"Desperate Housewives" Mystery Resolved: Gloria Did Do It!

FEBRUARY 20, 2007: The Monique Pollier mystery was put to rest on ABC's "Desperate Housewives" Sunday night, three months before the season's end as Gloria Hodge was revealed to be a homicidal religious zealot.

Series creator Marc Cherry and "Bang" episode writer Joe Keenan delivered one of the finest hours of "Desperate Housewives" this season, which of course hardly topped the outstanding supermarket shootout in November, but was nevertheless an excellent episode.

"The Little Things You Do Together" revealed that Orson was in psychiatric ward in 1976 after the supposed suicide of his adulterous, but religious father (we know now Gloria staged his suicide like she was trying to stage Bree's).


Speaking of which, there is a slight continuity error, as a written document Susan discovered in Orson's practice in the Christmas episode clearly stated Orson was admitted to the mental hospital in August 1981. Oh, well...

Gloria had blamed Orson for her husband's death, saying Orson was supposed to watch out for him, but chose to go out with friends instead. This led to Orson's supposed nervous breakdown.


Years later, Gloria discovered Orson was having an affair with Monique while being married to Alma (I suppose this happened after Alma had left Orson and moved without a word to Canada).

Mama Hodge then killed Monique with Mike's wrench the night the plumber made a house call to Pollier's residence while he went back home to get more tools. Orson, who was shocked to discover his mother standing over Monique's body, quickly got rid of Mike when the plumber came back and returned his wrench that was used as the murder weapon.

Although Gloria had washed the wrench, the police later discovered traces of Monique's DNA on it, which is why they accused Mike of killing the woman. Last week, we discovered Monique had never slept with Mike and she wrote his number on her hand because she was going to use his services.

Orson who was still being manipulated into feeling guilty over his dad's death reluctantly helped his mother dispose of the body. He buried Monique in the dirt while Gloria removed Monique's teeth.

Gloria was then injured when she fell into the hole a livid Orson had dug out for poor Monique following a scuffle with him. Orson then put his mother into a retirement home, hoping he never had to speak to her again.

That is before Bree unknowingly insisted on bringing that monster into their home.

Now, aside from the fact that I thoroughly enjoyed the hour that seemed to have neatly wrap up all threads of the mystery storyline I realized there was a huge continuity error in character development.

Why did Orson run over Mike?

Of course, as I had written in an earlier post, last year's writers had originally planned to make Orson a con artist whom Mike had recognized from jail. He was supposed to deceive Bree, so he tried to eliminate the man who could ruin his plans.

But, the new Orson that we were supposed to lose all suspicions about and fall in love with by the end of last Sunday's episode would never have tried to kill anyone, even if he was afraid he would go to jail if his secret was uncovered.

The writers conveniently made Mike responsible for Orson's fall off the hospital roof, so one could argue they were even at this point (which is further emphasized by their card game in previews for the next episode).

That to me, however is a plot hole the size of Fairview and I do not see at this point what the writers could possibly do to patch that up in any future episode. Or am I wrong? Feel free to disagree.


Finally, despite my little criticism, I did enjoy the hour immensely, with highlights being Susan and Bree making up at the hospital, Andrew rushing to his mom's aid and being very protective of her throughout the episode, Alma's death executed in "Housewives" trademark campy and humorous manner, Gloria telling Bree "killing Monique was easy because she was a slut, but [Bree] is a good woman", and the expression of bliss on Tom Scavo's face when despite all arguing, struggling for words, he thanked his wife for being there for him.


Oh, yes! And Zach is gone and the press release for the next episode does not list Cody Kasch. No offense to the actor, but that storyline was one of this season's lower points.

In two weeks, Rex Van De Kamp returns to narrate the next episode, while his widow Bree takes a two-month leave of absence. Welcome to Edie Britt's Wisteria Lane!

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