Nashville recap: ''Til I Can Make It on My Own'

Welcome, fans of the ‘ville! Last week, we opened a bunch of cans of emotional worms (poor Daph), so let’s not hang about. Here’s what went down in Music City this week:

After a trippy opening sequence where a dolled-up Juliette is having a moment before she heads on stage due to blurry vision, we head back in time 36 hours to find out how the heck we got here. The country diva sits down with her doctor, who explains that she’s been having dissociative episodes. But here’s the thing: This isn’t because of the crash. It’s related to childhood trauma. Oh, by the way, Juliette has lingering issues from her relationship with her never-before-mentioned dad, who died when she was 4.

But J doesn’t think that’s the problem; it’s her album flopping that must be the issue. “My brain can’t process failure,” she tells Avery. He thinks she should consider canceling her upcoming performance, but Juliette “gets a look in her eye” and walks off to call Glenn, telling him she wants to do the next day’s show sans gospel choir. Ouch.

Meanwhile at the Jaymes-Claybourne household, Daphne is playing some sad songs and lying to Deacon about having plans. She blows off his offer to hang out at the Music City Music Week Festival and goes to hang out with her new homeless crew. At the squatting spot, there’s a tattooed girl we haven’t met before, Wendy, who isn’t a fan of new kids like Daphne just showing up. I mean, I see her point; Daphne has a warm, clean home she could be in right now.

Anyway, they make a plan to go hang out at the scrap yard — again, is that preferable to backstage at a music festival? When they get there, a Private Property sign makes it clear these kids are trespassing, but they’re pretty intent on finding “valuable crap” to sell, so they squeeze through a gap in the locked gate. Daph chooses to wait outside. Literally three seconds later, the kids are caught by the yard owners and all try and make a run for it. Rather than exit the way she entered (three seconds ago), Liv tries to jump the barbed-wire fence and inevitably ends up tearing up her arm.

When they get back to the squatting spot, they try to patch up Liv while Daphne encourages her to go to the hospital. Frustrated at Daph’s lack of understanding, Liv gets short with her and ends up snapping. She later apologizes and relents when Daph suggests Liv come home with her, but not before she delivers this jarring response when Daphne asks where her parents are: “You referring to the biological drug addicts that ditched me or the foster drunks that never understood that no meant no?” Yikes.
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Back at the ranch (the Jaymes household), Daphne smuggles Liv into the house. “Yo, this is your house?!” exclaims the shocked homeless teen before inquiring what wing the bathroom is in. The girls clean up the nasty gash on Liv’s arm, and Daphne explains that she lives there with her stepdad because her dad’s in prison and her mom’s dead. See, Liv? Can’t judge this book by its huge mansion cover. “Maybe you’re my kind of girl after all,” quips Liv — not totally sure that’s a good thing. When Deacon gets home, he offers to make dinner for everyone, but Daphne just (very suspiciously) grabs two of everything from the fridge and heads back upstairs, citing stomach issues as an excuse.

Later, Deacon notices some bloodied rags in the bathroom trash and goes to Daphne’s room to ask her about it. Liv hides under the bed, but Deacon’s no fool and, noticing the room is covered in snacks and trash, bursts back in moments later when the two girls are celebrating his apparent cluelessness. He tells the girls Liv can’t stay; there are laws about harboring homeless kids. But Daph tears up, and he relents, saying she can stay for the time being.

Elsewhere, the choir isn’t being super Christian in the face of the news they’ve been cut from the performance; they’re pissed at Juliette, even though she lied and told them it was the label’s call. She wants to perform her old material instead because she’s more confident with it, but when she’s talking to Hallie about it all, she has another dissociative episode and almost faints. Hallie tells her to focus on a happy place, and J starts recalling a memory of her dad — because apparently all of a sudden he was a huge deal in her life. It doesn’t seem to help — in sound check, she takes another tumble and flashes back to her childhood again. This time, she’s painting with her dad until her mom appears and yells at her dad that he cares more about “that baby” than he does about her. Back in the present, Avery comes rushing over and picks her up.

The pressure’s on since this is Jules’ first live performance since the plane crash. Plus, all the big names are turning out for the music festival — including Cassadee Pope, who has a small cameo when Zach pitches her Highway 65 as a label. (Good news: She wants to “set something up.”)

Zach ambushes Deacon about getting rid of Bucky again. He thinks HW65 is missing out on opportunities, and Bucky’s archaic ways are to blame. To revamp things a little, he wants to release Maddie’s song at midnight, without the proper rollout. Deacon think it’s risky, but when Maddie hears the pitch later, she like the idea. Zach tells Deacon to take the next 24 hours to think it all over and to use his head, not his heart, in making the decision. It doesn’t take long for Bucky to realize he’s out of the loop about Maddie’s single. When he asks Deacon about it, Deacon confesses that Zach wants him out of HW65 but says he’s not going to let that happen.

Meanwhile, Damien has been calling Scarlett and texting her that he’s in town, so eventually, she decides to have dinner with him. He walks in all excited to see her and gives her a VERY long and lingering kiss on the cheek. Scarlett responds by blurting out that she’s pregnant before they’ve even ordered appetizers. Damien responds by ordering a double Grey Goose on the rocks. He’s surprised to hear she’s decided to keep the baby, but when she gets up to leave, he doesn’t want her to go. He explains he hasn’t faced this responsibility before and asks her to tell him what she needs to make things easier for her. Scarlett says it was a mistake to come here, and this time, he lets her leave.

Later, at the festival, all too aware of the Damien dinner, The Exes play a very subdued set. Gunnar then gets a little aggressive in his guitar strumming, and Scarlett opts for her favorite “I don’t know why you could possibly be upset with me” face. The next day, Damien comes over to see Scar and admits he “was a complete arse yesterday.” He goes on to declare his love for her and says he wants to “be in this 100 percent” and that they should “do this the right way; we can make this work.” Thankfully, he stops short of proposing. Scarlett’s all, “It’s not true,” but Damien responds that he wants it to be. And… I have no idea where this is going. If Scarlett rejects Gunnar AGAIN, I’m going to be seriously disgruntled.
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The night before the big performance, Juliette’s having a dream about her dad driving away to get groceries and saying he’ll “be right back.” I’m going to go out on a limb here and assume that this was the last time she ever saw him. The next morning, she’s telling Hallie about it, but when she gets interrupted by a crying Cadence, her assistant accidentally lets slip that it wasn’t the record label’s decision to cut the choir from the show; it was Juliette’s. In a surprisingly bold manner, Hallie tells Jules she’s a “selfish, narcissistic bitch.” She doesn’t want to hear J’s excuses about not being able to promote a record no one “gave a crap about,” and with a, “The only one you care about is you,” she storms out.

Later, Jules asks Avery if she’s narcissistic, and — smart man that he is — he doesn’t answer. But he does say she should apologize to the choir. She tells him she’s just grateful that he isn’t running away — there goes the tour opportunity he was offered after a great performance at the festival. (Avery might just be the best person on this show.) And so Juliette drives down to church and has another flashback of her mom telling her that something has happened to daddy and he isn’t coming home.

Juliette is pretty emotional by the time she explains to the choir her reasons for ditching them. Her explanation has something to do with them not knowing how it feels to think you are going to be paralyzed for the rest of your life and being afraid every day of making a fool of herself in front of all her fans. She finishes by admitting there’ll be no mini tour, but she says she still wants to see it through and asks if they’ll please sing with her tonight.

At the venue, Avery lets the tour manager know he can’t go on the road right now; Juliette needs him too much. She’s backstage before her performance, and there’s still no sign of the choir, but when she gets to the stage, they’re all there and ready to perform in their robes — which don’t totally match J’s sequined mini dress with plunging neckline, but hey, what do I know about putting on a show. At the bottom of the huge, steep steps to the stage (whoever planned this forgot about Juliette’s recent leg troubles), J has a moment, her vision blurs, and we’re back to where the episode started.

She flashes back to a moment after her dad’s funeral: She’s in the woods, and the ghost of her dad (all decked out in white and shrouded in light) tells her he’ll never leave her, he’ll always watch over her, she’ll be wonderful no matter what she does, blah blah blah. Okayyyyyy, too much, Nashville — if we’re going to get ghost action, how about that super-famous singer and matriarch we’re all missing dearly? Anyway, it works for J. She smiles, and with tears in her eyes, she walks up the stairs and out on stage with purpose as the choir prolongs its “ooooohs” to make up for her delay. And do you know what? It’s kind of a sweet song. In the crowd, Gunnar approaches Scar and puts an arm around her as Damien looks on, pissed. I wish I felt confident in Gunnar’s success.

Bucky’s backstage, and so is Zach. The Buckster approaches Deacon and tells him he’s leaving HW65. When Deacon protests, Bucky says it’s his decision; he won’t let Deacon sacrifice the company for him, but he warns him to be careful, since he gets the feeling Zach is just getting started. Rayna will be spinning in her grave. Zach lurks in the background like the traitorous whiz-kid villain that he is as Bucky walks out of the arena, passing under a poster of the late Rayna and trying to hold back tears. Sob.

Is that the last we’ll see of Bucky? Will Deacon fight back? Will Liv take a shower? We’ll be back next week to find out!