The Affair Recap: Bad News Spreads Like Wildfire (S5 E9)

The #metoo accusation against Noah Solloway began with two women from his past — Eden Ellery and Audrey Nelson – but by the time the Vanity Fair article came out, a total of six women had come forward to level accusations of abuse at Noah. Because of the nature of this show, always showing the incidents from somebody’s memory of it, nobody really knows what actually happened, not even the audience. Oddly enough, Noah’s only ally in this big mess is his ex-wife, Helen.

Helen figures out that her off-hand remark to Sasha at the Halloween party (in S5 E4) that Noah was probably sleeping with his former publicist, Eden Ellery is what really started this ball rolling. Sasha repeated that to Vanity Fair’s fact-checking Petra Ranes.

Speaking of Halloween parties, one of the other women who came forward was Erica, the script supervisor on the film of Noah’s book. She was the one who was making eyes at Noah. He led her on because he wanted the bra part of her costume so he could plant it in Sasha’s bedroom. She revealed that he left her bare-chested and freezing. He did so we can’t see how Noah can explain that one away!

Helen walked in on her kids watching Eden Ellery on TV being interviewed by Busy Philipps, and that particularly upset her. She told her kids that Eden was lying: “I was on that book tour, and I saw her, like, flirting like crazy with your dad.” She was also peeved that Busy took two parts of her public statement out of context that made it look like she has no sympathy for the women (not that she does).

Astonishingly, while Whitney was trying to get a flight, Furkat called her and invited her over. They both had just learned of the Vanity Fair article. Whatever Furkat really wanted, we don’t know. When Whitney began questioning him about his mistreatment of her, Furkat smelled #metoo and got rid of her as fast as he could. Back at the airport, Whitney just happened to get on the same flight as Audrey Nelson and decided to confront her about ruining Noah’s life. Whitney scored a few points but by the time Audrey got done talking, it looked like Whitney was agreeing with her. Audrey admitted that the negative fallout from her interaction with Noah was just the catalyst for “things that I had heard in one way or another my entire life– that I was worthless and stupid and not hot enough, just generally a waste of space.” But that kind of went by the wayside when Audrey started talking about why they were attracted to powerful men.

When Whitney finally got home, she told Colin that she can’t marry him because she slept with Furkat. To her surprise, Colin wanted to work things out and she thought that was because he needed his green card. Colin told her that he hates the good ol’ USA and doesn’t need a green card to stay here. He needs one to stay with her. Then he produced the painting he’s been working on — a portrait of Whitney and she fell into his arms, with kisses and I’m sorry’s. In the midst of their making up, Noah showed up to explain himself. In the midst of their trying to kick him out, Helen showed up with the kids and told everyone it was all her fault. Whitney doesn’t agree but she does blame Helen for continually forgiving Noah and not setting a better example for her of what not to put up with when it comes to men.

Other stuff:

• The other day, I came across this post from 2012 when I was recapping an ABC Family series called “Bunheads.” Julia Goldani Telles (Whitney) made her debut in it as a character named Sasha. Here she is (in the middle) dancing to “Istanbul (Not Constantinople)”

• Neither hide nor hair of Ben or Joanie was seen for the second week in a row.

• Because of the wildfires that broke out, Sierra took baby Eddie and went to stay with the baby’s grandparent’s, Priya and Abdul. Sasha picked Trevor and Stacey up at school without telling Helen. Then he sent a helicopter for her when she was able to locate the kids. That’s when she figured out it was Sasha who gave her number to Petra Ranes.

• As long as everyone is telling the truth, is it going to come out that Noah went to jail to protect Helen — the person who really ran Scotty Lockwood over?

• Only two episodes left.