Summary
Serenity’s various pairings seem closer and more stable than ever in “Fragile Things”, which in a show like this is rarely a good sign.
This recap of Sweet Magnolias season 2, episode 7, “Fragile Things”, contains spoilers.
There’s nothing like a new baby to bring people together, and Noreen’s seems to be uniting everyone in Serenity. “Fragile Things” — aptly titled! — opens with everyone from Bill and her parents to Isaac and Maddie fawning over her. Bill is pretty reasonable; her parents haven’t even made it through the door before he’s assuring them he has already taken care of the hospital costs and agreed on child support. He gives Isaac his card in the hallway outside and implores him to call him if mother or baby needs anything. Even Maddie tells Noreen she wants to reconcile and gifts her the same knitted blanket that all of her children came home from the hospital in.
Sweet Magnolias season 2, episode 7 recap
Oh, Erik. You’ll recall that the previous episode ended with him telling Helen that he had something he needed to share, and that turns out to be the story of him losing his wife during a pregnancy emergency. He used to be an EMT in Atlanta and thought he could get her to the hospital quicker than an ambulance could. He couldn’t, and he lost them both, and he has been grappling with the guilt of that ever since. Of course, with Helen trying to have a baby of her own, this is pretty relevant, but since they’re both being so transparent, they agree to walk the path together. It’s kind of refreshing to see adults behaving like adults, really.
Meanwhile, the entirety of Serenity continues to rally around Noreen. The magnolias make her up a gift basket. Trotter brings a giant bear. There’s a lovely moment when Noreen’s parents come in and meet everyone, and her mother realizes who Maddie is and almost breaks down at the “blessing”. As I said at the top, there’s nothing like a new baby to bring people together, especially when so many other people are looking for new babies of their very own. And not just Helen. Remember, Trotter and Ashley have officially decided to adopt too. So, everyone is feeling the love in this episode.
On the subject of parents and their children — Peggy and Isaac. Things are going less swimmingly in this regard. She tells her own mother about him, and she’s instructed to see him off immediately. It seems very much like Peggy’s mother strongly pushed Peggy to give Isaac up for adoption in the first place, since Peggy was so young. All Peggy was allowed to do was give him a name, and the couple who adopted him kept his birth name, Jeremiah, as his middle name. Peggy explains all this to Isaac in the first scene they’ve really shared together. He’s curious about his dad, too, but for now, it’s nice for the two of them to just be together.
“Fragile Things” finds everyone’s relationships as stable as they’ve ever been, I think, which is rarely a good sign in a show like this. But everyone from Maddie and Cal to Helen and Erik to Dana Sue and Ronnie seems to be doing well — perhaps even too well, given that Annie walks in on the last two while they’re doing the no-pants dance on the couch. Not a conventional cliffhanger, but it’ll do.
You can stream Sweet Magnolias season 2, episode 7, “Fragile Things”, exclusively on Netflix.
