The Atlantic ran an article last week about the life and work of Carl Hiaasen, the best-selling crime novelist whose books are filled with quintessential Florida Men and Florida Women: crooks, con artists, daredevils, and wastrels, all chasing an easy payday and an early happy hour. The article’s author Amy Weiss-Meyer argues that the whole of the USA right now is under siege by these same kinds of headline-grabbing weirdos, who have turned this country into a cartoon version of itself.
The Poker Face creative team apparently agrees. This week’s episode, “The Taste Of Human Blood”—written by Wyatt Cain and directed by the skilled horror filmmaker Lucky McKee—is about as Florida-coded as a TV show can possibly be. There are celebrity alligators, angry environmentalists, bad cops, and gaudy awards ceremonies, all set amid brain-frying heat and humidity. This episode should come with a fruity cocktail and a side of conch fritters.
Technically, this is the third straight Poker Face set in Florida, though it’s the first where the setting feels like Florida. In this season’s second episode, Charlie was just starting to relax into beach life before Beatrix kidnapped her, kicking off another Florida-set case in episode three, which ended with Charlie free to roam wherever she likes. At the start of this week’s installment, Charlie jabs her finger into a map to pick that next destination. But when she points to Bowling Green, Kentucky, she gives one of her patented Charlie “ehhhh”s. (Natasha Lyonne is really good at punctuating sentences with a noncommittal “ehhh.”)
Searching her feelings—with the help of the CB radio still in her Barracuda from episode two’s movie shoot—Charlie finds guidance in the form of a nameless voice on the other end of the radio. (We can name the voice behind the voice: It’s Steve Buscemi!) This voice understands Charlie’s Out Of The Blue references, and so she can trust his advice. When she tells him that she’s “at a place that feels like an ending, but it’s still a middle,” he replies, “You need a beginning.”
Speaking of beginnings, I should mention that the Charlie scenes above are actually in the “circle back” part of the story, about 20 minutes into the episode. “The Taste Of Human Blood” begins in 2019, with conscientious small-town police officer Fran Lamont (Gaby Hoffman) getting nominated for “Cop Of The Year” at The FlopaCopas: the Florida Panhandle Cop Awards. Her top competition is Joseph Pilson (Kumail Nanjiani), known as “Gator Joe” for saving a baby alligator named Daisy. (“Although really, she saved me.”)
Gator Joe won the award six years ago and has continued to win every year, always beating Fran, no matter how many lives she saves or hours she spends helping her community. Meanwhile, Gator Joe has become more of a caricature, posting viral TikToks of himself and his alligator pal busting criminals and swilling their branded “2 Hour Power Juice” energy drink. Gator Joe is so popular that he has two catch phrases: “Gator Done!” and “You Have The Right To Shit Your Pants!”
According to Fran’s boss, Chief Hal (John Sayles), she is the ideal of what a police officer should be: compassionate, fair, professional, and diligent. (“The opposite of Florida Man memes,” Chief Hal says.) So when she shows up for the 2025 FlopaCopas—with a stylish new hairdo, no less—and discovers Gator Joe is about to win again, she snaps. Fran takes some petty revenge by slipping a reptile laxative into Joe’s Power Juice, timing it so he’ll crap himself while receiving his award.
But Fran reads the dosage wrong. Joe dies. Her only shot at covering up the crime is to coax Joe’s lazy, Oreo-eating alligator into eating her owner. And the only way to goose Daisy into a kill frenzy is to feed the beast crystal meth.
Now we get the circle back, learning that Charlie ditched the Bowling Green plan and stayed in Florida, where she volunteers at a gator sanctuary and befriends a band of animal liberationists, led by the charismatic Hutch (Shiloh Fernandez). These guerrillas are at the FlopaCopas the night of Joe’s poisoning, posing as cater-waiters, intending to make a big public splash by freeing Daisy. Charlie isn’t happy to find out they’re pulling this job at “a cop convention, man.” (She had no idea what “FlopaCopas” was short for, because why should she?) After the gator eats Gator Joe, Charlie is even less enthused by how every law enforcement officer in this cruddy hotel ballroom wants to kill Daisy: a soulful animal with whom Charlie has spiritually bonded.
“The Taste Of Human Blood” is a more overtly comic Poker Face than usual, with more slapstick and less twisty mystery plotting. There is one literal twist: a twist-tie that Charlie uses to keep Daisy’s cage closed, which she later sees has been removed by human hands…Fran’s. There’s also some third-act panic on Fran’s part when she learns that Gator Joe recorded every moment of his life via a hidden camera in his sunglasses, which are currently working their way through Daisy’s innards.
But mostly this episode is an excuse for jokes about Floridians and alligators. (When Charlie asks an animal-control officer if he’s ever heard of something as crazy as “a meth gator,” he replies, “Like, every week.”) The best running gag in the episode is cued to its title. Everyone Charlie meets, even the animal lovers, insist that Daisy is beyond hope, because she now knows the taste of…well, you get it.
So while the vibes are great as always, the episode is somewhat lacking in substance. The primary thematic hook is how Fran’s righteousness is ruined by her desire for recognition. “I used to be a good cop,” she tells Charlie, after Charlie very easily sniffs out her bullshit. Fran threw her ideals away for “some asshole with two goddamn catch phrases.” In a final bit of irony, Fran quits her job to start working at Hutch’s gator sanctuary, where she finds herself in contention for “volunteer of the month.” The cycle continues.
In some ways, this episode seems designed as a kind of reflective pause, as Poker Face readjusts its premise from “fugitive Charlie” to “free-spirit Charlie.” As she heads into the next phase of her life, maybe she’ll see Fran’s story as a cautionary tale. Charlie has been used to not wanting recognition. Maybe she sees now that staying incognito is still the best way to live, even if she doesn’t have to. It’s all too easy for just a little bit of hunger for fame to turn into a ravenous craving.
Stray observations
- • I personally have no problem with Florida. I’ve always had a good time whenever I’ve visited there. Also, I live in Arkansas. I’m in no position to judge anyone else’s state.
- • Can I just say how cool it is that Lyonne and Rian Johnson (and their casting director) got John frickin’ Sayles to be on this show? An indie-film legend as a writer and director (and occasional actor), Sayles I think has been unduly forgotten by modern cinephiles. His Florida movie Sunshine State is pretty good, but when it comes to his overall filmography, you can’t go wrong with any of the outstanding movies he made in the ’90s: City Of Hope, Passion Fish, The Secret Of Roan Inish, Lone Star, Men With Guns, and Limbo.
- • Gator Joe kept his pet calm with the help of lorazepam. Did the lorazepam marketing team make a hard pitch to all the prestige cable and streaming shows this year?
- • Fun puns and pop-culture references abound at the FlopaCopas, including the name of the house band, Yolo Tomassi & The Rude Boys In Blue (like Rollo Tomasi in L.A. Confidential, but YOLO) and the way the waiters pass around appetizers while asking, “Can I feed you your Miranda bites?”
- • I also loved the throwaway gags surrounding the awards themselves, including the way the crowd boos at the award for “Best Internal Affairs Investigation” and how when the “Best Undercover Op” award goes to the seemingly absent “Diego Verbinski the Third,” on the edge of the screen we see a man in a janitor outfit quietly cheering.
- • The FlopaCopas are hosted by Matt Passmore (played by Matt Passmore), the star of A&E’s beloved Florida panhandle cop dramedy The Glades.
- • Gator Joe: “I’m the Michael Jordan of being a cop in Florida!”
