I fell behind in my HBO comedy viewing and missed an ‘Entourage’ recap last week. Did anyone notice? Probably not. As I’ve made clear in previous posts, I’ve been as disinterested in the show as anyone this season. It just seems to have outlived its usefulness. With recent news that the series will wrap up its run after just one more (shorter than normal) season, it seems that the producers and network have come to the same conclusion. However, with that said, I have to admit that ‘Bottoms Up’ had a lot of funny stuff in it, and so does this week’s episode, ‘Hair.’ Could the series be back on an upswing? It’s perhaps too soon to tell, but things are definitely a little more interesting lately.

To summarize what I missed covering last week: Vince is now dating porn star Sasha Grey (playing herself). Well, I don’t know if “dating” is the right word. They’re sure having a lot of sex, anyway. Eric and Sloan had a very awkward and uncomfortable yet very funny storyline where they tried unsuccessfully to experiment with anal sex. Ari’s rival, super-agent Amanda (Carla Gugino) is back, and has hired his disgruntled former employee Lizzie. And Vince has decided (against Eric’s wishes) to help Turtle out by sponsoring that tequila. Mostly, he came to this decision because he drank a lot of it.

In ‘Hair,’ Vince continues to drink the tequila. And drink. And drink. Sasha is leading him into a hedonistic downspiral, and he doesn’t even realize it. Eric and Scotty manage to negotiate him a huge offer to star in Randall Wallace’s ‘Air-Walker’ movie without any help from Ari, of which they are both proud. But Vince’s drunken antics leave the deal in jeopardy, especially after Turtle stupidly posts some videos on Twitter where Vince boasts about banging a porn star. That’s not exactly the image that the studio wants for a PG-13 comic book hero.

Johnny is also drinking too much, but for different reasons. While Vince is a happy drunk, Drama is miserable about his career downturn.

On the opposite end of this spectrum, Billy Walsh shows up totally clean and sober. He wants to mend fences, specifically with Eric. He actually wants Eric to manage him and help him turn his career around. Eric is skeptical, but likes an idea Billy throws out that Drama should try doing voice-acting work in animation. This could open some doors for Johnny that Eric hadn’t even considered.

Ari has been preoccupied with the Lizzie situation, and Amanda couldn’t be happier to rub it in his face. He’s worried that Lizzie will sue for sexual harassment. Apparently, she has recordings of him behaving like a sexist jackass in the office. Which is, of course, the way he behaves every day. If it goes to court, whether he wins or loses, Ari’s NFL deal will almost certainly fall through.

Ari tries to buy Lizzie off with a huge settlement offer, but it turns out that Lizzie doesn’t want his money and doesn’t even want to sue. She just wants to destroy him, and has released the recordings to ‘Deadline Hollywood.’ I kind of like the idea that Ari will finally have to be held accountable for his obnoxious fratboy behavior. Anyone who knows Ari well knows that he’s harmless and just likes to bluster, but those recordings going public will make him toxic in the industry.

While this is going on, Scotty (who hates Ari anyway) tries to talk Eric into dumping Ari as Vince’s agent. He’s convinced that the two of them can both manage and rep Vince.

With as much fuss as has been made over Vince’s haircut this season, you’d think the episode title would have something to do with that. Instead, it refers to Turtle’s storyline, and a completely different type of hair. Turtle finally manages to get with the annoying Alex, but totally blows the opportunity after discovering that she’s completely waxed clean beneath the panties. That’s not something he’s used to, and he freaks out a little. Yes, essentially, he’s afraid of her vagina. The guys tease him about this, and Johnny talks him into doing some “manscaping” of his own to level the playing field. When he gets a second shot at Alex, she finds this all very funny, but still thinks Turtle is cute.

As the episode ends, Ari tries to distract himself from his own troubles by focusing on fixing the Vince situation. He pays a visit to the house, where Eric assures him that he has everything under control and that Vince is fine. That’s all belied, of course, when Ari walks out to the pool and finds Vince naked, unconscious, and unresponsive.

Any episode with Carla Gugino is a good episode as far as I’m concerned. I don’t even care what show we’re talking about. I just want to see more of her on TV.

And speaking of “seeing more of her,” in the final scene Sasha struts across the screen to remind us of the episode title again. Let’s just say that she’s not like Alex.

I know this is what the girl does for a living. And I acknowledge that ‘Entourage’ has featured its share of tits and asses on screen over the years. Yet I have to say that seeing full-frontal nudity like that in a television show somehow still manages to give me pause.

Pause and Rewind and Slo-Mo, even.