TV Recap: "Furious" Episode 5 Recap — Alice Traps Her Own Abuser

Alice just found the name of the killer she’s hunting, only to be benched by Nora for her confrontation with Marshall. Meanwhile, Catherine has brought her next victim to the home where she works as a private nurse. Episode 5 of Hulu’s Furious continues the forward momentum, finding all three women fighting for justice in their own way.

Episode 5: “Pick a Sticker” - Written by Dan LeFranc

Vanessa, aka Catherine Grace (Lola Petticrew), lies in bed holding hands with her patient and new boyfriend, Aldan (Steve Way), amazed that she’s able to feel his hands, a sense she somehow lost and regained when he asked her to be his girlfriend. When his health monitor goes off, and she asks what’s wrong, he agrees to tell her only in exchange for the secret he can tell she’s keeping from him. He reveals that his heart is now only 25% functional and he doesn’t have long to live, hoping to marry her before he passes. Then it’s her turn: “My uncle’s outside in your van,” she lies, saying he’s an addict who needs to get clean. She says Aldan will hear noises like he’s in pain, but that’s normal.

Having just gotten back to the city, Alice Black (Emmy Rossum) and Danny Kelly (Scoot McNairy) argue outside of her apartment building. He sides with Nora for benching Alice after she pulled a gun on her abusive ex-boyfriend in public. He warns her that Marshall is trying to get promoted and that he’s dangerous, urging her to stay away from him. When she tells him that Marshall asked her to call the lieutenant and say she made it all up, Danny suggests that’s not a bad idea. Alice refuses. Danny brings up a friend who has an empty condo on the Jersey Shore and invites Alice to join him so they can get away from this mess. Instead of cheering her up, it seems to make Alice uncomfortable as she gets emotional and exits his car.

Alice helps her neighbor, Margaret (Barbara Andres), with her cart as they enter the building. Margaret asks Alice if the man she was with was trying to hurt her. She says no. 

Continuing to dig into the case in secret, Alice finds a former NYPD contact on one of the reports and meets Carter (Marinda Anderson) outside of the club she runs. Carter remembers the case and is upset that nobody seemed to care about the Jane Doe, now identified as Isabel Luna. Carter shares that an FBI agent named Nora was the only one who seemed to fight for justice, which surprises Alice. Carter says Nora fought until she hit a wall, and then passed all her case data on to Carter once she closed it at the FBI. “I don’t know what she thought I was going to do with them,” Carter says, adding that Nora was obsessed with the bracelet the girl was wearing that didn’t match any hospitals in the area. Most of the identifying numbers had washed off in the water. 

Hal (Campbell Scott) is tied to a chair in Catherine’s room at Aldan’s house, where his captor plugs in a curling iron. “Did you take this picture?” she asks, showing him the one that she turned into the FBI. Hal denies it, but Catherine knows he was there the night Isabel died. “I came after she died,” he confirms, saying that Jay Easton called him. Hal talked to the man Isabel was with and wired him money. That man stole Caleb’s car and took Catherine with him. Hal arranged for someone to clean up the blood. “I know that Jay Easton killed my friend,” Catherine declares, remembering that Hal came to talk to her the night Isabel died. Hal says that’s not true. “Do you not remember what happened?” he asks, realizing that Catherine has repressed the memory. But before he can talk, she starts to use the curling iron, searing the skin on his neck and arm. Distressed, Hal promises that he can help her, saying that he has incriminating photos and videos on his laptop that he downloaded from Jay Easton’s computer as potential leverage. Hal promises to represent Catherine if she wants to bring a case against him.

In an FBI conference room, Nora Washington (Quincy Tyler Bernstine), Frank Choi (Rob Yang), Marshall Connelly (Jake Lacy), and Danny meet without Alice, continuing work on the case. Ed George (Danny McCarthy) barges in, asking for an update. “This is exciting,” Nora condescendingly says, pointing out that he never checks on their operation. She shows him the photo of Isabel on Jay Easton’s lap, the photo of her from Bright Fields Group Home, and the photo of the Jane Doe on the beach, which he seems to be familiar with. “Stop the focus on the Jane Doe from 2012,” Ed orders, telling them to just focus on finding the other girl in the Easton photo. Danny shares that he believes the other girl is a healthcare worker now. “Just find the girl and bring her in quietly,” Ed instructs. “Quietly,” Nora repeats, suggesting she knows more than 

The conference room was within Alice’s view as she worked at her desk. She did some research about Ed and Nora in the system, following Nora to the bathroom when the meeting ended. “You didn’t want to close that case,” Alice declares, pointing out that Nora requested to transfer to C20 in 2012 just after she closed the Jane Doe case. “I think you had to,” Alice concludes. Since she’s on probation, she begs Nora to let her look into the case since Ed won’t allow Nora to. “I read all your case notes,” Alice adds. “I know how hard you fought.” When Alice brings up the bracelet, Nora shares that it wasn’t from a hospital. She encourages Alice to try to make the thing with Marshall go away so she can have her back.

Alice texts Marshall, asking her to meet him. They talk in the hallway, and he apologizes for reporting the incident, saying he had to since it was in public. He says he still cares for her and wants to talk, leaving work stuff out of it.

“Vanessa” apologizes to Aldan about how loud her uncle has been. She brings him the laptop, asking him to help her find files on it and to make sure nobody is tracking it. “Is he really your uncle?” Aldan asks. “No,” she confesses. Vanessa has decided to accept Aldan’s marriage proposal.

Catherine tells Hal that she only remembers certain things. Her memories of Adrian are clear, like how he loved Hello Kitty and how she and Isabel would mock him for it. She tells him about her engagement, and he asks if she loves her fiancée. “I loved Isabel,” she responds, sharing that Isabel put up with her infatuation. She asks Hal if he remembers seeing Isabel’s dead body. “I couldn’t stop seeing it,” he sincerely says. The thought of destroying Jay brings him comfort. Catherine changes the subject, showing him Aldan’s mom’s old wedding dress, which she wants to get married in. Hal tells her it’s beautiful as he starts to cry. 

Danny and Marshall visit hospitals with a picture of Catherine Grace, asking employees if they’ve worked with her. Marshall shares an anecdote about how his father used to threaten to rip his legs off when he was a kid. Danny calls him out for asking Alice to lie about him so he can get a promotion. Marshall tells Danny that he thinks Alice has been bruising herself to mess with him, but Danny tells him about the apps she’s been using. Before Danny walks away, he tells Marshall that Alice still loves him in spite of everything.

In her apartment, Alice pulls a duffel bag out of her closet, full of items from her life with Marshall, including a dress, one of his old shirts, and a box of photos. We see a few of them together throughout their lives, and then some of her battered face as evidence. Changed into the dress, Alice answers the door when Marshall arrives. He instantly notices the alcohol on her breath, asking when she started drinking whisky. “It makes me think of you,” she confesses, asking if she can drink more while they talk on her couch, taking it straight from the bottle. 

Alice shows Marshall a shirt of his that she kept, saying she sometimes wears it, starting to cry. He moves closer to console her, and she kisses his neck, the part of him she missed most. Marshall pushes her back, bringing up the app that Danny told him about. “Is that what you wanted when we were together?” he asks, confused. His mom recently told him that Alice was pregnant and kicked out of her home before she came to live with them, questioning why she never told him any of that. She gets on her knees, saying she always felt like she belonged to Marshall, like she knew what he wanted her to do. He caresses her face and leans down for a kiss.

Back on the couch, Alice seductively pours bourbon down her chest, asking her recovering alcoholic ex to lick it off her. After he does, he grabs the bottle and takes a swig of the drink he’s missed most. She pours it on his chest and licks it off him. And then, on top of him, she pours so much bourbon into his mouth that he begins to choke. He pushes her off, and she taunts him, saying, “Do whatever you want to me.” In his confusion, she tells him that their conversation in the FBI was on camera. Furious, realizing this was a setup, he punches her lamp, grabs his things, and storms out of her apartment, slamming the door.

Alice grabs her phone and calls Margaret, sharing that she saw a really drunk man outside the building with a gun. Margaret hangs up with Alice to call the police.

We see Alice, cozy in her bathrobe, packing all of Marshall’s things back into the duffel bag. But before she closes it up, she looks at a sonography photo. And then she has an epiphany about Isabel’s bracelet.

Danny enters an elevator in the FBI, finding himself alone with Nora. She tells him that he cannot release a picture of the suspect, but since this is a joint initiative, she technically can’t order him not to. He nods knowingly, understanding that this is her way of asking him to do it.

“I found some pictures and some videos,” Aldan tells Vanessa about what he’s found on Hal’s laptop, asking if those types of things happened to her. “Don’t come out of your room,” she warns him instead of answering, heading across the hall.

Inside the room with Hal, Catherine pulls out a box of stickers. He asks if she’s ok, realizing she must have seen what he has from Jay’s computer. She doesn’t answer, asking him to pick a sticker. When he doesn’t choose one, she picks a caterpillar with a hat on. Her hands tremble as she tries to peel the backing off, as if she can’t feel it on her fingertips again. She slaps the sticker on Hal’s arm burns, ripping it off, causing him to scream. “Think you’re better than him?” she asks as his burn wounds bleed. She pulls out the syringe and prepares to give him two doses. “Who killed Isabel?” she asks. “I don’t know,” Hal responds. “So how do you know it wasn’t Jay?” “Because he wasn’t in the room when she died.” When she asks who was there, Hal deflects. She cuts his right arm free. “Please,” he begs, “I had to protect… someone.” She touches the needle to his arm and asks again who was in that room. But the interrogation stops when she hears Aldan’s health alarm beeping.

Back in Aldan’s room, Vanessa finds that he intentionally backed up over his oxygen tube to cause the alarm. He shows her a wanted poster with her face on it. “Is your name Catherine?” he asks.

With one arm free, Hal was able to get himself out of the chair. His legs weak, he loses his balance and falls in the kitchen. Aldan rolls in, trying to get away from Catherine, finding Hal on the floor. Catherine lunges at her captor, overpowering the weak man, pointing the syringe at his face. She injects him in the eye, and he dies. She rises, turning around to face Aldan, who backs up his chair in fear.

Ed confronts Nora, furious that Danny leaked the photo. She acts shocked but seems pleased, as she mentioned the media attention the case will get now.

Alice picks up a report she requested from Yara (Layan Elwazani): a list of safe-surrender deposit boxes from 2012. She goes back to her desk, finding the office buzzing with conversation. Danny approaches her, saying that Marshall hasn’t shown up to work and isn’t answering his phone. When Frank calls Danny into the conference room, Alice opens the report and finds a listing linked to the Candlelight Lounge. Still images in the report show a girl who looks like Isabel.

In the conference room, Frank announces that they received a report from a home nurse named Yuti claiming that she’s seen Catherine Grace. Her last known location was the home of Aldan Drummings, who requires a full-time nurse. Danny and Frank rush to respond.

Alice calls Crossroads Survivor Shelter, asking if safe surrender boxes for newborns come with coded bracelets. The woman taking the call, Jean (Marcia DeBonis), confirms that both the mom and baby get them in that case, with 14 days to change their mind. Alice hangs up and heads to the elevator. Nora sees her determination and asks where she’s going. “Coffee run,” Alice lies. Nora sees a note on Alice’s desk: “Going to see if Jane Doe bracelet is from Safe Surrender box close to Candlelight Lounge.” Nora tears it up. “Don’t take too long getting coffee,” she calls to Alice as the elevator doors open.

Danny and Frank arrive at Aldan’s home, finding the door ajar. Entering, they find Hal dead on the floor. Searching the house, they find Aldan alive in his room.

Alice arrives at Crossroads Survivor Shelter, getting a form to fill out from Jean. Glancing in the mirror behind the desk, she sees a familiar young woman in the waiting room - Catherine Grace! Alice takes the form and sits in a chair behind the killer she’s been searching for.

To be continued next Monday, August 16th, in Episode 6, “They Make a Noise Like Features.”

Alice has one hour to get Catherine to trust her.