The Fosters Recap 219: Monty Python And The Holy Grail

Previously on The Fosters, Lena spilled a few too many emotional beans in Monty’s direction while Jude and Connor made out with each other’s faces while Callie finally came clean to Stef about why she agreed to go live with Robert. Also, Brandon sold a baseball.

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Just because Arya Stark is wearing a skirt in the new Game of Thrones promos doesn’t mean they’re de-tomboying her.

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Would you ever wear a skirt?

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She’s right. You wore a Misandry t-shirt and jeans to church last time we went to hear my dad preach.

All Callie had to do was say the words “You’re my moms” (and they are!) to Stef and Lena, and they have tripled down on keeping her. They call their lawyer to their house for a strategy session, and this lady isn’t pulling any punches. She tells them it was always going to be a hard sell, and now that they’re having to factor Bro Code into it, it’s going to be very nearly impossible to convince the judge to side with them over Robert. All Stef wants Callie to do is ask Robert, in front of the judge, to let Callie live out her 180 days of foster custody with them. She thinks Robert will have to agree because he wants to look good. Both the lawyer and Callie are worried that Stef and Lena are spending dollars and hit points on a game they can’t win, but so was interracial marriage and same-sex marriage just a very few years ago, so they’re used to beating the odds.

All the Adams Foster kids are in the bathroom trying to brush their teeth, and like always when they are gathered in the same space, everyone starts shaking the secrets out of their hair.

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I saw Mom’s handcuffs clamped to the headboard when I was in their bedroom earlier.

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MARIANA GROSS STOP.

Mariana: Everybody calm down. There’s going to be more room soon because Jesus is going to boarding school on a scholarship. But, well, that’s not exactly true because the baby will be small but will probably get her own room. Brandon’s room. Which means you’ll be moving in with Jesus, Brandon.
Callie and Brandon: Wait, Jesus got an academic scholarship?

Once Mariana has scooted, Jesus explains about Anna’s baby and says there’s no way Stef and Lena are going to adopt her.

The next morning, Stef and Lena go over the things they have to do today: Feed and clothe five kids, work ten hours at their jobs, reschedule with Jesus’ wrestling guy from the Testosterone Academy, hit up the judge at lunchtime to convince him to let Callie stay for a while, and get slightly passive-aggressive about how much say Stef’s ex-husband and Lena’s new boss get in terms of raising their children. Lena wants to have Monty over for dinner to scope out the scene there, especially because she’s a graduate of like every single Ivy League school, and Stef knows academia really gets Lena going. Lena does not want to have Monty over because the DVR is at 86% and if they don’t start watching and deleting stuff, it’s going to stop recording new episodes.

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I put your handcuffs in your bag.

As soon as Lena has left for work, Stef opens up the laptop she shares with her wife* and clicks on a folder on her desktop** and inside it is a report from a PI about Robert Rich’s misdeeds, including: a mistress.

*Dumb place to hide a thing.
**Double dumb place to hide a thing. 

Mariana is still trying to recruit for her dance team, so she’s psyched when Jesus tells her Emma used to be a cheerleader. Mariana stalks Emma down at school like a lion does a zebra and yells about her being a cheerleader one time. Emma ducks her head down and her eyes dart around like Mariana just outed her as a Russian spy or something. Mariana explains that dance team stuff isn’t cheerleading stuff. They’re not on the sidelines; they’re the game! Emma seems like the kind of girl that is always moved by rousing pep talks in sports movies, and Mariana’s feminist monologue moves her just as good. She agrees to give it a go.

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Yes, they were! The Fox and the Hound were totally gay!

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Surrounded by gay boys and straight girls. I’m never going to make out with anyone.

Courtyard.

Jude: Connor, hey, do you have some gum? The bathroom at my house was packed this morning and I forgot to brush my teeth.
Connor: Kiss me and I’ll tell you if your breath is okay.
Jude: Haha. Yeah, okay.
Connor: No, for real, do you want to study/make out this afternoon at your house?
Taylor to Daria at a picnic table across the way: Your boyfriend is gay, by the way.

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Heather Hogan

Heather Hogan is an Autostraddle senior editor who lives in New York City with her wife, Stacy, and their cackle of rescued pets. She's a member of the Television Critics Association, GALECA: The Society of LGBTQ Entertainment Critics, and a Rotten Tomatoes Tomatometer critic. You can also find her on Twitter and Instagram.

Heather has written 1718 articles for us.

20 Comments

  1. I was so furious at the end of this episode. Like only in fucking America could some innocent kids playing at being a lil bit grown up end in a fucking shooting. Like seriously. Fucks sake. Sort your gun shit out already America. Please.

  2. Okay, I know that a lot of stuff happened in this episode (Stef and Lena why are you both being so duuuuuuuumb) but after it was over, literally all I could think was:

    This is why I will never move to the US. How fucked up do you have to be that you hear a weird noise in the middle of the night, and you’re FIRST THOUGHT, before even asking “who’s there?” is “oh, guess I better just START SHOOTING!” You have to be a compete psychopath to honestly believe it’s better to KILL someone then to have your TV stolen!

    Ugh. American Straddlers, I am so sorry about the fucked up gun culture in your country, and I hope you all stay safe. If Connor is dead, I am going to throw a shit fit.

    PS: Anyone know if California has a stand your ground law?

  3. I used to hate Mariana but now she is one of my favourites. They really turned her around. Brandon remains the worst.

  4. REALLY interested to see where they go with whatever the fallout is of the shooting and what messages they send about guns. California has a “protect your castle” doctrine, which isn’t the same as stand your ground, but it lets you use deadly force within your own home if there is “reasonable fear of death or injury.” If they try to use that in the storyline, I really hope to see some serious questioning of the logic behind the castle doctrine, stand your ground, and American gun culture in general.

  5. “Callie dances like left shark” <3

    I hate Brendon. Almost as much as I hate how crazy American gun culture is… OK not even close to as much, but still a large amount of dislike is happening.

    • Also I’m hoping they are just being misleadingly dramatic in the promos and none of the kids actually get shot. And that when Lena is talking to Jude about losing a friend it’s just because Connor’s dad decided to move them away because of work.

  6. So in the Taylor picnic table
    picture, who is the floating head in the bottom left corner? Is she also someone not making out with anybody?

  7. I hope I’m not ruffling any feathers by going all “meta”, but there is no way in Hades they’re going to kill off Connor. Killing off gay male characters (I realize the Connor character isn’t necessarily entirely homosexual, but for dramatic purposes, he is a gay character for the time being) is a homophobic legacy of the pre-gay liberation entertainment industry. A friend of mine told me he had book that had a long necrology of gay male characters in movies who met a premature end as a fundamental part of the story, and of course the reason for this dramatic convention was to reinforce the idea that homosexuality was an egregious social transgression that necessarily carried dire and entirely deserved consequences. The writers have to know how utterly unforgivably ugly and offensive it would be to kill off Connor within days of his kissing Jude on-camera. And what I’ve seen of this show so far tends to suggest that no way could its writers be that out-to-lunch st00pid.

    What I predict will happen is that Connor will survive after a period of a few episodes where it’s up in the air whether or not he’ll pull through, and almost losing him will make Jude highly eager to take their relationship to the next level (not in terms of sex, just in terms of their emotional bond). And then Connor will at first be all, “Whoa, I’m not sure I’m ready to be a dude’s no-nonsense, for-real boyfriend just yet!” and Jude will be all hurt by that, but Connor will eventually realize that’s where he wants things to go, too.

    By the way, I don’t really have money to throw around on things such as cable TV, so I appreciate Heather’s great recaps. She could have done recaps for the Television Without Pity website back in its hey-day! :-)

      • I just saw the preview on YouTube for the next ep, and it’s not at all clear that Connor is even seriously hurt. When Lena makes her comment about how hard it is to lose a friend, it’s clearly in the context of Jude being in tears over his relationship with Connor apparently ending on account of the emotional fallout of the recent Jonnor lip-lock.

    • I agree I don’t think they are going to kill off Connor, we’re not watching GOT here.

      I think one of the girls gets shot and Connor’s over protective/controlling father responds by banning any Jonnor activities for the rest of his natural life.

      So Jude is heart broken because he can’t see his boo, and Lena comforts him.

      Meanwhile, how is Calie going to mess up this imancipation thing? There are so many cogs! She’s bound to sent this train flying odd the rails, am I right?

      • I don’t have enough familiarity with the character of Callie to comment, but if she has a history of throwing a screw-up wrench into important matters, then yes, she will likely do so in this situation, too.

        I have to admit, I’m kind of with Connor that Jude lets his adopted mothers in on way too many things about which Jude should keep quiet. But of course being somewhat taken with Connor, I’ll end up siding with him. ;-)

    • If you have iTunes, you can download the standard definition episodes for $2 at a time or buy a season pass which discounts it by about $5. The episodes are available the afternoon after they air, that’s how I watch them.

  8. So, how old is Callie supposed to be? Last season, when she was thinking about getting her own apartment, I seem to remember her saying that she would be 18 in a few months. Perhaps I’m remembering wrong, but if she is indeed almost 18, then what is the point of a custody battle? Like, what’s the big deal? She could just go stay with Robert for a few months, if there’s no way out of it, and then move back to Stef and Lena’s after she turns 18. Would people really waste time and resources on a custody battle over a 17-and-a-half year old? This just seems weird to me–but then again I’m not a parent.

    • For some reason I thought she was 16 but I could be totally off. But you’re right I don’t think they’re being consistent on staying on track with their ages.

    • I think (and I may be wrong, because I don’t have time to go back and check) that when she was looking for an apartment she was waiting on her 16th birthday, maybe (??) even her 17th, but definitely not 18.

      It was something about how if you were in the Foster system, after a certain age you could live on your own in state approved housing if you proved yourself to be mature/ sufficient. Essentially, they would give you the money that they would traditionally be giving your foster parent and you would use that money to take care of yourself. Or something that generally works along those lines. Like I said, I don’t have time to go back and look up the nitty gritty specifics.

      It’s the same system that Daphne was living under until she landed back at Girls United a few episodes ago.

    • Thanks, K! Do you think ABC Family keeps track of how many people buy single-episode and “season passes” on iTunes? If they do, I’m thinking more folks (such as yours truly) buying eps on iTunes might make up for the lackluster ratings from which Season 2B has been suffering (according to the scuttlebutt, anyway).

  9. Can we please talk about how Monty was “feeling” Lena up at the end with their long lasting hug? At first I was like awww, she just needs a friend…but then it turned into …Oh she reallllly needs a “friend”.

  10. *POSSIBLE* *SPOILER* *ALERT*

    I saw a “between takes” photograph online of the actors who play Jude, Connor, and Connor’s father that appears to be from the set of the show, in which Gavin MacIntosh, who plays Connor, is wearing a hospital gown, so clearly Connor is seriously wounded, and I’m guessing Connor’s father misguidedly reacts by blaming Jude and trying to quash “Jonnor”.

    Now, assuming Connor’s father comes around and lightens up, and we can assume he will based on that “Jonnor” is going to be a more prominent part of the show’s third season (assuming it doesn’t get canceled, as its ratings have been diving recently), there’s probably going to be a scene in which Connor has a serious conversation with Lena and Stef about the events that led up to the shooting.

    In my vision of how that scene would go, I’m thinking that the reason Connor got shot is that when he looked behind him and saw where Taylor’s father was pointing the barrel of the gun, he saw that Jude was in the line of fire. So of course, Connor, without even thinking about it, pushes Jude out of the line of fire with no regard for his own safety. In his conversation with Lena and Stef about that night, Stef starts out by saying that Jude told her what Connor did to save Jude that night, and Stef sincerely if somewhat sternly and tersely thanks him for protecting Jude, but then also tells Connor that she is still terribly disappointed in him because it would have been very unlikely Jude would have been stealing booze and drinking underage had Connor not assented to the idea.

    Connor responds by looking down and getting the most adorable sad/ ashamed/ regretful expression on his face and confesses to Stef and Lena that he realizes they *should* be disappointed in him regardless of his taking a bullet for Jude, because Jude wouldn’t have been there to be in the line of fire in the first place had Connor vetoed the whole booze-stealing idea as soon as Taylor brought it up. And Connor adds that he realized this while he was lying on the ground losing consciousness from the bullet wound and it also occurred to him that if he were to die, Jude would likely be badly emotionally scarred for the rest of his life.

    And so Connor knows that he failed miserably as Jude’s friend that night regardless of taking a bullet for Jude. Lena replies that she’s glad Connor at least has the maturity to understand why she and Stef have very serious misgivings about Jude’s friendship with him in light of Connor’s display of very poor judgement that fateful night. Connor, of course, keeps to himself that the reason he didn’t listen to Jude’s protestations about the whole thing being a bad idea is that he wanted to see how sexually pliant a little bit of liquor might make Jude. But he also realizes Stef and Lena may very well already suspect this, effectively explaining why Stef has been giving him a low-key stink-eye since the conversation began.

    Connor concludes by solemnly promising Lena and Stef that if he allows his friendship with Jude to continue, he will repay their giving him another chance by making sure he keeps himself and Jude out of any and all trouble, and also that he will never use his influence over Jude to “take advantage of him in any way”. Lena smiles and accepts Connor’s promise. Stef kind of wants to keep giving him the stink-eye but can’t quite put aside the fact that this promise is coming from the boy who took a bullet to save her son. So her expression becomes more neutral and accepting and she tells Connor that if he’s sincere and won’t let peer-pressure affect his promise, then that’s a good place to start and will give their continued friendship her tentative approval. Lena makes a note to herself to later chide Stef for being Ms. Police Officer in such a “24/7” way.

    • “Connor concludes by solemnly promising Lena and Stef that if he allows his friendship with Jude to continue,”

      should be

      “Connor concludes by solemnly promising Lena and Stef that if they allow his friendship with Jude to continue,”

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