‘House of Lies’ season 3, episode 2 review: Marty, Jeannie, and more challenges

This week on Showtimes’ “House of Lies,” there were a variety of different things that took place; We had a random stabbing, Marty get completely owned in a game of basketball, and he and Jeannie had another nice moment that proved that there is some genuine chemistry between the two of them.

As a matter of fact, Kristen Bell and Don Cheadle gave us one of the most painful moments of the entire series, mostly in that they stopped just short of giving us what we really wanted: An admission from Marty that she was what he was missing in his life, and at his new firm. It is in some ways very realistic that he would not choose to make this admission, mostly because he does not want let the truth about his feelings out there and then fail at having this romance work.

There was a little note in here that we want to specifically highlight, and that is the appearance of none other than Bex Taylor-Klaus as Roscoe’s friend and basketball-playing partner. At first, we didn’t even recognize her in this role, since it is such a colorful and different change in comparison to what she did on “The Killing” or what she is even doing on “Arrow.”

Elsewhere, we do at least like that Doug is as hapless of a character as humanly possible, but there still isn’t too much to get out of his relationship with his wife. As for the stabbing, that was the strangest part of the entire hour. It just felt so ridiculous and over-the-top that we still don’t quite understand why it was included in here in the first place. The same goes for that picture above; it was a great moment between Jeannie and Julianne, but it wasn’t really that necessary.

All in all, this was a fun half-hour of TV, but a small step down from the fantastic season premiere. There just were not as many laughs. Grade: B.

What did you think about this episode? Let us know below.