'Army Wives': Mad men, bad men, and cad men

You know you've headed down some bad road when pretty much the nicest thing that happens to anybody here in this episode of Army Wives is getting fired from a job for only suspected impropriety. It's an easy complaint to make of Army Wives that sometimes maybe things are too nice, too clean, too easily wrapped up in a convenient little bow at the end of each episode. And sometimes maybe things do work out a little too cleanly, a little two conveniently in many episodes.

But as of this week, the series is faced with a new timeslot competitor, a certain Golden Globe-winning drama known for its bleakness, for an uncompromising lack of tidy endings, and for some real depravity in its characters. And so it is as if the writers of Army Wives said, "Oh, dark? We can do dark. I see your drinking and your smoking and your womanizing and your misogyny, and I raise you a dash of adultery, a sprinkling of sexual harassment, a possible unplanned pregnancy, suspected pedophilia, the possible beginnings of drug addiction, frivolous lawsuits up the wazoo, houses being ransacked, and an international smuggling operation. And war profiteering. Bet you can't do war profiteering."

Mirror, mirror, on the wall, who's the baddest of them all? We'll ask that at the end. But by the end of this episode, a whole lot of people will find themselves involved in a whole lot of dirt.

We begin first with what technically happened last in the episode, as the season-long flirting between Denise and Getti comes to a climax with a kiss. Throughout the hour leading up to that moment, Denise was spending her time finally saying publicly what she no doubt had been saying to herself privately all along, which is that this is wrong and she needs to put the brakes on it. First, she admits to Roland that she's got a great connection with the new doc, though as of that point it had all been completely innocent. "I guess I feel more like me when I'm with him. At least, more like the me I thought I'd be," Denise says.

Roland tries to put the kibosh on that before Denise makes a mistake. Roland knows this territory. He's been there. And the look that Roland saw Denise giving Getti at the bar opening is a look that Roland recognizes as one he had himself not too long ago. "When it happened to me, I wish I'd just walked away," he says.

After the talk, Denise is skittish the next time she meets Getti, and tries to get out of there as quickly as possible. By the next time they run into each other, Denise has collected her thoughts enough to say that they need to talk. "'We need to talk.' Four words that never lead to good news," Getti sighs. Denise says that she's been married for twenty years, and in all that time she never even thought about another man. But she is now. Denise admits that she's confused. She's definitely got feelings for Getti. And he admits once and for all that he has feelings for her as well. But this can't happen, Denise says. It just can't.

But promises in a moment of calm are no match for passion in a moment of adrenaline. Denise and Getti soon find themselves together once again, in the frenetic environment of treating an emergency room patient. The patient doesn't survive, but when Denise and Getti retreat to an empty room to talk, the heart-pumping energy of the moment gets to them. They kiss, and it's a big juicy one, with both parties just as into it. Denise runs out of the room after realizing what she did, but the line has definitely been crossed.

Denise isn't the only one confronted by a possible workplace affair. Roxy hires a new waitress named Sandi to work at the bar, and Sandi is immediately all over Trevor, who's helping out in his spare time while he rehabs. Sandi calls Trevor a hot piece of eye candy, right to Trevor's face and with no compunction about laying on a heavy coating of flattery right in front of Roxy.

Later on, Sandi finds Trevor all alone in the bar's stock room. "A person could get in a lot of trouble here, you know? If they wanted to," Sandi comes on to Trevor. No, no, Trevor says; he's very happily married, to the woman right outside the door. "Nothing's gonna happen. Unless you want it to," Sandi just continues, with Roxy by this point actually standing behind them watching Sandi hit on her wife. Roxy fires her, right quick. "And unless you want this jar of mayo on your head, I'd leave. Right now."

But there are soon repercussions. Roxy gets served with papers -- Sandi is suing her for wrongful termination. So Roxy needs a lawyer. She doesn't technically know one of those, but she does know somebody who once attended law school before dropping out. When Claudia Joy reads over the lawsuit, she suggests that Roxy might just try to settle to make this woman go away. "I am not paying that tramp a dime," Roxy puts her foot down. "So what should I do, lie down and let her do to me what she wanted to do to my husband?"

Claudia Joy says that if Roxy wants to fight, she can't just defend herself. She should also go on the offensive, maybe find some dirt on Sandi. Oh, so law schools teach the dark side of the law, and that's not something you just learn in the professional realm? Good to know. They quickly find that Sandi's rather lawsuit-happy. She's done this several times before, suing employers for both wrongful termination and slip-'n-fall injuries. "I may not know any of this legalese mumbo jumbo. But I do know a low-down dirty scammer when I see one," Roxy confronts her. And with that, Sandi appears ready to give up the game. I just feel bad for Trevor. Was Sandi only flirting with him out of some nefarious plan? That hurts.

But right now, a wounded ego would be only the smallest of problems for Trevor. He fails the physical he needed to pass in order to deploy on time with the unit, so he's stuck back home where he's depressed. But at least he got some painkillers from the doctor who administered the physical. And he immediately starts popping them. You may be man candy, Trevor, but you're not supposed to pop those pills like candy.

While Trevor can't wait to go back to Iraq, Chase and his Delta Force unit are finding their overseas adventures possibly coming back to bite them. Pamela is stunned when military police knock on the door in the middle of the night and arrest Chase. Carla's husband Steve is also arrested, as well as another Delta Force member named Ken. Pamela heads to the military police station, but nobody there will let her see Chase, or explain exactly what Chase is charged with. If only we knew somebody with a familiarity with the military judicial system ...

Getting no answers anywhere, Pamela tries to get some answers from Carla. But when she goes there, Carla's house has been tossed. Somebody's been looking around for evidence. Pamela asks Carla what the hell is going on. "Oh, don't give me the innocent crap," Carla snaps at her. Carla says that Chase is in the same boat as Steve, so Pamela should know full well what's going on. It's just a little bit of war profiteering, Carla finally explains. Nothing more than "taking a few artifacts that no one is ever going to miss in that desert hellhole." Pamela says no, no way, Chase would never be involved with that.

Finally, much later, Pamela finally gets to meet with an orange-jumpsuited Chase. "I know that you can't be mixed up in this," she says. But Chase won't say anything, even as little as saying that he's innocent. "You're just gonna have to trust me," Chase says, stone-faced. Chase says to tell the kids that he's away at war. Huh. Very strange. "I get this whole Delta code of silence crap. But in case you haven't noticed, I am losing it here," Pamela cries. "I need the man I love to talk to me." But he can't. He can't say anything.

Pamela decides to ransack her own house to see if there's any evidence of wrongdoing, but finds nothing. Chase finally reappears. He still can't tell Pamela everything, he says, but he hasn't done anything wrong. Steve, though, was indeed part of a smuggling ring. Chase is aiding in the investigation against some other members of his unit, but he had to stage being arrested himself as a ruse that would ensure none of the members of the unit would be suspicious. To Pamela, that's certainly better than the alternative -- but Pamela still doesn't agree that that justifies Chase keeping her in the dark through the whole ordeal. "This was not OK. It really wasn't. You are not the only one here trying to protect this family," Pamela declares. So Chase may be off the hook when it comes to criminal matters, but he's still going to be dealing with one very angry ex-cop who happens to be his wife.

Elsewhere, though Roland has been teaching for several episodes now, we haven't yet seen him in a classroom, until now. But we don't see him teaching; instead, we see him in more of his usual role, counseling, and talking with a girl after school. The girl, Jessica, thanks him for helping her through a problem, and then gives Roland a hug, with perfect timing in that the school principal immediately walks through the door and catches Roland in what looks like a compromising position.

Jessica's a young lesbian who hopes to enter the Army herself, only the military doesn't particularly care for lesbians, young or otherwise. She's been accepted to West Point, but she also has a girlfriend she's rather serious about, and the two cannot coexist. "The rules are the rules," she knows. Roland says she can't throw West Point away. Maybe one day, the rules won't be the rules, and she'll be allowed to have both the career and the romance she wants to have, deserves to have.

But Roland has broken some rules of his own, being in a compromising position with a student. Roland was only temporarily a teacher at the school, so in the face of his first possible indiscretion, he's given a quick hook. The school can't afford to have a possible scandal, so Roland hardly even gets a chance to explain what really happened before he's fired. "Let's just make this easy all the way around and say your time with the school is up," says Principal Gates.

Jessica hears the news, that Roland has been canned, and she tells Roland that she has to tell the principal the truth, that she's gay and therefore it would be impossible for what the principal assumes to be true. Roland tells her she can't. If she does so, she'd be risking her entire future. "Telling Principal Gates is like telling the Army. You can kiss West Point good-bye." Roland says not to do it. He'd rather lose his job than have Jessica lose her promising future.

Roland gets a call later to come back and meet with Principal Gates. Jessica's there too. Jessica has decided to tell everyone the truth. It's a noble sacrifice to do the right thing and save Roland, but the operative word there is sacrifice. Jessica's West Point future appears done. Principal Gates tells Roland that he's going to have to contact West Point, withdraw the school's recommendation of Jessica, and explain why. "The policy is don't ask, don't tell. And she told. What choice do I have?" he says. I wonder if it's intentional that the principal who is blindly adhering to Army policy has the same name as the Secretary of Defense? Hmmm? Roland tries to convince Gates not to go back on the school's West Point recommendation, but it looks like a futile effort.

At least there is one bit of happy news for Roland. Claudia Joy was worried that she might be pregnant, and it leads to her and Michael talking about whether or not they'd really want another child after what happened with Amanda, and with Emmalin almost all grown up and ready to leave the house. But in the interim, there is what may or may not be the next best thing. Michael and Claudia Joy may not have another child of their own, but they are still going to be asked to be part of another child's life. Roland and Joan ask them to be their baby's godparents.

Who's the naughtiest of them all?
Getti: Shamelessly pursuing another man's wife.
Denise: Because she's the one who's actually being unfaithful.
Frank: Not actually in the episode. But lots of people blame him for forcing Denise into infidelity with his treatment of her.
Evan: Also not in this episode. But presumably still a jerk, wherever he is.
Trevor: Maybe starting a pill-popping addiction?
Sandi: The apparent queen of frivolous lawsuits, and of hitting on a man right in front of his wife.
Claudia Joy: Twenty-some-odd years after law school, apparently all she has remembered is how to play dirty.
Steve & Carla: Just a little friendly international smuggling operation and war profiteering.
Chase: Keeping his wife in the dark about his undercover mission, knowing that it's psychological torture on her.
Joan: Wants to give her daughter the unfortunate name of Enid, which "sounds like an insect."
Principal Gates: Blindly adhering to a controversial policy even though it may ruin the future of a promising student whose future he should be looking out for.
Emmalin: Spends all night text-messaging boys. As a writer, I can't help but believe that text messaging is a blight on the English language.

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