Welcome to the weekly recaps of the Showtime series Masters of Sex that follows the history of Dr. William Masters (Michael Sheen) and Virginia Johnson's (Lizzy Caplan) actual studies of sex. Make sure to tune in every Tuesday for a dissection of the week's episode featuring thoughts of the show in general as well as predictions of where things are headed.
Things catch a snag in the research as Lester (Kevin Christy) begins to suffer some problems. When Virginia interferes, she finds methods that may end up helping them, that is if Masters will listen to her. Meanwhile, Barton Scully (Beau Bridges) consults Betty DiMello (Annaleigh Ashford) about her partner's pregnancy, growing concerned not that she is a single mother, but that she is gay. Masters discovers Virginia's affair and starts to enter a downward spiral. Meanwhile, Tessa (Isabelle Fuhrman) starts exploring her sex life. Libby Masters (Caitlin Fitzgerald) celebrates her birthday by confronting her other lover about her age. He's fine with her being in her 40's. Despite Masters attempting to do an affair with the new secretary, he stops because he wants to be true to Virginia, even if she is not.
Rating: 4.5 out of 5
Oh, Masters. Will anything work out for you? It has now come to the point where everyone else is having chances at love besides him. With his nose buried in a project, taking it steadfast without critique, he doesn't seem to be doing too well on his own. Even then, to see his face as Virginia drives away with her lover fills him with a certain desperation that has been building this whole season. What he thought that he had with Virginia was pure. Instead, it was the novelty relationship that most everyone else has with everyone else. Even Tessa is having more romance now than he is. How is he going to survive the last few episodes, especially if he cannot work on his own?
It will be an interesting form of humbling that should pay off in some ways. While I don't know that Virginia and Masters are as compatible as they once were, I do think that there will be something that makes or breaks them in the next episode. There will be something of substance. Maybe we will get Masters' outbreak in which he confronts the issue. What about Libby? Will he ever know what Libby has been up to? It doesn't seem like he would care, especially with the amount of affair time that he has put in. Everything has shifted from the work, which is reflective of Masters' unfocused state, and is now about him. What is he doing to satisfy himself?
While I do not know that the show has done a lot that is interesting with Virginia's new relationship, I do think that it has been a much needed shift in the overall series. It created a hurdle that proves that Masters isn't the only one capable of cheating on someone. Then again, Masters and Virginia weren't really married. Libby knew about their fling, but she learned to forgive with her own affair. I do think that it's interesting to see that everyone else is happier when they are not around him, having to deal with his various observations that frankly don't always pan out. He may be a genius, but he is also very stubborn at times.
Speaking as Helen and Betty's romance has happened over seasons, I don't know if the pregnancy plot will wrap up in the two weeks to come. That is, unless there is a major time jump. While the show has a notorious streak when it comes to that, I don't believe that the answers this season are lying in that format. I'm not entirely sure what there will be, but it may be more directly about the dissatisfaction about the team who were on top of the world. It was the team who convinced people to talk more confidently about sex and understand their own bodies. Now, they aren't all that compatible because of egos - and at the height of their powers at that. They have never been more popular and notorious. Now they just need to stay there.
I do think that Masters of Sex in its third season has settled into a nice little niche that captures something more intriguing about the show. Where it was more about work in the past, this season chooses to show what the work produced. Did it bring them happiness? Is everyone's comfort with their bodies now an issue? There's a lot that has been explored and while at times a little uneven, have been a lot stronger than they have been in the past. One can only imagine that this whole season has been about how we relate to each other through sex now that it isn't as taboo. It isn't quite as pretty, especially as the man who found love in the dangerous side now is on the other end of the argument. Here's hoping he'll make it out in one piece.
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