Dallas - Season 4, Episode 20

Afton enjoys all of the superfluous airtime

"Ewing vs. Ewing"
Original airdate: 4/3/1981

Episode summary: Bobby defuses the Takapa quagmire by proposing a compromise. Cliff suspects that JR may have financed the Southeast Asian counter-revolution. Clint gives Sue Ellen an ultimatum.

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Recap: After arriving in downtown Dallas, Donna asks Miss Ellie if she's absolutely, positively, completely sure she wants to consult a divorce attorney, and Miss Ellie's like, "Hell yeah" and says that lately she's been able to think of little else other than her need to end the nightmare that has become her misery of a marriage to Mr. Crotchety. 

In a downtown hotel, Jock snarlingly declares to Bobby, "Now you listen to me, boy. The Takapa resort is going to be built!" Bobby tries to explain to his obnoxiously overbearing daddy that an entire panel of senators will be voting on the matter - but an agitated Jock nonsensically growls, "You're still my son, whichever place you're working at." Bobby points out that that doesn't give him the right to influence his vote, to which Jock bellows, "I'm not trying to influence you. I'm telling you what I want you to do!" Bwahahaha! Bobby makes clear that as an elected official he won't allow himself to be railroaded into voting a certain way, tells his idiot father he should have pulled out of the Takapa deal months ago, and that a parcel of swampland couldn't possibly be worth more to him than his forty-five year marriage. Jock grumbles that Miss Ellie has backed him into a corner, but then sheepishly agrees to make a compromise if Bobby can help him find a way out of this tedious Takapa turmoil.

"I can't let you railroad me, daddy sir."

"You can and you will, boy."

Miss Ellie tells her lawyer (Lincoln Hargrove) that she can't bear to live with Jock anymore - and Hargrove looks aghast, reminds her that she and Jock have been married for forty-five years, and strongly urges her to sort out whatever problems they may have. Miss Ellie says their problems run too deep, snarls, "To hell with the empire", and asks Hargrove if he's going to take the case or not. Hargrove says he's going to need some time to mull that over and promises to call her, and Miss Ellie makes it clear that if he doesn't want to represent her, she'll find another lawyer who'd be more than happy to. 

​Dave Stratton remarks to Jeremy Wendell that JR seemed kinda anxious when the Southeast Asian counter-revolution came up in conversation during the previous episode, then says that so far no one's been able to ID him as the coup's financier. Jeremy says that perhaps Cliff will be able to connect the dots, then tells Jeremy to cooperate with JR - but report directly to him any findings Cliff stumbles upon.

Over at Ewing Oil, JR gets a complete inventory of all company assets, much to the concern of his accountant, Baxter, who says it sounds as though he wants to sell the company. JR tells him to shut it with his observations and just get him the info he asks for whenever he asks for it. 

Sue Ellen rushes to the nursery to comfort an under-the-weather Baby John, then calls Clint to cancel the day's nooner.

Pam is doing some paperwork in the Southfork sitting room when Sue Ellen wanders in and mutters about how worried she is about Baby John. She adds that the doctor paid him a house call and pronounced his cold a mild illness, and Pam says it's understandable for her to worry and offers to help in any way she can. A few seconds later, Miss Ellie and Donna return from downtown, and Miss Ellie breaks the news that she's thinking seriously of ending her shittastic marriage. After she ambles off, a stunned Pam's all, "I can't believe it", while Sue Ellen wryly says she's surprised that those two have been married this long. LOL. She tells Donna and Pam that love doesn't count for much when it comes to any man that has Ewing blood in him - Ray included - then idly wonders what JR plans to do with himself when Ewing Oil gets dismantled as part of the divorce settlement.

Lincoln Hargrove heads straight to Ewing Oil to blab about Miss Ellie's intention to divorce Jock...and does this while seeming completely unconcerned about disbarment for violating client-lawyer privilege. Hargrove urges JR to stop his parents from divorcing, not least 'cause Miss Ellie doesn't seem to give a rat's ass about the destruction of Ewing Oil in the process. JR promises to try to salvage the situation...and after Hargrove exits the office, he phones Jeremy Wendell and says they're going to need to move fast if he has any desire to acquire Ewing Oil.

"I'm risking my law license to blab about your Mama's intention to divorce Jock."

"I'm appreciative of your efforts, as well as entirely indifferent to the possible end of your law career for blabbing to me about this."

Mitch apologizes to Lucy for acting like such an assbag the night before, and Lucy softens as the two exchange I love yous and walk arm-in-arm towards the bedroom for a morning romp. They're interrupted by a knock on the door by one of Lucy's photo shoot flunkies to inform her that the limo is waiting. As Mitch twitches unhappily, Lucy promises to fix him dinner when she gets home after modelling all day.  

JR summons Dave Stratton to Oil Ewing and orders him to keep in contact with Cliff and report back what he's up to, along with any info he's gathered on the Southeast Asian counter-revolution. Dave says he may have to feed Cliff something in exchange, and JR says he'd be more than happy to give him bits of useless intel to pass along to Cliff.

While dining out, Rebecca tells Pam that her daughter Katherine is interested in meeting her half-sister and hopefully half-brother. As Pam expresses sympathy for what happened with Cliff last episode, Cliff happens to be in the same restaurant and spots the two dining together. 

Leslie tells JR she found a superb suite of offices for her new PR company, which include a bedroom for when she has to work late. JR's penis perks up at the mention of a bedroom, and he asks her if she'd be willing to suspend her 'no sex with married men' policy, to which she responds by saying she can always stay in her current shitty office space. JR backs off and urges her to go ahead with renting the luxury office suite she wants, and the two smooch intensely - just as Louella enters the office to remind JR about his meeting with Jeremy Wendell.

Clint gives Sue Ellen a tour of his electronics company and proudly tells her he spent the last ten years building it...but that he's willing to give it all up for her in case he loses it in the divorce settlement. What a dumb chump. Sue Ellen urges him not to divorce his wife 'cause of how content she is with their daily nooners - but Clint says he won't settle for sneaking around, wants her to be his wife not his mistress, and is now going to passively wait for her to come to him whenever she decides she feels the same way.  

JR reads the fine print of Jeremy Wendell's Ewing Oil acquisition contract before signing...and Jeremy reminds him that in order to make it binding, Jock also has to sign it. He tells JR that he committed to his board that this was going to happen, regardless of Jock's/Miss Ellie's marriage status, and JR breezily assures him they have a deal.

Leslie returns to her apartment and finds her ex-husband Craig waiting for her. She tells him she's delighted to see him, then gives him the low-down on her latest target: JR Ewing. She chuckles about what a valuable client he's been, and how she's been holding him at arm's length 'cause she correctly assumes that once they hit the sheets he'll lose interest in her pretty quick. She tells Craig that if she were successful in suckering JR into marrying her, she'd get a great client list out of it, along with an enormous divorce settlement. [Assuming he'd neglect to ask her to sign a prenup, which I find highly doubtful.] Craig glances around the room and asks her if she's taping this conversation, and she laughs and says she only tapes people who are useful to her...and that he ceased being useful to her the moment he divorced her. 

Cliff bursts into Pam's office at The Store to inform her that the woman he saw her eating lunch with yesterday is a fraudster who's pretending to be a friend of their mother's. Pam calls him a damn fool with his bitterness and suspicious nature and breaks the news that the alleged fraudster is their bio mom.

Senate committee hearing! The panel is ready to discuss all things Takapa in front of both interested parties: Unified Development (Jock et. al.) and The DOA (Miss Ellie et. al.). As the hearing gets underway, Bobby interjects to tell the senators he's pretty sure he can save the committee a lengthy hearing by suggesting a compromise. When he's given the green light, he displays a regional map of Takapa and points at a parcel of semi-developed land located in close proximity to the swampland the DOA wants to preserve. He explains that he purchased this land with his own funds, and is willing to donate it to Unified Development in exchange for them agreeing to donate the original Takapa parcel of land to the state of Texas to be designated a wildlife preserve. After a few seconds of excited tittering by everyone in attendance, the senators agree that, yep, it's a fair and reasonable proposal...and both Unified Development and the DOA concur. Hurray! After the hearing adjourns, a pleased looking Jock tells Miss Ellie he's sooooo glad this storyline is finally over, but she just shoots him the stink-eye and snarls, "The only thing that's over is this hearing", and stomps off as Ray and Donna stare after her concernedly. 

"I would like to propose that my daddy build a shopping center on the semi-developed land I purchased in order to hastily wrap up this tiresome storyline."

"Brilliant! We agree."

"Us too."

"We're not sure what to do with our highly paid selves, now that this sticky conundrum has been resolved so quickly."

At Southfork that evening, Pam tells Bobby that since Miss Ellie looks supremely pissed off, she assumed that he voted against the DOA at the hearing. Bobby says, in fact, he worked out "a pretty terrific compromise" that made both sides happy, and Pam sheepishly apologizes for leaping to the wrong conclusion. 

Afton is singing in the Stardrift Lounge as Cliff hangs with Dave Stratton and tells him about the gut feeling he has that JR was somehow involved in the Southeast Asian counter-revolution, and is determined to figure out how it links to Hank Johnson. Dave asks him why he's so interested in something that doesn't remotely concern him, and Cliff just shrugs and says that since he doesn't have a fucking life, everything about Ewing Oil fascinates him. The camera then pans over to the stage where Afton is singing...and stays fixed on the bosomy blonde for the entire duration of her song (!). After she takes her final bow, she ambles over to where Cliff is sitting and asks if she knows him...and he's like, "Hey, that's my line!" and invites her to join him for a drink. Afton says he actually does look familiar to her, and the two quickly learn that he's Pam's brother and she's Lucy's sister-in-law. She tells Cliff that the Ewings have been very kind to her, particularly JR, and Cliff is all, "I'll just bet he has" but then seems intrigued by her slutty connection to his archenemy.

Jock calls JR at the office to grumble about how impossible it is to communicate with Miss Ellie, and therefore assumes that the divorce is a go. JR tells him he's been in talks with Jeremy Wendell about selling Ewing Oil - just as Ray arrives at Jock's hotel room to travel with him to the new Takapa development site. JR insists that they urgently need to talk, but Jock growls, "Not now" and hangs up on him.

Ray and Donna conspire to get Jock and Miss Ellie to run into each other at Casa Yokel so they can quickly make up [and wrap up filming Jim Davis' final scenes now that, sadly, he's about to become far too ill to make it to the Dallas set anymore]. Ray tells Miss Ellie he knows that the main source of tension is Jock's announcement that he's his bio son, which led to Gary no longer feeling guilty about starring in Dallas' spin-off show. Ray insists that he never intended to hurt her by making her think he ever presumed to take Gary's place, and she bitchily snaps, "It's a little late for that!" Ray [somehow refrains from telling her where she can stuff her bitchitude] and says he went to his lawyer last night and had papers drawn up that bar him from having any legal claim to Southfork or the Ewing spawns' trust, and hands them to Miss Ellie so she can look them over. As Jock gruffly warns him to not give up his birthright, Miss Ellie tells Ray that she can't let him do this, and admits that she's been clinging to the futile hope that Gary will one day want to return to Southfork. She acknowledges that he's likely never coming back, given how miserable he always was on the ranch, and nonsensically blamed him (Ray) and also channelled all of her hurt and anger in Operation Save Takapa From Being Developed Into a Shopping Mall. She tearfully tells Ray, "You are a Ewing" and says she wants him to stay at Southfork...and when a hopeful looking Jock asks if that invitation extends to him, she smilingly replies, "Oh yes." She asks Jock to forgive her for nearly destroying their marriage, and he replies, "There's nothing to forgive" - despite how cuntily she's behaved towards Ray for the last twelve episodes - and the two happily exchange I love yous and declare all of their marital problems water under the bridge.

"I'm willing to accept you as the Ewing family's ugly step-child."

"It's all I ever believed I deserve."

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