‘Under the Dome’ 3.04 Recap: “This Place Blows”

It’s mating season ‘Under the Dome’! In the latest episode of the show I don’t know why I can’t stop hate-watching, the evil butterflies from outer space make everybody in Chester’s Mill super horny. Yes, this is really the plot of a TV series that airs on a major network in primetime.

First off, did the show ever address the fact that the dome isn’t shrinking anymore? That was a huge plot-driver at the end of the last season, and I don’t recall it ever being resolved. I guess that’s just one more thing the writers have forgotten about.

Anyway, where are we? Having burned down his house, Junior pitches a tent on the edge of the lake. He then pitches another tent when Christine runs up to him all sweaty and milfy and heaving her bosoms. I forget what excuse she makes for needing to talk to him in this state. I was too busy wincing in disgust when she tosses her sweat-soaked shirt at his face. Eww…

From across the lake, Big Jim spies on his boy using a pair of binoculars like a perv until a soldier in a gas mask sneaks up behind and throws a bag over his head. How do all these new people keep getting into the dome?

Joe catches Norrie and Hunter frolicking at the beach. When she tries to deny that they were so obviously just about to bang (Pro tip: It’s not as sexy as you think it will be to get sand up inside all your sensitive body parts), Joe tells her, “Let’s just end this.” I feel like saying that to this show every week.

Barbie, still under the magic butterfly spell (I cannot believe I’m writing these sentences), turns cold toward Julia for no reason and defends Christine. Then, at Christine’s suggestion, he agrees to show Eva around town and help her look for a new food supply. In the show’s official chronology, the characters have been trapped under this dome for just three weeks, during which time they’ve already run out of every last scrap of anything edible.

Julia, naturally, is not happy about this. She goes snooping in Christine’s office and finds the voice recorder on which Christine has been dictating her evil plans, but doesn’t get a chance to listen to it before Christine catches her and asks for it back. Julia questions her about a half-destroyed ID badge that Christine says is for a university where she teaches. Much tension is brewing between these two characters!

Secretly, Christine worries that the more time the townspeople spend outside the Butterfly Matrix, the weaker her spell over them will get and the more they’ll return to their old selves.

Big Jim finds himself tied to a chair while men in hazmat suits inject him with something and run tests on him. When they determine that he’s not infected with whatever they were expecting him to be infected with, they remove their hoods. One is Malick, the soldier guy who works for the evil Aktaion corporation. Jim is puzzled as to how he got under the dome. The other guy is Frank Whaley, who mostly stands around like he’s waiting for Samuel Jackson to shoot him. Malick demands that Jim tell him where the pink space egg is. Jim, of course, knows that the egg has been destroyed, but they don’t. When he tries to negotiate a deal, Malick beats on him and threatens torture. Jim fights back, gets loose from his chair, and holds Malick as a hostage. Frank Whaley, in no mood to make deals, orders a goon to shoot Malick dead. Jim runs off.

While searching for food, Barbie and Eva reminisce about all that fake time they spent together as a couple that never really happened because they were really trapped in the Butterfly Matrix dreaming the whole thing. They come upon some farm silos filled with cattle feed. Eva, who has now taken over for the late, lamented Science Teacher Rebecca as the biggest know-it-all in town, announces that the feed may be disgusting, but it will be edible to humans. Barbie almost falls off the roof of a silo until Eva climbs up and rescues him, very sexily. They share a moment and make goo-goo eyes at each other.

Some stupid soap opera bullshit happens with Sam and some random unimportant woman who tries to kill herself and then gets him to start drinking again, but these are boring characters that nobody cares about.

Julia identifies the logo on Christine’s ID badge and realizes that the woman actually works for Aktaion. She tries to explain this to Joe, but he’s now on Team Butterfly and doesn’t care. When Barbie returns to town, Julia tries to tell him about it but gets a similar reaction. Julia and Barbie then have a fight about Eva. Barbie punches a hole in a wall. Julia cries. How sad it must be to find out that the man you met three weeks ago who murdered your husband and yet you stupidly fell in love with anyway has already moved on.

Hunter puts the moves on Norrie again, but she suddenly remembers that she’s a high school student and he’s an older creep. She gets weirded out and leaves. She finds Joe and apologizes to him for being such a bitch. She doesn’t want to have sex with Hunter. She wants to have sex with Joe, of course! Super psyched that he’s about to lose his virginity, Joe questions how many condoms they’ll need. He’s going to try to put them all on at once, isn’t he?

Now broken up with Julia, Barbie immediately heads right for Eva’s motel room. She has just taken a pregnancy test to find out if anything that happened in the Butterfly Matrix carried through to the real world, and is very sad when the test comes back negative. Barbie consoles her with his penis. If she wants a baby, he’ll put a baby inside her all right!

Sad Julia gets in a dinghy and rows over to Big Jim’s island, where she promptly runs into Big Jim running through the woods. Jim tries to tell her that evil Aktaion guys are in town. She doesn’t believe him at first and contemplates shooting him (what did she go the island for, anyway?), but then she sees an Aktaion goon and shoots him instead. I guess Julia and Big Jim are teamed up now.

The episode ends with Christine bringing Junior to the butterfly cave, where she smears gross goo on his face and fucks him. For those of you asking the same question I did, yes, Christine is more than twice Junior’s age. In fact, she’s eight years older than his mother. (Alexander Koch 27, Sherry Stringfield 48, Marg Helgenberger 56.)

For all that, the most ridiculous part of the episode is when Christine gives a speech and addresses all the residents of Chester’s Mill as “Millers.” Seriously, that’s the nickname we’re going with? I think “Dumbasses” would get to the point quicker.

3 comments

  1. Brian Ben

    Wow. No food, but let’s multiply. Do you suppose they’ll eat the new born? Becoming more apparent why these people are kept under a dome.

  2. Lauren

    This is one of the funniest and best recaps of a TV episode I’ve ever read. Thank you for this. Glad to see I wasn’t the only one cringing my way through this season so far. What it is about summertime that makes us gobble up whatever garbage these shows hurl at us, as long as it’s something new to watch? If this show were on during the fall or winter, I would have abandoned it a full season ago.

  3. Lord Bowler

    I’m finishing up Under the Dome Season 3 very late, mostly hate-watching at this point.

    This whole post is laugh-out-loud funny and so true!

    Now I have to finish this show just to follow along with these awesome recaps!

    How did this show get a second, much less a third season?

    I’m beginning to dread what a Season 2 of Zoo will look like. I enjoyed Season 1, but it was very reminiscent of Under the Dome Season 1. Lots of potential, but seems to work better as a one-off season rather than multi-year series. Zoo Season 2 could become the next Under the Dome hate-watch…

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