The Fosters Recap: The Winter Ball of Our Discontent

It’s truth or dare on The Fosters this week, and no one’s safe from the madness. It’s the (seasonally a little late) Winter Ball this week, and if you’ve ever seen an episode of The Vampire Diaries (literally, almost any episode) you know how quickly a themed dance can go downhill.

To start the week off, Callie walks in on Brandon in a practice room, where he’s working on a piece for an audition that Dani got him for the San Diego Junior Symphony. It’s a nice gesture, but I’m pretty sure it’s still part of Dani’s Mystery Evil plan. Brandon then plays Callie the song he’s writing about the family using them all as separate musical melodies mashed into one lovely tune. Callie’s is the most beautiful melody of all, but of course. Callie brings up that she and Jude will be getting adopted on Monday. Better watch it, Brandon.

To make the love a little more triangular, Wyatt (remember him!) calls Callie and tells her she looks good. Callie whips around and finds Wyatt brooding pleasantly before her. Brandon watches all of this with maximum sinister scowling from his practice room window. 

Callie and Wyatt catch up, and she finds out out that Wyatt called Lena and Stef to come get her after she ran away. She’s a little miffed, but she’s grown and she gets why he did it. It’s Wyatt who gets the line of the night with, “I think you have more hair than me now.” I’m officially back on this team. Beautiful, wavy-haired teenage love forever!

Emma attempts to tutor Jesus in Algebra, but he’s all over the place. He tells her he’ll concentrate if she’ll go to the Winter Ball, but she says she already has a date. In worse news, Zac’s mom comes to school to volunteer to be a chaperone at the winter ball. She’s chipper as can be and seemingly doesn’t remember calling Mariana a whore in the last episode. Mariana can see this is more than just 'mood swings,' and suggests his mom get help, but Zac  shrugs it off as her 'eccentric' personality.

Mike catches up with Stef and informs her Brandon’s doing better, practicing for his audition, and Dani’s often home with him to make him dinner. However, Ana also catches up with Stef to tell her that her son gave her $900 to lie about what happened the night of her boyfriend’s murder. Bonus: if Stef doesn’t give her $10,000, she’ll tell the DA everything. Stef tells her she’ll arrest Ana for threatening to extort a police officer.

That night, Stef suggests to the angry bouncy ball that is Jesus that he go back on his meds. She tells him they’ll give him a little more time to deal with this, but she wants to see a change in grades and attitude. She then asks him if he saw Ana, and he insists he didn’t.

More importantly than anything, we learn that the school is announcing nominations for Winter Queen and King tomorrow. Naturally everyone is in a tizzy. Callie will be going alone since Wyatt’s not technically back at school yet, and Zac hasn’t asked Mariana yet. That night, Callie texts Wyatt saying he’s been approved to return to school, they just need contact info for the people he’s staying with. Wyatt doesn’t respond as he lies down to sleep in his car. Poor dear. Even worse, that morning after showering at a public beach, he finds his car’s been towed. At least he’s got great hair!

It’s (slightly less) trouble in paradise for Stef and Lena as well, as Stef complains that they barely cuddle anymore due to their new mattress where they can adjust levels separately. Stef whines, “Someday we’ll be intimate again!” as Lena reads baby books, and the night ends coldly. Stef really needs to step up her game on the baby enthusiasm. Kudos also for getting such a dramatic storyline out of a new mattress.

At Mike’s apartment, Brandon vents to Dani about Callie and Wyatt. Dani the Devil encourages Brandon to tell Callie they should get back together, and suggests they have the apartment alone for a couple hours. Brandon’s 110% into this idea, and Dani’s plan to ruin everything takes another triumphant step forward.

In the cutest moment of the episode, when Mariana goes to ask Zac to the dance, she discovers he’s planned an adorable little “Mystery Date” style surprise to ask her himself. She accepts! The Fosters' second-most adorable couple behind Stef and Lena is still going strong.

Brandon runs into Callie again and informs her that so far the only thing Vico the ID-making bully has done to avenge Brandon’s betrayal is keyed his car and bumped into him. Remember, Vico was planning to use Callie’s picture to make a fake ID when we last saw him, so Brandon’s little update that all’s good clearly means something terrible is about to go down. Brandon then invites Callie to his dad’s ala Dani’s proposal. But there are bigger fish to fry, Brandon! The Winter Queen and King are about to be announced! And of course, the nominees include Talia, Brandon’s strawberry blonde and occasionally horrible ex and (shock of 2014) Callie Jacob herself. Callie thinks it’s a joke, but Wyatt says she’s got to own the nomination. Callie next finds out that Wyatt has nowhere to stay since his friend’s parents wouldn’t take him like he thought. Really puts this whole “Winter Queen” debacle in perspective.

At home, Brandon croons a love song called, “Callie’s Song” on his piano, and it’s this very weird, illegal-activities themed ballad that we’re probably supposed to think is really sweet. But Brandon’s not quite Callie’s priority, and she misses their sexy rendezvous to go talk Daphne into letting Wyatt stay with her.

Family dinner time! Callie admits she wants to remove her name from the ballot and not go to the dance, but Stef and Lena tell her that she didn’t get a positive progress report and that attending a school function is kind of a must at this point to get into the principals good graces. Mariana complains about how she didn’t get nominated, and insists she would suffer the torment if it meant her name was on the ballot. Lena decides to share some fun torment stories of her own and tells the family about some of her school nicknames growing up. Apparently, kids would call her ‘Oreo’ because she was biracial, then when they found out she was a lesbian switched over to Klon‘dyke’ bar. So Lena brought a hundred Klondike bars and no one made fun of her again. The lesson there was either embrace the torment, or bring your enemies ice cream. You decide.

It’s the moment we’ve all been waiting for! The kids all arrive at the best, most expensively chic winter formal ever. Jesus watches Emma and her tall, blonde date get cozy on the dance floor. Callie scored Wyatt a bar-tending job, and he’s going to use the money to get his car back, so at least something positive is going to come out of this impendingly disastrous occasion. We learn that Callie kept her name on the ballot (a Carrie reference has already been made, don’t worry), and to make matters even more uncomfortable. Lena tells Brandon to dance with Callie close to Principal Sanchez so she can see Callie out and being social. Not a great idea, Lena (or even the very worst idea, according to my own mother who spent the next five minutes unendingly yelling about it).

    

Jesus finally approaches Emma and tells her she could do better than the guy she’s with. She responds, “God knows I’ve done worse.” I feel this ship might be sinking. Too bad we can’t jump on the SS Brallie, cause that’s pretty much hit rock bottom as well. Brandon follows Lena’s advice and asks Callie to dance, but she leaves her purse on the counter. There’s an extra long shot of it alone there, so you know something’s about to go to hell. Talia, Vico, and several other judging eyes study Callie as she bravely heads to the dance floor. Is it possible Callie’s been secretly telekinetic this entire time and The Fosters has just been one long Carrie backstory reinterpretation?! (No.)

 

Because it’s a high school dance, there’s a secret drunken party in a bathroom. Even worse, the several skeezy boys partaking add a special toast to Callie. Has this girl not been through enough? Back on the dance floor, Brandon and Callie compete for  world’s least enthusiastic dancers before Callie pulls him away for a serious talk. Brandon gets mad at her for helping Wyatt find a home instead of going to meet him at his dad’s love nest. He admits he’s still in love with her, and explains she can still get adopted, he’ll stay at her dad, and they can be together officially when they’re 18. Callie tries to reinforce the fact she’s going to be his sister, but then Brandon really breaks it down with a lot of talk about actual bloodlines and not being his real sister. Callie gets real herself and tells him, “If you’re not really my brother, then Stef and Lena won’t really be my mothers.” Brandon tries to insist it’s not the same, but Callie is wise and all-knowing and tells him he needs to let her go. Brandon asks her to say something to help him get over her. Callie lies and says she had sex with Wyatt when she ran away and they stayed at a hotel together. Just the motivation Brandon was looking for.

 

Somehow, even those problems get insignificant when Zac’s mom takes over from Mariana and starts dancing with her son. But it doesn’t seem like it’s Zac she thinks she’s dancing with, and suddenly she’s clearly reliving some sort of past moment with her husband after he cheated on her.

What better time to announce Winter Queen and King! Callie tries to escape, but the principal is standing there, so she goes onstage. Vico is crowned King, Callie is crowned Queen, and something’s definitely going to go wrong at any moment. Callie gives a generic little speech, and even though there’s no pig’s blood yet but all’s not well as Talia whispers something to the principal. 

The principal then goes to the bathroom, where she finds a bunch of random girls boozing it up. The random girls tell the principal that Callie bought the alcohol with a fake ID so that they'd vote for her in the Winter Ball election. Just then, Lena walks in. Who will you believe, Lena? These random girls we’ve never seen before or a series regular?!

 

The principal ignorantly believes the girls, and poor Callie’s so confident in her good behavior she tells them they can search her purse. Remember that endless shot of it alone on the table? The principal immediately finds the fake ID, along with Callie’s phone that was used to text the girls about the alcohol, and says she’s going to have to call the police. 

Is it at all possible for Callie’s suffering to end? Survey says no, but after confronting a remorseless Vico, Brandon certainly tries by taking all the blame himself with the excuse that he wanted to get back at Callie for not feeling the same way. Brandon finally did something not awful, but it once again involved lying so no brownie points yet. The police officer called in asks Stef what he should do and she says, “Arrest him.” Rough day. I warned you themed dances are never the way to go.

 

To close the night, Jesus assaults Emma’s date for drinking and tries to take his car keys. Emma insists she’s the designated driver and they storm off. In worse news, Zac and Mariana, who skipped out on the dance to find his mom, finally locate her, only to discover she doesn’t have a clue who Zac is. It’s definitely time to replace ‘kooky’ with ‘in need of medical attention.’

Tragically, all the underaged drinking puts an end to the Winter Ball, but not to romance, because as Brandon’s being shoved in a cop car Callie runs outside to tell him she didn’t actually sleep with Wyatt. 

Back at the station, Stef and Mike get in the police car with Brandon and demand he finally tell the truth. Surprisingly, the poor kid actually does. The whole damn thing. Looks like Brandon ain’t the golden boy no more. Treasure every moment, Fosters fans, for next week is the last episode of season one. It’s certainly been a rocky ride for everyone, but a show that can make Mondays the best day of the week is a treasure indeed.