Hart of Dixie - Season 3 Episode 3 - Recap - Take This Job and Shove It
Hart of Dixie - Season 3 Episode 3 - Recap - Take This Job and Shove It
The CW's charming sitcom/melodrama Hart of Dixie returns with another episode (with my recap a day late thanks to a local sportsball match pre-empting the show, grrr). We're far less complex here than in last week's installment, but that's not a bad thing at all. Dr. Zoe Hart is still headstrong in her quest to win back the people of BlueBell, many of whom mistrust her after she'd left a few months back.
Zoe's still out of work after her return to BlueBell, but she's been schmoozing and diagnosing to try and win back her half of the practice from Dr. Brick Breeland. Then, Zoe's useless and terrible boyfriend Joel accidentally makes Brick think Zoe wants to open a competing practice. The pair go to explain/apologize, but because Brick is a total jerk, a yelling match begins and Zoe says she will open her own practice after all. Big coincidence as town lawyer George Tucker enters the doctor's office just in time to inform Zoe that her contract had a non-competition clause, meaning she can't open a practice without getting sued into show cancellation. Brick hires a private investigator to follow Zoe; he wants to make sure she isn't secretly seeing any patients. Then, Zoe gets an emergency call from George and Lynly. In an effort to distract Brick while Zoe is away, Joel gets gut punched and has Brick do a bunch of unnecessary tests on him. He's still an annoying character who I hate though.
George is law tutor to LaVon's cousin Lynly, who won't stop flirting with him. She tries a slick move where she lays in his bed in her skivvies, but this ends up being embarrassing for everyone (which, I mean, come on, George is crazy; Lynly is super hot). Lynly tries to get her dress back on, but the zipper is stuck. She asks for George's help, and he gets his hand caught in it (they show it and it's super gross). The pair calls up Zoe for help. Zoe arrives on George's boat to find George and Lynly looking... indecent. She helps George unzip his hand from the dress. They keep showing the wound and I hate it so much, it's so gross ahhhhhh!
Mayor LaVon Hayes is distressed because BlueBell's rival town of Fillmore is about to get a minor league baseball team. The owner of the team is an old friend of Brick's, though, so LaVon asks for help in trying to swing the pendulum towards BlueBell instead. Brick's got to woo the team's owner, an obsessed former beau. Brick has to leave when his PI calls about Zoe, and the deal ends up falling through.
Zoe takes the high road and concedes defeat to Brick, writing him a check for $350k (the amount he'd be able to sue for if she started her own practice) as a symbolic gesture. In a rare move of not being a jerk, Dr. Breeland makes his own gesture right back, offering Zoe a job at the practice not as his equal but as his subordinate. She accepts readily, very eager to earn back the town's trust after her abandoning it.
Lemon is still on the outs with the Belles. Her affair with Meatball has her under sanction, with her opinion being wholly disregarded. She's basically got to be hazed all over again in order to be reinstated. After hours and hours of chores, Lemon just ends up quitting the Belles. That feels a bit anti-climactic, but this was also the plot with the smallest amount of screen time, so it's understandable.
This week felt like a vacation almost, taking a slower pace for smaller stories with lower stakes. There were hardly any social disasters at all! Usually the show revolves around someone making a big mistake in the town and having to deal with all the embarrassment as fallout from it. This week had the staple weekly medical emergency, but the social faux pas were mostly inconsequential. It does feel distinctly as if the events of the episode (Zoe's new job, Lemon quitting the Belles, the Fillmore sports team, etc.) will have a major effect on the rest of the season, though, so I'm excited for more! Check out the preview below.