Sugar Episode 4: Recap & Ending Explained – What’s behind the locked door?

Episode 4 of Sugar is titled “Starry-Eyed” and follows John trying to make sense of Olvia’s disappearance. The episode uncovers a long-hidden secret for a character, and we are slowly inching towards an answer for the case. However, John’s secret, which was briefly mentioned in the previous episode, is nowhere to be found. The episode sees the narrative through Olivia’s Instagram stories, and it’s not looking good for Seigal—the Hollywood royalty.

The article below examines Episode 4 of Sugar in great detail, so please read at your own discretion. The post contains spoilers.

Sugar Episode 4 “Starry-Eyed” Recap:

Episode 4 of Sugar uses Oliva’s Instagram as a filler to move the plot forward or fill up the missing info for the time being. The episode opens with John finally following up on Ruby’s advice with a visit to Dr. Vickers. 

While all of John’s vital signs are good, Dr. Vickers is concerned that he is taking intravenous drugs a little too often or sleeping a little too little. John makes sure he tells him that he is in good shape, but before he leaves, there they are—his tremors back again, and he is unable to tie a simple knot. 

On the other hand, Davy and Kenny reach Ms. Sugar’s (Jayne Taini) place, assuming to find some dirt on John. But John had already been aware that this could happen and had alerted her. Ms. Sugar acts like she is a fan of Davy and his acting debut, ‘The Boy in the Corner.’ Also, from the conversation we briefly see between John and Ms. Sugar, it feels like they have a certain arrangement, and she might not even be his mother. 

We also see Bernie returning to his home early in the morning after spending the night at his beach house with Melanie. Mrs. Siegel, Bernie’s current wife, is completely unaware of his time with Melanie, and we can expect some kind of blowout coming up. Anyway, his return clears off one important thing when he goes through his family album. He does care about Olivia, no matter what had been implied in the previous episodes or what Sugur assumed about him. 

Ruby, on the other hand, is hard to read right now. She tells John that she hasn’t found any dirt on Stallings—at least, not something related to Human trafficking and the like—but we can clearly see that she is holding important info from John.

Who is Taylor, and what happened to her?

After they had a little bit of actual familiarity in the previous episode, Melanie lands up at Sugur’s doorstep to discuss something about Olivia. She tells Sugar that she was to meet Olivia some six weeks from now, but she canceled at the last minute, citing that she isn’t well. However, Melanie saw her later that day in the Silver Lake area talking to a girl who seemed really upset. 

From the stories throughout the episode, we can see that Olvia was a strong spokesperson for women’s rights, and even the excessive trolling wasn’t pulling her down. However, according to Melanie, this scenario with the girl did seem a little fishy to her. 

So, John and Melanie decide to work and investigate this lead around the Silver Lake area. After showing her picture around and trying to figure out if anyone has seen her, they land at a local store where someone recognizes Melanie for her yesteryears as a Rockstar. Assuming that they can trust Melanie, they tell both of them about Taylor (Isabella Briggs), the girl that Melanie saw Oliva with. 

They get Taylor’s address and land at her flat. She is reluctant to talk to them, but she does let them in for 5 minutes and unloads her truth. She tells them that back then, she was following Olivia’s protest and stories on Instagram regularly. However, she was pissed about her consistent support for women because her anger wasn’t directed towards her own people. 

This is when Olivia decided to meet up with Taylor, whom Melanie had seen six weeks before. She tells Melanie and John that she sat down with Oliva to tell her about her brother, Davy. Taylor tells them that she was up for an audition for Bernie Seigal’s film. So, since she had known Davy for a long time, she talked about it to him pretty casually. However, after a while, he started texting her continuously with excuses for meeting her. In spite of Taylor’s constant dismission, he kept bothering her until one day, he sent her a video of the two of them having sex. 

Taylor was extremely upset because this was from a time she and Davy had a little fling. She did not, however, know that Davy had filmed the entire thing and was now using it as bait to harass her into having sex with him again. 

Taylor even went to the police about the whole thing, but when they learned that it was Jonathan Seigl’s grandson, they tried to shut her up. She even received a heavy check to sign an NDA about not disclosing all of this. However, Taylor did not do it. 

What did Olivia know about Davy? 

Taylor was so upset with the entire thing that she even told Olivia to fuck off. However, Olivia sat her down and told her that it wasn’t just her who was the victim. In fact, Davy had done this sort of sexual blackmailing to numerous other women, posing as a predatory threat to everyone. It was because he was in a state of power that no one did anything about it. 

After dropping a really upset Melaine off, John decides to understand how deep this predatory rot runs through the Seigal family and if Jonathan Seigal was aware of all this. So, John decides to meet him up, but since he is busy with a premiere of one of his classic films, he asks John to come to the premiere directly. 

At the premiere, you can clearly see that the Seigals don’t gel well with each other. Bernie is clearly upset with Jonathan about something. At this point, this could only be guesswork, but Jonathan Seigal isn’t quite the saint he looks like. Since Bernie points out that Jonathan was a ‘truly terrible father,’ we can sense a kind of anger brimming there. 

What is the reason for Jonathan’s stroke? 

Anyway, John meets up with Jonathan, but he tells him that he will talk to him after the screening. But, during the Q&A session for the film, which starred Jonathan’s wife, Lorraine Everly, one of the most legendary artists of the generation, he has a heart attack. The reason for the heart attack is the sudden surge of messages all around the auditorium of the news leak about Davy’s predatory behavior with multiple women. 

Now, the reason for Jonathan’s stroke can be because of the leak of Davy being a sexual predator. The Seigal have been trying their best to pull the news under the rug for a long time, and I am assuming that Jonathan knew about it, too. So, the stroke can’t just be because of his reputation going to the ruins. I assume that it’s because Jonathan was also a predator during his time. 

Now, I am not quite sure about this, but when Sugar later finds out that the picture of Olvia’s mother and that of Lorraine Everly in Jonathan’s movie (his wife) were wearing the same dress, something feels off. So it’s possible that Jonathan had an affair with his son’s wife (now ex-wife and Olivia’s mother). This is the reason for Bernie being upset with his father and also a reason for the stroke because he might have had flashbacks of the times when he was also under scrutiny. 

Sugar Episode 4 Ending, Explained: 

What does John learn about Melaine? 

At the premiere, John and his keen observational eyes also see that Melanie has been secretly trying to get Bernie’s attention. This makes him understand that he was wrong about her being completely clean about what she knows. When he follows her through the theatre, he lands in the projection room and sees the two of them talking, with Melanie possibly getting upset with Bernie because of Davy’s truth. 

Is Davy responsible for Olvia’s disappearance? 

Towards the end of Episode 4, we see Davy receiving a call from Stallings. While things are not made clear right away, the two of them talking with each other clearly state that Davy is indebted to Stallings for some reason. 

Now, it doesn’t take a genuine deduce that Davy must have sought help from Stallings to temporarily keep his sister away from the limelight. Since she was a drug addict, people might just assume that she is using again when the reason for her disappearance was that she might have threatened Davy about coming out with all the women who have been the victims of sexual abuse that was inflicted by him. 

What’s behind the locked door? 

The final moments of the episode see Stallings leaving for some business while allowing Roberta (Jennifer Marshall), one of his associates, to keep a check on his ‘special project,’ which is basically looking after a locked door. Now, what’s behind this door? I am assuming Olvia.

Since we have seen throughout the episode that Olivia mentions that ‘someone’s been following me,’ we can deduce that it was Stallings who was following her and kidnapped her. Since we see Roberta going through a drawer of things and finding a cross that Olvia used to wear, we can confirm that Olvia is, in fact, a captive in the house and is locked behind that door. 

Now, most of these things and deductions should make sense when we see the next episode, but what would be surprising to understand is how Ruby fits into all of this and why she is helping Stalling out. 

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Sugar Episode 4 Links: IMDb, Rotten Tomatoes, Wikipedia
Sugar Episode 4 Cast: Colin Farrell, Kirby Howell-Baptiste, Amy Ryan, Dennis Boutsikaris, Alex Hernandez, Lindsay Pulsipher
Sugar Genre: Drama, Mystery | Runtime: 8 Episodes

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