‘Murdaugh: Death In The Family’ Episode 3 Recap: All I Do Is Win

As we pick up in Murdaugh: Death In The Family Episode 3, Paul has been indicted by a grand jury in Mallory’s death, and no one is doing a good job preparing him for what he’s going to face. Paul doesn’t meet his lawyer Dick (Jim O’Heir) until his bail hearing on May 6, 2019; he has to be told to “stand the fuck up” when the judge walks in; and Paul’s mind is so distant that the lawyers’ voices as they argue about his immediate fate seem to be coming from very far away. When the judge sets bail at $50,000 and the jocular Dick says, “See? What did I tell you. Easy,” Paul can only faintly ask, “Is it over?”

It’s not, and everyone else is finding ways to act like it’s not happening at all. Maggie doesn’t see any issue about joining the meal train for Mallory’s family; Alex cautions her that bringing over sympathy casseroles is going to make it look like she’s apologizing for something, which she can’t appear to be doing. Alex himself is so determined in his denial that he decides the family should go for a restorative long weekend to a resort in the Bahamas — apparently forgetting, until Paul reminds him, that Buster might not want to go since he nearly lost an arm to a shark on a previous family trip there. Dick is going to get Paul’s case delayed, Alex declares, so it’s just fine for them to leave town! Maggie seems worried, but Alex’s pitch — including tropical drinks and a festive rendition of “Kokomo” — quickly wins her over.

This timing is, of course, worst for Paul, since the only person in the house who seems to want to look after him is Gloria — or Go-Go, as everyone calls her. Gloria gently tells Paul that one of the best things about the Lord is that you can always ask Him for forgiveness and He will grant it. She knows Paul isn’t one for church, but she goes every Sunday with her boys, and Paul would always be welcome to join them. As she watches his silent shame, she adds that she knows Mallory is in heaven, so he shouldn’t worry. 

When the family jets off for their trip, we get a look at Gloria’s life outside her care of the Murdaughs. She brings two bags of their hand-me-downs home to her trailer for her sons, Brian and Tony (Winter Andrews and J.D. Starnes). She takes off a back brace before heavily sitting on her couch. Her blessing over dinner includes a special mention of the Murdaughs: she hopes the Lord helps them get away from their troubles and that the angels watch over Paul. Tony, an ER tech whose patients Gloria also prays for, takes Gloria’s blood pressure after dinner and urges her to see a cardiologist. When Gloria waves him off, saying it’s too expensive, he reminds her that Maggie had said she’d pay for it. Gloria generously says the Murdaughs have a lot going on, adding, “You know how they can be.” 

We certainly know, and they’re no less ostentatious outside the U.S. than when they’re at home. Alex tips a poolside server $100 for a huge, obnoxious scorpion bowl. Alex makes Buster’s girlfriend Brooklynn (Mina Sundial) join them in trying to suck down without a pause for breath. 

Alex gets annoyed when Paul sees a speeding boat in a video promo for the fishing charter they’re about to take and refuses to join. Buster insists on following Paul to the bar to try to stop him getting into trouble, but has already peeled off by the time Paul, after drinking all day, orders one of the Aussies he’s been hanging out with to punch him in the face; when his new friend refuses, Paul spits at him to force the retaliation and punishment he craves. 

Maggie, meanwhile, has a reiki session at the resort spa. It seems like she’s expecting something like a massage, so she’s alarmed when the practitioner says she doesn’t feel Maggie grounded or present in her body, and finds intense anger in her core. She starts clearing it, telling Maggie, “Oh, I feel like I’m opening up a cage, like you’ve been in one of those, um, those— those travel cages like— like an animal would be in, but the door was never locked. You were always free.”

Opening the cage, if indeed that is what’s happened, forces Maggie to be present in her body and notice Alex’s — specifically his chin, covered in melted butter from the seafood dinner he is sloppily eating. 

After dinner, once Alex has departed to hit on a much younger woman in the resort’s nightclub, Maggie has a drink by herself. Another guest named Sarah (Rya Kihlstedt) joins her at the bar, small-talking that this resort isn’t her idea of a great vacation, but her friends picked it for their girls’ trip. Maggie, already a little bleary, tries out a new identity: her name is Margaret, and she’s a divorced, childless landscape architect. Her sister surprised her with this weekend after Margaret finished a big job in Atlanta, but Margaret would rather be at her beach house with her dog, the only place she can just…be. “Life is not perfect,” says Margaret, “but it is good. And that makes me happy.” Imagining how few decisions Maggie could have made differently to live her fantasy life is yet another tragedy in a story full of them.

Maggie is still in bed when a horny Alex gets back from the club and (consensually) rocks her world with approximately 27 seconds of what can technically pass for sex. “We still got it, baby!” Alex celebrates. “Yeah, that was great,” Maggie mumbles flatly.

By the pool, a post-punch Paul calls the most attentive parental figure in his life: Gloria. Crying, he asks her what it’s like in Hell. Does she think it really hurts? Gloria assures Paul that God forgives him. Paul doesn’t think so. Gloria promises that if Paul accepts God’s love in his heart, God will take care of him. Paul doesn’t think he has a heart. “You love me, baby, I know you do,” says Gloria. She tells him to let God in. Paul agrees.

As the whole family meets up for a last seafood dinner, Alex sees that the Alvarez settlement money he’s been checking for has landed in the Forge account. He calls his banker to take what he needs to pay Alex’s credit cards, then toasts to each member of the party. He ends on how much he loves Paul, which is when a detachment of servers shows up with a huge cocktail, a balloon hat in the shape of a lobster, and bottles of liquor they pour directly into Paul’s mouth. A server straddles Paul to give him a lap dance, and he dissociates: the server disappears, replaced by Mallory, standing a few feet away, smiling angelically. 

Paul snaps back to reality and pushes the server away, upsetting the family. Alex complains about how much the trip cost and how hard Alex worked for it; all Paul has to do is enjoy it, but he insists on being “a little pussy” lest anyone forget what a “fuckup” he really is. If that’s true, Paul shoots back, why did Alex give him the keys to the boat? Maggie tries to smooth things over, but Paul says she’s as bad as Alex is, concerned about nothing but keeping up appearances with her friends. Buster’s attempt to break in just leads Paul to tell Buster how awful it’s been for him, stuck alone in the house with their parents. There’s no “misunderstanding” for Maggie and Alex to solve, as Maggie puts it, Paul says: Paul is the reason Mallory is dead.

The next day, it’s back to denial: new gold sneakers for Maggie, just like the ones Sarah was wearing. A $68,000+ resort bill for Alex to settle with the funds on Mr. Alvarez’s debit card, while telling Mr. Alvarez on the phone that the insurance company still hasn’t paid it. A family photo with everyone (even Brooklynn), no matter how miserable or bruised anyone may appear in it.

Back home, Alex is having breakfast at his favorite diner when a fellow attorney named Mark (Tommy Dewey) tells him he’ll be representing the Beaches, Mallory’s parents, in their wrongful death suit against the Murdaughs; Mark didn’t want Alex to be blindsided by the process server outside. Alex pretends to take it in stride, but as soon as Mark is gone, Alex smashes his dishes against the booth Mark’s just vacated.

And back at the house, Gloria sets aside the snow globe Maggie brought her — containing a blonde woman in a swimsuit, enjoying the kind of beach vacation Gloria probably doesn’t dare dream of for herself — to gather her strength and unload all the suitcases the Murdaughs left in the SUV when they got home the night before. One by one, no doubt straining against the brace under her t-shirt, Gloria drags the suitcases up the walkway to the house until her foot hits a loose brick. 

At the sound of a clatter, Paul comes running from his room to see Gloria, flat on her back, blood pooling under her head. Paul screams for Maggie: “Go-Go fell!!!”

Television Without Pity, Fametracker, and Previously.TV co-founder Tara Ariano has had bylines in The New York Times Magazine, Vanity Fair, Vulture, Slate, Salon, Mel Magazine, Collider, and The Awl, among others. She co-hosts the podcasts Extra Hot Great, Again With This (a compulsively detailed episode-by-episode breakdown of Beverly Hills, 90210 and Melrose Place), Listen To Sassy, and The Sweet Smell Of Succession. She’s also the co-author, with Sarah D. Bunting, of A Very Special 90210 Book: 93 Absolutely Essential Episodes From TV’s Most Notorious Zip Code (Abrams 2020). She lives in Austin.