Eastbound & Down Recap: Chapter 11

“Well, looks like we found what we were looking for… Cheeseburgers and paradise.”

Kenny Powers, finally reunited with Eduardo Sanchez, could not be any happier. Eduardo Sanchez (Don Johnson) proves to be one badass motherfucker, highly understandable considering Eduardo Sanchez is Kenny’s old man. He’s got the same All-American bravado, equally scathing tongue, and a slick ‘do that have come to characterize Kenny Powers. It wouldn’t be a stretch to apply the old saying, “The apple does not fall far from the tree” to this father-son tag team. Unfortunately, awesome-ness isn’t the only familiar gene running through the Powers men.

Bad seed

In typical Kenny Powers fashion, father and son do their best to one-up the other in a series of braggadocious claims to demonstrate their amazing ability to have cool shit. Kenny is beat when his father claims to have a boat and jet plane. Like trying to beat your father in arm-wrestling, no matter how old he gets he’s still gonna kick your punk ass around. Eduardo can’t seem to help himself when he hits Kenny with a low blow, introducing him to his new step-mom Soledad and step-brother Casper.

Kenny takes a breather throwing up insults at Stevie to calm himself down. After threatening Casper to not get in the way of his reconnecting with the elder Powers, Kenny makes his power move. A ride on some ATV’s through the non-resort areas of Mexico brings out the five year old in Kenny. He wants nothing more than to spend some QT (quality time) with his totally cool dad. He even asks for some fatherly advice, which Eduardo has no problem spewing:

“I believe you gotta do what you feel in the moment. You gotta trust in your feelings… You wanna have sex with a girl. Have sex with her. You wanna leave the condom off? Go for it – feels better that way.”

It does. It really does. So, not only does Kenny’s father endorse a no rubbers policy, but he’s telling Kenny he’s doing alright in running away from his problems. Kenny comes clean to his father, telling him a bit too much, which will no doubt come back to bite his flat white ass. You can see where this is going. Kenny Powers, the world’s most lovable scumbag, is headed down a dangerous path. If he stays, he becomes the same man his father is… If he goes, he could become a better person. Nothing worse than that.

Baddest apple

Of course, Kenny won’t realize this until it’s too late. Good thing he’s got Stevie around. Stevie, uneasy throughout the entire trip (probably due to the constant jabs at his manhood and sexuality), finally comes clean to Kenny but not before Kenny takes a piss all over his step-brother’s keyboard. Stevie confesses that his story about April marrying Cutler isn’t true and that he made it all up because he wanted to be back with Kenny – double teaming life. He is promptly punched in the nose.

Kenny digs himself deeper into his shithole by declaring that he’s “finally found his place and he intends to enjoy himself”. It isn’t long before the asshole gene in the Powers DNA rears its ugly mug. Eduardo gives Kenny up to the po-po in hopes of getting a bounty for directing the feds to the “banditos”. Kenny is cuffed and crushed that his father is no different than he is – “a lyng, cheating, back-stabbing gigilo”. After he’s bailed out, Kenny doesn’t take Soledad up on her offer to bone and rejects his father’s invitation to tag-team some she-devils in hell. Luckily for us, Kenny doesn’t fuck with the devil and doesn’t mix gangbangs with blood relatives. He’s done being an asshole who runs away. Instead he’s gonna be an asshole who’s running back. Back home to sweet, sweet April (NSFW)!