Woohoo! All is right in Ugly Betty land as of the end of this week’s episode. The evil queen has been dethroned, Betty proved she is as awesome as ……, and Christina gets pushed down a flight of stairs. Wait? What? That last part definitely isn’t right. But let’s start with the unhappy start of the episode: Betty is unhappy at Player Magazine, Daniel is worried his son would choose to live with his grandparents in France, Alexis isn’t happy with the way Willie is running the magazine and Hilda is dating a married guy, need I say more.
Betty needs more from life than girls in bikinis and her ideas turning into soft porn photo shoots. So when she finds the mock up of Willie’s launch issue of Mode, she starts building Daniel’s confidence so maybe he’ll believe he belongs back in the big chair. But, of course, he doesn’t believe her and so he’s content to stay at Player. He also has bigger issues on his mind. Turns out DJ’s maternal grandparents want to raise him in France and willing to go through quite a nasty little custody battle to get him. So even though Daniel does miss his old hooch-free environment, he won’t admit it. I guess it’s a good thing that Betty doesn’t really listen to Daniel and takes his notes to Alexis.
And it turns out that Daniel’s notes are pretty durn good. Willie has turned Mode into a magazine version of herself; cold, distant, difficult to understand. But she does have an eye for a scheme and when she finds out it was Betty who turned Alexis onto Daniel’s notes, she does the unthinkable. Wilhelmina offers Betty, big pink belted, brace-face Betty, a job as her assistant. Don’t worry; she doesn’t want Mark to go anywhere. She just wants to take Daniel’s most valuable asset away so he won’t get any ideas about trying to come back. And even though Betty knows Willie’s evil and she knows how difficult it would be for both her and Daniel, she doesn’t turn down the offer. In fact, when she discusses it with Daniel the next day (after Wilhelmina accosted him in the elevator with the fact that she’s trying to poach his assistant), she decides to take it because it would be better for her career.
Meanwhile, in the lives of our other favorite gals and guys…Hilda is having trouble dealing with the fact that she’s dating a married man. I mean, he’s married but says it’s over and then stands Hilda up because the wife doesn’t go out of town. What kind of unhappily married man without children stays married? Yup. Luckily, Amanda is a quick little pickpocket and when the Coach visits Betty at work she steals his phone because he’s just so yummy. And, of course, she sneaks on his phone and finds pictures of him and another girl (the wife) and shows them to the understandably pissed Betty. When Betty shows the pictures to Hilda, she confesses to Betty that she knows the Coach is married and thus begins the sister tiff.
On a happier front, Daniel finally gets the guts to ask DJ if he wants to stay with him or his grandparents. So cute that he chooses Daniel. And kudos to the writers for not only keeping the kid around and making Daniel a great Dad but not being afraid to explore other sides of our beloved Betty characters.
So let’s get back to Betty, who is now working in the recently dismal halls of Mode with Mark and Willie. At first, she’s charged with just filing and bringing cappuccino to the new boss. But, on accident, of course, she ends up not only speaking to but also talking an old client into buying more ad space in the new Mode. Suddenly, Betty’s looking really good. Or so she thinks. What Betty thought was a smile from Willie, Mark so sweetly pointed out that “she’s not smiling, she’s showing her teeth.” Just need to say I heart Mark. Anyways, Willie calls Betty into her office and gives her a list of menial but slightly difficult tasks including the most important task possible: Willie wants Catherine the Great’s tiara for her launch party. Come on, you know it’s a test and what test does Betty fail. Exactly. Betty gets the tiara and this time Willie actually is smiling.
Betty is the young Wilhelmina she’s been searching for. Betty is the one and you know what that means. Mark is no longer giving Willie her Botox injections or planning her launch party. Betty is the princess now and all must bow down. Except Mark and Amanda, who refuse to do anything for Betty. They won’t even help her by shredding old paper for confetti. Before Betty can get to the shredding, she succumbs to the exhaustion working for Wilhelmina has caused and has a little daydream. An evil daydream filled with a platinum bobbed Betty running Mode and yelling at a man to fix his teeth and a woman to lose weight. The topper that finally snapped her out of the daymare? She kicked the cutest little puppy for no reason at all other than it was a puppy. Never one to not finish what she started, though, Betty began taking out the papers to shred. Only they weren’t papers, they were letters. Tons of positive letters from when Daniel was editor of Mode. That sneaky little Mark. He must really miss his Willie because we all know where those letters will end up.
Betty drops the letters off with Daniel but he still refuses to believe Alexis will give him a chance with Mode. How wrong he is. The launch party is going without a hitch, other than Betty turning her two weeks notice in to a disappointed Wilhelmina. I guess Betty isn’t like her after all. Just then, Alexis, Daniel and Claire saunter in and make an announcement. Daniel is back in and Willie is back to Creative Director. Guess Alexis wasn’t the only one who didn’t like the new Mode. First week sales were the lowest they’ve been in months. Ha. She storms off but Daniel and Betty are back were they belong and from the smiles on all the other partygoers, it’s none too soon.
So, all is right in Betty world and that’s good news for us viewers because now the sky is the limit as far as storylines go. Of course, Betty doesn’t know that Christina was pushed down a flight of stairs by…you think they would really tell us? You must be Betty beginners if you thought you’d get off that easy.
