With Laura back in the picture, Shadow’s a little confused. The New Gods don’t have time for that nonsense, though, and have a proposition for Wednesday and Shadow that takes them both away from the motel. Here’s our recap of “Lemon Scented You” and a preview for episode six, “A Murder of Gods”!
{93% Fresh at Rotten Tomatoes}
Coming to America
“Lemon Scented You” begins with Atsula. Based on what I found, she’s a very old priestess who brought her God, Nunyunnini, to America across the land bridge separating North American from Siberia.
Her daughter dies along the way and there’s no food once they reach the promised land.
“The Gods are great, but people are greater. For it is in their hearts that Gods are born and God’s return.” <---IMPORTANT
Shadow’s shock at seeing Laura hasn’t faded a single bit. He stands at the door in shock.
“Hi, puppy.”
“Hey, baby. What the fuck are you doing here?”
Then to prove he isn’t going insane, he throws a pillow at her to see if she’s real. Of course, it nails her.
When he’s satisfied Laura’s really there, he wants to talk about Robbie, but Laura wants to talk about how she’s back from the dead.
“You rising from the dead is par for the course since I got out of prison.”
We all feel you Shadow. Since your release, it’s been chaos.
Laura, in her no-nonsense fashion, tells him that she always sorta knew she couldn’t wait for him while he was in prison, and that it was thirteen months after he went to jail that she began to have an affair with Robbie.
She explains that the cat died and there was wine, and it just happened.
“Were you going to leave me for him?”
“Robbie? Please. I love you. You’re my puppy.”
Then she goes into details about their final night, and how she felt about dying.
“Really, I was very blah about the whole thing. I wasn’t scared.”
Laura then asks Shadow for a cigarette, and if I were Shadow I’d be asking if I was losing my mind, too, because she’s so nonchalant about everything.
Shadow goes and gets the cigarettes but notices a car parked across the way with someone in it.
Back inside the room, Laura is in the bathtub. She tells him that she wants to warm up her body because he would probably prefer if she was warm to the touch. Shadow looks at her like she’s crazy.
“What?”
“Normally, people who die tend to stay in their graves, that’s what.”
Cut to a raven hopping down the hallway to Wednesday’s room. (Is he Odin?) The raven does a Lassie-esque talking thing and Wednesday goes to Shadow’s room.
In Shadow’s room, Laura asks him if he wants to put her ring back on her. He ignores it and explains that the last time he talked to her, he knew something bad was going to happen that nothing felt right.
Laura moves toward him and tells him that things can feel okay again. She kisses him then and her heart beats again as light feels her chest.
She always sees light around Shadow and this happened, so is Shadow a God? Perhaps one of life?
Laura tells him that she loves him so much then:
“You got yourself mixed up in some really weird shit, by the way.”
She thanks him for the coin and asks him if he’s still her puppy. She’s asked Shadow in a lot of ways if he still loves her or cares for her but he hasn’t given her anything yet, so this direct question is meant to have a direct answer.
“No.”
At that moment, Wednesday knocks on the door. Shadow opens it and barely steps out. He can tell Wednesday smells something off, so Shadow steps outside completely. Wednesday’s is making a point to look into Shadow’s eyes like he can see into them.
That’s when the sirens show up and the cops arrest Shadow and Wednesday for bank robbery.
Laura’s back in the tub and is watching through the window as she sees Shadow’s light leave the area.
****
Technical Boy is walking out of a club and the lights start going out around him as he approaches a limo.
Inside is Media (as David Bowie), and she’s not happy at all. In fact, she brings a message from Mr. World that Technical Boy needs to apologize immediately.
***Gillian Anderson stars as the New God Media in the critically acclaimed series “American Gods.” Media assumes whatever form will deliver her message most effectively and is often personified by iconic celebrities. [via STARZ]***
Technical Boy misconstrues that as an apology to Mr. World, and Media explains he has to apologize to Wednesday’s man, Shadow.
This really sets Technical Boy off.
“Wednesday’s collecting monsters. Fucking Pokémon.”
He’s still going to apologize and he’s going to mean it.
****
At the police department, Wednesday and Shadow are being interrogated.
Shadow repeatedly asks for a lawyer and Wednesday is playing the senile, old man game from the first episode.
They ask Wednesday for the true story for being in Chicago.
“I’m recruiting an old God of Death to fight the New Gods because they fear him and they should fear me as much.”
He also tells them that the leprechaun has been against it since the beginning and Mr. Nancy is bitterly dispossessed.
Over in Shadow’s room, the detective explains to him that they found him because some FAXED the exact GPS coordinates to them on a fax machine that hasn’t working in years. He and Wednesday have powerful enemies and she wants to know who they are.
“I’d like to know what you know.”
“I don’t think you do.”
The detective says that they’ll look leinientely on him since he just lost his wife if he’ll help.
****
Laura is in the motel room, getting dressed when Mad Sweeney shows up, demanding his coin.
“Give me my fucking coin, dead wife!”
Laura interrogates him about what he is and what’s going on. Sweeney tells him not to trust Wednesday and that Shadow shouldn’t trust him either. He also tells her that he’ll get his coin back eventually because she’ll decompose and turn to soup, especially if she keeps taking warm baths.
Sweeney tackles her into the tub and is holding her under when the cops bust in again. Laura pretends to be dead the entire time as the cops haul Sweeney aways.
He yells the entire time.
“You’re an asshole, dead wife!”
****
They put Wednesday and Shadow in the same room with the photos, and Wednesday tells Shadow that they’re a “God’s eye” view of the world.
Mr. Nancy, in spider form, opens up his cuffs. Noises of fighting start filtering in from beyond the doors, and Shadow asks who is after him.
“Someone you don’t want to see your face until you’re ready to be seen.”
The door opens and Media floats in. This time as Marilyn Monroe. She gives up details about Marilyn’s death, and Shadow begs Wednesday to tell him that this isn’t real.
That’s when Mr. World makes his much anticipated appearance.
The first thing he does is apologize to Wednesday. He says he should have sought him out sooner, but he couldn’t see him clearly.
Wednesday tells Shadow not to say a word to Mr. World, but World says he already knows Shadow.
“You’re a person. I know people. All of them. You have a name, Shadow Moon. You have a blood type and a recurring nightmare. B positive and an orchard of bones.”
His head turns to gigabytes almost as he speaks. Media pulls him back to the present and he straightens himself back out. Then he asks Media if Technical Boy is still sulking.
After he whistles a couple of times, Technical Boy shuffles in the room. Technical Boy knows what he needs to do, but doesn’t want to.
“I’m sorry…for lynching you. Hanging a dark-skinned man was in very poor taste.”
Shadow doesn’t look impressed (and he shouldn’t be because that apology was shit) and Mr. World offers Shadow a free shot at Technical Boy. Maybe knock out a couple of his teeth, but Shadow declines.
Mr. World “absolves” Technical Boy and tells him to sit. That’s when they begin their pitch since all the unpleasantness is out of the way.
“Technology’s evolving. We’re all evolving. It would be an honor, sir, to evolve with you. I want to help you influence people like never before.”
Media adds: “We want to help you find your audience.”
Wednesday asks if this is a truce, and Mr. World says a truce implies they’ve been at war and he doesn’t think they have. This is more of a merger. Media tells him it would be a “new, lemon scented you.”
They’re appealing to his desire not to be forgotten, but it’s not working because he’s too much of an individual. They tell him that individualism doesn’t work and that’s why he’s been forgotten.
They show him a rocket set to take off from North Korea called “Odin” and all four walls turn to T.V. screens. This missile would kill millions of people, everyone would know his name, and Wednesday would be rebranded…and that’s just the start.
Wednesday slams his hands down on the table and it all disappears.
“An oyster. Inside every pearl is a single, irritating grain of sand. That’s me. Otherwise, you wouldn’t be here.”
He then tells them that the New Gods just occupy people’s time while the Old Gods gave them meaning.
Mr. World: “Give it to them again.”
World says it’s time to go, and Technical Boy is pretty ticked off that they don’t just kill Wednesday. He’s there and they have him. Why let him go?
This incredible scene is below. Crispin Glover nails it!
As Mr. World leaves, he tells Wednesday:
“I’m not your enemy.”
After a few seconds, Shadow asks if this is really happening to which Wednesday tells him that it’s still happening.
They escape and as they exit the station, they see all the police have been murdered.
“What story will they tell here?” Shadow asks.
“Anyone they want.”
This implies heavily that Mr. World, Media, and Technical Boy are spinning the world’s news and views.
The female detective from earlier is dead, and her chair has a an eye on it like the people from the beginning of the story.
The chair grows and forms a tree like from Shadow’s dreams. A branch reaches out and slashes him as he passes.
****
Outside, Sweeney is in a police car and sees several police go in and hears the shots being fired. He breaks out the back window and as he tries to escape crushes his balls on the window edge and lands on his back.
He picks himself up and runs away.
****
At the morgue, the coroner hears a noise and goes to look where all the bodies are placed. Laura knocks off the door to her box and it hits the man.
Once she’s on her feet, she steals some clothes and leaves.
****
Next week on American Gods, “A Murder of Gods” will focus on Wednesday’s recruitment of another to his cause and put Shadow in a pretty uncomfortable position.
On the run after the New Gods’ show of force, Shadow and Mr. Wednesday seek safe haven with one of Mr. Wednesday’s oldest friends, Vulcan, God of the Fire and the Forge. [via STARZ]
