Twisted - Recap: Puttin' On the Skits

But we don't know why Danny did what he did, and that mystery keeps him from being wholly unsympathetic, since he could very likely have had a good reason for committing the crime that's shaped his entire identity in the community. In "PSA de Resistance", Danny tries more fervently to put the past behind him, and to blend in with his social surroundings. This is really the first time in the series where it's been made somewhat explicit that Danny simply wants a normal life. Initially, it had just seemed that Danny wanted his old friends back, and perhaps even his late, beloved father as well. But here, we can see the desperation in Danny's eyes, his need to put the past away and move forward. The episode succeeds by illustrating just how difficult that's going to be, not only for Danny, but for the people around him.

Credit: ABC Family

Danny's attempts to reclaim his old life are mostly focused on his mission to win back Lacey (Kylie Bunbury) as his friend. However, Lacey has no intention of letting Danny back into her life, particularly once she goes to Sheriff Masterson (Sam Robards) to make a statement only to learn that he already knew she'd slept over at Danny's house the night of Regina's death. Lacey thinks Danny spilled the beans, but Danny is quickly able to piece together that it was actually his mother, Karen (Denise Richards), who let the secret slip. But Lacey simply doesn't trust Danny, nor does Lacey's jock boyfriend, Archie (Grey Damon). Archie persists in his verbal abuse of Danny, declaring him a "sociopath" who manipulates others to get what he wants. Danny sets out to disprove this notion by assisting Phoebe (Brittany Curran) in her Sobriety Awareness Day skit for the school assembly. Jo (Maddie Hasson) decides to join Danny in helping out, though they don't exactly receive a warm welcome. In particular, Sarita (Jamila Velasquez) proves to be the most insufferable character in the episode, spending half the time whining about having to rehearse for the skit, then getting bitter once Danny's script rewrite cuts out her character. Phoebe tries to placate the wounded Sarita by putting her in charge of the A/V, but this proves to be a catastrophic mistake.

Credit: ABC Family

At the assembly, Danny, Lacey and Jo perform the skit themselves, and it's the best scene of the episode for how it serves as a microcosm of the trio's lost friendship, as they work through issues of separation, peer pressure and forgiveness. However, things quickly go awry when Sarita plays video of a drunk Jo cavorting around at Regina's party. Jo is humiliated, and Rico (Ashton Moio), who has been alienating himself from Jo due to what he feels is her changing attitude, flees from the assembly, presumably hurt by having witnessed a side of his best friend he's never seen before. Rico and Jo eventually come face-to-face, at which point Rico reveals that his behavior is borne out of a fear of losing Jo. Though the two friends quickly make amends, the same cannot be said for Danny and Lacey. They have a moment in the hallway after the assembly in which Danny pleads with Lacey to give him another chance. In that moment, the two come perilously close to a romantic entanglement, as it looks like both Danny and Lacey are about to lean in for a kiss. However, Lacey breaks eye contact and flees down the hall before things have the chance to get too real.

Credit: ABC Family

Not long after, Danny confronts Archie, and it's Avan Jogia's best scene in the series so far. Danny reveals just how desperately he wants to "blend in" and pleads with Archie to quit calling him a "psycho" every time he enters a room. In essence, Danny offers a truce to Archie, and the vulnerability in Danny's eyes represents a first for the character, since I can't recall having seen him this desperate before. But in genuine Archie fashion, Danny's offer is rebuffed. "You're not gonna blend in here," Archie says. "You might as well accept it." The angst in this scene is deftly followed up by a confrontation between Danny and his mother, after Danny reveals that he's taken his attempts to blend in a step further by joining the soccer team, of all things. Karen demands to know why Danny got rid of all their pictures of Aunt Tara. "Because it's morbid!" Danny shouts, and though we know that he was at least part of his motivation was to dispose of suspicious evidence, Jogia delivers the line with such conviction that it's hard to believe that Danny doesn't mean it. He takes it a step further by railing against Karen, saying, "I'm trying to start over! What chance do I have if my own mom doesn't believe me?" Karen softens her stance and embraces Danny, assuring him that she does believe him. But there's a darker side to Danny lingering beneath the surface that we haven't had occasion to see in full. And once again, no one but Danny knows that the necklace is under his bed. Mysteries pile on top of mysteries.

Credit: ABC Family

We also get progress in the investigation, as Sheriff Kyle Masterson doesn't let up on his obsession with Danny's guilt. He tries to get photos of Danny's house from a realtor in order to see if there's a copy of the Aunt Tara photo in one of the pics. However, when that doesn't pan out, Sheriff Masterson looks into his own collection of photographs from his daughter's shared childhood with the presumed killer. And there, in a photo taken at one of Danny's boyhood birthday parties, is a picture of Aunt Tara -- and she's wearing the incriminating necklace. Kyle now has the circumstantial evidence he needs to prove Danny and his mother were lying about having never seen the necklace before, in addition to destroying the incriminating photographic evidence in their house. This might be enough for a search warrant, and if the cops look under Danny's bed, it could be game over. But Regina's case isn't nearly as open-and-shut, as Jo and Rico discover that Archie was lying about his activities on the night of Regina's murder. He had told everyone that he wasn't at the party because he was at home, resting up for the big game the next day. But if that's true, why would he have needed to borrow the car of Sarita's boyfriend Scott (Todd Julian) for the entire night? And further down the rabbit hole we go...

Credit: ABC Family

"PSA de Resistance" tells a solid story about forgiveness, and the ways in which friendships live and die by one friend's capacity to forgive the other. If two people can't come to a mutual understanding such that forgiveness is possible, then the friendship really has no chance. It's illustrated here between Danny and Lacey, and more successfully between Rico and Jo. It's these kinds of stories, grounded in the character connections that evolve and change as the story grows more complex, that will separate the series from other dramas of its ilk. As for now, however, Twisted remains one of Tuesday night's best summer offerings.