Brothers & Sisters

Spooky! It was a scary episode for the Walkers, with all sorts of shocks and dread. Despite the Halloween theme, though, it wasn’t ghosts and goblins or even egg-wielding teens doing the damaged; far worse, it was loved ones, trusted and untrustworthy.

Joe couldn’t have been any bigger a figure of terror if he was dressed as the grim reaper himself. Here, he was dealing death to Sarah’s self-confidence, her self-image, her belief in the decisions they made together and in his essential goodness. Recent history aside, Sarah had clearly been assuming that the Whedon divorce was going to be civilized, with the former spouses working together to raise their children in an atmosphere of respect and compromise. The kind of thing you could get your non-divorce-lawyer brother to handle, something all in the family.

So she thinks nothing of calling Joe to help her out when she has to reschedule a meeting for school drop-off time in order to make their lawyerly get-together. That’s what civilized divorced folks do, right, help each other out? But that nothing becomes a big something at the meeting, when — after Sarah’s allowed Joe to keep his guitar collection, and Joe’s made no claims on Ojai Foods stock, and things seem to be all agreeable-like — Joe’s smug lawyer uses it as an example of the sort of work-before-kids behavior that is prompting Joe to demand full custody. Kevin quickly retreats, huffing about an ambush, but lets Sarah know that she better get herself a file full of character references but quick.

Funny thing about those character references, though — everybody Sarah calls, all the teachers and mothers and coaches and caregivers, has already stood up for Joe. Clearly, the guy’s been planning this for a while, maybe even back when he was canoodling with Sarah on the washing machine. Which makes him look like a grade-A weasel, but it also sounds like it’s lifted directly from the Divorce Lawyer’s Playbook: Let the other spouse think everything’s cool so she doesn’t assemble her own case while you’re assembling yours. Blindsiding stinks on a personal level, but on a legal level, it tends to work well.

As, indeed, it does when they go before the judge for a temporary custody hearing. Despite Sarah’s heartfelt plea, and the novel Nora wrote for her as a character reference, the judge quickly decides that temporary custody goes to the stay-at-home dad. Joe at least has the good grace to look sheepish when he comes to pick up Paige and Cooper that night, although maybe it’s just because Nora’s there, giving him the old mother-in-law stinkeye. Just as well not to leave Sarah and Joe alone, because when Sarah visited him earlier in the episode, they just got into a shouting match that upset Paige.

Now Paige is upset again, because she doesn’t want to leave her room or her mom. Sarah has a very sweet moment with her, giving her a cell phone (she’s a true Walker now!), assuring her she can call anytime, and filling her with all the confidence and strength of heart she no longer feels herself. When the kids are gone, out of her life until two weekends hence, Sarah sinks onto the steps and into her mother’s arms. This is no vampire movie, but Joe’s sure driven a stake through her heart.

Driving a stake through my heart is the fact that Tommy and Lena apparently did have a one-nighter, and although Lena understands why Tommy now, nicely, wants to call it quits, she wishes things were different. She’s less understanding when Holly gives her the same line, ’cause Holly’s like the Administrator of Affairs With Married Men, and Lena hasn’t filled out the proper paperwork. Maybe Lena’s just bad news, or maybe she takes Holly’s chastisement as a challenge (actually, those aren’t mutually exclusive), but she’s quick to call Tommy when she’s too drunk to drive, and needs a ride home. Quick to kiss him, too, for his troubles. And he ain’t slow to kiss her back, either. Sigh. People! If you’re going to carry on an extramarital affair, do not be kissing in public! The Administrator will be writing you up straightaway.

Tommy does manage to break away from Lena to stop by his mom’s house for Halloween night, where the family’s gathered watching Robert in the Republican debate. There’s a great moment at the door where Justin asks Tommy what his costume is. “An abandoned husband,” Tommy replies. “What’s yours?” Justin’s quick with “Wounded veteran.” But he could just as well have said, “Lying junkie,” ’cause he popped a few pills in the hallway there before opening the door. Or “Insatiable gossip,” since he’s been going to town all day with an overheard secret so juicy that Mom had to go all the way into the pantry to hide the rest of the phone call from him.

And what secret might that be? Saul’s sexuality? Rebecca’s kiss complicity? The fate of Rev. Jason’s bad TV show Malaysian mission? Another Walker sibling we know nothing of? No, no, no, and no. For the answer, I have to backtrack now to Kitty’s storyline. Just pretend you didn’t watch the previews, okay?

Robert and his staff are busily preparing for the big make-or-break debate, but Kitty’s more concerned about the quality of the shrimp they just ingested. When Nora hears she lost her seafood lunch and thought the shellfish smelled fishy, Mom jumps right to conclusions: You must be pregnant, nausea over “sea meat” being a time-honored Walker-woman pregnancy test. Kitty buys the more conventional drugstore variety and talks to her mom while waiting for her fate to be decided, in the conversation that loose-lips Justin overhears. When Kitty sees the results, she tells her mom it’s negative, but even before we’re shown that big fat plus sign, we know she’s lying, don’t we?

Kitty goes into Robert’s office to … well, since it’s Debate Prep Central in there, to ask him his position on unwed mothers, yuk, yuk. Robert doesn’t get the connection, but Travis clues him in later that nausea + interest in unwed mothers = pregnancy. Robert’s understandably a little ticked that he had to hear about it from that guy, so he gives Kitty a little test: For dinner, tonight, dear, we’re having sushi and champagne! When Kitty demurs, it’s clear that she’s knocked up. They have themselves a nice little shouting match, conducted on both personal and professional levels, in which both are in the right and the wrong. Kitty announces that he won’t have to worry about her throwing up backstage at the debates, because she’s going home to mother. And that sets us up for that merry Halloween night at Nora’s.

By the time the debate starts, Justin has managed to spill the beans to everyone about Kitty’s delicate condition. Saul’s the one who can’t keep from tipping Kitty off, though, and when suspicions are finally out in the open, Nora corrects everyone and then Kitty corrects her. Whatever mixed emotions the senator and his fiancee may be having, her family’s emotions are entirely positive. Well, alright, it’s still a little awkward, what with Sarah losing her kids at the same time Kitty is potentially gaining one. But Robert says lots of nice things in the debate, and sticks up for Kitty and her values when his opponents try to use her against him, so it’s all good.

In the end, as so often happens, Kitty and Robert make up, and share that they’re glad about the baby if not-so-much about the timing. They huddle up with his advisors, in the wake now of his debate win, to make a playbook for the spinning of illegitimate offspring. It can go on the shelf right next to the playbooks for spinning the gay brothers, and the gay brothers dating, and the cheating father-in-law, and the pill-popping brother-in-law, and the illegitimate half-sister-in-law, and the sister-in-law who lost custody of her kids, and the outspokenly liberal mother-in-law, and the whole drunken badly behaved McCallister clan besides. It’s a big shelf. But if Robert can stay afloat in a campaign with all that hanging around his neck? Running the country should be a snap.

Next week’s previews promise the arrival of Danny Glover, who immediately gets in good with Nora by suggesting a quickie wedding for the senator. Time to put the tent back up in the backyard! Meanwhile, it looks like Lena may be making a play for Justin this time around (yuck), and Rebecca may be jealous (yuckier).

For more recaps of “Domestic Issues,” check these sites:

• TV Guide
• Entertainment Weekly
• TV Squad
• Television Without Pity
• AfterElton

and come back here tomorrow for a round-up of memorable lines.

_{Photo: ABC.com}

Brothers and Sisters, ABC, Domestic Issues, recap