Episode description[edit | edit source]
"The" Scuba Shop, Bluff City Boardwalk - ★★ (2 Stars)
Reviewed by Robert M.
I received a ticket for the Personal Submarine Experience (3 Person) as a prize for coming first in a work success drive and while I was excited about the prospect of seeing the beautiful underwater life of the Bluff City coast I have to say I was sorely disappointed I am not a man to hold back in my criticism and, I make no apology for that!!
In comparison to the buildings around it the Bluff City Boardwalk Scuba Shop looks like it belongs to another time every building is cleaner and neater. Except maybe the clam shop but I can tolerate that because the clams, are great! The Scuba suits for rental look safe and clean but they are mostly stored on the floor rather than on shelves or racks where they belong, and it's clear the shop's management is doing something other than managing, I can tell you that.
When I asked the attendant (Doyle) if he could help me with the ticket I won he had not heard of the program (but to his credit he helped me anyway and that is why I will not give the Scuba Shop one star). But when I asked him if he'd be accompanying me on the Submarine trip as a pilot he said that he could not swim (and that is why I will not give the Scuba Shop three stars).
Anyway in the end the submarines could only store two people each and were cramped and unpleasant and so one of our number had to go on a trip on their own and they said they had a terrible time when they got back. I did see some coral and I did see a seal though but when I got back the owner of the shop said that everybody sees coral and a seal. He said that it wasn't anything special.
This week on Friends at the Table: A Bowling Alley, A Boxer, and A Bird Pt. 1
Finnegan H., Owner of "The" Scuba Shop, Bluff City Boardwalk Responded:
Okay FIRST OF ALL g
Contents[edit | edit source]
Opening[edit | edit source]
“
Welcome to Bluff City. Flickering neon reflecting off the waves. Slot machine ring. Boardwalk hustle. Booming laughs from the corner spot.
Bluff City. Home of the lucky, and their poor families too. A revving engine. The sounding of a harbor bell. A familiar wind. A gunshot round the way. The din of the casino floor. A bad plan misheard. America's favorite fling.
Bluff City. The light of a cigarette, the shape of a body or two. The red and blues of a patrol car, and money, man, money. They say there's a thousand highways you can take to reach this town, but there ain't no train to Bluff City.
One of them towns where there's a tale behind every hand of cards, a lie for every truth, a side gig for every payday.
How do you start a story like Bluff City's? Like this: with a bowling alley, a boxer, and a bird.”
Plot[edit | edit source]
Honestly, it's always a wild fucking time in Bluff City.
A van approaches "The" Scuba Shop, slowly, through the crowds of tourists along the Boardwalk. Finnegan Hands, spotting the van, calls Doyle MacKaye out of the shop to help him deal with the visitor.
A woman gets out of the van, introducing herself as Maggie Darcy of the IRS. She is there to check over the Scuba Shop’s financial records, as Finnegan has reported making several upgrades on his taxes the previous year. Finnegan stresses that there is “nothing… nothing… nothing… wrong” and sends Doyle to get the store’s ooks and receipts. He instructs Doyle to get the binders labelled ‘accounts’ and not the red binders which he tells Maggie contain “customer information” that he cannot share due to “data protection”.
Doyle returns with the binders, and as Finnegan hands them over, the binders' interiors break and the receipts spill across the floor.
A ship’s bell rings, transitioning into the ringing of a fight bell, moving the episode’s location and time to the night of a fight at The Splits: Doyle vs “Sweet” Bell Moran. The fight is just beginning and Doyle is playing to the crowd (“Sweet’s about to get a little sour over here!”). Sweets gets in a hit, and Doyle turns, laying him out easily with one hit.
Later, after the fight, Sonny Veranda approaches Doyle and his trainer Tawny Buck with the night’s take and hands Doyle his money. Doyle claims the fight was too easy and Sonny says he knows about a big guy coming in from “out of town”, suggesting that Doyle might find him to be a better opponent. He tells Doyle to come to the bowling alley the next night alone to talk more about it, and Doyle says he will.
Tawny is frustrated by the interaction, as she believes that Sonny will ask Doyle to take a dive. Doyle says that Sonny would never do that, and that even if Sonny did he would never throw a fight.
Tawny returns to the bowling alley the next day to have lunch (bad cheese fries), and to meet Jodie while she's working undercover to gather information on Sonny’s plan. Jodie doesn’t know anything about it, as she doesn't work late, and is shocked that illegal underground boxing is taking place. Tawny is frustrated by this, and Jodie agrees to break into Sonny’s office to try and find information on hiss plans.
When Sonny takes his next smoke break, Jodie heads to his office. On his desk, she finds a blueprint for The Gilded Menagerie Casino, where he has circled the secret entrance (which is underwater, small enough that a scuba diver could get in), as well as information that the Whitaker family is coming. Jodie realises that he is trying to organise a double cross of both his family and the Whitaker family. Jodie takes pictures of the blueprints with her cell phone and texts them to Tawny.
While Jodie is in his office, Sonny calls Finnegan to discuss his plan. Finnegan answers, in the middle of picking up receipts. Finnegan quickly excuses himself, stepping out of "The" Scuba Shop to talk. They go over Sonny’s plan to get the Whitaker family to give him money in exchange for his family’s bird, but he needs Finnegan to retrieve the bird from the casino’s secret underwater entrance. Finnegan says that he is proud of Sonny for taking charge of the plan, and Sonny says it feels good to be doing something for himself for a change.
After this, Finnegan goes to Tawny’s gym to check in on Doyle's training. Tawny is positive about Doyle’s progress. While there, they begin talking about Sonny. Tawny asks Finnegan what Sonny wants him to do, and Finnegan says that Sonny wants him to steal a bird and to check in on Doyle. Tawny is startled about the first part, and Finnegan tells her that the plan is not totally clear to him.
Finnegan admits he has a problem; he has told Sonny that he can get any bird, which he cannot, and asks Tawny to help him find a bird that looks like the real one. Another complication is that he currently does not know what the real bird looks like, as it is so rare that he cannot find any photos of it. Doyle says that he has a friend that works for the Bluff City Zoo who could help out.
Sonny texts Finnegan an extremely pixelated photo of the bird, which he shows to Tawny. Tawny says that this does not help, as the photo looks like “a fucking oyster with marinara sauce on it”. Finnegan and Doyle try to convince Tawny to help, and Tawny says that she will look into it.
Doyle, Tawny and Jodie head to the zoo to see Van McLaren about the bird after zoo opening hours. Tawny shows him the photo but has no further information about the bird, so Van tries to brainstorm what they could use to replace it. Jodie suggests they could paint a bird similar in size to what they need, and Doyle says that rare birds are always big “that’s why they’re rare”.
Van leads them to the aviary. They look at the birds and choose the toucan to steal. Finnegan texts “how’s the [pigeon emoji] going?”. Doyle texts back a 100 emoji. Van asks if they will return the bird, and Doyle confirms that he will. Van agrees to give them five birds. Doyle and Jodie both say they cannot house them, and so Tawny reluctantly leaves with five birds - a toucan, a robin, an oriole, and two doves. Van reminds the trio that he needs the birds back in one week, and Doyle promises he'll return them (“when have I let you down? Don’t answer that”).
Tawny and Jodie meet with Maggie at the local IRS office. Maggie says Tawny looks tired, and Tawny explains her part in the recent bird theft. Maggie slowly clarifies the situation, and asks where they were stolen from. Tawny says that technically they are not stolen, as they are on loan from the zoo, and that she took them on behalf of Finnegan, which she believes is connected to Finnegan’s new improvements on his shop.
They discuss who else was involved in the bird theft, and Jodie reveals to Maggie that illegal boxing is happening at The Splits. Maggie directs them to deliver the birds to Finnegan. She will watch the delivery, and they will “follow the string” to connect it to the illegal boxing ring. Before leaving, she tells them she will rendezvous with them in three days.
The night after the bird theft, Sonny meets Doyle and Finnegan at the bowling alley over cheese fries. Sonny tells them that if Doyle wins, they will get the Whitaker’s money and return the bird so that no one knows it was stolen, and if they lose then the Whitakers take the bird and the Verandas kill the Whitaker family for taking the bird.
Finnegan stresses that he wants to keep the real bird, and the three argue until the Whitaker family patriarch (Walt) and their fighter (Achilles Apollo) arrive. Sonny rushes to get Walt whiskey from his private stash. Walt and Apollo do not have positive things to say about Bluff City.
Sonny stresses to Walt and Apollo that the fight will be a success, before rushing off again and returning with a briefcase. He gives Whitaker the briefcase, which contains Sonny’s life savings (a couple hundred thousand dollars in cash), to sweeten the deal he is attempting to make with them.
Meanwhile, at The Gilded Menagerie, a clicking sound is heard from the outside of the vault. The long-taloned foot of a bird steps onto a pile of cash. The bird is “much, much bigger than we thought it was going to be”. The footage cuts to black.
Cast[edit | edit source]
- Austin Walker (Sonny Veranda)
- Jack de Quidt (Finnegan Hands)
- Janine Hawkins (Tawny Buck)
- Sylvia Clare (Doyle MacKaye)
- Andrew Lee Swan (Jodie O’Brian)