Calvin Evans is dead. Just in case you came here thinking there’s no way they’d kill off that man in episode two, it was the perfect, most lovely romance and maybe that bus just nicked him because no there is just no way I won’t stand for it THERE IS NO WAY. I see you. I hear you. But, sadly, there is a way. That bus slammed directly into happy, beautiful, on-the-verge-of-a-scientific-breakthrough Calvin Evans, leaving behind one sneaker and his pocket watch in its wake. It is devastating. Just look at Elizabeth Zott when the police tell her the news and hand her that watch — she is devastated.
While the follow-up to Calvin’s heartbreaking death is, yes, about Elizabeth, it is also very much about a very good boy named Six Thirty. Shall we talk about the dog narration? In the novel, letting Six Thirty narrate in different chapters works really well. It’s a seamless change in point of view. Six Thirty gets real character development. His voice is funny, it’s poignant, and it never feels awkward. Here, it feels awkward — at least, the transition from an episode with some serious subject matter that ends with such a shock into one narrated by a dog is not the easiest to swallow. Perhaps it’s meant to soften the blow? It feels a little ridiculous at the start. However, the dog admittedly won me over in the end. Am I a sucker? Maybe! But that’s my problem, okay?
The smartest choice Lessons in Chemistry makes, aside from getting B.J. Novak to admirably perform Six Thirty’s narration, is to not make the dog narration cutesy. Six Thirty’s story is a serious one with some complex emotions. Guys, this dog is so sad! Look at his sad face! Look at how he won’t eat because he blames himself for Calvin’s death! Look at him missing his running buddy!! If you have a dog, did you hug it after you watched this episode? If you don’t have a dog, did you stumble out onto the street looking for a dog to hug? I don’t recommend that second thing, but I do understand the urge.
We learn that Six Thirty was being trained on a nearby military base before his meet-cute with Elizabeth by her trash cans, but he was never built to be a military dog. He was “trained to protect,†but instead of being brave, he was constantly “paralyzed†with fear. “I was a coward and I hated myself for it,†Six Thirty tells us. No, seriously, have you hugged a dog today?
He makes his own escape from the military base, not feeling up to the challenge, and quickly falls in love with his life alongside Elizabeth and Calvin. We relive the highlights of their story through Six Thirty’s eyes. He believes he found a purpose through them. He promises to protect them. He fails at that, too. After Calvin’s death, Six Thirty can barely stand himself: “In that moment, everything I thought about myself, every worst fear I had, it all came true.†Someone get this dog into therapy, please, I am begging.
While therapy isn’t an option for Six Thirty, he does begin to try and make it up to Elizabeth. She might not be able to look at him, but he does remain by her side while she attempts to pick up the pieces of her life. He’s there as she goes to Calvin’s funeral and sits alone in the front row. He’s there while a reporter from the Los Angeles Times named Ralph bugs her for a quote about Calvin and thinks it’s appropriate to tell an obviously grieving woman that so far most of the anecdotes his colleagues have shared have been about Calvin being a recluse and a jerk. This man clearly has never interacted with other human beings before, which is weird since he is a journalist. When Elizabeth tells him that she didn’t know Calvin “long enough,†he uses the quote “I didn’t know him long†in his article that completely paints Calvin in a negative light. Six Thirty can’t protect her from that.
He’s there with her when she heads back to Hastings Lab way too soon and discovers that not only is their lab completely cleared up and their research — which apparently now belongs to Hastings — and Calvin’s personal belongings are all boxed up in storage, but that Elizabeth’s not allowed to have any of it because they weren’t married and she isn’t a blood relative. Six Thirty saying that he couldn’t smell any of Calvin’s smells in that lab gutted me. Am I having a mental breakdown over this dog? Don’t answer that. While Fran Frask can’t help Elizabeth with that awful “policy,†she is able to find her a new position at the lab. Sure, it’s as an admin assistant to a man whose current role at Hastings seems to be recounting lunch menus from the 1930s, but it is a job.
Six Thirty may want to protect Elizabeth now more than ever, but all he can really do is be there for her. She’s especially going to need it after learning, thanks to the wildest home-pregnancy test on the planet (look up “determining pregnancy status using amphibian ovulation†and have yourself an afternoon), that despite being very clear in the last episode that she did not want a baby, one is on the way. Although it’s surprising that Elizabeth doesn’t even bring up the idea of abortion, she decides pretty early on to deal with it by ignoring it. Well, okay, first she deals with it by taking a sledgehammer to her kitchen in order to build herself an industrial-grade chemistry lab to continue her work, but then she ignores it. She smashes things, she cooks, she ergs, repeat.
It’s not until she starts showing that she is forced to acknowledge what’s happening to her and that’s because, once again, Dr. Donatti reveals himself to be the absolute worst. In a meeting with Donatti, Lunch Menus from the 1930s, and Fran Frask, Donatti tries to fire Elizabeth for not just being pregnant but pregnant and unwed — the horror. “You’re the woman, you got knocked up — we have rules,†he tells her as I try not to punch my TV screen. Elizabeth calmly but firmly informs him that they in fact do not have rules about this and any “unwritten†rules are not legally binding. He can’t fire her. So Donatti hurls the only thing he can think of to hurt her in her direction, telling her Calvin would be so “ashamed†of her. But Elizabeth knows that’s not even remotely true. Donatti knows it too.
If you think that’s the worst thing Donatti could do to Elizabeth at the moment, buckle up. Guess what else he’s up to? He’s stolen Elizabeth and Calvin’s work and has tasked Al Borowitz to help him re-create their findings step-by-step, claim it as their own, and get the Remsen Grant. It’s so devious and slimy and awful; Donatti is just an outright villain at this point. Though, honestly, Borowitz, the one chemist who always seemed kind and respectful of Elizabeth, being involved in this might actually sting more. When he brings over a box of Calvin’s personal effects and acts like a hero while lying to Elizabeth’s face about the research going missing, Borowitz crosses over into unforgivable territory.
But the fallout of Calvin’s death and Elizabeth’s pregnancy isn’t all bad. The biggest silver lining is that she begins to form a friendship with Harriet. Harriet, too, is gutted by the loss of her friend Calvin, especially because they left things on such bad terms. She’s the one who brings the terrible Times article to Elizabeth’s attention, but immediately sees that Elizabeth is in no state to process any of it and so takes on restoring Calvin’s reputation by herself and keeps an eye on her unraveled neighbor with the sledgehammer. When Elizabeth shows up at her door to give her a Thelonious Monk album she found in Calvin’s box that had a note from Calvin to Harriet attached to it — he would make up for missing that hearing, he promised — she invites Elizabeth in. A friendship is born! They talk about missing Calvin, they make fun of his horrific dancing, and, finally, Elizabeth is able to open up about how scared she is to be pregnant. “No one can do it, but then you expand,†she tells Elizabeth, “you think you can’t do it but you do it anyway — that’s being a mother.†While Harriet takes a liking to the sad, strange woman who lives across the street, she does draw the line at supplying Elizabeth with an axe, which feels right.
Harriet isn’t the only person from Calvin’s life who offers some support. Elizabeth also meets one of her late partner’s rowing buddies, who also happens to be an OB/GYN, Dr. Mason. When she finally comes to see him for a checkup — she’s already in her third trimester — he realizes she is alone and scared and also has been erging up to 10,000 miles. So, he writes her a prescription to come join him down at the boathouse in one year. I hope he also writes her some prescriptions for, like, actual medicine, but it is a really sweet moment.
So, Elizabeth Zott has lost a lot, but she’s gained some things too. The grief is still so acute and she’s clearly in pain — but there’s really not much Six Thirty can do about it. When Elizabeth looks a little deeper through the box of Calvin’s things, she finds his notebook full of recipes and thoughts for the dinner he made her at Christmas. She finds an engagement ring in his lab coat. It’s crushing (for both Elizabeth and me, to be honest). Six Thirty has one idea: He gets Elizabeth to take him outside. Six Thirty remembers something Calvin always said about why he loved running — even when it was hard or you didn’t think you could continue on, all you had to do was put one foot in front of the other. “One foot. One foot. And then sure enough, you’ll be home.†Six Thirty and Elizabeth put one foot in front of the other and they begin to run.
Lab Notes
• Harriet decides to go see that Times reporter and let him know he got Calvin Evans all wrong. Calvin’s heart was even bigger than his intellect, she tells him. “He was the warmest person I knew,†she says. But it’s too late, and Ralph did use actual quotes from colleagues. Controversy is good for selling papers, he tells her. Harriet sees an opportunity: She has Ralph come to the next hearing about the freeway and, in turn, Ralph writes up a great article praising Harriet’s argument and her brief but informative master class on the 14th Amendment. The publicity is a big win for her and she tells Elizabeth that she felt Calvin there — in a way, he did keep his promise to her.
• After Calvin dies, there’s a scene of Harriet and her kids in church and Harriet eventually has to excuse herself. We find her alone in the lobby, almost doubled over in sobs over the loss of her friend. Aja Naomi King is so, so good here.
• Beau Bridges shows up as a mysterious figure from the Ramsen Foundation, looking to bestow the grant money to another scientist after losing Calvin. You don’t hire Beau Bridges to just lurk around in the background at funerals, so let’s assume his character will come into play in a bigger way at a later date.
• Let’s not totally write off Fran Frask just yet. Did you see her taking in everything Elizabeth was saying during her infuriating meeting with Donatti? Maybe we’ll make a feminist out of Fran after all.