The Affair Review: Can at Least One Love Story Be Redeemed?

This week’s episode of The Affair is better, and I think I know why! We didn’t have to watch Noah Solloway self-destruct!

Tonight, Alison goes to court to try to get visitation rights with Joanie. Ultimately, it’s Louisa who takes the stand and says they should have shared custody. The judge grants it, even though initially Cole seems upset at the idea.

While that’s working out, Alison is called by the home that helped her heal. They want her to help another mother who has lost a child and feels suicidal.

Alison helps her and feels so good about it that the center offers her a job and she takes it.

Helen and Alison happen to meet at a bar after a difficult night and it’s clear that Noah was two different people to them. To Helen, he was insecure. To Alison, he was stable and driven. Same man. Two personas. Whether that’s the influence of age or a reflection of how the women affected him, it’s obvious that he’s not true to himself.

Cole is dealing with Louisa, who wants to have a child. He hesitates, and then changes his mind. He also has a heart-to-heart chat with Oscar in which Oscar figures out that Cole is back to sleeping with his ex-wife and tells him to stop it.

All of a sudden Oscar is the reasonable one?

What Alison and Cole agree on is that the detectives are back in town because they have footage of Cole out the night that Noah was stabbed. He won’t answer them and then gets into a fight, which lands him in jail.

When Alison gets there to talk to him, he tells her the truth. He loves her. He saw that she was better, so he went to the rehab center to find out what happened.

He gets home and tells Louisa the truth about where he was, but not the truth that he loves Alison.

He gets up and goes over to Alison’s house, where they talk about his conflicted feelings some more. She tells him that maybe he would be happy if they were together, instead of playing the miserable hero.

Cole chooses “miserable hero” for now, but maybe Cole will throw off this self-image for his one true love and daughter.

Keri is a professional chatterbox who loves watching TV & movies, reading about pop culture, and gawking at any craziness on the internet. You can follow Keri on Twitter.