‘The Bold Type’: Can Sutton & Richard Compromise About Having Kids? (RECAP)
Spoiler Alert
[Warning: The below contains MAJOR spoilers for Season 4, Episode 15 of The Bold Type, “Love.”]
This is a rough one for Bold Type fans.
In Thursday’s episode, the Freeform drama takes a deep dive into not just Jane (Katie Stevens), Sutton (Meghann Fahy) and Kat’s (Aisha Dee) relationships, but also those of Jacqueline (Melora Hardin) and Alex (Matt Ward) as each faces a challenge of some sort.
Following Sutton’s admission to new husband Richard (Sam Page) that she doesn’t want children — he’d realized how much he did after her miscarriage, while the opposite was true for her — a bartender assures her it sounds like she has “unconditional love.” Sutton’s not so sure, given some of the things they both said, but with the hope that he’d be waiting for her, she heads home.
But before we find out if he is, The Bold Type takes a detour to the rest of its relationships, and one moves forward while another has a breakthrough.
Kat & Ava
After saying Ava’s (Alex Paxton-Beesley) name in bed with another woman (awkward!), Kat is hesitant when she learns they’re doing a photoshoot together to promote her podcast at the Belle. While posing, she wonders why Ava didn’t mention she’s gay before the podcast. “I bring up my sexuality when it makes sense to me,” Ava says.
(Freeform/Jonathan Wenk)
Kat then stops by Ava’s to thank her for helping her get the podcast by being the first guest. “This podcast is bigger than you and me, and I’m not going to let my feelings for you get in the way of that,” she says. Though Kat tries to play off like she meant her “frustrations” about their opposing viewpoints, she kisses Ava … and they’re interrupted by Sutton calling.
Jane & Scott
While working on a story about one of Scott’s (Mat Vairo) friends who was fired so her company could avoid a #MeToo situation, Jane and her new employee that her friends have been teasing her about continue to bond, this time over writing. And while discussing the story, he admits “working with someone you’re attracted to is difficult” — and confirms he’s talking about her.
“I didn’t expect to feel this way,” he continues. “I know it’s not ideal, and I probably shouldn’t be saying it, but if you feel the same way…” Sutton calls, and Jane doesn’t give him an answer.
Jacqueline & Ian
The couple has been working on their marriage, and that includes doing a hobby they can share together (tennis). She refuses to take his advice because it “feels weird” and insists on returning to her way of doing it … though she does listen to a stranger. After that, Ian (Gildart Jackson) tells her he feels like she doesn’t want him to be right and that he’s not “heard” by her.
Though she runs off to meet Richard when he needs to see her, she returns home with a better understanding of her own relationship. “You were right,” she says. “I do have trouble taking advice from you. And maybe that’s because I don’t want to give up control, and I need to work on that. Or maybe it’s because being wrong makes me feel vulnerable. It is never because I don’t respect your opinion.” So she’s in for tennis every week and the trip to Iceland they’ve been trying to go on for 10 years. (She promises work won’t get in the way.)
(Freeform/Jonathan Wenk)
Alex & Alicia
Alicia (Yasha Jackson) joins Alex at an amateur night to watch Andrew (Adam Capriolo), in drag, perform, and while Alex gets them drinks, a man approaches her and sits across from her despite her rejection. “She wouldn’t like” him telling the guy to get lost, Alex tells the bartender, and when the guy refuses to leave, it’s Andrew who comes to Alicia’s defense, even hitting him.
Later, Alex admits he wish he had done something more than stand there, but hadn’t because he knows she likes to fight her own battles. While Alicia thought what Andrew did was dumb, she also calls it “brave.” She was scared, she says, which just makes their relationship more complicated (but obviously something they’re willing to work on).
Sutton & Richard
When we turn back to their relationship, we see what happened immediately after the end of the last episode, when Sutton said she didn’t want kids. “Usually not wanting to have kids is something you talk about before you get married,” Richard argues, and he made his feelings on the subject clear: he wants kids. By saying she wasn’t ready, it seemed like she would be at some point.
He feels like he’s “always the one to make adjustments,” that she gets everything she wants, including when it comes to her career. She chose work over going to California with him, and that long-distance relationship was just another adjustment he made. “I knew on our wedding night that I was going to be the one who was always adjusting, but I loved you so much I was okay with it,” he says.
But she insists she’s made adjustments too, like when she moved in when she wasn’t ready, when she supported his move to San Francisco — and when he proposed a bit too soon for her. And that’s when their age difference (41 to 26) comes up. They’re at different stages in their lives, and her decision to never have kids is a life decision she made on her own that affects him.
(Freeform/Jonathan Wenk)
He even suggests that they get a nanny and a night nurse and he “do it all.” But she knows she’d be a “terrible mother” if she agreed to that. “Either way, one of us loses,” he concludes. “I’m just so sick of it being me.” That’s where they leave the discussion for the night, and they part ways the next day, him to meetings and her to the bar.
Richard calls Jacqueline in hopes that she can offer him advice. “We didn’t listen to each other,” he’s realized about his marriage. Sutton knew he wanted kids, and she said she wasn’t close, but they just pretended there wasn’t a problem. Because he wants kids, “now I have to decide which one I want more: kids or Sutton.”
He is waiting when she gets home from the bar, and both apologize before falling into bed … for what ends up being goodbye sex?! “I need you. Richard left me,” Sutton cries when Jane and Kat answer her call … as Richard leaves with a suitcase.
The Bold Type, Thursdays, 10/9c, Freeform
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