Sons of Anarchy, Season 3, Episode 4, Home Recap

Previously on Sons of Anarchy, the Guatemalan Hottie met Bachman, Opie lost his marbles at the porn party, John Teller and Maureen Ashby might have had a love child, and Jax pissed me off.

In this week's Sons of Anarchy... well... let's just deal with what went down in the basement. Jax thought it would be a good idea to remind Tara of her place in the SAMCRO pecking order which is apparently is nonexistent. He basically told her:

1. You're not coming with because your place is at work.
2. We're not your family
3. You want to be an old lady? THEN DO AS YOU'RE TOLD.

Jax may be right on the first point and Gemma actually came up with a well reasoned explanation as to why Tara should to remain in Charming. Someone needs to hold down the fort and take care of The Kid.

And that is where all reasonableness ends. To say that Tara isn't a part of the family is just patently absurd. Tara has known and/or been involved with Jax on and off since she was a teenager. Tara is right, Abel is hers too. She has been caring for Sweet Baby Abel since he was born. It was Tara and Gemma babysitting, changing diapers, feeding him soy-based forumla, and dealing with his apnea. Where was The Prince of Charming in all of this? No where to be found. Jax isn't going to win any Father of The Year awards any time soon. He didn't even really seem to care when Wendy was pregnant or when Abel was in jeopardy right after his birth. Jax seems to be the only one to think that Tara isn't family. Gemma and Clay are on board Tara as family train.  

For whatever reason, Tara wants to hold the family together. This clearly comes from page 38 of the Gemma Teller-Morrow Handbook on How To Be An Old Lady. But Jax, in spite of all of his talk and bombast, is (1) doing nothing beyond talking a big game about finding Abel and generally yelling at people and (2) allowing Abel's abduction to fracture his family. He should be lucky that he has his brothers in the MC who will back him up no matter what. He probably doesn't appreciate it or realize it because it's Jax's world ya'll and everyone else just lives in it. (See: Opie attending the porn party. Jax is fundamentally a bad friend for not stepping in and insulating his pal the MC's fundraising enterprise. And this isn't the first time Jax has been a bad friend.)

Now let's deal with the DO AS YOU'RE TOLD. Or from here on out, referred to as the DAYT moment. Since Tara has been attending the Gemma Teller-Morrow School of Old Lady Training let's considering the following questions: Does Gemma do as she's told? Does Gemma fall in line like a subservient sheep? Have we ever seen Clay speak to Gemma like that. No, nope, and not on his life. And even if you take it outside of the Gemma-centric way of looking at things, the DAYT dictum seems a lot more consistent with a Croweater than it does an Old Lady.

Jax, you're being a petulant little asshole. Wait. Correction. A hypocritical, petulant little asshole. Let me get this straight: it's totes okay for you to to help Tara kill Kohn, or to help Opie kill a guy who was wrongly fingered for killing Donna, or to gun down Weston in the shitter but it's not okay for Gemma and Tara to accidentally kill the Guatemalan hottie?

That's it, Jax. This whole kidnapping is bringing out the absolute worst in you. I can hope for some sort of redemption by the end of the season but until then, I'm breaking up with you. And Tara should too.

PS: Gemma finally found out about Abel. Jesus. It took 4 episodes for that to happen. And then it caused her to have a cliffhanger/maybe heart attach.


PPS: I <3 Piney. And so does Honey.

PPPS: Tig is my new hero for being exasperated by Gemma and Tara.

Just like last week, the screen caps come courtesy of Bobby Elvis' Bake Sale