This isn’t your traditional boring what happened TV recap. I just respond, review and break down what I saw while digging deeper at what the masterminds behind the operation are hinting at. Let’s call a reviewcap. 

What-Kingdom

When-Wednesday nights at 8pm

Where-Direct TV on Audience

Every fighter in the world knows the immortal rule. One punch, kick, or shot can end a fight or career. Once they climb into the ring, danger surrounds them like their own shadow. As confident as a fighter can seem on the outside, inside their head exists a place where they think about and dread over the last fight.

Episode 203, “Broken or Missing”, brought us a lot of developments. The return of Kenny to society, fresh out of prison and slapping bitches who talk shit about his weight. A possible Jay-Ryan fight. Love blossoming between Jay and his photographer girlfriend, Laura. It also brought Nate(Nick Jonas) and his first fight after the street mugging.

It’s easy to call the climax of this episode the most shocking of Kingdom’s run on Direct TV. The moment Nate got caught in the ring with a swing kick and fell motionless to the floor, the midway sideways blow of Clint Eastwood’s Million Dollar Baby hit me. They aren’t doing that with the youngest Kulina, are they? Render the most popular face on the show paralyzed and finished!!!?? No way. Turns out creator Byron Balasco was thinking more Manny Pacquaio-Juan Manuel Marquez IV, where the fight ended in the sixth round with a thunderous counter hook landing flush to an attacking Pac Man’s jaw and dropping him unconscious to the floor.

Nate didn’t just lose his fight. He was knocked the fuck out cold. All he got was a concussion, but Alvey(Frank Grillo) has bigger concerns. Can his young tiger finish off opponents? Can he kick the knife all the way in or will he just poke the other guy with shots? Earlier in the fight, Nate was hammering the guy to the point where he left himself unguarded and looking at the referee for a stoppage. Big mistake that was foreshadowing. A fighter should NEVER take his eyes off the opponent in a ring, whether it’s a square, octagon or street alley. Your eyes are as powerful as your fists in any fight, and Nate forgot about rule #1. Never take your eyes off your opponent. During round 2, he was dropped.

If you know where Nate’s head is, let us know. The young man is living a lie when it comes to romance and when it comes to 95% of everything else. How happy can you be if you can’t be yourself? How do you tell your dad, who is Rambo meets Han Solo in a ring, that fighting isn’t the top priority on your list of what to do when you get up and breathe today?

Elsewhere, the stakes for the future got white hot.

In order to solve his opponents dropping out right before the right, Jay is offered a deal by shady promoter Garo(Bryan Cullen) to fight the champion himself, none other than Ryan Wheeler. Before you think Jay will pull a honorable Kulina response of no thank you, remember this is Jay Kulina we are talking about. He wants the glory and desperately wants to be taken seriously by his father, his fellow fighters and the world of MMA again. If this is the only way back into the castle of greatness, Jay is all for it.

What follows is even better. Wheeler is finishing up a workout and holding a cup of piss(for a skeptical Alvey to test) and Jay stares him down mano o mano. This ends in a playful if half serious wrestle scrap between the two lifelong friends, but each knows that a possible matchup has to be on the horizon. The only holdup is Alvey. Will he let his ticket back to the big time in Ryan step into the ring with his troubled son who he doesn’t trust? Can he deal with a Wheeler defeat or a Jay drama show? For Alvey, this doesn’t end well in any outcome. Jay wins and Wheeler’s career is derailed, especially after a disappointing title defense. If Jay loses, there could be a rift in the family and on Navy Street for quite some time. Ah, the drama that follows a season one finale where everybody seemed to win.

Alvey and Christina are officially getting divorced, but when asked about getting married by the whiskey guzzling Alvey, Lisa(Kiele Sanchez) decides to pause and not answer, which in pregnant lady telepathy is “Fuck No.” This doesn’t mean it won’t happen but isn’t high on the list of things to do for the matriarch of Navy Street. The clearly glowingly pregnant and beautiful Sanchez doesn’t overplay this scene at all. She just looks tired and careful.

Think about it. She is promoting her boyfriend’s son who he doesn’t trust and in a fight possibly in a fight against the boyfriend’s main fighter, who also happens to be her ex-serious squeeze. She also has Christina poking around her sons lives and coming to the fight and acting all nice for a change instead of snapping at her with history. Then there is the Nate knockout. Episode 203 was a big drama show, as Gennady Golovkin would call it.

Poor Alvey, I keep thinking back to the first scene of Season 2. Grillo gleaming as he fired those weapons and thought things were settling down. He was a king on a chair with a cracked leg, and he couldn’t even see it. A proud man with his back to the storm. He found out his top fighter used cocaine and can’t make money for six fights, which he may not have. He is unsure his youngest son is ready, and then watches him get knocked out cold. His other son wants to fight Wheeler, and that creates issues. He is severing ties with his wife so he can marry Lisa and gets rebuffed. Thank goodness for whiskey.

Keith is out and looks dangerous. He walks from jail to his house, where Ryan is staying but not before he stops for food and has to slap some fools for making fun of his weight. Ryan does his best to make him feel at home but this guy couldn’t feel at home in a factory full of avocados with a barrel of stuffed animals right now. After all, he is sitting in the place where he murdered his parents. Drama!

Ryan also goes to see his dad, where he finds out that the old man was busting his balls on purpose the last time he visited, which was in Season 1. There is so much history between these two guys that the audience has not seen, which allows Matt Lauria and M.C. Gainey to act the shit out of this scene. Couple pros.

Tidbits-

*While Laura and Jay swoon over one another, the Kulina rebel is going to screw this up, right?

*There isn’t a more convincing and more heartbreaking father-son performance than Grillo and Jonas. When Frank looks at him like a hawk with a wounded wing, it’s so heartbreaking that you have to replay it a few times. Acting is all in the eyes and Grillo is a master at it.

*No one says FUCK like Grillo either. Sorry, DeNiro.

*We get one Mac Brandt sighting and it’s right before the Kulina family rushes into the ring to attend to Nate.

*Laura is sexy, smart and ferocious so there are worse ladies to have your heart smashed over, Jay. Jessica Szohr fits into this reckless world of misfits.

What happens next week? Where does Nate stand after his loss? Will Alvey let Ryan fight Jay? Will Lisa marry Alvey? How before Chapas gets involved and really sets the world on fire? Also, I want some flashbacks to Alvey’s career and maybe his record. All these posters and mentions. I want more. Give me some Alvey history.

Thanks for reading. For more traditional recaps, seek out big boy sites like Entertainment Weekly or Hitflix. I just talk a lot. This isn’t your father’s recap…or your brother’s,if you know what I mean.

Check back in next week for more Kingdom talk. Mouthpieces are optional.