The Righteous Gemstones recap: Walton Goggins crashes Cousins Night and hits “Payday”

Family has always been at the heart of The Righteous Gemstones. After all, the show isn’t called The Righteous Jesse Gemstone. Even at their most insulting, depraved, and selfish, Jesse, Kelvin, and Judy love each other and the people around them because behind every “fuck you” hides an “I love you.” Heartwarming, isn’t it?

Creator Danny McBride has long used blood relations to soften the stubborn, fragile men he portrays and dissects. Eastbound And Down’s Kenny Powers and Vice Principals’ Neal Gamby have children, wives, ex-wives, and ex-wives’ husbands help make these windbags palatable. With Gemstones, McBride spreads the love even further, reaching the extended family and chosen family in the case of Kelvin and Keefe. As only McBride could do, the episode’s title, “For Their Nakedness Is Your Own Nakedness,” comes from the Bible verse forbidding incest (Leviticus 18:10), which writers McBride, Kevin Barnett, and Chris Pappas recontextualize into an episode about a family member’s vulnerabilities being the whole clan’s responsibility. Following two episodes of family feuds, McBride directs one about making mends over sausage dip in what might be the show’s sweetest episode to date.

That sweetness sneaks up on you. The show opens with Baby Billy making his glorious debut this season and setting up what is typically Gemstones at its most cynical. Looking like Lisa Frank painted “The Birth Of Venus” in an oil slick, Baby Billy (Walton Goggins) returns with a brand-new banger: “Payday Someday.” Like numerous gospel tracks, Baby Billy borrows the phrasing of Baptist Pastor R.G. Lee’s famed sermon “Payday Someday,” which warns people away from sin and greed. In Baby Billy’s hands, the phrase is perverted into a jaunty earworm about self-enrichment and a better tomorrow.

Singing in a dream space of his own making directly to the camera, with the “sunbums” of Zion’s pool joining the song, Baby Billy is at rock bottom again. Except he’s not. By his own admission, he’s living in paradise at the Zion pool, singing songs, drinking free Piña Coladas, and getting a suntan all day. That’s not the life for someone as famous as he used to be; there’s no prestige. Returning to his penthouse, where he lives with his supportive wife Tiffany (Valyn Hall) and drooling toddler Lionel, Billy catches a moment of a Family Feud rerun, which inspires his next venture: a Bible-themed knockoff of Family Feud called “Baby Billy’s Bible Bonkers.” Baby Billy is going back to TV.

Billy’s arc provides a nice shape to the episode, but he’s not responsible for the bad blood this time. Draped in bathrobes, the youngest Montgomerys, Chuck and Karl, sit in the Gemstone mansion. While munching on fistfuls of bacon, they warn Eli that Peter believes he called in the raid and that he’s coming for the whole family. May-May pleads with her big brother Eli to keep her boys safe, and although he protests in typical Gemstone fashion (he calls her a “dummy”), Eli agrees. At the Aimee-Leigh reflection pool, with the New Generation in tight formation, Eli demands they spend some time with the Montgomerys. True to themselves, the Gemstone three flip the bird to the idea and their cousins, who watch from a nearby window and bob in and out of the frame Haunted Mansion style.

The Gemstones might be a unified front, but Judy’s personal life is on shaky ground. Having learned about the affair, marriage expert Amber brings a copy of her counseling course, The System, to Judy’s house. When B.J. answers the door, Amber stumbles to explain why Judy—or anyone—would need The System. Later, when Judy catches B.J. watching horror movies The System DVD, she freaks and spits her guilt and rage all over B.J. Poor, sweet B.J. He must begin to suspect things between him and Judy aren’t kosher. The show’s ability to complicate B.J.’s naievté has helped ground and complicate his and Judy’s relationship. Judy’s clearly awful to B.J., but the show clearly wants us to sympathize with Baltz, who does an excellent job of appearing both clueless and trusting without frustrating the viewer. His straight man against Judy’s obvious guilt should be dramatic and comedic death. Yet it remains one of the season’s most engaging plots.

From here, the episode veers in a kinder direction, with Kevlin and Keefe sharing a tender moment among butt buzzers. When Kelvin invites Keefe to Cousins Night, an evening of familial bonding, it’s quietly a big step. Adam DeVine occasionally gets lost among the other performances on the show, but the earnestness he brings deepens our bond with these two. The sincerity he and Cavalaro express made Kelvin referring to Keefe as his awkward labeling of “best dude friend” a little more painful.

Competing for B-plot supremacy against Judy’s affair, “Baby Billy’s Bible Bonkers” arrives fully formed in the Gemstones throne room. Simply put: Walton Goggins is on fire in this episode. His ace delivery is on full display with the little squat he performs when he says the Gemstones “can’t see solid gold when I’m shitting it right in front of you.” His control of this character makes every line, movement, and song a miracle. Still, despite putting what looks like a lot of work into his diorama of “Bible Bonkers,” it’s too much of a rip-off of the Feud for the Sharks, and for that reason, they’re out. Though the Gemstones pass on “Baby Billy’s Bible Bonkers,” there’s something endearing about Jesse saying, “You’re our uncle. I’m assuming we’ll hear from you again.” Ditto for Judy’s “Love you, Aunt Tiffy.” These tossed-off acknowledgments keep popping up, reaffirming the familial connections. For example, after Judy and Amber settle The System debacle, Amber responds to Judy’s aggression by asking if Judy is going to Cousins Night, a slight admission that, like Baby Billy, this isn’t the end of their relationship.

Cousins Night gives the family reason to come together, but it doesn’t go as planned. For one thing, the architect of Cousins Night, Eli, learns that May-May is living in that rundown church and decides to pay a visit and patch holes in her roof—a little heavy-handed in its metaphor but a welcome additional bit of warmth. Moreover, the cousins still aren’t getting along. Their differences are apparent from the jump, with the Montgomerys taking a dip in the trout pond while the Gemstones judge them from afar. The power of Keefe’s fire dance appropriately changes the temperature a bit. Their shocked, confused reactions aside, it’s easy to imagine everyone at Cousins Night loving Keefe’s dance. Kelvin certainly does.

Dinner begins with Karl, once again, forgetting he has teeth and shoveling food down his throat as Baby Billy wheels in a game of “Bible Bonkers.” As expected, the one round they play ends with Jesse pulling a knife and threatening a “187.” The threat of violence raises the tension, but Karl takes the hit. Calling back his inability to chew, Karl starts choking on his BBQ—not the sausage dip. The family comes together to rescue Karl because his vulnerability is everyone’s vulnerability. After a quick Heimlich that ends on B.J.’s face, the fences have been mended, and everyone couples off with a smile. Baby Billy and Tiffany are getting ass and waffles; Kelvin gives Keefe a once-over and delivers another beautiful moment between weirdos (“You never disappoint”); and B.J. hugs his wife as Judy flips Amber the bird. But it’s Jesse who offers an olive branch to the Montgomerys, giving them a ride home, joyfully howling at the moon along the way. There will be a payday someday, and, hallelujah, this was it.

Stray observations

• The art in Judy’s home is beautiful. Last week, I believe it showed a Renaissance-style portrait of Judy holding Judy in a park. This week, a very naked and anatomically impressive Adam and Eve kissing in a bed of ivy.
• HBO should sell those Judy and B.J. couch pillows
• Like the neck injury last week, Karl’s reckless eating style provided a nice callback at the episode’s end. Even the misdirect of Lionel eating dirt and cigarette butts. It doesn’t take much to set up a pin to knock down later, but it makes all the difference
• I love Baby Billy, but there will never, ever be a Family Feud host funnier or better than Steve Harvey.
• Baby Billy’s description of a gameshow host: Standing in air conditioning all day, being cool, being charming.
• Whenever “Payday Someday” is released as a single, it might dethrone “Misbehavin’” as my most listened-to track on Apple Music. Maybe.
• Tiffany’s Bible Bonkers theme was a quiet jam.
• In general, Tiffany has a great vibe.
• When Jesse offered to give the Montgomerys a ride, I was sure we’d smash cut to the three of them in The Redeemer. Chekov’s monster truck must be making an appearance later in the season.
• The System is called a “system,” but it is essentially a swear jar that comes with a DVD—every time Jesse considers sinning, he plops a “gemstone” into the vase container (“I love my wife”).
• There’s no viewer on Earth that didn’t try to say that tongue-twister with the Gemstones. “Let that roll around your mouth.”
• “Cousins Night is about adult cousins, dawg. Ain’t no babies.”
• “Baby Lionel’s eating dirt.”
• Keefe knows Chuck didn’t choke on the sausage dip because he could smell the vomit on B.J.’s face. It wasn’t meat. It was poultry. Thanks, Sherlock Keefe.
• “Heimlich his ass!”
  “Lick his what?”
• The fruits of the Gemstone throne room have really come to bear, uh? Only after rewatching the second episode did I realize they were building the throne room!
• It feels like they’re setting up some love triangle between Eli, Peter, and Aimee-Leigh. I hope it’s a little more than that. Rewatching episode two, it feels like there’s some sexual component to Peter’s speech, which feels a little gross even for this show
• God, every B.J. fit is better than the last. With NoHo Hank leaving us recently, it’s good to know B.J. is out there
• The crack in Lucas Haas’ voice when he says, “I bet she still purrs like a kitten.”
• “‘Satan loves porn.’ These protest posters are tops!”
• I love the teenage way everyone talks about Cousins Night. “My dad’s making me go to some stupid Cousins Night.” By the time John Goodman popped in to ask the Montgomery boys about it, looking so damn cheerful about Cousins Night, I was in heaven
• There’s a lot of snitching going on this season. Walker’s sugar cookie story, the FBI raid, Judy’s affair. There’s a rat in the house of Gemstone.
• Though Jesse expresses a tinge of sympathy the says the militia were “Ruby Ridged,” I’m not entirely convinced he didn’t tip off the feds.