With lots of tough issues to overcome, The Split Season 3 Episode 1 opens on a good footing, ten months after the events of that explosive Season 2 conclusion. Nathan and Hannah are divorcing, and it appears to be nice at first. But this is The Split, after all, and it’s the split that has been building since the First Episode, so it’s not all sweetness and agreements over who gets what from the Le Creuset set. Melanie has been hired by Nathan for his part of the divorce, which is a brilliant move.
Christie has relocated to the Big Apple. Nina is now a mother and has an inappropriate relationship. Rose isn’t a lawyer and thus doesn’t receive as much screen time. She will hopefully find the love she deserves for not being as twisted up as the rest of the cast. Will the rest of the cast be ready in time for The Split to end? I don’t believe it, but that’s all part of the enjoyment.
The Split Season 3 Episode 1 Recap & Review
Hannah, a mother of three, informs her husband Nathan that intimacy with her colleague Christie, with whom she had an on-again, off-again affair for years, who was in New York, was superior to with him in the final Episode of The Split Season 2. This doesn’t appear to be good news for their marriage, but who knows. And, after all, who better than a pair of divorce lawyers to arrange their own split?
The Split Season 3 Episode 1 transports us to the post-lockdown era of podcasts from the posh kitchen table, just in time for the adoption of no-fault divorce legislation in England and Wales this week. The Defoe house is unusually gleaming and high-ceilinged, to say the least. Has Ruth actually moved in with her daughter? According to reports, he is interviewing couples about their marriages, including Rose and her handsome ex-banker husband James, and making dramatic statements such as, “If marriage is the invasion and divorce is the investigation, can there ever be a decent divorce?”
Divorce & Adoption
Hannah is fumbling painfully with her rings and delaying signing the divorce papers at work, unaware that Nathan has not only signed his but also has an extremely arrogant new girlfriend, Kate, a “kid psychologist” who has released a book about divorce and its legacy. Meanwhile, Rose, who is caring for Nina’s kid while she is at the office, and James, who is now a freelance technician with a company called Brain on a Bike, would like to adopt, despite Rose’s reservations. As he rides away, James reminds Rose that she needs to seize this opportunity or she will miss out on life.
Except for Lindsay Duncan’s fabulously calm S&M countess, whose former husband came back to her after abandoning her for someone younger, everyone is confused about everything. She says on Ruth’s podcast, “We have only this one life.” “And it’s worth reviving a relationship if it has a pulse.” Hannah pays close attention and tears the divorce papers up. Nathan’s calming presence returns to the family home soon after a devastating family tragedy.
Donation & Death
Aside from the countess storyline, there’s Leonora, a cardiac surgeon who needs a divorce despite her seemingly flawless marriage. The unconvincing and surely soon to be ruined, the reason for her wanting to leave her husband remains a mystery until the Second Episode – by which time we’ve lost interest – when the honesty theme gets all the attention, with Hannah, who until recently kept her affair with Christie from Nathan so isn’t exactly one to talk, advocating honesty above all else. This backfires when Sian and her wife, the newly pregnant Bella, demand that sperm donor Gus sign a document stating that he has no parental rights.
Nina explains to Gus that his legal situation would be different if it had been a natural conception instead of artificial insemination. With strange attention, Gus examines Bella’s ultrasound. Bella and Gus were on-site in Bali for a photo session. Hannah and Nina give each other a sidelong glance. Hannah asserts to a suspicious Nina that Sian has the right to know about the conception.
But the genuine “take the rug out from under your feet” moment came in the last minutes of the episode when the show did a One Day and had James hit by a car while riding his bike, resulting in his untimely death just minutes after telling Rose he didn’t want to “lose out on life.” To make matters worse, Rose had left him a heartfelt message moments before his accident, expressing to him she was “all in” and telling him he’d be the best dad.
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