Recap: ‘Tell Me Lies’ Season 2, Episode 7 Is Excruciating, As Usual

I can say with a relative degree of certainty that Tell Me Lies is the most stressful show in existence, for all kinds of reasons, many of which come to the fore in Episode 7 of Season 2, “I’m Not Drowning Fast Enough”. Oliver almost manages to lap Stephen in the race to become the most punchable character on TV, but the perennial frontrunner manages to pull it back in the final stretch, much to the disgust of all of us. Readers, I’m just tired.

Things begin with a dream. In it, Stephen recalls the night of Macy’s death; him coming to after the collision, his shock at seeing her dead in the passenger seat. And then he recalls Lucy. She leads Stephen out of the car, drags Macy into the driver’s seat, and reassures Stephen that he’s okay.

Curious.

Meanwhile, the heavy specter of that disastrous Thanksgiving still looms large. Lucy hasn’t spoken to Leo and is being weird about Stephen. Nobody has spoken to Diana. All of Bree’s photos are rubbish. And the truly horrifying news is that little escapade didn’t even represent the high water mark for brutally awkward social events. Marianne has invited the entire class to her house for the holidays.

Christmas At Marianne and Oliver’s House

Bree naturally doesn’t know whether she should attend or not. It’ll be awkward since Oliver will be co-hosting — “I think it’s just called hosting when it’s your home,” he smugly corrects her — but Bree’s just a glutton for punishment and loves making every situation ten times more awkward than it need be. Oliver also gets her an early Christmas present which he presents to her between kisses in his office — a new camera. How did he know the old one was playing up? Did he sabotage it? That’s just the kind of creepy thing a 45-year-old man sleeping with a teenager would do.

Bree is immediately distant at the party and says weird stuff and Marianne compares the whole thing to Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?, which neither Lucy nor Bree can remember in any detail. Spoiler alert: It’s about a mad barren couple who behave like psychopaths around house guests and lure them into their own demented game of psychosexual oneupmanship.

In other words: This is not going to go well.

Oliver Is Awful

(Disney/Josh Stringer)
CATHERINE MISSAL

As much as I’m loathe to discuss Oliver because he makes me feel physically sick, we must mention what happens between him and Bree at the party because it’s insane.

After playing nice and innocent for a while, Oliver lures Bree to a laundry room — “Wipe off your lipstick”, he tells her in the creepy manner of a man well-schooled in extramarital affairs — and they have sex while Bree stares awkwardly at Marianne’s laundry. The whole thing makes her feel deeply weird, and when Oliver hands her one of Marianne’s nightgowns to clean herself up with she has a minor panic attack. Because she’s making too much noise, Oliver blurts out that he loves her, and with childish glee she says the same, repeating it even as he leaves.

Lucy watches Bree leave the laundry room with disgust painted on her face. Can you imagine how erratically you need to be behaving to appall Lucy, of all people? Well, Bree takes bad behavior to an even higher level, returning to the laundry room to leave her earrings in a pair of Oliver’s pants. She has clearly bought into the fallacy that he loves her, is imagining they can be together, and has decided to speed things along by sabotaging his marriage. Fun!

It’s worth noting that at the very end of “I’m Not Drowning Fast Enough” this hilariously backfires when Marianne comes to class wearing the earrings. Readers, I was howling. How much does she know?

Pippa and Wrigley

(Disney/Josh Stringer)
SPENCER HOUSE

Things are going well between Pippa and Wrigley in Tell Me Lies Season 2, Episode 7, but because this show hates us, it has to ruin that too.

The situation is a bit confusing, to be fair. Wrigley opens up a little about how much he’s struggling with Drew ignoring him, and Pippa opens up about being attracted to a girl, and they later have sex because they largely seem a little confused by spending so much platonic time in each other’s company. But I love these two together, and as soon as they called each other their respective best friends, I just knew it was all going to go wrong.

It’s because of Lucy, again. Everyone’s out in a bar but the talk of the town is that the charges against Lydia’s brother Chris have been dropped and his victim, Caitie, is generally considered by everyone to be a liar. Lucy can’t stand hearing everyone dismiss her so she casts herself in the lead role of Pippa’s story, telling everyone that Chris tried to assault her. I get her logic here but it backfires horribly. Pippa just feels awful, and when Wrigley makes an otherwise innocuous comment about her liking girls to try and lighten the mood, he gets both barrels. His damp teary eyes made me legitimately sad.

Luckily this does get fixed. Wrigley turns up at Pippa’s dorm to apologize and has a complete breakdown, and it’s worth pointing out that Spencer House is legitimately fantastic here. There are a few high-quality acting moments in this episode, but this is the real standout. Plus, these two are the only characters I actively root for, which helps.

Stephen

When it comes to characters I don’t root for, Stephen is at the very top of the list. He has a litany of scumbag moments in “I’m Not Drowning Fast Enough” including sulking with Diana for being cut off by her father, saying needlessly mean and personal stuff to Wrigley to try and ruin things between him and Pippa, and then ingratiating himself back into Lucy’s life.

The Lucy stuff legitimately irritates me. It was always going to happen but it’s such a pain that he manages to weasel his way back in. And what they ultimately bond over is both being awful, which I suppose is fitting and true but still feels like a pretty serious red flag. Then again, Stephen is a walking, talking red flag, so what can you do?

This is the most stressful show on television. I feel dirty just having watched it.

Read More: Tell Me Lies Season 2 Ending Explained