In the 2nd episode of Smoke, Dave and Michelle set their sights on Arch, because they were convinced that he was the arsonist I have nicknamed Potato Chips. But after stalking him for days, they didn’t have anything concrete that would allow them to issue a warrant to search his bunker. Feeling the pressure of her duties, Michelle decided to break into Arch’s “mancave,” that too without informing Dave, to see if she could find a shred of evidence that could be used against the disgusting bigot. Although Arch’s bunker didn’t have any material that could be used for arson, it was full of enough guns to arm an entire army. In addition to that, there was some kind of a BDSM dungeon where Arch probably partook in some shady activities. Arch caught Michelle trespassing, and in retaliation, she shot him in the leg and framed the incident of breaking and entering as a part of her investigation into Arch’s terrorist-like tendencies. The Umberland Fire Department threw Michelle a party for this amazing feat, which actually got on Dave’s nerves. He was also going through a rough patch with Ashley and Emmett. And when things came to a boil, he went out and set fire to the snacks section of the supermarket nearby, thereby proving that Dave was actually Potato Chips. Did Michelle make any strides towards nabbing Dave in the 3rd episode of Smoke? Let’s find out.
Spoiler Alert
Michelle Makes a Breakthrough
In episode 3 of Smoke, Michelle is sent to a mandatory psychological evaluation because she was recently involved in a shooting. She starts off incredibly defensive about how she is actually feeling. But slowly and steadily, the layers begin to peel back, and it’s revealed that her hardened exterior is just an armor to protect her scarred soul. There’s something particularly painful about the way Jurnee Smollett says, “I am a job. Job is me,” and the next moment she is joyously telling Dave that she has been cleared for active field duty. She knows that if she is not out there doing what she does best, she’ll crumble. And in order to keep herself from facing the truth, she has to loudly proclaim that she is doing fine and that she loves her work. Anyway, coming to the meat of the matter, Michelle asks Dave if they can resume their investigation, but since Dave is busy with some stuff, Michelle goes solo.
Previously, Michelle had said that she was suspicious of Dave, and a map littered with evidence, documents, and sticky notes reveals that she is actually looking into Dave’s involvement in the serial arson incidents. This leads to a pretty sweet montage of Michelle driving to every single location that Dave had been to when he was working all alone as the only arson investigator in Umberland. She hits one dead end after another because she is looking for a cigarette butt in a forest. When she stops at a railway crossing, she has an epiphany. She assumes that the arsonist, who is obviously Dave, must’ve used a car to get to all the locations he set fire to. She knows that he is a stickler for stop signs. She assumes that Dave must’ve stopped at these traffic junctions and thrown his modified cigarette from the car and started the fire. Based on that assumption, there should be a cigarette butt near one of these stop signs. What she does next is pretty ingenious: she takes a coin and flings it while seated in her car to replicate Dave’s act of flinging the cigarette. After several coin flicks, she finally strikes gold as she finds a cigarette butt in the forest (it’s a real Han Solo-esque “never tell me the odds” moment).
Dave Has an Epiphany
Gerard is seen having a bit of a tiff with Emmett because the latter is unhappy about his dad’s decision to take up a job that’ll prevent him from being a part of his son’s life. Emmett is too young to understand what it means to have a tenured job in this economy; Gerard tries to get Emmett to see things from his perspective, but it doesn’t really work. Meanwhile, there is his stepdad, who is cleaning up the room he is going to stay in and is distracted by Haruki Murakami’s book on music. Ashley somehow manages to make this miniscule moment about Dave’s latent daddy issues and subtly forces him to exit Emmett’s room. As mentioned in my previous articles on Smoke, it’s obvious that Dave is not right in the head, which is why he is an arson investigator by day and a serial arsonist by night. That said, there’s something wrong with Ashley too. It’s totally possible that there’s some credible reason behind her antagonistic behavior. But if that’s the only reason why Dave has become a criminal, I won’t be all that surprised, to be honest.
Coming back to Dave, he is seen perfecting Milk Jug’s story. In doing so, he not only adds a chapter to his book, but he also figures out an important detail: the serial arsonist must’ve carried his gasoline-filled plastic milk container in a plastic bag to avoid being caught carrying such deadly material. Based on that, he collects all the pieces of plastic (from the container) that were retrieved from each of the crime scenes and finds the residue of black plastic on all of them. Burke has informed Michelle that there’s no way to use the cigarette butt she found in the forest as evidence; hence, she focuses on this black plastic bag theory to nail Milk Jug. She naively assumes that the Umberland Fire Department has the budget to fit black plastic bags with QR codes that can be detected with the help of special scanners, and her hopes of taking a high-tech approach to this case are hilariously dashed by Harvey. Harvey’s “Dear Santa, I want QR codes and a pony” message to Michelle is extremely funny; I laughed as hard as Dave at that reveal.
Freddy’s Awful Interview
Over at Coop’s Fried Chicken, Lee is uncharacteristically angry at Freddy for aspiring to be something more than just a low-level employee at a fast food chain. He wants Freddy to be realistic about the expectations he has from the higher-ups at the company for which he has undoubtedly worked for a long time. But Lee’s manner of expressing those thoughts is pretty agressive, which almost causes Freddy to retaliate in kind. At the end of the day, though, Freddy is a meek guy, at least when he doesn’t have a milk jug full of gasoline in his hand, I guess. So, he gives Lee a pass. As for Freddy’s interview for the managerial position, it goes horribly. I mean, kudos to Ntare Guma Mbaho Mwine for making me cringe so effortlessly. It’s such an awkward interaction that I didn’t know if I should feel sorry for Freddy or laugh at him. Back at the fast food joint, Freddy reunites with Lee. While Lee is busy apologizing to Freddy for his misbehavior earlier that day, which he claims stems from his daddy issues, Freddy is focused on refreshing his message app because he is waiting for an invite for the 2nd round of interviews.
When Freddy says that the recruiters have told him that they’ll “be in touch” with him, I think Lee understands that Freddy isn’t getting a callback, because that phrase is the globally accepted, subtle-but-rude way of rejecting a candidate. But he doesn’t burst Freddy’s bubble and leaves him to his devices. You can say that by doing so, Lee is worsening Freddy’s mental state, and telling him the truth would’ve at least motivated Freddy to move on and dream about something else. However, sometimes, it’s difficult to be pragmatic with a person whose world is slowly unraveling before their very eyes. Once Freddy accepts what he is capable of, he won’t even need someone like Lee to guide him through this perilous planet. Why is Freddy like this, though? How can he be so simple-minded and yet commit such heinous acts of arson? Is he even the serial arsonist named Milk Jug, or is he being framed by Dave, who is both Milk Jug and Potato Chips? That’s some food for thought.
Michelle Opposes Renata’s Parole
Michelle is seen taking care of Sophie, the daughter of her brother, Benji. While putting the little child to sleep, she is reminded of the moment from her childhood when her mother, Renata, locked her in a closet and set fire to the room. That memory is interrupted by the arrival of Benji, who takes Sophie home. Although Sophie is half-asleep, she doesn’t forget to invite her aunt to her birthday party. Meanwhile, Benji requests Michelle to not show up to Renata’s parole hearing, because he wants her to get out of jail since she is just an old woman. Michelle doesn’t confirm or deny if she’ll show up to the hearing, but she explicitly says, no matter what happens in the world, she’ll show up for Sophie’s birthday party. The following day, Michelle does show up at the hearing and makes an impassioned plea to the authorities to not let Renata back out into the world, which undoubtedly irks her siblings. She basically describes Renata like she’s Dracula. She is of the opinion that Renata’s claim that she has reformed is merely an act so that she can go outside and kill more people. Everyone can say that Renata was off her rocker when she set fire to the motel she and a young Michelle were in, but Michelle knows that she did what she did while being completely conscious of her decisions.
Renata has apparently claimed that she wasn’t trying to kill Michelle; she was rescuing her. However, based on the brief snippets of Michelle’s memory of that incident, Renata not only set fire to the motel, she also shot somebody. I don’t know what’s true; I guess we’ll know more about it in future episodes. What’s interesting, though, is how adamant Michelle’s siblings are about setting Renata free. I don’t see love or care. I see greed. I think Renata has a lot of money to her name, which her kids can’t get at unless she is out of jail. Which is why they want to ignore Michelle’s trauma and get Renata to sign a bunch of checks. This is just my theory, by the way; I have no way to prove this yet. It’s just a feeling. By the way, amidst all this family drama, we do get a couple of scenes where we see that Dave has started to change his methods by torching a random expensive car in the suburbs because he thinks that Michelle is too close to figuring out that he is Potato Chips, especially after her cigarette butt investigation. Since the description of this arsonist and his technique doesn’t match with Milk Jug or Potato Chips, Dave and Michelle are forced to label it as a stray incident and nothing else. How long will it take for Michelle to figure out that the man she thinks is her “bestie” is actually a fiend? Hopefully soon.
