Ugly Betty Episode 2.05: A League of Their Own

Full recap of Ugly Betty season 2, Episode 5: “A League of Their Own”

Betty is on the bus, speaking on her cell phone to Henry, who is on another bus.  She is insisting that the two of the arrange their schedules so that they do not run into one another.  They swap schedules, and agree that “maybe the whole avoidance thing will work after all”.  They then run into each other. 

Ignacio is making breakfast.  Hilda says she cannot stay, she has to go to the cemetery to do scratch-off lottery tickets with Santos.  Justin says he is going to be with his friends.  Ignacio asks, “the drama club?” Justin says the Drama Club is lame.  Justin presents something for Hilda to sign, which she does without question.  After he leaves, Ignacio asks Hilda what it was, she didn’t know.

Justin walks out, his friends (including “the girlfriend”) are there.  He tells him his mother just gave him an excuse note to miss the field trip tomorrow.  They decide to take Hilda’s car.  The girl is impressed.

Betty tells Daniel that Bradford wants to have Dinner with Wilhelmina, Alexis, and him.  They then walk into a staff meeting.  Henry is there.  They are discussing the “advertising situation. Betty is trying to get everyone to swap chairs so she doesn’t have to sit next to Henry.  She was not successful.  Wilhelmina tells the group that 54% of their advertisers have pulled out.  Henry says Mode will be out of business in 90 days.

Claire is drinking.  She tells Yoga she doesn’t want to go overseas.  She says she’ll turn herself in. 

Christina is doing “measurements” on a hunky underwear model, while discussing the Henry situation with Betty.  She convinces Betty to try online dating.  There is this wonderful exchange:

“Christina, what are you doing? You can’t alter underwear!”

“Oh, they never catch on…”

Christina is going to put Betty’s profile on bachelocity.com (Yes, Disney owns this domain, too).   Betty says, “I’m not that desperate”.  We hear Henry’s voice saying, “You’re a little desperate…”  Betty looks up, and Henry’s head is on the model’s body! (It might really be his body, I don’t know).  She looks again, and it’s the model again.

Betty fills out her profile while Christina attempts to take her picture.  Her photos keep turning out bad.  Amanda barges in, and gives her advice on how to look better, including getting rid of the glasses.  She says, “guys don’t make passes at girls who are fat”.  She returns a shoe box to Christina, which has a sandwich in it.  Amanda had hoped that Christina wouldn’t notice, she leaves to get the shoes. 

As Christina takes Betty’s picture again, Betty is so pleased with the sandwich, she exclaims, “Ah! Ham!”  At this time, Christina takes her picture, and it turns out great.

Wilhelmina tells Marc that her plan to ruin the company is going well, and tells him he can supervise the Valentino shoot.  Marc wonders if that is part of her plan to ruin Mode.  But he goes anyway.  As he walks onto the shoot, Cliff, the photographer, who is kind of portly and a slog,  says “You’re late, take off your clothes…” mistaking him for a model.  Marc then shows his modeling prowess by slapping his own butt too hard.  This makes Cliff giggle.  The REAL model, who is not the brightest bulb, put the underwear on backward.  Marc goes to “help” him.

The photo shoot was based on “Rear Window”, which Marc had never seen.  Nor had he seen Psycho, which Cliff invited him to come over and see, after getting drinks.  Amanda barges in and tells Marc that Betty is internet dating, and that they must go “Mock”.  Marc says it will have to wait, he is going to ask out the underwear guy.

Ignacio comes back to the house, and three old ladies are there: Hilda’s new friends from the cemetery.  They are making a quilt from their dead husband’s shirts. 

Wilhelmina makes crazy suggestions to save money now that the magazine is losing money.  She suggests printing on rice paper and using soy ink.  She also suggests giving out free detergent samples.

Kenny comes to get Daniel’s signature, and talks to Betty.  Betty gives Kenny her time card, because she doesn’t want to go to the accounting department.  He speaks a bunch of gibberish.  Betty tells him, “You’re from Greenwich.  Stop frontin’ ” He replies, “South side, yo!”  He tells Christian (about Betty), “Tell your girl to throw my man a Betty Bone!”. 

Betty’s gotten 15 replies to her dating profile, all but one were jokes form Amanda.  But one guy asks her out bowling.  She replies, accidentally, “Yes, I love blowing”.

Hilda is still hanging out with the cemetery ladies, they are separating pills and ironing money.  While they are talking about things they want to write angry letters about, Justin sneaks in and takes Hilda’s car keys.  Ignacio finally tells Hilda that she has to stop hanging out with the old ladies.  She explains that the women know what she’s going through.  Ignacio says he does, too, but life has to go on. 

Daniel shows Betty a prototype of the “new” Mode, she tells him it’s not very good.  She says he should keep Mode the way it is, and ak her father for money.  Of course, Daniel doesn’t want to do this.  He notices Betty is wearing her lucky sweater.  Betty tells him about her bowling date.

Claire is going through her friend’s mail, and sees an invitation to Bradford’s wedding.  Later, she is gone, and Yoga notices one of the display guns is missing from the rack.

Alexis walks up to Daniel.  She shows him how the soy ink will not work – she gets it all over her Dolce top.  She insists they ask their father for money.  They decide she is the best one to do this.  She was the “golden boy”.  She says, “And this golden boy has to go wash ink off his boobs!” (funny)

Henry is working, Kenny comes in and gossips, telling him about Betty’s internet date.  Cut to the bowling alley.  Betty is checking her teeth in a bowling trophy when her dates walks up.  He is obviously disappointed in her looks, but still polite.  She is blathering on nervously, and he is trying to “hurry up” the date.  She gets a call , and he excuses himself and goes to the bathroom.  Christina is on the phone, but she has to leave to get a new message on the dating website.  It turns out to be her husband. (Who she mentioned in the season 1 finale).

In the meantime, Betty is drying her underarms on the bowling hand dryers; the date sees this, and decides to leave without telling Betty.  Ad he’s leaving, we see Henry, who had been crouching down, watching everything.  Betty turns to see Henry there, he pretends to have been there for League night. Henry lies about why the guy left (his bird got the bird flu).  Henry wants to bowl in the next lane, but then the alley announcing “couples bowl”.  Everyone starts making out.  Betty says, “Bowling sucks”, and they leave.

Marc tells Amanda he’s got a date with the underwear model (Amanda doesn’t believe him).  Cliff walks in,and asks Marc if he wants to go to the Village after the movie.  Marc tells him he can’t go, he asked out Gus the model.  Cliff is disappointed, but Marc doesn’t get that Cliff thought they were going on a date.  Then, he suddenly understands.  He tries to apologise, Cliff at first blows it off, then tells Marc how upset he is that he didn’t think they had a “date” because of the way he looked.  He says, “I thought there was more to you…”

Alexis and Daniel come over for dinner with Bradford and Wilhelmina.  Alexis starts to have flashbacks.  Outside, Claire is aiming a gun into the window at Wilhelmina.  Wilhelmina gets them all together to take their holiday photo.  Claire decides not to shoot Wilhelmina.  She realises that Wilhelmina has brought her family back together – everything’s OK now. She tells Yoga she wants to go to Italy now.

Back at the Suarez house, Hilda is knitting while the cemetery girls are sleeping.  As she’s checking one of them to see if she’s breathing, the police pull up.  “Who died?” one of them asks.  It turns out it’s a policewoman who knows Hilda, and she has brought Justin home.  He had wrecked their car into a tree. This is when Hilda finally snaps out of it.  She tells “the girls’ they have to leave, then has a heart-to-heart with Justin.  First, she lays down the law, then tells him it’s OK to grieve.  He tells her he just wanted his dad to be proud of him. They embrace and cry.

Alexis starts to tell Bradford about the lost advertisers, but Daniel interrupts her and tells him.  Bradford starts yelling at Daniel.  At this time, Alexis finally remembers everything, including when her father disowned her.  She confesses to Alex that she had tried to kill her father.  Daniel is very upset about this, and leaves.

Betty and Henry go to a restaurant; turns out it’s a romantic restaurant.  A strolling violinist comes by, they try to tell him they are just friends.  “He got another girl pregnant”, Betty says.  A woman walks up with roses “for the pretty lady” – the violinist tells her “he got another girl pregnant”.  Betty starts to leave.  Henry had dropped his fork, he was on his knees as he grabbed her hand and asked her to wait.  The other patrons mistakenly thought this meant he was proposing.  Betty says, “I can’t do this”, then walks away.

Marc is in Cliff’s apartment.  They start the movie.  Marc asks, “What if I get scared?”  Cliff tells him he’ll be there to hold his hand, which he does.

Betty is walking home, she gets a cell call.  It’s Henry, but he’s actually right behind her.  They argue.  Henry asks her if she wants him to leave Mode.  She says yes.  He says he’ll give his notice on Monday.  She goes inside. She then comes back out and says, “There is another option”, then kisses him, as “As Time Goes By” plays in the background. She says she knows her heart will break, but maybe it’s worth it.