Lucky Hank (Season 1), Episode 3 Recap & Ending Explained: ‘Lucky Hank’ has so far explored Hank’s midlife crisis while creating a bittersweet portrait of his life. Besides his attachment issues with his father, we saw him struggling with the fact that he is not an accomplished writer. The past and the present collided, which opened up some of his emotional wounds.
Now the latest episode on AMC+ takes it a step further to showcase a literal baggage sent by his father to contextualize the metaphorical one. As always, Hank struggles with self-esteem issues while dealing with his duties as a chairman at the mediocrity’s capital.
Spoilers ahead.
Lucky Hank (Season 1), Episode 3 Recap
Episode 3: Escape
In the morning, before leaving for work, Hank (Bob Odenkirk) and Lily (Mireille Enos) have sex in the shower. Suddenly, they hear a large thud in their backyard and rush out to find a storage pod suddenly in front of their house. The smug storage guy does not care that it comes in between Hank’s garage and considers dumping it anyhow as doing his duty. Hank is left with signing to confirm that he received it.
Lily reads out the sender’s address, and Hank confirms that it is from his father. He calls Marnie, his father’s secretary, to get rid of it. But she becomes yet another person who does not care about his problem. She rather asks if there might be some space to get his car out of the garage. Alas, Hank’s efforts go futile while the contents of his father’s entire office stay in his backyard.
Besides, Hank learns that his father is planning to come to his place to access these contents. He is justifiably angry at Hank Sr., who left him and his mother and did not speak with them for over 15 years. And now he wants to be with us? What gives him that right? Hank wonders. However, unlike him, Lily thinks that he should tell his mother -Laurel (Anne Gee Byrd), about it, even if he believes that Hank Sr.’s affairs hurt her several times. She believes that Laurel would be resilient instead of the way Hank looks at her. So, he calls his mother and tells her about the storage pod. All she says to him at the time is, ‘Oh dear!’
Back in her school, Lily sees Jason (the student that she did not expel earlier) pissing on one of the lockers. She asks the janitor to get it cleaned. He refuses to mop any such thing despite her repeated commands. The school principal also does not accept any responsibility and stays as diplomatic as a man can be. Instead of helping her, he tells how replacing the janitor would get them in trouble in the union hearing. He thinks the weekend cleaning crew will handle this problem by Monday.
Meanwhile, Hank gets lost in the thoughts of self-pity while seeing himself as a not-so-problematic person who had to deal with so much pain regardless of it. He sees his irritation as the only of its kind in the world and significantly larger compared to his father. Dean Rose (Oscar Nuñez) breaks his chain of thought and tries to bring him back to reality. He mentions a rumor going around the college that the department heads must share a list of 20% of the faculty who must be let go. Instead of being a despicable figure, he sees that as the ideal antidote to his misery.
The rumors also remain in the staffroom before Hank enters it. As expected, he gets questioned by Gracie DuBois (Suzanne Cryer), who expects him to reveal the truth about job cuts out of courtesy toward them. While Emma (Shannon DeVido) conveys her minor concern, Finny (Haig Sutherland) gets lost in reciting yet another unrelated quote. Hank unashamedly confirms that it is true and eats up their hatred. He rather considers it as his fuel.
Later in the bar, Hank keeps struggling to begin with a chain of thought. He writes down an inconsequential detail of a waitress sharing a drink. Then Meg (Sara Amini) passes by, still waiting for his recommendation for her tenure. He tries to make her disinterested in the thankless job as a teacher by sharing his misery of chairmanship. He projects his own issues onto her and expects her to get out of town instead of getting stuck with such a job.
She makes a case for herself and how important this opportunity is for her. Seeing her passion for it, he lets her write the document herself and agrees to sign it without even reading it. He then shushes her away while making it seem as if he is writing something meaningful.
Meanwhile, in the college, Finny and Emma discuss the possibility of them getting kicked out. While Finny feigns confidence, Emma knows that he is just as hopeless as everyone else. Gracie tries to get Jacob on board to secure her job since Paul (Cedric Yarbrough) is yet another poetry professor at Railton. On the other hand, Paul uses a different strategy. He stops Hank in the middle of his lecture to question him. Paul tries to scare him by mentioning their union rep – Leslie (Glynis Davies). He expects Hank to give a signed statement in solidarity with those in authority. But Hank continues to ridicule others and does not take even a step to help them.
Then there are the younger professors – Teddy (Arthur Keng) and June (Alvina August), who worry that the seniors will be prioritized in the upcoming list. They approach Jacob, who tries to calm their stress through a general tactic of kindness. Since that does not work out, he directs them to Bartow’s (Jackson Kelly) new committee.
Meanwhile, at their meeting, Bartow, Ava (Lilah Fitzgerald), and Lester (Jason Sakaki) discuss adding new members to their team to strengthen it. During their dialogue, Lester and Ava keep fighting for Bartow’s attention. Teddy and June approach them with the hope of joining their grievance committee. Bartow opposes it since he considers their involvement in the committee would tarnish their ruthless image. Teddy convinces them by offering a helping hand as faculty to fulfill their goals.
Meanwhile, Hank consoles Emma, who believes that she will be the one certainly getting kicked out. After getting a dose of hatred and misery, he returns home to wallow in self-pity. He breaks open the storage pod’s lock and gets inside to check what his dad has got there. While shuffling through its boxes, he finds one with a bunch of letters from his mother for several years. He feels cheated by that since he believed she was his companion in the misery of his father’s abandonment.
He rushes into the garage, determined to get his car out, despite being well aware of the futility of those attempts. Suddenly, Paul arrives at his home with Leslie, who is hoping to make a case from the union’s side. Hank cries like a little kid asking them to drive them to his mother’s place. He contemplates being seated in the back seat, which can either be infantilizing or empowering. He ends up feeling like an infant driven to Laurel’s place and being lectured for how he needs to save professors’ jobs, which he believes already benefitted despite their glaring incompetence. So, he shows no disregard for their concern.
While Hank keeps worrying about these trivial matters, Lily takes it upon herself to clean the piss on her school floor by herself since no one else cares about it. You wonder, what is more worrying? Her extreme concern or an utter disregard by others? Even her fixation on getting it cleaned seems like an extension of her caring nature.
Despite getting it cleaned, she gets charged with the additional cleaning tools she purchased for the job. The principal refuses to use their emergency fund for it since he does not consider ‘piss on the floor’ to be an emergency. Even before, he made her feel responsible for the reckless behavior of a student since she decided not to expel him. She gets tired of this disrespectful treatment and threatens him about leaving the school and going to New York to interview for a position at the Arlyle school.
Meanwhile, Meg interviews Russel (Daniel Doheny) for a bartender’s job at her bar. When their conversation reaches Hank’s topic, he shares his anger toward Hank’s indecisiveness. She empathizes with him since Railton did not remain to be just a part of his journey but became a destination. She rushes to the college to meet him. Instead, she meets Billie (Nancy Robertson), who drinks her sorrows down with a bottle of whiskey. So Meg spends the rest of her time taking care of Billie’s misery.
By that time, Hank meets Laurel, who accepts that his father did not abandon her, but only him. Now, she is ready to let him get off the hook and offer him a place to stay. Hank, however, does not want to forgive his father. So, he calls Frank Sr.’s phone and shares a voice note saying that he is not welcome at his place.
Back at home, Julie (Olivia Scott Welch) opens up about her pain of adulting and how overwhelming the added pressures feel. Instead of comforting her, he tells her to move out of their town to try out other options for how her life can turn out. Throughout his dialogue with her, he fails at every attempt to console her.
Later, at the bar, he tells Meg that she should rethink her wish for tenure since it seems highly unlikely. He lies about its unlikeliness while referring to the recent budget cuts. Instead, he wants her to explore other options outside Nashville that can make better use of a young and bright academic like her. He then engages in a drinking spree with her and afterward takes her back to her place. She considers it as an invitation for sex and gets naked in front of him. He does not engage with her as per her expectations and returns home.
Lucky Hank (Season 1), Episode 3 Ending Explained:
Why does Hank project his insecurities onto others?
On his journey home, Hank mulls over what lies he should tell Lily about what he was doing until so late. In the end, he decides to be transparent and tells her the complete truth. Owing to his usual fondness for ironic tone, she thinks he is joking. He confirms that he is serious in saying that he did not give in to Meg’s sexual provocations. Instead, he told her to leave the town and move away.
Lily sees a pattern in his recent behavior and how he is projecting his issues onto others. He wants others to lead their lives while not repeating the mistakes he made. She points out the absurdity of his belief. Then, she reveals her plan to interview at the Arlyle’s. Yet, he is not ready to let her figure out her life on her own, either. He reacts dejectedly as if he is not happy with her joy. All of it, in one way or the other, comes back to his own unresolved issues.
