Dallas - Season 4, Episode 2

"Sorry for possibly shooting you."

"No More Mister Nice Guy, Part 2"
Original airdate: 11/9/1980

Episode summary: JR undergoes a second surgery to remove the bullet from his spine. Gary arrives in Dallas to offer support to his family. Jock puts Bobby in charge of Ewing Oil. 

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Recap: JR glances around his hospital room in response to the police detective's question, "Do you know who shot you?", then finally replies that it was too dark and that he doesn't remember anything after stepping into the darkened hallway. A nurse enters the room and orders everyone to leave so that JR can get some rest...and Sue Ellen hangs back and hovers over JR as she tearfully moans, "I'm sooooo very sorry."

Lucy returns to Southfork from her airport run with Gary, and he's warmly greeted by the family before everyone seats themselves at the patio table for breakfast. After a few minutes of pleasant chitchat, Gary decides he'd like to meet his baby nephew and heads up to the nursery. Ellie reminds Jock about his promise to keep Bobby at Southfork, so Jock turns his attention to Bobby and tells him he'd like to install him as interim overlord at Ewing Oil. Bobby makes an ew face at the prospect and says he's not remotely interested in being in charge of the family business, then asks if the company can't just run itself for the time being. LOL. Ellie pleads with him to stay in town and take the reins of the company...and Bobby unhappily mulls that over for a few seconds before agreeing to temporarily fill in.

Gary dotes over Baby John, then turns his attention to Sue Ellen and invokes the car accident that led to the tot's premature birth. When Sue Ellen gets defensive about her binge drinking, Gary says that as a fellow alcoholic he totally gets her reluctance to open up about it...and she manages to keep a straight face when she retorts that sure she likes to take a drink every now and again to steady her nerves, but doesn't consider herself to be an alcoholic. Gary nods sympathetically at her deluded pronouncement and says that he too thought he had his alcoholism beat - but as soon as he took one drink, things immediately spiralled out of control. Sue Ellen snaps at him to stop preaching at her, insists again that she's not an alcoholic, and stomps out of the nursery.

"Us reforming alcoholics need to stick together."

"Speak for yourself, wino."

At the entry point of the Southfork gates, Gary asks Bobby to pull the car over so they can gaze at the estate and contemplate the toxic Ewing dysfunction from afar. Bobby informs him that he and Pam were on their way to start a new life in California when they got the news about JR's shooting, then agree that the collective douchewaddery of Jock and JR are what make living at Southfork so unbearable. Gary jokes that if JR hadn't been shot, they might be surfing together right now...and the two lament how, hospitalized or not, JR always seems to control their destinies.

Sue Ellen is sitting by JR's bedside, urging him to get better so that he can come home soon. JR says that that may not be very realistic, then reveals that he can't feel his legs and worries it's 'cause he's paralyzed...and Sue Ellen stares back at him in horror while twitching nervously.

Dr. Pearson tells the Ewings that JR's paralysis is caused by the bullet that's still lodged in his spine, but that a second surgery could be risky 'cause it could lead to permanent paralysis...or kill him altogether. Miss Ellie ignores that last thing and insists that she wants the world's best neurosurgeon to operate on her son - but Sue Ellen snaps that she doesn't want her husband to undergo the risk of surgery, period. After she storms off, the Ewings continue to discuss JR's options, and Dr. Pearson says that if JR gives him the go-ahead for the surgery, it'll need to get done in the next day or so. 

Pam turns on the local news and hears a report on Vaughn Leland, who's been cleared as a suspect in JR's shooting 'cause apparently he was his lawyer's office at the time, filing for bankruptcy.

Sue Ellen schedules an emergency appointment with Dr. Ellby to wail at him about how afraid she is that she may have been the one who shot JR. Dr. Ellby scrunches his face confusedly and asks her how in blazes she wouldn't know that for sure, so she explains that 1) she had a gun in her purse, 2) had every intention of ending her husband's life when she stormed out of the house, and 3) got wasted on her way to kill JR and now has no memory of what happened prior to waking up the morning after in the airport parking lot. She then rolls her eyes and recounts - with a mystifying lack of self-awareness - how her recovering alcoholic brother-in-law had the temerity to also refer to her as an alcoholic, and Dr. Ellby's like, "Well duh" and points out the obvious: she just confessed to drinking so much booze that she completely blacked out and isn't sure whether or not she shot her own husband. Sue Ellen says she's perplexed at the tenderness she now feels for JR, who she just wants to protect while he's laying helpless in his hospital bed. She tearfully adds that she's against him having a second surgery 'cause she's afraid it might result in her losing him for good.

"My brother-in-law tried to paint me as a hopeless alcoholic."

"And this is inaccurate because..?"

During a stroll, Gary tells Miss Ellie that he was incentivized to stop drinking when Valene threatened to leave him...and would possibly consider moving back to Dallas if Jock and JR didn't always act like such hostile dickwads towards him and his wife. Miss Ellie says she'd loooooove it if he and Valene settled in Dallas, and Gary stares wistfully into space and non-promises, "Maybe someday."

Bobby is on the phone at Ewing Oil, talking to some yokel named Billy John about oil leases. After the call, he whines to his secretary Connie by rhetorically asking what he was thinking agreeing to being in charge, and complains that any of his business decisions can be overturned by Jock at any given time. Connie just shrugs and weakly reminds him that he's a Ewing...and a few seconds later, a process server bursts into the foyer to hand Bobby a subpoena. Upon reading it, he learns that Ewing Oil is being sued by Marilee Stone for the wrongful death of her husband Seth after he reacted to getting swindled by JR by killing himself. Bobby gets Marilee on the phone and implores her to drop the lawsuit, and she snappishly retorts that she has nothing to say to him and that her lawyer will be in touch with his lawyer.

Gary and Bobby are visiting with JR, and the three happily reminisce about their childhood at Southfork. JR asks Gary if Miss Ellie has tried to talk him into staying in Dallas permanently...and Gary says she has, but that it's a non-starter now that he has a spin-off show he needs to get off the ground.

Lucy and her gal pals are hanging by the Southfork pool, making plans to go out on the town this evening and troll for men.

JR is conducting Ewing Oil business from his hospital bed...and when he ends the call, Sue Ellen fusses over him and urges him to relax more. JR shoots her a suspicious glare and remarks on all the time she's been spending with him since his shooting, and she says she's merely ensuring that he's being properly cared for...then warns him about the dangers of undergoing a second surgery. A skeptical JR asks her if she's running her scam of pretending to be a loving wife so that she can blindside him by abruptly filing for divorce and taking away their son - but she gets teary and says she feels protective of him after the shooting and that she genuinely wants to be close to him. As JR stares back at her in puzzlement, she leans in and gives him a tender smooch.

Bobby whines to Pam about how frustrated he is that his business decisions keep getting overruled by Jock and JR. He says he's going to demand that the two stay out of his handling of the Stone lawsuit...and that if Jock agrees to give him carte blanche at Ewing Oil, he'll finally know whether or not his daddy truly trusts him.

Kristin runs into Alan Beam in the hospital parking lot and tells him she heard that the cops were looking for him. Alan says they tracked him down in a Chicago hotel room...and that he's happy to report he's no longer a suspect in JR's shooting 'cause he was in Missouri when the actual shooting occurred. He asks Kristin if she knows who the shooter could be, and she just shrugs faux cluelessly and says with a straight face that she has absolutely no idea...then foolishly reminds him that she too had a motive to shoot JR 'cause of how horribly he treated her. 

"Any idea who shot JR?"

"Nope!"

Bobby drops by Marilee Stone's house unannounced to urge her to settle the wrongful death matter out of court. Marilee rails about JR being "a vulture", says it's no wonder that Sue Ellen became a drunk, then moans about how much she misses Seth. Bobby says he's sympathetic, but that winning a lawsuit against Ewing Oil is a long shot...and that the only thing she'll accomplish is making her lawyers rich. He offers her a payment of 500K and the satisfaction of knowing that she beat the Ewings, and she flirtily straightens his collar and calls him "very persuasive". She invites him to stay for a drink, but he declines and mumbles, "Rain check."

A bored, drunken Lucy is out clubbing with her friends...and eventually she grows tired of the clubbing and announces that she's leaving. She staggers out the door, gigglingly gives the cute blonde valet her ticket...and he wisely pays a cab driver to transport the nitwit home in lieu of allowing her to put herself in danger and/or needlessly kill whoever else happens to be out on the road in a senseless drinking and driving accident.

Two policemen drop by Cliff's apartment with a search warrant, and Cliff saves them the time and energy from ripping the place apart by directing them right to the drawer where he stores his .38 calibre gun. The cops carefully place it in a baggie and ask Cliff to accompany them to headquarters for questioning in the attempted murder of JR Ewing, and he's like 'sure, why the hell not?' and amiably heads out with them. 

A world renowned neurosurgeon tells the Ewings that JR needs to have an operation in order to remove the bullet that's lodged in his spine - but can't guarantee that he'll ever walk again. Miss Ellie and Jock tell him they're A-OK with that...while a despondent Sue Ellen heads into JR's hospital room to hover over him before giving him a pre-surgery good luck kiss. He gamely assures her, "No one ever beats JR."
​
Cliff calls Pam to inform her that he's been stuck at the police station all night while a ballistics check was being performed on his revolver to see if the bullets match the ones that someone pumped into JR. Pam's all, "Ack!" and tells him she'll be right over.

The cute blonde valet (aka Mitch Cooper) is studying in his dorm room when Lucy drops by and saucily asks him if he remembers her. He says he vaguely recalls that she was the drunkard from the bar last night, and she tells him she came by to repay the cab fare and get the skinny on who he is and what he does. He tells her he's a med student who has very little time to socialize...and when she flirtily suggests that they get together sometime, he says he hopes she's not asking him out 'cause he's a misogynist tool who prefers men to do the asking. Lucy shoots him an irritated stink-eye before storming out...and this is definitely not the last we'll see of chauvinist Mitch.

"I prefer my women to meekly await my dinner invitations."

"You seem like a definite keeper."

​Cliff is playing cards with a lieutenant when Pam arrives at police headquarters. A few seconds later, the ballistics report comes back and Cliff is told that the bullets from his gun don't match the ones that were uncovered in JR's shooting. The lieutenant tells Cliff that while he's free to go, he's still considered a suspect.

During JR's surgery, Dr. Pearson remarks that the nerve near where the bullet is lodged wasn't severed, which is good news for JR possibly being able to walk again.

Bobby is in the hospital's waiting room when he gets a business call from some two-name yokel. Bobby irritably informs the caller that he doesn't have the authority to decide anything without first clearing it with Jock, then hangs up and stomps back to the waiting room looking visibly frustrated. When Jock asks him whassup with the bitchy demeanor, Bobby whines about having to run to him to get an OK for everything that happens at Ewing Oil, and that he's sick and tired of always being second guessed. He then lays out an ultimatum: he'll agree to remain at the helm of Ewing Oil as long as he's granted full control of all company decisions, in writing. Jock says he'd be more than happy to accommodate that...and an eavesdropping Sue Ellen looks less than thrilled to learn of this latest development.

After the surgery, Dr. Pearson tells the Ewings that JR handled the operation well - but that it's too soon to know if he'll regain the ability to walk.

That evening, Sue Ellen sits by JR's bedside and stares at him concernedly...and for some reason this where the writers decided to abruptly end the episode.

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