American Crime recap: 'Season Three: Episode Three'

When it comes to American Crime, no episode would ever go so far as to be considered a “breather,” though this one is the closest we’ll get following season 3’s relentlessly ferocious narrative thus far. And this is an episode that contains rape, a brutal ass-kicking, and an excruciating group-therapy confession. Still, a good portion of the hour felt like maybe not so much filler, but just a means to get to the next part of the story.

However, the slower pace allowed us to reconnect with Shae, who was pretty much left behind at a shelter by Kimara (and the plotline) last week. Thanks to tonight’s episode, though, the teenager has now supplanted the other characters as the heart of this season. “Episode Three” has made up for last week’s Shae shortage in spades, using her screen time to document how shelter life is far from the safe haven it’s supposed to represent. In a poignant scene where the onetime prostitute shares her story in group therapy, Ana Mulvoy Ten joins the ranks of cast members Felicity Huffman, Regina King, Richard Cabral, Lili Taylor, Timothy Hutton, and, most recently, Connor Jessup: Actors without whom American Crime would flounder.

Shae talks at length about how much happier she was with her pimp, Billy, whom she truly believes took better care of her than her family: “[Billy is] the only one who ever gave me anything. I miss that. I miss him,” she confesses. (The teen’s backstory also includes being forced to have an abortion by her father’s girlfriend when the woman claimed Shae got pregnant just to get attention.)

But that’s not the most disturbing part of Mulvoy Ten’s monologue: No, that comes when she admits she’s going to terminate her current pregnancy (remember, we’re in North Carolina, so that may not be as easy as she thinks) because she knows the baby isn’t Billy’s. She muses wistfully that if the baby was her pimp’s — and he wasn’t in jail — all three of them could live happily ever after like the family they were meant to be.

Shae’s fantasy is a twisted one, but considering the provided montage of her day-to-day existence at the shelter, it’s not as outlandish to her as it may seem to us. Who wouldn’t want to get out of a routine that includes mandatory drug tests, cleanup duties and preachy chapel sessions where the girls are slut-shamed into thinking their children will “curse them” if they don’t lay a strong foundation for their lives? Shae’s not the only one in that chapel session who looks utterly miserable.

The only friend Shae has at the moment is Kimara, who can see how the shelter’s rules are breaking the girl’s spirit. After Shae is caught with an illegal phone — which she’s been using just to take pictures of things that capture her eye — Kimara smuggles her another one, thus placing their relationship on a trustworthy track. But that’s the only silver lining in Kimara’s life this episode, as Reggie turns down her request to serve as her sperm donor. To add insult to injury, Reggie also holds up a mirror to Kimara’s reality by reminding her of how all-consuming her job is — so much so that he fears she won’t give the baby she wants 100 percent of her attention. And he should know: It was Kimara’s relentless devotion to her work that destroyed their relationship.

You can’t blame Reggie for his decision, but you also feel for Kimara, who cries over the very real possibility she’ll never know what a child’s love feels like. It’s too soon to know if this is the end of the road on her baby journey, but it’s no wonder she’s now even more determined to help Shae. Also a nice touch in the Kimara story? That moment where she slips a young girl her card after she witnesses her boyfriend (pimp?) roughing her up at a convenience store. But if Kimara does have a child, will she be able to stop herself from handing out that card to every troubled youth she comes across?

NEXT: Keeping ’em down on the farm

Over on the agricultural side of things, Luis is making major strides toward tracking down Teo, as well as ingratiating himself into the narrative’s larger thread. He’s now landed at the Hesby farm, working alongside Isaac and Coy. Through further word of mouth, he meets a young mother named Itzel who provides crucial information about his son — details that, when put together, allow us to extrapolate what very likely happened. Itzel tells Luis that Teo was her friend and someone who stood up for her when she was raped in the tomato fields. (It’s easy to assume her baby is Teo’s, but that theory shifts quickly.)

While it’s only been hinted at in previous episodes, the rape culture that proliferates among the farm workers is placed front and center tonight. Yes, American Crime is doubling down on its upsetting subject matter, but anyone who watches the show should know there’s going to be hard-to-stomach parts of every episode. In an eerie contrast to his role from last season, the opening scene has Jessup’s character, Coy, witnessing Isaac’s brother, Diego, sexually assaulting someone in the fields. Later, as Itzel tells her story, it is revealed Teo earned a severe beating from his bosses for daring to come to her aid, and she never saw him again (that, paired with those first images from the season premiere, paints a morbid picture). But when Luis demands Itzel give him the name of the boss who beat Teo, American Crime doesn’t show her response. Instead, we cut to Diego — which, while not confirming his role in Teo’s disappearance or that he fathered Itzel’s baby — heavily suggests he is responsible for both.

Diego is a busy guy: When he’s not preying on women or assaulting subordinates, he’s teaching the next generation of bosses to instill fear into the hearts of their underlings through pure bullying. Toward the end of the episode, it’s not Diego who doles out the familiar-looking ass-kicking to Coy (who is clearly not pulling his weight, thanks to his Oxy addiction), but Isaac. Tired of his brother constantly emasculating him and angry over Coy’s white-boy cockiness (he bragged to Isaac about how he’s “died” from drug overdoses five times, but was always revived because he learned to shoot up near a fire station) Isaac makes an example of the troubled youth: He beats Coy to a bloody pulp while Luis, fully aware Teo suffered the same fate, watches helplessly.

This brilliantly shot sequence — the beating happens in the distance, as Luis looks on and Diego stands unconcerned to the side — further illustrates the theme of how, as I said last week, the “compost” rolls downhill in this infrastructure. We already know the Hesbys maintain despicable practices, but as a result, their underlings are no better. It’s every man (and woman) for themselves, which means even those suffering are capable of doing terrible things to their fellow humans.

Throughout this atrocious narrative, Jeanette continues to push back against her indifferent in-laws following her investigation of last week’s fire, using her sheer boredom to energize her commitment (“I sit around, that’s what I do all day,” she tells Carson). To her surprise and ours, she winds up finding a kindred spirit in JD — who, just as he did in the previous episode, tells her the truth. The “policy review” Laurie Ann said she would conduct? Total hogwash. Plus, JD drops an even bigger bombshell: Those fires have been happening since he was a boy, and no one has ever tried to reform the system (he calls it “business as usual”). Still, Jeanette finally has an ally, albeit one whose drinking has constantly gotten in the way of his attempts to implement change.

But it’s a start. The final scene of the episode shows the two of them attending a workers’ rally, and while neither of them need to be reminded of how bad things are at the Hesby farm, hearing about the consequences of their ignorance certainly can’t hurt.