Previously on Ringer: I threatened to quit recapping this show, and yet here I am.  I’m like the anti-VICTOR MACHADO, never willing to leave too early.  Oh, also, Gemma accepted that Bridget is impersonating Siobhan, we were all supposed to believe that Henry killed Gemma, which he totally didn’t, and tension was defused far more times than I can count.  And I can count really high.

This week we begin with Bridget putting Juliet to bed, where I’m sure she’ll have horrible nightmares about going to GASP! public school.  As the child of two public school teachers, let me be the first to say thanks for that, Ringer.  Meanwhile in the Butlers’ apartment (did we know that was their name before that?), Henry’s cleaning up after some event and they’re continuing to try to convince me that the (Henry) Butler did it, (and by “it,” I mean killing Gemma).  Still not buying it, Ringer.  And then opening cred–, oh wait, they’re finished.

Bridget tries calling Gemma the next day, and again we get her “don’t be boring” message.  Her message should really be, “Hey, it’s Gemma.  Have I mentioned my husband is cheating on me?”  Juliet is about to leave for school and we get to hear more disparaging remarks about public school.  Delightful.  Juliet gives Bridget her stash and Bridget has to be disturbed by the sight of narcotics.  This moment is brought to you by the 1980’s war-on-drugs.

Henry ditches his not-cleaning-up-after-a-murder materials in a dumpster at the same time Bridget has a crisis about dumping the stash.  Henry is headed to JFK.  He must be doing something that looks like fleeing the city to duck a murder charge but really isn’t.  Bridget, tempted by the sight of the delicious drugs, calls Malcolm and tells him she’s, well, tempted by the sight of the delicious drugs.  As always, this show is super good at telling us thing we already figured out.

Maddie from Gemma’s office stops by to drop off the keys to the loft, and Maddie wants to know if Bridget’s seen Gemma, because it seems like she’s probably totally murdered, but not really.  Bridget then, and I’m not kidding, flashes back to something we saw SEVEN MINUTES AGO, just to reassure us that it will keep spoon-feeding us everything.  No need to think, folks.

At Juliet’s dirty, disgusting, public school (which seems to have good facilities and reasonable student-teacher ratios), I finally breathe a sigh of relief when I see Jason Dohring, Logan Echolls of the late, lamented Veronica Mars playing a teacher.  Hopefully he can rise above the material.  He assures Juliet that this school is not as bad as it looks.  It looks great, so this must be the bestest school ever.  The badass chick behind Juliet calls her rich girl and tries to extort money and it works.  Yes, she got insulted by Juliet, but she gets four times what she asked for, so that’s a net plus.

Bridget tries to visit Gemma, but no answer.  Instead, Henry comes out and has Bridget get into the apartment.  See, he thinks Bridget is the one who killed Gemma, and he was cleaning up after Bridget.  Wow, I never saw this coming.  Bridget explains that she didn’t kill Gemma (who isn’t dead) and they play a game of, “You killed her!”  “No, you killed her!”  We get our second and third flashbacks of the episode in this scene, and at least one of them is something we haven’t seen yet, but it’s still annoying.  Just because you hired Nestor Carbonell doesn’t make you Lost, Ringer.

Back in Rock Springs, Wyoming, we get the return of VICTOR MACHADO.  Maybe he’s back to look at the food spoiling in his apartment.  Actually, he’s there to investigate a crime scene involving Malcolm’s disappearance.  In the longest interrogation ever, Malcolm keeps refusing to tell Matawi where Bridget is Matawi keeps tempting him with drugs.  But on day thirty-five, Malcolm finally cracks and says he’ll tell Matawi where Bridget it.  Thank goodness.  Matawi must have spent a ton of money on heroin for this adventure.

At the beautifully-appointed public high school, the badass chick shows she’s not great with nicknames by calling Juliet “rich girl” fifty more times and then throws her into a set of lockers.  Juliet and badass start fighting and Logan stops the proceedings.  Maybe if Juliet hadn’t given up her stash, she’d be much more mellow now and less prone to fisticuffs.  Speaking of the stash,  Bridget goes to check on it, and a man comes up behind her and grabs her.  Finally, a little excitement.  Is it one of Matawi’s thugs?  Is it some murderer sent by Siobhan (WHO HASN’T BEEN ON THE SHOW FOR AN EPISODE AND A HALF NOW!)?

No, it’s just dumb Henry.  Ugh.  He doesn’t want her to scream, so the smart the thing to do was to come up behind her and grab her.  Just saying hi would never have worked for that.  Henry and Bridget have another exciting conversation about how they didn’t murder Gemma but now they both look guilty.  Um, aren’t they all rich?  Considering they’re super good with getting rich guilty people off, think of what an expensive lawyer could do with a rich innocent person.

Bridget meets up with Charlie, her hunky rehab pal, and he brings logic to Ringer by taking Juliet’s stash and throwing it away.  Bridget actually says, “Now why couldn’t I just do that?”  We’re all wondering that.   In this scene, Bridget looks in a mirror.  Remember when the show was totally obsessed with them, and then gave them up in episode two?  Ah, the good old days of Ringer.  And then yet another conversation with Henry about Gemma’s not-murder, only this time he tells her where he dumped the evidence.  This is a whole lot of revving the engines for something that will be nothing.

VICTOR MACHADO goes to visit Matawi and asks about Malcolm and Bridget.  Of course, VICTOR MACHADO busts his way through the club and finds Malcolm.  No, just kidding, he does what he always does: walks away sheepishly after someone tells him no.  He really is the most easily discouraged FBI agent ever.

At the high school with lovely plants and non-oppressive lighting, Juliet sits down with the principal and Juliet’s past comes back to haunt her with the appearance of her permanent record.  Wait, that’s a real thing?  I thought that was just an empty threat that teachers made.  Andrew comes by the school and Juliet realizes that Daddy doesn’t believe what she says.  What??  Why doesn’t Andrew believe the girl who’s lied all the time and was caught drinking and doing drugs?

Bridget finds the evidence in the dumpster Henry mentioned and she calls in Gemma’s disappearance to the police, adding where the cops can find the evidence.  Dum-dum-dum!  I mean, dumb-dumb-dumb.  The cops acted quickly on this one because they show up at Henry’s apartment like five minutes later and catch Henry in some lies.  They don’t believe him because, well, because he’s a terrible liar and they take him to the station.  Bridget watches all this and talks to hunky Charlie on the phone and takes him up on his offer to be her sponsor.

VICTOR MACHADO’s lunch is stopped by a warrant to search the strip club.  He finally has no reason to not do FBI work so he reluctantly goes and searches Matawi’s place.  Poor VICTOR, this is totally cutting into his walking-away-frustrated time.  He actually gets to be super macho MACHADO when he busts down a door and visits the strip club’s basement in search of Malcolm.  The strip club, like many of its employees, has a cluttered and dirty downstairs (Boom!).  But it doesn’t have Malcolm.  He’s disappeared.  The plot thinnens.

At the super pristine office of that terrible public school (where there are posters for Italy and the weirdly named Falkbank University), Logan comforts the crying Juliet.  This is actually a nice scene, due 100% to Jason Dohring’s subtlety.  Logan stands up for Juliet and I would appreciate what he does, except that badass girl (named Tessa) gets blamed for the fight, which probably means she’ll be suspended.  That seems kinda shitty.

Henry is questioned by the police, and honestly, the police should let him go.  If they just read his fiction they would see how bad he is at making up stories.  There’s no way he could convincingly lie about not killing her.  All of a sudden, the police do let him go.  Maybe they’re thinking the same thing I am.

In Wyoming, when the FBI have to leave (after finding nothing), it’s a glower-off between Matawi and VICTOR MACHADO.  If you’ve seen previous episodes of this show, you know who wins.  But we soon find out why the NY cops let Henry go.  They call VICTOR to let him know they found some fingerprints on Gemma’s evidence.  Bridget’s fingerprints.

VICTOR calls Bridget (after a super-boring convo between her and Andrew about Gemma’s disappearance) and lets her know what we know about the fingerprints.  But here’s the weird thing: Bridget was wearing gloves when she moved the evidence.  And here’s the weirder thing: Bridget planted her fingerprints.  Wait, that’s not weird.  That’s just kind of stupid.  Is Bridget trying to fully assume Siobhan’s identity by pretending to get rid of Bridget by implicating her in a murder?  This is odd.

Finally, in Paris, Siobhan (yeah!) gets a call telling her that Gemma has been taken care of.  Siobhan makes vague comments of regret which are supposed to make us think Gemma was murdered, but, um, she wasn’t.

• Contrary to what the opening says, the two sisters don’t share the same face.  They both have their own copies of the same face.  It’s not like one of them is ever not allowed to use it.  I may be getting too picky with this show.
• By the way, the lockers in the high school?  Not one bit of graffiti on them.  They look great.  What a horrible place public school is.
• Also, Logan locks the door to his classroom, which means he gets to be in the same classroom all day.  Typical of one of those terrible public schools.
• Henry: “She’s the mother of my children, Siobhan.”  You know, the children we never see.  Maybe they’re the ones who murdered Gemma.
• Oh, and Gemma’s not dead.  Not even a little.

I’m still recapping Ringer, so let’s make it worth our respective whiles and talk about it below.  Unless you believe Gemma’s actually dead.  You don’t really, do you?