Six Feet Under recap: Falling Into Place (Season 4 premiere)(Original air date 13 June 2004)

THIS WEEK'S EPITAPHS:

• Here lies Lisa, or at least most of her.
• We fondly remember Nate's marriage, such as it was.
• Let's have a moment of silence for Russell's seemingly cool cynicism.
• Arthur, your casket has been ordered.

Bruno Baskerville Walsh (1951-1972) — Trippy, man. A bunch of college students are dropping acid and seeing how beautiful life can be when you're fucked up. The main one says that "the motherfucking moments, man, they just keep on coming" -- and yeah, that's true, but they are a bit less overwhelming when the light is not all bendy and twisty around you. He leads his friend Cindy, or Sandy, or something, up onto the roof, and then promptly jumps off it, and seems to sort of watch himself die from the vantage point of his suspended acid-addled animation.

You know, when I was about 8, my sister made me promise her that I'll try acid before I die. From the looks of it, I could end up trying it right before I die.

Brenda's apartment — Brenda is tending to Nate's bruised and battered face. He apologizes for showing up at her door, but shouldn't you try to be with your soulmate when you're desperate and broken?

The Fishers' kitchen table — Claire wants to know when she gets to self-destruct, or when David does, or when somebody besides Nate does. I dunno, Claire, I think maybe your "self" is not quite as much in your way as Nate's is in his way. But I get your point.

Claire says she's "so sick of everything being so fuckin' awful all the time." David gives her a look of true sympathy that makes me wish, and not for the first time, that he were my big brother. Claire tells Keith goodnight and gives him and David a sarcastically sweet smile as she goes.

We get this delicious bit of dialogue:

Keith: "I feel like I've been eating this cake for 12 months."
David: "I wasn't gonna say anything."

Don't mock me like that! Do you know how hard it is to wait so damn long for these shows to start up again? No, you don't, so eat your cake and shut the fuck up.

David tells Keith he can stay over, if he's too drunk to drive or "whatever." Yeah, it's the whatever that keeps you two together. They bicker some more and end up laughing at each other.

Brenda's apartment — Nate needs to sleep, and Brenda tells him so, but he's in too much shock and pain. He says, "It's all so fuckin' impossible," but it really isn't, Nate, and you of all people should know that, with the kinds of things you see every day.

Fisher & Diaz — Keith and David are cuddling in David's childhood bedroom. David says it's strange that he's just been blown in the same bed where his mother used to read him The Runaway Bunny. Right on cue, they hear George and Ruth moaning in bed. David hides under the covers. I'd be diving out the window, I think, but I guess it is George and Ruth's wedding night, after all.

Arthur and Claire are rather disconcerted by the whole thing too.

In the master bedroom, Ruth marvels at the fact that she's married again, because she never though she would be. Well, maybe you're not: this guy is so shady, he probably worked something out at that tacky wedding chapel so he won't have to bother with another divorce when he's ready to leave.

George says something deceptively enlightened about living his life just the way he's wanted to, and whoever doesn't like it can go fuck themselves. Ruth doesn't look terribly impressed, with either his philosophy or the fucking. But she does look like she's in love, so okay, whatever.

Brenda's bathroom mirror — Brenda's brushing her teeth. I think I could watch her do that for hours, but I could watch her do almost anything for hours.

She gets into bed with Nate, intending to comfort and hold him, and of course he soon starts to want more than comfort. So she lets him do whatever he wants, but I don't think she has any illusions about what that really is: just another form of comfort, because sex can have all kinds of healing effects, and can even be a way to express grief and move through it. Yeah, I could be reading too much into it, but Brenda's face is telling me a lot. She loves Nate, so she's helping him any way she can, and that's part of what makes her so gorgeous. Yeah, I know, the sex addict thing complicates it, but she still seems to know exactly what the hell she's doing.

The next morning, they sum things up:

Brenda: "Nate..."
Nate: "You don't have to say it. I know."

Things are still like that between these two, aren't they? Unspoken. Ineffable.

Or not. They say a frosty farewell, but maybe that's because Nate can't feel much of anything right now.

The Fishers' kitchen table — Claire, Keith, and David are laughing about the noises of the night before. Keith gets David some more coffee, and it's a grand gesture that both Claire and David notice.

Nate comes in with his bashed-in face and bad news. He explains that Lisa drowned, and that it took the lab a while to figure out that it was her.

David: "She just... drowned?"
Nate: "That's what they said. No evidence of anything else... bad."
Keith: "But she could swim, right?"
Nate: "Yeah. It just... looks like she drowned."

Yeah, we're all thinking it, Keith.

Claire asks Nate what happened to his face; he just says he got in a fight, and rolls his eyes at himself.

George and Ruth saunter in, aglow with their newly wedded bliss, until they see Nate's face and hear the news about Lisa. Nate and his mom share a nice hug.

Rico's house — Vanessa wants to know why Rico got home late the night before -- you know, when he was with Infinity the stripper. He makes up some excuse. You suck, Rico. Yeah, I know: so does Infinity.

On the road to get Lisa — Nate asks David whether he and Keith are back together. David says no, he was just being polite when he told Keith he could spend the night. "Polite and horny," says Nate. Snicker.

Nate bares his soul:

Nate: "I never really thought Lisa and I would be together forever. I always knew something would come along and end it. I just didn't want it to be me. You wouldn't believe how much time I wasted thinking, 'Please don't let it be me that fucks it up.'
David: "And it wasn't."
Nate: "No. Good for me."

A flashback — Lisa says Nate smells funny, and it's because of the cavity fluid. She says that when she dies, she doesn't want any of that stuff in her; she just wants to be buried in the forest somewhere, with nothing between her and the earth that made her.

Nate: "You don't want to end up in a graveyard."
Lisa: "Nate, the whole world's a graveyard."

I know people didn't like Lisa much. But I've been a Lili Taylor fan for quite a while, and I think she conveys wide-eyed trust and simple belief better than anyone, and that's what she did just then.

Brenda's apartment — Brenda's horny horn-playing neighbor, Joe, arrives with Chinese food. Brenda's been crying, and he can tell, so she just says, "A friend of mine died." She and Joe share some awkward, yet companionable, salt-and-pepper shrimp. I can't believe that's the same guy that was in Mulholland Drive (which, by the way, includes some of the hottest girl-on-girl kissing I've ever seen).

Brenda says she'll eat the shrimp; she eats everything but mushrooms. I'm with ya there: the texture is so icky! And they taste like dirt, which is what Joe says.

Santa Barbara — David goes into the... the morgue or wherever, to pick up Lisa's body. The mortician starts to talk about how messed up the corpse is, and says it was one of the worst ones he's ever seen, so David interrupts and says "this is my sister-in-law." The guy says he thought David was there on business, to which David says, "I am, and this is my sister-in-law, and you shouldn't talk like that about anybody." I almost wish Nate had gone in instead: he would have decked the guy. We get a brief glimpse of Lisa's body, and it's sad.

Back in the van, the smell is almost too much for Nate and Dave, so they roll the windows down and get the fuck outta there.

Fisher & Diaz — Lisa's sister Barb is nice. She has two scary-looking twin sons. Well, they're sort of cute, but they're also sort of Stephen King-y. Lisa's parents are even more frightening, though: her dad seems to only be able to speak in clichés, and her mom is an Atavan-popping one-person pity party.

Lisa's niece, Michaela, bonds with David, who asks her if she wants something to eat. She says, "Not me. But I bet the rest of them do." This kid looks like she could grow up to work at Fisher & Diaz, and also looks like she could be the kid sister of Christina Ricci or Jena Malone, and coming from me those are all compliments.

Rico's house — Vanessa asks her sister Angelica to move out. Angelica blames Rico, of course, but I think this time Rico's actually innocent, even though he does look awfully pleased.

Claire's bedroom — David is there to escape from all the people downstairs. Claire is trying to "break her eye open" -- to learn to see things differently, without all the "tired associations we've made all our sad lives," so she can be a better artist. She's looking at a book of Nan Goldin's photography. Good stuff.

Claire asks David whether he's back together with Keith, and more importantly, whether he wants to be.

David: "I think I could be happy going back, if I could..."
Claire: "Break your eye open a little."
David: "Yeah. If we both could."
Claire: "Is it that hard?"
David: "You tell me."
Claire: "Yeah. The hardest fuckin' thing in the world."
David: "Yeah. It is. What about you: are you seeing anybody? Have you got a thing for anybody?"
Claire: "Are you kidding? Ugh. Everyone is an asshole who ultimately fucks you over. I am totally done with that. I'm thinking about becoming like a crazy hermit recluse."
David: "You won't always feel that way."
Claire: "Yes, I will."

The Stephen King-y twins come to get David; he's wanted downstairs. Claire thanks him for listening to her complain about her "cushy, alienated life." Claire rocks.

Downstairs at Fisher & Diaz — Lisa's mom doesn't care what Lisa wanted: she's putting her daughter in the family mausoleum in Coeur d'Alene. David tries to get everybody to compromise. Lisa's mom pops some more pills. Barb tries to respect Lisa's wishes, sort of. Nate just can't be there anymore, so he leaves. Michaela is watching from afar.

A phone call — Claire calls Russell from her car. Russell is on his way to have coffee with some "absolute idiots who think they're revolutionaries because they just went to their first flash mob." Hey, I wanna try one of those! I guess I should move to a cooler town.

Claire tells Russell about Lisa. What can you say to news like that? Russell doesn't really know either.

The basement at Fisher & Diaz — David and Nate argue while Arthur alternately eavesdrops and tries to excuse himself. Nate wants to bury Lisa under the stars, and of course David knows that's against the law and they could lose their license. Fuck the law!

A church — Rico wants to confess his sins. I guess that's good, but he's still an idiot, because anybody who can't see how beautiful Vanessa is doesn't really deserve a second chance. Also, when did Catholics start doing face-to-face confessions? I would think the anonymity would be a good thing. But at least this way the priest can see that although Rico may be feeling guilty, he's not really feeling sorry.

Brenda's apartment — Brenda calls Nate. There's a book and a highlighter on her desk: what's she studying? She asks Nate when Lisa's funeral is, and whether she should go to it. Nate says no, probably not. Brenda says Nate should do whatever he needs to do. I need you to tell me what you're studying, Brenda, and whether you're available to go for coffee, right about now. I hate mushrooms and like sex: we're meant for each other!

The funeral service — Lisa's sister Barb says some truly beautiful things about Lisa's inability to understand the borders that most of us think keep life manageable: yeah, that was the thing I liked about her, even if borders were the thing Lisa couldn't maintain where Nate was concerned. Barb closes her comments with this: "Lisa didn't believe in borders, and that's why I know that wherever Lisa is right now, she's everywhere. She's everywhere and that means she's home."

Lisa's mom cries openly in a very fake way. I cry surreptitiously in a very real way. Then those spooky twins, and their father, sing that Crosby, Stills, Nash, & Young song, "Teach Your Children." It's kinda perfect.

Elsewhere, Claire tells Russell that she had an abortion, because she needs someone to talk to. He gets possessive and insulted and eventually says this stupid thing:

Russell: "It's fucking sad and it's fucked up. I mean, did you cry? Did you?"
Claire: "I cried more than you have ever cried in your whole life."

Russell, I used to think you were kind of cool, but you're being a jerk. And that ponytail is absolutely hideous.

Speaking of hideous, George pokes his head in to make sure everything's okay. Go away, George.

Outside — Rico offers to go to the crematorium first thing in the morning to pick up the ashes, but Nate says he'll handle it himself and have them do it right away. David says, in a plotting, suspicious way, that he'll see Nate in about an hour.

A street — Rico drives by the strip club. You still suck, Rico.

The couch — David tells Keith that he doesn't know what he'd do if he lost him. Keith says he'd find somebody else, but David doesn't want anybody else, and neither does Keith.

David: "Then why do we...?"
Keith: "Keep fuckin' it up?
David: "Yeah."
Keith: "Because we're human?"
David: "If there was a way to start over... if there was actually a way to start over, I'd do it, I really would. But is there, even, really a way to start over, really? Just even in general. I was talking to Claire, and she's trying to see in this new way, you know, for her art. I don't know how it happens; I don't know where the new comes from. You know, the genuinely new. God, I don't."

I don't either. This show was kinda new, though, when it started, and it's still pretty good, so maybe the answer is to watch more TV.

They decide they can find the genuinely new together, but not if they have to sit through more therapy, and only if Keith quits his job. They joke about having just sort of gotten married, and it's cute. Keith gives David the remote -- another grand gesture. Yay!

Outside Brenda's apartment — Neighbor Joe is feeding stray cats. Brenda says she appreciated his stopping by the other night, and then gives him a kiss. Hmm.

The basement at Fisher & Diaz — Nate is boxing up some ashes. He presents them to Lisa's parents, who are grateful. Lisa's dad spits out another meaningless platitude.

Michaela the goth girl tells David she's glad he's in her family. David's good with kids the way I am: he treats them like they're people, rather than aliens.

Nate tells David there's some stuff to clean up in the basement. David says he'll take care of it.

Falling into place — And then Nate goes, out on the road. We go back to David for a moment: he's cleaning up the mess Nate left when he boxed up the ashes -- which were actually those of Bruno Baskerville Walsh. Trippy!

So yes, Nate is returning Lisa to the earth that made her. While he does, we see Claire, still trying to break her eye open; and David, going back to Keith's house, to try to make it a home; and Ruth, watching George sleep.

Nate digs the grave, and it's hard work and not quite right, but there Lisa is, under the stars. He struggles to get her out of the body bag; it's horrible to hear her thump against the dirt walls of her new home. Nate sobs, and in the cold morning light, he screams.

I'll say it again: I know people didn't like Lisa much, and maybe Nate didn't really love her either. But in his desperate, stark grief, Nate has done right by her, in his own way, and I think it's enough.

NEXT WEEK ON SIX FEET UNDER: Brenda reveals that she's studying to become a therapist; Claire looks to Mena Suvari for inspiration (and who doesn't, really?); Keith guards the stars; Nate gets even more dissatisfied with his life; and there's something horrible on the kitchen table.

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