Rules
Episode 4 of A Teacher begins with Eric returning home from Homecoming flustered and telling his Mum that the night was fun. Juxtaposing his flustered reaction, Claire heads home breathing heavily and heading inside to greet her husband. There, Matt and the midlife gang sit with instruments discussing their band and their plans for the future.
In the morning, Eric catches up with Josh and Logan who confirm the after-party was a bust. Josh’s sister bounced too, not wanting to be around Logan. When Logan leaves, Josh speaks to Eric privately about his confusing emotions. He senses something happened with his friend but Eric simply tells him he hooked up with Steph again.
This confusion continues later on when Eric messages Claire and tells her he can’t stop thinking about her. Predictably, Claire deletes the message.
At school the next day, Alison catches up with Eric and confronts him about Homecoming. He apologizes for ditching her but this apology falls on deaf ears; she doesn’t want anything to do with him.
Things continue to escalate after class too, when Claire tells Eric they should schedule more tutoring sessions together. That, of course, is code for them continuing their illicit affair.
The pair make it to their hang-out spot just like before and lay out some basic rules, including not meeting on school grounds and making sure they keep it between them. All of this strictness emanates from Eric liking one of Claire’s pictures.
At schoo, Claire struggles to keep her eyes off Eric, sizing him up from the balcony. To try and keep her mind off things, she heads out with fellow teacher Kathryn later that evening for drinks. Only, when they get to the bar she happens to have a hickey on her neck; a physical manifestation of her affair. Heading into the toilets, she takes a revealing picture and sends it on to Eric.
Claire breaks their arrangement and tells Eric she wants to meet right now at their usual hang-out spot. Eric is obviously confused and after palming off his brothers to another babysitter, he shows up and tells Claire that he likes her. She smiles, telling him she likes him too.
After hooking up, Eric returns home to find his Mother there waiting for him. She demands to know where he’s been but he refuses, simply heading into his room and looking in the mirror. “I’m the man.” He reiterates to himself.
The Episode Review
A Teacher continues to escalate the illicit affair between this student and teacher with a very real danger that everything is going to bubble over in the messiest way possible.
The whole time watching I can’t help but wonder what would happen if the roles were reversed in this drama. How would the mainstream media react to a 35 year old male teacher engaging in an affair with a 17/18 year old girl at school? Would this receive the same treatment this series seems to have?
To be fair though, A Teacher has done a pretty good job so far with its screenplay to try and showcase this affair for the predatory situation that it is.
Hopefully the second half will start to dive into the ramifications of what’s taken place between the two. For now though, A Teacher bows out with another episode that just about continues on the tightrope without falling into dangerous waters below.
Previous Episode |
Next Episode |
| Expect A Full Season Write-Up When This Season Concludes! | |
-
Episode Rating
(3)