Bad Monkey – Season 1 Episode 4 Recap & Review

Eve and the Forbidden Fruit

Episode 4 of Bad Monkey starts with Caitlin confronting Eve. As we know, Nick is still alive… but how? Well, our tale sets us up 5 years back. Eve is on stage but she’s not a particularly great actress, having only really starred in one car commercial. She lashes out at the director for his constructive criticism and loses her role in Ghost.

Meanwhile, Caitlin and her father have a close bond and she’s excelling with her magazine shoots. However, Nick is not particularly enthused about her going to these launch parties. Caitlin is 17 though and wants to branch out and make her own decisions. Unfortunately, Nick ends up more vulnerable than usual, and he spies Eve.

As the pair talk, Caitlin notices that Nick and Eve begin kissing and, eventually, end up married. Her dog is chosen as a bridesmaid over Caitlin, which doesn’t help, and it only sours their relationship further.

So what about Yancy? Well, he’s working as a cop in the Miami PD and continues to make enemies. Here we see the inception of his rivalry with Mendez. It turns out he’s as dirty as they come, and naturally, Yancy goes to the higher-ups with this information. Mendez is taken off the tip line as the department don’t want to expose his crimes, and they also refuse to promote him up to detective (for now anyway). As for Yancy? He’s transferred out to the Keys.

As he works, Izzy and Nick enter the “heyday” of their Super Rollie scam. Eve weasels her way into the operation, encouraging Nick to go bigger. The money starts to pile in and they celebrate with a trip over to the Andros. Eve seduces Nick with the idea of a resort. He falls for it, hook line and sinker. Neville is here and he has a strong sense of foreboding but it’s just a shame that Nick doesn’t feel the same way. He gets too close to the sun but before he gets burned, Nick decides they need to get out of dodge and go on the run.

When Eve finds out, she’s not happy and doesn’t want to live without the money. Nick doesn’t want to lose her, and inevitably, he thinks with his penis rather than his brain. Speaking of which, Yancy and Bonnie start to grow closer together while all this is going on. She has a nasty shiner right over her eye, and this is the handiwork of Cliff. These bad decisions that both Yancy and Nick make (the former hitting out at Cliff, the former framing his murder) haunt them for the rest of their lives.

Nick phones Caitlin before he goes through with chopping his arm off and faking his death. He apologizes to her, but of course he knows he’s messed things up with her. It’s kinda ironic too, given he was worried that Caitlin would run off with someone else when in reality, it’s him who was seduced by Eve.

Izzy O’Peele is the one who does the dirty work, handing over the money to Phinney and setting up the severed arm onboard the boat. Not only that, but Izzy smashes up the arm in the shower, explaining the shards of bones they found. Naturally, Eve’s inability to cry, which was set up right at the start of the episode, comes back to bite her when Yancy figures everything out.

Nick crosses paths with the Dragon Queen and Ya-Ya though, causing drama to ensue. Phinney is not done though and continues to extort money from Nick. Eve though, contemplates the idea of killing him, explaining the hit and run.

As for Izzy, he’s not doing too well and after Yancy visits him, Nick shows up. He’s not happy when he finds out Izzy is going to speak up and reveal everything. Nick though, covers his tracks and makes the awful decision to kill his friend. Unfortunately, as Nick starts spilling his heart out about how many sacrifices he’s made for them in the parking lot, Heather from the Weather happens to hear everything. Eve jumps in and inevitably kills her, with Nick stuffing her body in the trunk of her car.

This catches us up to the present, with Madeline safe and not murdered. However, news of Heather’s death makes it way across the news. Nick tries to patch up his differences with Caitlin, apologizing for being a terrible dad to her in recent years. He promises to be there for her whenever she needs him.

While Yancy continues to try and ring Caitlin, Rosa and Yancy try to figure out who killed Izzy. Mendez’s apparent belief that this was a murder-suicide certainly isn’t going to fly with Ro or Yancy. Rosa decides to try and keep the case open, believing it could well be murder. She and Yancy get close together, with them eventually having sex.

At the same time, Eve broaches the idea of killing Caitlin to Nick. Nick is not happy and as he confronts her, Eve actually manages to cry, convincing Nick that he’s got his wires crossed and that’s not what she meant after all. As this is going on, a witness comes forward to Mendez and claims that she saw Yancy leave Izzy’s apartment.

Yancy gets an idea that night, and rings Rosa. He believes Nick and Christopher are one and the same, and that he faked his murder. As we know, this is the truth but when he hangs up, Nick shows and smacks him upside the head with a tire iron.

Episode Review

The past is finally laid out for us to see and Bad Monkey thankfully hasn’t dragged this out until the end of the show. There are enough reveals across the run-time, alongside some surprisingly good character development to keep this as an intriguing watch. Understanding Eve’s psyche, and how she’s completely off-the-rails is one thing, but seeing this played out with her inability to cry is a nice way of showing how far her “acting” has come. This woman really doesn’t care about anyone other than herself.

As for Nick, seeing him slowly slip into murkier waters, all thanks to a beautiful woman, reinforces how far off the wagon he’s gone. All of this eventually paves way for that ending, with Nick desperate for his happily ever after, and Yancy determined to put a stop to that.

The ending leaves plenty on the table for next week’s follow-up, and it’s anyone’s guess where this will go next.