Our Flag Means Death recaps: The gang slowly learns to trust each other again

“It’s not your fault you’re broken.”

That’s Blackbeard talking to a busted door latch he’s doing his best to repair—the first thing he’s successfully fixed since he came back from the brink. But he could just as easily be addressing any given human aboard the Revenge. They’re a crew of lost souls who’ve had the good (and sometimes, really, really bad) fortune of finding each other out there on the rolling blue, and they’ve smashed at least as much as they’ve mended.

Following the crew’s harrowing separation and reunion in the first third of season two, episodes four and five chart the aftermath, as the gang slowly learns to trust each other again. For Lucius and Izzy, that means finding healthy(ish) ways to process their trauma; and for Stede and Blackbeard, it means a tentative rekindling of their interrupted romance—with a little help from a couple who are experts at keeping the old flame burning.

But first: Stede’s teary bedside reunion with his presumed-dead love goes from sentimental to fuck-you when Ed headbutts him right in the nose. (“It’s supposed to hurt! That’s the point of headbutts!” he says later.) Newly reinstated as captain, Stede tries to convince his shipmates to give Blackbeard another chance. But he never saw how horribly his main squeeze treated those who remained aboard—and they understandably want Ed to get the hell off the ship.

Banished to a desert island, a still-delirious Blackbeard meanders through the jungle, getting into a heavy conversation with an uncomprehending bunny rabbit. That’s when he bumps into Mary Read (frequent Taika Waititi collaborator Rachel Head), who, IRL, was one of only a handful of women who made a name for themselves during the Golden Age of Piracy.

GRADE FOR SEASON 2, EPISODE 5, “THE CURSE OF THE SEAFARING LIFE”: B+

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She brings her old pal Blackbeard back to her, yes, lesbian desert island antique shop (god bless this show), where her partner is waiting: Anne Bonny, the other infamous lady pirate of her day, played by none other than Minnie Driver. When Stede shows up at the shop—because of course he does—Mary and Anne immediately clock the fraught chemistry between him and Ed and decide to invite them over for dinner (and fuckery).

The only one who knows about Ed’s purgatorial trip to “the gravy basket” is Buttons, who’s visited a few times himself. He’s the fifth wheel at the dinner party, but he’s got his own shit going on: namely, finding an antique bowl suitable for the “avian transmogrification” spell that Auntie gifted him last week.

Back on the Revenge, Wee John clocks the weirdness of the energy as he knits an adorable sweater. He and the others who stayed with Stede (Buttons, Pete, Oluwande, and Roach) are doing okay. But the ones who were forced to spiral into ultraviolence with Blackbeard (Jim, Frenchie, Fang, Archie, and Izzy) are extremely messed up; and that’s not to mention Lucius, who’s turned his own trauma into a sort of cabaret performance, complete with a cigarette he always carries but never lights and a sharp wit honed to a deadly point.

Because this is Our Flag Means Death, Roach suggests creating a “safe space” for Team Blackbeard to process their shit. But considering that the freshly one-legged Izzy is drunk off his face and screaming at the headless unicorn figurehead on the prow, and that Frenchie, Jim, Archie, and Fang are going all Lady Macbeth on the section of the deck where they beat the stuffing out of Ed, they’ve got their work cut out for them.

Over cordials, Anne and Mary tell their guests the story of their meet-cute, which involved slicing off a prison guard’s face and wearing it as a disguise. Adorbs! Ed and Stede sit on opposite ends of the couch, tiptoeing around each other like bitter divorcés rather than two guys who kissed one time and then tore themselves apart about it.

Like Spanish Jackie, Zheng Yi Sao, and Mary Bonnet before them, Anne and Mary aren’t nearly as sentimental or impractical as the men of Our Flag. The guys are treated to the 18th-century version of Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? as their hosts engage in nonlethal stabbing and poisoning, casual adultery, and serious pot-stirring to keep the spark in their relationship. (No kink-shaming here!) Then Anne, a true messy bench who loves drama, reveals to Blackbeard that Stede went back to his wife and family after ditching him at the end of last season.

Anne and Mary’s meddling turns out to be exactly what the guys need to finally talk through their shit. Ed says he feels like a fool for trusting that things would work out between them, and Stede acknowledges that they’re both “whim-prone” (much like the TV show they’re the protagonists of). Their conversation culminates in a heartfelt declaration of love from Stede; a hopeful, childlike smile from Ed; and ten thousand squees from shippers ’round the world.

Out at sea, Roach & Co.’s attempt to make nice with the empty-eyed half of the crew culminates in a Mexican standoff. (Who would’ve guessed how re-traumatizing a cake and piñata party could be?) It takes a screaming, slurring Izzy stumbling belowdecks, carrying the severed forelegs of the ship’s unicorn figurehead, to unite the rest of them under a common goal: fix their broken first mate. They ultimately gift him a prosthetic made from one of the legs, now with gold embellishments, along with a note that reads: For the new unicorn. “Fucking cocksuckers,” Izzy mutters through tears of gratitude. This crew is just a bunch of murderous Care Bears.

Back on the island, Mary and Anne have an epiphany about their own relationship: They’re both bored as hell and want to go back to piracy. Mary warns Stede and Ed that, even if they do get their shit together, their desire for each other will wane until “fun and games are all that’s left.” Little does she know that Anne has cashed in all her chips by setting their house—and all the priceless antiques inside it—aflame. “We’re free!” she declares, raising her hands in the air as fire burns around her.

When Stede offers to let Blackbeard stay on the ship for one more night, the two trade shy smiles like the 14-year-old boys Mary said they were. But it’s Buttons who gets the true catharsis, because he finally has everything he needs for his spell. Ed watches in bemusement as he chants and waves a sage stick around, not realizing that this man, who knows exactly what he wants, is probably the wisest person he’s ever met.

“To love the sea as she must be loved requires change,” Buttons says. Blackbeard insists he doesn’t believe in change, but he eats his words when the man seemingly vanishes, replaced by a seagull who takes off into the sky. And that’s all it takes for the light to return to Ed’s eyes—because if his old crewmate can transform himself into a bird, maybe he and Stede can transform themselves into grown-ass men.

Episode five, “The Curse Of The Seafaring Life,” is a true ensemble piece that allows the inhabitants of the Revenge to explore what their new normal looks like. That includes Blackbeard, whose banishment has been rescinded. The caveat? He has to wear a sackcloth onesie and a cat collar with a little bell on it (so he can’t sneak up on people) until they decide he’s done his penance. Surprisingly, the crew is on board with Stede’s rehabilitation plan—even Izzy, who has become positively serene in his new role as unicorn. The only naysayer is Lucius, who continues to hold himself apart from his shipmates.

As Stede tidies the estate room, Blackbeard points out that if he wants to be respected as the (old) new captain, he better start throwing his weight around. But when he practices saying, “I’m your captain!” he’s about as intimidating as a three-week-old kitten.

At a loss for how to strike fear in the hearts of his crew, he turns to the scariest guy on the ship: Izzy, who’s practicing his swordplay while shirtless, sweaty, and surrounded by candles. (The queer gaze in Our Flag is strong.) When Stede uses flattery to convince Izzy to teach him to be a better fighter, it’s the beginning of an episode-long demonstration of a leadership approach that’s very different from Ed’s—but twice as effective.

Not that Ed’s in any place to be giving advice. He’s in full beginner’s-mind mode, letting Lucius push him over the side of the ship for once, then joining Fang on a fishing trip to learn about the fine art of shutting his trap for a hot second. (“Do you talk so much because you don’t want to know how to sit with yourself?” Fang suggests.)

During a training montage with Izzy, Stede proves to be useless at everything from sword-fighting to musketry to pugilism. (Rhys Darby’s pratfalls, on the other hand, are masterful.) He hopes to test out his total lack of skills by attacking a nearby Spanish ship; but the raiding party arrives to a gory scene that makes even Blackbeard’s wedding massacre look tame, complete with severed heads and a pentagram painted in blood.

Stede and Jim find the captain on the verge of death in his stateroom. With his last breath, he warns them that everything on the ship is cursed and that they definitely, under no circumstances, should touch anything. So Stede immediately touches a thing: a gaudy red velvet suit complete with a billowy jacket, which he starts peacocking around in the moment he’s back on the Revenge.

Determined to fend off the curse, Jim, Oluwande, and Archie don garlic necklaces; meanwhile, Frenchie has developed a mysterious illness that is definitely caused by the suit and not by an undiagnosed peanut allergy. Clotheshorse that he is, Stede is loath to part with his prize; but Izzy tells him that, even if he doesn’t believe in curses, his crew does—and that tends to become a self-fulfilling prophecy.

And once again, the Gentleman Pirate proves that the carrot can be more effective than the stick. He leads them in a raid on another ship so they can foist his beloved outfit off on some other suckers. “No backsies!” Stede cries gleefully as he hangs the suit on the uniformed soldiers tied to the mast, then flees.

Back on the Revenge, Lucius discovers that pushing Ed into the drink didn’t make him feel better, after all. Black Pete calls him out on his wallowing when he catches his boo obsessively doodling Blackbeard’s face in his notebook. “You talk all the time about how you almost died,” he says, “but I never hear anything about the fact that you lived.”

After conferring with Izzy, the ship’s resident PTSD specialist, Lucius decides to try out this whole moving on thing. He decides to celebrate his aliveness with a marriage proposal—which Pete gleefully accepts. And, man, I really hope we get a shipboard wedding later this season. Stede would be such a good officiant!

Lucius’ epiphany is a version of Ed’s at the end of “Fun And Games”: The rough shit that happened to you is always going to have happened; whether it dictates what comes next is up to you.

Blackbeard rounds out the day by catching up with Stede on the deck. Sailing on calm seas by the light of the gibbous moon, the two kiss softly—the polar opposite of Mary and Anne’s harsh, bruising love. Blackbeard wants to take it slow since they both tend to rush into things, and Stede agrees. Maybe this is what the start of an “adult relationship” looks like; but considering the smiles the pair exchange after a bout of tender thumb wrestling, maturity is kind of overrated.

Stray observations

• Historical Trivia Corner: According to some reports, Mary Read and Anne Bonny were likely lovers in real life. The two both had eventful early lives—Bonny’s plantation-owner father kicked her out after she married a small-time pirate, while Read served in the British military disguised as a man—and met while serving under Calico Jack (whom Will Arnett played in the first season of Our Flag). Bonny was also briefly married to him. The three were captured and slated for execution, but Read and Bonny “pleaded the belly,” earning reprieves because they were both pregnant. Though Read died in childbirth a year later, Bonny’s fate is unknown.
• Needle drops: “Seabird” by the Alessi Brothers, which is fitting considering Buttons’ fate; Franz Schubert’s “Ständchen,” which underscores Lucius and Izzy’s dramatics; and late-’70s soft-rock swooner “Baby” by Donnie And Joe Emerson, which plays as Stede and Ed hold hands in the moonlight.
• “Dinner’s gonna be a minute. Somebody forgot to take the intestines out of the rabbit.”
  “Nobody minds a bit of shit on their rabbit!”
• Driver and Head’s chemistry as Anne and Mary is off the chain. I would absolutely watch a spinoff about these two.
• I’m thrilled for Buttons that he’s finally free to soar high above his wife (the sea), but I equally hope this isn’t the last we’ll see of Ewen Bremner’s singularly oddball performance.
• The reunited crew hoists a fresh flag, depicting a white cat with razor-sharp teeth, red eyes, and claws dripping with blood. Seems like Frenchie finally got his wish!
• Darby has the time of his life in episode five, whether he’s preening and posing in Stede’s fancy coat or spectacularly failing to swing across the deck on a rope. (Also, “Izzy, did you see that? I did a punch!” is destined to become a GIF for the ages.)
• Izzy was forced to be the sole human among Muppets in season one; so it’s nice to see a mellower, wryer version of him coming to the fore. And that tiny shark he whittles for Lucius? So cute.
• The biggest revelation of these episodes: Fang’s real name is Kevin!
• “This here is a ship, and it’s a spaceship.”
  “…Safe space.”
  “It’s a safe…space…ship.”