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Transparent

The second season of Transparent arrives in full on Amazon Prime Video on December 11th, and Prime subscribers have been granted sneak-preview access to the first episode already; it’s a beautiful start to the season. Don’t expect a whole lot of hand-holding from the show either. The season starts right in the middle of a major life event, and it keeps on rolling forward from there.

So in the interests of giving you the best platform from which to leap right back into the lives of the Pfeffermans — it’s been over fourteen months, after all — we’ve assembled a quick catch-up guide for where things left off at the end of season one.

Who Are These People?

Okay, we’re not going to recap the entirety of season one, but just in case you’re bad with names or whatever: Jeffrey Tambor plays Mort Pfefferman, who in the very first episode comes out to his family as a trangender woman. Her name is Maura. Maura’s three adult children — Sarah (Amy Landecker), Josh (Jay Duplass), and Ali (Gaby Hoffmann) — call her “moppa” now. There’s also the matter of Shelly Pfefferman (Judith Light), Maura’s ex-wife and the kids’ mother. Her second husband, Ed, died at the end of the season. Sarah has two young kids, Zack and Ella, with her ex-husband Len (Rob Huebel).

And Just Real Quick About Maura …

While Maura’s name is new, she’s been a woman her whole life. While she was married to Shelly and the kids were little, she spent some time going away to vacation spots for like-minded people, men dressing as women, et cetera. Labels were harder to come by back then, but Maura (then Mort) really took to them.

So Sarah Is Divorced …

Right, not long after Maura came out to her children, Sarah broke up with Len and started dating Tammy (Melora Hardin). Tammy is … a lot to take. As the season ended and Tammy got to be pretty overbearing, Sarah’s eye began to wander back to Len. They almost had sex during Ed’s shiva, but Len stopped it. Moments later, Sarah suggested to Tammy that they should get married.

And What’s Up With Josh?

So much! After a good deal of teasing it out, Josh got together with rabbi Raquel (Kathryn Hahn), despite the eight billion red flags waving behind him at all times. Red flags like the years-long relationship he’s carried on with his former babysitter, Rita. Raquel is awesome, though, and the best of everyone. She’s good for Josh. Which is good news, because at season’s end, she and Josh found out that she’s pregnant. And then they found out that Rita had a son by Josh, unbeknownst to him and later given up for adoption. That son, Colton (Alex MacNicoll), is now back in the picture, looking like he’s spent the past 18 years eating nothing but corn in the heartland.

Is Ali the Worst Pfefferman?

Ali is the worst Pfefferman. It’s probably understandable that Ali is the worst Pfefferman. She was the youngest when her parents got divorced, and as flashbacks have shown, she was kind of ignored. Still, she’s the most selfish person in the family AND THAT IS SAYING SOMETHING, she’s been continually ungenerous towards her moppa despite being outwardly liberal and bohemian and fancying herself very open-minded. Her response to Maura’s revelation is to give herself an androgynous makeover and explore her own sexual boundaries in a very touristy way. She’s a terrible friend to Syd (Carrie Brownstein), her supposed best friend who also slept with Josh and later confessed that she’s had romantic feelings for Ali for a long time, to the point of telling Syd not to come to shiva for Ed. And at the shiva, rather than deal with any of her own emotions, she instead does stuff like tell Raquel that Josh is probably a sex addict.

Is There a Bianca in All This?

Sure is! Bianca is [deep breath] Tammy’s step-daughter from a previous marriage. She’s kind of at odds and ends. She and Josh were majorly flirting for a while, in a way that made everybody nervous, especially since Tammy and Josh basically hate each other. By season’s end, Josh got Bianca and her friend Margeaux (Clementine Creevy) turned on to Heart and is grooming them as a musical act.

So It Sounds Like Everybody’s At Odds

You’d think? And yet season one ended on the most generous of notes, with Colton leading the Pfeffermans in a prayer of thanks for their day, their lives, and for each other. Even after Maura righteously told off Ali at the shiva, Ali was welcomed back into the fold without question. Shelly and Maura are closer than they’ve been in years. Sarah and Josh both seem to have invited love into their lives. What could possibly sabotage all this but themselves?