Animal Kingdom recap: There once was a cat named Tank

On Animal Kingdom, Smurf is literally falling to pieces and just wants some late Mother’s Day love.

The latest episode of Animal Kingdom is called “Tank”, but I have no clue why. There’s one mention of Pope and Julia’s childhood pet cat named Tank, but it’s only in reference to how creepy of a mother Smurf is. So… apparently, Smurf further messed up Pope using a cat? We need more information here.

Mia and J

Following the hit-woman stunt last episode,  J throws Mia’s stuff out on the front lawn and changes the locks to their shared apartment, however, he never considered the fact that his fancy apartment is 60% windows and windows break very easily.

With Tupi’s help, Mia retaliates against her surprise eviction and breaks and/or rips apart everything inside. However, she calls it quits when Tupi tries opening J’s safe, pretending it’s full of useless papers. Mia may be mad at J, but she likes Tupi even less, she’s not going to burn all her bridges with him just yet.

Meanwhile, J is looking to prove himself and starts hunting for a new job involving that college brat pack he met in the first episode.

The weekly flashback

Colin experiences war flashbacks from his time in Vietnam, becoming paranoid and erratic as he thinks someone is chasing him. In response to this, Smurf shares her own experiences of dark things she’s seen and reveals that her mother Marian was a prostitute while the two of them were living out of a car, implying that her mother had sex with some of the men while little Janine was still in the car.

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The other men of the gang mock Colin’s PTSD behind his back like pretend-brave schoolchildren throwing insults at their teacher when they aren’t at her mercy and Smurf puts them in their place. “Show some respect!”

These flashbacks are clearly leading to something major that turns Smurf into the she-devil she’s become, and since most of the core flashback characters are already accounted for, I’m guessing Death has his eye on Colin.

Adrian, Deran, and a really annoying pest

Remember Colby from Animal Kingdom Season 3? The guy who’s like a seagull that got fed one French Fry and never went away, flocking around Deran for scraps hoping that if he’s loud enough someone will throw him the whole McDonald’s bag! Well, he returns with the somewhat pointless news of Ox’s official death in a scene that’s probably only meant to introduce Colby as one of the season’s minor antagonists.

It’s been confirmed that someone will rat on the Cody’s this season and guess what Colby loosely admits to during his talk with Deran? He spoke to the cops when identifying Ox’s body and now he’s suddenly very interested in Deran’s extracurricular activities. The cops probably figured out he was involved with Ox’s death and are giving him a plea deal in exchange for information.

Colby and his stupid floppy boy band hair make one more appearance before the end to give Deran the news we’ve all been waiting for. He knows about Adrian’s drug dealing and demands to be included, going as far as making a veiled threat if he isn’t. So Deran now knows about Adrian and Colby is definitely going to die in a few weeks.

Speaking of informants, despite leading the DEA to the warehouse, they still want Adrian to complete the circuit so they can catch the drug bosses. It’s during this when Mr. DEA Agent reveals he knows Adrian lied about Deran Cody being his roommate, and if Adrian wasn’t such a guilty doe-eyed innocent he might have been able to come up with an excuse instead of looking like a shell-shocked pair of car headlights sinking in cold water.

Craig

Poor Craig might have lost his winning streak. The statue job runs smoothly but it turns out the payment won’t be available for weeks, which Craig knew nothing about. You’d think he would’ve discussed this with her earlier.

The boys are used to stealing their money firsthand, so Frankie not having the money up front rings alarm sirens in Craig’s brain. She ends up giving him $40k with a promise to get the rest, but he doesn’t tell the guys just yet. They kept warning him against Frankie and now he’s afraid they might’ve been right.

Later that night though, while moping about the money, Craig gets a surprise visit from a heavily pregnant Renn! Animal Kingdom is about to move up its number of semi-functioning couples from one to two.

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Angela

Angela is way too comfortable in the Cody house, the way she’s completely unfazed by everything around her is a little nutty. Her sole purpose is to deliver insight into Julia’s relationships with her brother and mother, but I think she’s overstayed her welcome. Thanks to Angela’s reminiscing, we learn that Smurf might not have been the only Cody woman inappropriately obsessed with Pope. Angela mentions how Julia never wanted to share her twin, even when she started dating Baz, Pope belonged to her.

I’m starting to wonder if the reason Smurf kicked Julia out had something to do with Pope. The original assumption was that Smurf found out she was sleeping with Baz, but thanks to Angela we now know a little more about how Smurf and Julia viewed each other. Julia sounded like a disastrous version of Smurf.

Smurf

Smurf spends most of this episode making unannounced house calls after spending all morning laying by the pool in a disheveled state hoping to score sympathy points with Pope. When that doesn’t work, she gets high with Craig and pays Adrian a visit, making lasagna for the Cody-Dolan household and talks to Adrian as if he’s an unworthy in-law.

Back home, she goes behind Pope’s back and hires some painters to recolor Lena’s room, another nail in the coffin shutting away any competition over Pope’s affections. He never gets the chance to rip her head off though because when he comes home, he finds her passed out on the bathroom floor with blood leaking from her mouth.

I think it’s pretty clear the show is going to kill Smurf. She’s vomiting up blood, that’s not a good sign.

Don’t miss the next episode of Animal Kingdom on Tuesday night at 9:00 p.m.  EST on TNT.