Black-ish season 4, episode 13 recap: Turning Bow into a housewife

Black-ish returned from a two-week hiatus and picks up in the immediate aftermath of Bow deciding to take time off from work. Meanwhile, Junior and Diane find a common enemy.

When we last saw the Johnson family, Bow was still getting used to the idea of being a stay-at-home mom. With some encouragement from Dre, she accepted that she needed more time and in this episode we see the results.

Here’s what went down in the latest episode of black-ish…

Bow and Dre

The episode begins with Dre watching, happily, as Bow takes over his morning duties with the children. With that time freed up he’s now free to do more of the things he wants to do with his mornings, like watch morning shows. However, over time Bow becomes less enthusiastic about getting an early start to her day. Suddenly, preparing breakfast and picking up the dry-cleaning cease to happen. They’ve been replaced with Bow doing things for herself?

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After dropping Jack and Diane at the school Bow is approached by the other stay-at-home moms. When she was a working mom, she despised these women and thought they were useless. She had a rude awakening when she found out that they all had careers before becoming stay-at-home moms in season two. Blair (Brittany Daniel), Nicole (Christina DeRosa), and Kayla (Sarah Hudson) invite Bow to come to yoga with them. Initially she resists, but she has the time now so she decides to go.

From there, yoga becomes a daily ritual and she’s getting her hair and nails done multiple times during the week. Dre is jealous of her sleeping in and is especially upset about his dry-cleaning not being picked up.

The Fountain

He can’t just confront her however because he is the reason she is staying at home now. Instead, he decides to install a camera. He watches as she receives a large package at the house and knows that it’s something expensive. At home, Bow explains that the fountain is just like the one in her yoga class and is soothing. Dre then confronts her about her spending and makes a couple of key mistakes. First, he talks about the money in the home being his when he asks her to run purchases by him. Then, he calls her a “kept woman” which, as you might imagine, did not go over well. Bow walks away after this conversation and Dre realizes his approach was wrong.

In the end, Bow returns the fountain (it was making her pee) and Dre acknowledges where he went wrong. He tells Bow that when he told her to stay home he was looking at all of the ways it would be good for him but was not thinking about her. As usual, this episode of Black-ish ended with a moment of understanding.

Junior and Diane

Now that Junior has his license, he is tasked with taking Jack and Diane to school. The problem is he also has to take Jack’s friend Mason to school and Mason is quite annoying. During the ride he bombards Junior with a ton of hypothetical “what would you dos.” One of which happens to be: “What would you do if I opened my mouth, and a snake came out?”

Junior is clearly not amused and ends up having the kid sit in the back with Jack, promoting Diane to the front seat. This means having to make conversation with Diane, and initially he struggles. Then Mason starts up with his “what would you do” scenarios and Junior makes a joke about him under his breath. Diane, being the evil one and all, joins in and the two bond over their shared enemy.

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All is going fine until one day Mason overhears them. He leaves the car hurt and crying which reminds Junior of the times he was picked on. He ends up going to Mason’s house to apologize (and teach his mom how to use excel), but this ruins his relationship with Diane. She cannot tolerate this softness.

While most of the episode revolved around Dre and Bow, it was good to see how the kids are getting along with Zoe off at college.

Oh, and I really hope Dre remembers to take that camera out of his living room. The episode ends with Bow asking Dre if he ordered her a box of leotards. Dre did not, Charlie did as he’s been watching the feed in Dre’s office.

Bonus

In the middle of the episode, Black-ish aired a special video related to the upcoming release of Black Panther which you can see below.

Black-ish is a show that does a great job of making their show socially conscious while keeping the content accessible to all. The Black Panther bonus peak was a great surprise from tonight’s episode.

Tune into Black-ish on ABC Tuesday nights at 9/8 central.