get past Nathan calling her mother a “hateful, awful” word to her face. Stef points out that Dana has forgiven Nathan. Maybe Nathan used that word because he was hurting. Holding this grudge has made Lena say hurtful things and Jude overheard them.

Outside, Mariana is helping Jesus put up decorations when old man Potter from next door come over to tell Jesus that he better watch it. Bedford Falls is his town and he won’t stand for little punks slashing his snowman.

Back inside, Lena finds Jude to have a little chat. First she tells him that he sure did get a nice gift for Callie for forty bucks. Judicorn explains that he wanted her to have something nice since she didn’t get adopted. Lena tells him that Callie is lucky to have him as a brother. Lena has a brother but she doesn’t talk about him much. She says it’s probably because they didn’t grow up in the same house and struggles to explain that when Nathan came to visit their dad, he wasn’t very nice. “Wasn’t very nice” covers all manner of sins. What’s a few racial epithets between family? Jude with his super empathic powers says simply that maybe Nathan was jealous. She says he’s probably right and that she was jealous that her parents are spending Christmas with Nathan and she said some stuff she didn’t mean. Before she leaves she lets Jude know that he doesn’t have to get Callie a special present to make up for her not getting adopted. The Judicorn is special enough that his mere presence on earth is enough gift for all of us.

The next morning, Jude walks back into the antique store and tells the semi-terrifying woman (who looks like she would be better suited as an assistant to Miranda Priestley than behind the counter at Crap You Don’t Need Antiques) that he accidentally put the bracelet into his pocket yesterday and walked out without paying. He tells her he doesn’t have the one hundred dollars he need and she asks what he can spend. By a Christmas miracle it is on sale for precisely forty dollars.

Callie calls Daphne to invite her over for Christmas. Daphne’s a little distracted because she’s doing some stalking of her daughter. Oh Daphne, Rosie is going to be so mad at you! Tasha’s foster mom isn’t paying attention so Daphne calls her over. No matter how adorable that kid is, this is terrible decision making, dude. Just terrible.

Time for Christmas Eve dinner at the Adams Foster house. Some of the most delightful drama has occurred around this table. Everyone has some sort of goofy holiday item they must put on. Don we now our gay apparel does seems rather apt for this crew. Stef complains she doesn’t have anything. Lena hands her a small box containing some lovely diamond earrings. Stef should have just put on her hip waders because she is about to step in some deep shit. She tells Lean she hopes they aren’t real and blathers about how they weren’t supposed to get each other gifts.

Oh Stef, that is a classic trap. Everyone knows “we’re not getting each other presents” means at least one of you is going to get a present, so don’t be the dope who sticks to the deal. Lena just wanted Stef to have something nice to open. Sharon thinks it’s nice that someone is in the Christmas spirit. And now the fight really gets going. Stef tells her mom that she’s spend too much money on presents including the bed that killed their sex life. Sharon shoots back that maybe if Stef wore something other than grannie panties she and Lena wouldn’t be having issues in the boudoir. Oh lord, do I love Annie Potts.

Lena comes back from the kitchen with a burned lasagna and bursts into tears a she tells Stef she’s sorry she got her a nice present and Sharon she’s sorry they don’t like the bed and she’s real sorry Frank didn’t leave Stef all that money but for Christ’s sake all she wants is a nice dinner. In the midst of this chaos carolers show up at the door asking if Natalie is at home. Not now, we’re having a family fight. Shove off weirdos in your pilgrim outfits.

When they get back to the table Stef and Sharon look properly chastened and apologize to Lena. Stef explains that her kids need college educations not hoverboards and she doesn’t want to worry that her mother will have nothing left to live on because she spend too much money. Sharon gets up from the table and practically throws a present at Stef. When Stef opens it, she finds college savings accounts for all five of the kids.

Sharon reaches across the table and tells Stef she knows she’s been under a lot of pressure and she’s doing a great job but she needs to relax a little. Sharon will be fine, she has a bunch of shares of Google socked away and will have plenty to live on.

Stef apologizes to Lena and give her a kiss and Sharon welcomes Jude and Callie to their first crazy Adams Foster Christmas Clusterfuck.

Honestly, this is one of the things I love most about this show. They get what family is. Some people like to describe families as being “rock solid” but I don’t think that’s what families are. I think families are more like Legos. Families are built brick by tiny Lego brick. Maybe in your mind you thought your family was going to be like some giant impenetrable castle. But then the challenges rolled in an one tower broke and the drawbridge stopped working and you were left with a pile of bricks. If the family is healthy it rebuilds. Maybe it’s not the same shape. Maybe in the midst of rebuilding it breaks again. But if you’re a family, if you really care enough, you never stop rebuilding. Sharon and Stef yell and fight and bicker and laugh and cry but they also reach across the table and put the pieces back together again. Stef apologizes to Lena and they stick those pieces back on, too. It’s not easy. Sometimes you want to walk away and leave that pile of broken shit on the ground. But, I think, family means giving it another shot and being willing to adapt. Maybe your castle becomes more of a houseboat, or a tree house, or something else entirely. But no matter what, you find a way to fix what you have broken.

While they all laugh and eat the burnt lasagna, Callie gets a desperate text from Daphne. She went and Bette Porter’d little Tasha and now she needs Callie and Brandon to help her out. Callie tries to get Brandon to leave but he won’t bail on her.

Mariana brings some cocoa out to Jesus who is sleeping in a manger a tent in the yard to protect his masterpiece. She tells him that she remembers when they were five and Ana left them home alone to go get high on Christmas and how, even though he was little, he tried to make her feel better. She apologizes for saying he gets her shitty presents (even if he did get her a toothbrush) because he’s a good brother and that’s a pretty excellent gift. But not quite good enough to convince her to sleep outside.

Brandon pulls the car up to the house where Tasha is staying. Daphne takes Tasha up to the front walk and tells her to walk up to the door and knock. Tasha cries and waves when she gets to the door. It’s absolutely heartbreaking to watch.

Jesus is woken by three wise men coming to bring him presents. Not really. He and Mr. Crabapple are woken by a bunch of kids breaking their decorations. After Jesus and Mr. Scrooge have chased the evil doers away, they sit on the steps, drinking cocoa, and talking about family. Mr. Curmudgeon says his kids don’t come for the holidays because they want to be home and he won’t visit them because he wants to be home, too. Besides, he doesn’t want to break his streak of winning the award for ridiculous decoration. After they say good night, Jesus takes their house out of the competition. He’s getting an electric skateboard and a college education, he can let Mr. Nesbitt win this one.

The next morning everyone is opening presents. After Sharon gives Stef some underwear to help spice up the Craftmatic, Lena steps outside to call Dana. She asks her mom to put Nathan on so she can wish him Merry Christmas and put a few of those pieces back together. After Callie opens a piece of the Berlin wall from Wyatt (very practical) she finds Brandon outside and gives him a metronome and they pinky promise that no matter what they won’t let each other give up on their dreams.

This is the moment we are back in the present. Callie sidles up to Brandon but before they can process their kiss, an ambulance drives by and into the Quinn’s courtyard. That’s where we leave this crew until January 19th.

What did you think of the Christmas episode?

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