Twisted - Recap: A Cute Triangle

It's not thematically dense or anything, but it doesn't really need to be. This is the ABC Family teen mystery show formula at its best, taking an engaging, catalyzing situation and crafting characters around it that leave an indelible impression, for better or worse (hell, this is the episode that finally got me on-board the Lacey train, once and for all). I'm actually a bit surprised at how quickly the story is escalating, seven episodes into the season. There's a lot of story here to burn through, so it sort of makes sense that we're already at the point where two of our principal characters are hooking up on the regular, but what of the mystery at the heart of the series? Sure, it's unlikely the show is going to twist its audience by revealing that Danny really is as bad as everyone thinks he is, but there's an awful lot of circumstantial evidence against him -- and the vagueness of his responses aren't helping. It's the aura of mystery surrounding Danny and his troubled past that make him such a narratively potent figure, and why the story of "We Need to Talk About Danny" is so compelling. The more the show centers on Danny, the better it invariably is.

Credit: ABC FAMILY/Eric McCandless

Though Danny finally gives a vague answer to why he killed his Aunt Tara, the bulk of "We Need to Talk About Danny" centers on the love triangle, and how outcasts often seek understanding through other outcasts. It would be a bit of a misnomer to label Lacey an "outcast," but she's drifting farther and farther apart from her central circle of friends like Sarita. Even her relationship with Archie is going down the tubes. It all comes to a head when Sarita gives Lacey an ultimatum, either them or Danny/Jo. This, in itself, would be a hard enough decision, but the matters are complicated by Lacey's romantic feelings for Danny, who confesses that the kiss they shared has been all he thinks about. For much of the episode, Lacey tries to deny her feelings to herself -- which is the opposite from the approach Jo takes. As much as it might upset Rico (Ashton Moio), Jo admits that she has a crush on Danny, and resolves to get over it. "It's not like I want to have a crush," Jo tells him, but Rico doesn't feel that any of the actions she's taken are the actions of someone who's trying to get over a crush. And he's right, for the most part. But he's not her boyfriend, so while Jo can appreciate the advice he's giving (even if it comes in the form of scolding), she isn't actually obligated to listen to any of it.

Credit: ABC Family

Even though it accounts for a small piece of the episode, I found the scenes between Rico and Jo to be among the best of the episode, if only because it's easy to see where both are coming from. Hell, I've been Jo before: sometimes you might tell yourself you want to get over someone, but it's all just part of a larger fiction you live while you try to sort out your own feelings. Then again, I've also been Rico: you might want to be there for a friend, but when you have feelings for them, your judgment is immediately clouded. Even if Rico is giving good advice about what a bad idea it is to be into Danny, it's compromised by his bias and jealousy. Both characters come from logical places where neither is necessarily wrong for how they feel, and that's not always the case in similar shows, where the writing puts a premium on one character always being right while the other is wrong. Jo, for her part, struggles to come to grips with her feelings after she has a mildly erotic dream about Danny in which he takes his shirt off under the pretext of not getting sweat on her bed. They then lock lips in a pretty intense makeout session before Jo wakes up. It's an amusing moment, if a little ridiculous; but it takes a "show, don't tell" approach in illustrating just how deep Jo's developing crush runs, so I can't really argue with the depiction.

Credit: ABC Family

But even while Jo dreams about kissing Danny, Lacey is the one who's actually doing it. After getting kicked off the soccer team on suspicions of poisoning teammate Cole Farrell with mothballs, Danny decides to get drunk at a party being held in -- of all places -- a cemetery. The party is for the good-looking, popular president of the cinema club, Tyler. He also happens to have a thing for Jo, comparing her to an "enigma" that he vows to crack. He doesn't really seem like Jo's type, but then, I'm not sure Danny seems like her type either. Yet she sympathizes with Danny when he confesses to getting kicked off the soccer team, in addition to his much bigger confession that he killed his Aunt Tara to keep her from ruining his family. Apparently, his father and Aunt Tara hated one another due to something that happened when they were kids, and she apparently had the leverage to ruin the Desai family. Danny took actions to ensure that didn't happen, but in the process, he ruined any chance of ever having a normal life. Even worse, his father stopped visiting him in juvie altogether in the months leading up to his death. This is some of Avan Jogia's best work in the series so far, illustrating the depth of Danny's pain and resentment over the loss of his chance at normalcy, explaining that being on the soccer team allowed him to feel as though his father was still here. Danny's resentment boils over when he learns from Lacey and Jo that the apartment from which the hush-money was sent to Regina was an apartment rented to his late father. He has no idea what to make of the revelation, but he's clearly confused and hurt -- and it's hard not to feel for him. Danny killed a person, sure, but the series muddies the black-and-white nature of the crime, not only by making Danny a kid when he committed the act, but by presenting him as someone who did it for a greater good -- a good that's likely been nullified by the consequences of what he did. Because what is the Desai family, if not ruined?

Credit: ABC Family

Jo leaves to get home before her curfew, and Lacey has a moment alone with Danny over the grave of Tara Desai in which their feelings for one another come to the surface. They share a passionate kiss...and then move their makeout session to the ground! I swear, if they had gotten it on over the grave of Tara Desai, this series would totally have earned its title. I was grinning like a damn moron at the scandal of it. But Lacey can't go further. She stops things and excuses herself, then goes to the diner to meet up with Archie. But we eventually learn it's only one brief stop on the road back to Danny, as she meets with Archie simply to break up with him before heading over to Danny's house to reciprocate his feelings. "No one can know," she says. And just like that, Danny and Lacey are the hottest couple no one knows about.

And perhaps that's a good thing, because I can't imagine Jo would take it well at all. While talking with her mother that night, Jo reveals that it's more than just a crush. "I think I'm in love with him." Tess is understandably concerned, but says she simply wants her daughter to be careful. Yet despite the warnings of both Rico and her mother, Jo seems dead-set on getting her heart broken, as she calls Danny that night only for her call to go unanswered. While Danny missed the call honestly -- instead of ignoring it altogether -- Jo still seems hurt. Still, Danny did tell Jo at the cemetery that she's the most important person in the world to him. But really, all he needed to say to complete the friendzoning was to add "as a friend" to the end of the statement. Po' Jo.

Credit: ABC Family

There are other subplots in the episode, although neither seems to amount to all that much. Kyle (Sam Robards) tries to use the ol' Masterson charm to ingratiate himself to Karen (Denise Richards), and it actually seems to go pretty well. He does this because one of his deputies thinks it could help them break the case, particularly where the necklace is concerned. Of course, this ends up being completely nullified by the end of the episode, where they end up finding the necklace anyway without Karen. Talk about a cliffhanger. Oh, and Kyle and Tess bang in her pottery studio, because why should the teens get to have all the fun?

In conclusion, "We Need to Talk About Danny" is a borderline scandalous episode of Twisted, and I loved every minute. Seriously, does anyone else look forward to Tuesdays?