Swinging into another lovely week in “The League” land, Pete gets his lunch interrupted by his old friend Lane. Everyone has a friend like Lane. You know, that friend that calls and laments about everything that’s wrong with their life, who only asks how your day is so they can tell you how terrible theirs was. Anyway, Lane ends the call in a huff at the sound of Pete eating potato chips because *sacrilege* how could he dare eat while on the phone?!? Lane and I could never be friends. I go to TOWN when I’m on the phone with people. Oreos, chips, cheese doodles – I run the gamut, no food is safe.
At Gibson’s, Pete relays the story about Lane’s phone call, Andre reveals his lady problems with his cat, and Ruxin announces that he has two tickets to the Bears vs. Packers game — hello, competition between friends, haven’t seen you in a while. Taco interjects the excitement with his frustration at everyone being late to meet him at the movies. Everyone seems confused at Taco’s anger and they remind him that it’s Daylight Savings. Bewildered, Taco asks for explanation. The gang attempts miserably at explaining why Daylight Savings is a thing and Taco deems the entire thing stupid. Yeah, I feel you Taco. I can get with Daylight Savings in the fall but in the spring when we lose an hour? BULLSHIT.
Lane crashes in on Ruxin while he’s at work and has a borderline mental breakdown. In a weird moment of incessant babbling that sort of has me feeling like this is what you’d hear someone say if they were on shrooms, Lane offers to perform Reiki on Ruxin, Ruxin declines, and he somehow walks away with the Bears vs. Packers game tickets. Le sigh. No “friendly” competition after all.
The usual game-watching at the MacArthurs’ house is in motion and Andre shows up a little late with scratches all over his arms. His relationship with M’Lady, his cat, has become full-on abusive and he’s in serious denial. As is his awareness of paisley being something that’s fashionable… Taco comes in the living room unsure of why everyone is still awake. By his own method of telling time, “Taco Standard Time,” it’s five in the morning. Everyone’s really freaking confused until Andre gets word from his phone that Lane tried to commit suicide. (Here’s another situation where this show is seriously pushing the envelope… these writers DEFINITELY smoke a lot of weed and just say ‘screw it, let’s do it’ whenever they think of something horribly offensive.)
Ruxin goes to visit Lane in the hospital with no other purpose than to find out what Lane did with the Bears/Packers tickets. Lane insists that all the answers Ruxin’s looking for are in the thirteen-page suicide note he emailed everyone. Meanwhile, Taco has gone total Taco and changed all the clocks in the McArthur household to match “Taco Standard Time,” fourteen hours and thirty-nine minutes ahead of actual time. This and the massive CLOCK FIRE (????) Taco has erected in the front yard make Kevin super late to work. Mr. Lipscum is pissed at Kevin because he missed a major deposition that let a career criminal go free. Kevin uses Lane’s attempted suicide as his late excuse which sparks sympathy in the usually cold Lipscum and he insists that Kevin take the rest of the day.
Pete and Ruxin go to lunch with Lane, who is extremely upset that everyone is putting up their TL;DR blinders to his thirteen-page suicide note. As such, he has memorized the letter and proceeds to recite the absurd tale. Pete and Ruxin’s food arrives literally one sentence in and they can’t help but dig in to their fajitas. This enrages Lane even more and he leaves.
Andre visits Kevin to discuss his issues with his cat. He asks Kevin if he’s seen the videos he sent over and Kevin obviously says no. Andre pulls out the iPad and proceeds to play a Ray Rice/Solange-Jay Z-esque elevator video of him and M’Lady. Mr. Lipscum comes in and thinks Andre is Kevin’s suicidal friend. He sends his well-wishes, remarks on Andre’s scratches, and leaves. Kevin advises Andre to show that video to no one else and before he can say anymore, Taco arrives to give everyone “Taco Standard Time” watches. No one is interested. Andre is particularly unenthused with the watch, but is more unenthused when Mr. Lipscum returns to Kevin’s office with a doctor in tow to take Andre away because he believes Andre is a danger to himself. Well, this escalated quickly.
Pete refuses to read Lane’s suicide note so he recruits his coworker Jeremy to read it for him. Jeremy shows the note to Pete’s boss and Pete’s boss insists he leave for the day to better himself. Meanwhile, Andre is stuck sitting in a suicide prevention support group and the experience devolves into Andre venting about his abusive relationship with M’Lady. The group freaks out on him when they realize that he’s been venting about a cat and not a person. SO many judgments are thrown. This is a great scene, by the way, and there needs to be a gif of Andre “throwing judgments” made IMMEDIATELY.
At the MacArthur’s, Ruxin and Pete chat about the density of Lane’s suicide note. Kevin interrupts with the Andre/M’Lady elevator video and the reaction from the gang is pure disgust. Their disgust continues when they get a “suicide tweet” from Lane. They ponder if the protocol is to retweet or favorite. They agree on favoriting.
Lane goes for suicide round two with an attempt to asphyxiate himself in the car with the exhaust pipe. He fails when Taco joins him and the two just get stoned. Ruxin and Pete come out to find them and they inquire about the Bears/Packers tickets. Lane has given one to Taco and the other to Pete. Ruxin is left alone with the exhaust pipe. Womp womp.
THINGS TO NOTE:
Keep up with “The League” recaps here every week. “The League” airs on Wednesdays at 10 p.m. ET on FXX.
