Dear Franklin – As this episode of Night Sky begins, Irene (Sissy Spacek) puts on a record and dances with Franklin (JK Simmons). Jude (Chai Hansen) watches them from the other room. During dinner, Franklin tells Irene that her license expired. She was just giving Jude a little driving lesson so Franklin won’t have to drive her everywhere now. Irene missed the freedom. She tells Franklin about Jude’s dad having a run-in with a local named Bill Dunlap. Franklin has a project in the workshop that he wants to get back to. When Franklin heads outside, he finds the trashcan flipped over and immediately blames raccoons. He picks up and begins reading Irene’s letter saying she isn’t doing this to hurt him. She has finished waiting. Back inside, Irene finishes her phone call with Mr. Dunlap. Once the call ends, she tells Jude that Bill Jr. said his dad lived in the nursing home until the day he died.

He still works in town and agreed that they could stop by and see him. Jude promises to do his best to stay out of trouble for one night. Irene climbs the stairs instead of using the lift. She tells Franklin she didn’t see him come up. Irene knows something is wrong. Franklin shows her the letter before saying he cannot be here right now. He goes downstairs where he asks Jude if he has any idea what he is doing to them or the pain he is causing. Franklin goes on to say they were fine before he came here. Jude asks him if he is sure about that. Franklin just nods before walking away. Nick (Stephen Louis Grush) and Stella (Julieta Zylberberg) get two rooms at a motel while Toni waits outside. Nick tries to give Stella a key to his room, but she won’t take it.

Toni (Rocio Hernandez) flips through the television channels moments later. She wants to do something fun only to be told they’ll have to wait for sightseeing. Toni asks her mother why Nick has guns in the van. Stella claims all Americans have guns and Nick just wants to seem important. When Toni reveals that Nick said he knew her father, Stella says he shouldn’t be talking about things like that. Stella alludes to the fact that she is keeping things from her because she wants her to have a normal life. Toni complains that she is 15 and her mom is her only friend. She doesn’t think that is a normal life. Toni doesn’t want to stay at home and have no friends even though Stella does that. As Stella walks back from the vending machine, she hears Nick talking to Nina (Kelly Felthous). She opens the door and finds him showing off the glowing ball.

Stella pays Nina $200 to leave as Nick jokes he thought it was love. Nick insists nobody would believe Nina even if she said anything, but Stella argues he can’t play around like that. People die when he plays around like his brother. Nick reveals his brother is the first thing he thinks about when he wakes up in the morning. He doesn’t think Stella should be lecturing anyone since her own daughter knows nothing about her. Nick tells her she should be glad she brought him because she’d be out here chasing her own tail otherwise. When Stella storms out, she discovers that Toni has been eavesdropping on them. Toni asks if Nick is in trouble, but Stella says he is always trouble. Later that night, Toni leaves her mother in bed and exits their motel room. Nick yells at her to find out where she is going.

Toni claims she just wanted to look around. She spends time talking to Nick and complaining that her mom won’t let her do anything. He says Stella is in a bad spot because she isn’t a kid anymore and she is all Stella has. Nick believes she is afraid of losing her daughter. Toni didn’t know that thing existed until two days ago. She is glad Nick is nice to her. Nick explains that there are only so many of them so they have to watch each other’s backs. In the morning, Jude gives Irene coffee and asks about going to see Dunlap today. She isn’t feeling up to it and suggests he should take a taxi. When he asks about whatever happened last night, Irene says it isn’t worth talking about because marriages are like that sometimes. Jude believes it is hard on Franklin who is used to her needing him all the time.

She will always need him and he’ll always need her. Byron (Adam Bartley) wakes up Franklin to show him something, but Jeanine (Cass Buggee) interrupts before he can. Once she leaves, Byron shows Franklin the shiny ball that his caretaker buried behind his house. Byron wants to put it back in and get the machine working again, but Franklin has things to do. He gives Byron permission to try. Denise (Kiah McKirnan) calls her professor. When she returns to Katie (Paulina Olszynski), she reveals that she just dropped out of school. Katie asks about the life she was building. Denise says that wasn’t the life she wanted although Katie doesn’t think everyone lives the life they want. Katie finds it insulting because not everyone got the same advantages as Denise.

Katie mentions Sarah Rush who tried to get into business school and couldn’t. Denise says she didn’t go to class. Katie suggests there were things about her that made her less appealing than her. Denise says she worked her butt off although she’ll always have people wondering if she earned it at all. She gets a call from Jude who asks if she is busy. She picks him up and tells him how it feels amazing to have the weight removed from her shoulders. She believes this is the start of something new. They meet with Mr. Dunlap (James Vincent Meredith) who realizes they have something that belonged to Bill Senior. When he sees the necklace, he says it was his dad’s lucky charm and thought it was lost. Jude wants to know if he knows where his father got it. Bill admits his dad often bull crapped.

He claimed to have picked up a hitchhiker in town. The guy was sketchy like he was on the run or something. A few hours into the trick his father realized that someone was tailing them in a van, but his dad knew all the backroads. Once they lost the van, the hitchhiker pulled out his dad’s hunting knife from the glovebox. He cut that thing out of his ankle and banged it on the dash a few times. Eventually, the hitchhiker gave it to Bill’s father as a memento. Once Franklin returns home, Irene confesses she doesn’t know what to say. She apologizes because it was a mistake. Franklin argues that this wasn’t just a mistake. He reminds her how they got the phone call about Michael and how it was a phone call no parent should ever get. He made himself strong so she could grieve the way she needed.

Franklin believes that was the right thing. He doesn’t like the fact that she was going to leave him here to go through all of that again. Irene admits she was selfish. He reminds her that she promised him 30 more years, but she claims she couldn’t promise him 30 more days let alone years. Franklin says he just wants to be enough for her to want to stay. Byron puts the shiny ball back. Thomas (Tim Griffin) asks Officer Gibbons (Jason Bradley) about the arrest of Jude. Gibby tells him it was just a mix-up and the kid ended up being the York’s caretaker. Thomas goes back to his office and gets the mug Franklin gave him earlier. Jeanine joins Byron who is looking for the jumper cables. She says Franklin looks miserable although Byron believes he’ll be fine.

She is just glad he is making a new friend. Byron tells Franklin he is on it as he returns to the shed. Thomas visits Irene to ask whether her caretaker is there. He shows her a folder full of stuff about Jude including violent incidents and psychiatric holds. Thomas wants to take him into custody until they sort it out. Irene claims she already fired him after he got arrested. Thomas tells her to call him if he tries to contact her in any way. At a restaurant, Nick tells Toni that Stella was just a little bit older than her when they met at her Perdisco. He saw firsthand that Stella used to have a wild side. Stella asks him not to do this before Nick says she did nothing respectable. Stella tells Toni she was young and stupid. It was nothing to be proud of. She tells Nick that some of them grew out of it before someone got hurt.

Nick asks about Caleb. He is surprised that Stella didn’t tell Toni anything about Caleb because they were really close. Stella grabs his head and slams it into the table before telling Toni to run. They drive away in the van while Nick yells at Stella. Denise and Jude return with Bill Senior’s delivery ledger to show where his father went. Jude wants to visit Enfield, Michigan since that is where his father went. Denise thinks everyone should go there, but Franklin isn’t interested. Jude admits it looks like a remote place that would be good for laying low so his dad might be there. Irene asks him to come with her.

Denise checks on Franklin who tells her not to worry about it. She offers to stay or convince Irene to stay, but Franklin won’t have it. Irene shows Jude the paperwork from Thomas. Jude insists it isn’t real and is the people he has been telling her about. He shows her the scar on his leg where he cut the tracker out. When Stella stops the van, Toni admits it might’ve been a bad idea to ditch their navigator. Toni claims she knows how to use the equipment from watching Nick do it. She won’t do anything until her mother tells her what the package is though. Stella reveals that the package is a person and not an object. He broke the rules and it is their job to find him. If they don’t, it could put a lot of people in danger.

Stella didn’t tell her earlier because she didn’t think she would understand. She also admits there is a lot more to this than just the chapel. Toni agrees to work the equipment as the van drives away. Irene tells Franklin that the night she wrote the letter was the night she found Jude. On the night she was ready to stop asking why, it finally answered her. Frank says she is always looking for life’s great mystery. He found his here in this house with Irene. He hopes she’ll find what she is looking for, but he is going to be here waiting for her regardless. When Franklin leaves, Irene sees the wood carving and it causes her to remember something from her past with Michael and the family. Irene notices that something is up with Michael so she follows him outside. She offers to listen to him when he is ready to talk.

Michael (Angus O’Brien) says there is going to be a review at work and it will not be good. He is trying hard to make everything fit and Leslie keeps telling him they should be grateful. Although she is right, Michael doesn’t know how to make himself feel that. He is so tired of letting everyone down. Irene tells him that he isn’t letting anyone down and Denise adores him. Dr. Evans wants to adjust Michael’s medications again. They agree that might be good. Michael says he’ll be okay and just needed to vent. Denise checks on Irene as they head toward their destination. At home, Franklin gets a call about the doubloons. He doesn’t remember speaking on the phone previously because it wasn’t him. The man says he is interested in the coins. Franklin insists the coins don’t belong to him so the caller shouldn’t call again.

Once he hangs up, Byron bangs on the window. Byron takes him down to the door and explains that the ball is the heart. When the ball is taken out, it loses its charge. The guy who took it out wanted to make sure they could never use it again. He shows Franklin how he wants to jumpstart the machine. Frank says screw it before plugging in the cord. The machine begins charging. It ends up shooting out an energy wave that causes the car alarms to go off. Dogs begin barking and birds fall from the sky. The machine messes up on Toni who thinks they’ve arrived. Byron wakes up Frank and tells him that they did it. Franklin tells him that this will be the 857th time he has done this. He gives Byron a bowl just before they’ve beamed up. Once Byron has taken it all in, Franklin tells him he was always too scared to go through the door. Just before the episode ends, he says he isn’t scared anymore.

 

Night Sky Review

Dear Franklin was a good step in the right direction as it pushed Stella and Toni closer to their meeting with the “package” which I think everyone already knows who that is at this point. It is too bad they had to ditch Nick, but this likely isn’t the last we’ll see of him. The episode was emotional thanks to Irene and Franklin’s past and present turmoil. Of course, the ending of the episode was great as usual. Night Sky seems to have a knack for creating good cliffhangers that make the next episode feel like a must.

The dialogue with racial undertones was really unnecessary since it felt like it was just added to tick another box. It’d be a real surprise for stuff like this not to show up in a new show every once in a while. Truthfully, in the real world, people don’t go around suggesting stuff like Katie did. It doesn’t happen as frequently as these shows portray considering something like this is in every single show nowadays. It is even odder to throw that in there considering the dynamics of the York family and came out of left field.

Regardless, there are only two episodes left so I would expect the intensity to be cranked up significantly from here on out. The episode scores a 7 out of 10. Recaps of Night Sky can be found on Reel Mockery here. Find out how to support the Reel Mockery project at this link.