TV Recap: “Big Sky” – The Kleinsasser’s Bury a Son While Ronald Buries His Latest Victim in “Nice Animals”

Can you believe what happened on Big Sky last week? Neither could I, but the wait is over after last week’s shocking cliffhanger. ABC debuted the fourteenth episode tonight, “Nice Animals,” and we’ve got you covered with a detailed recap of every twist, turn and surprise.

Jenny is pulled out of the rubble of her destroyed motel room by the manager of the Grey Cliff Inn. Looking around as police sirens blare, she sees Angela’s unconscious body and runs to her, seeing that her head is bleeding on a cement block that was exposed when the truck drove through the room, destroying it.

Cassie and Mark come upstairs in Mary’s house after finding a body in the freezer, seeing that the front door is now open (they had to sneak in through the back in the previous episode). Cassie pulls out her gun and Mark steps outside, noticing that one of Mary’s dolls is sitting on the hood of his car. He tells Cassie that Ronald must have been watching them and that he somehow cleaned up Mary’s body. Cassie tells him that they don’t know for sure that Mary is dead, but he gives her a look that says she is. Mark calls for backup as they go back to the living room and Cassie gets a call about Jenny.

Sheriff Wagy watches as Angela is loaded into an ambulance inside a body bag on a stretcher. A medic inspects Jenny and when he’s dun, he approaches her. She is scared of him, asking him to stay away and telling him that the Kleinsassers are responsible for the attack. “We don’t know that yet,” he tells her, to which she disagrees, adding that he’s an accessory to the crime. “That’s a big word, young lady,” he cautions her as she continues, telling him that he’s been doing their dirty work for years. He tells her that she’s just a private investigator with no jurisdiction. “Angela’s dead because of you,” she says. “You’re not going to get away with this.”

Jerrie arrives at Mary’s house, offering Mark some tea. He tells her she shouldn’t be there given her history as a victim of Ronald’s but she says “I won’t feel safe until he’s caught.” At the office, Jerrie researched Mary and discovered that she has a sister named Scarlet who lives close by.

At the Kleinsasser Ranch, Sheriff Wagy arrives to meet with Horst, telling him that Angela is dead and it’s Rand’s fault. He adds that Jenny Hoyt survived and that witnesses have said they saw Rand at the scene. Horst smugly replies that he has witnesses that can place Rand on the ranch at the time of the incident. “It ain’t like it used to be,” Wagy cautions Horst, adding that Angela was talking to Jenny when she died. He hands Horst a document that he says was found in Jenny’s room, which references chemicals on the ranch. Horst asks if she got it from Gil, telling Wagy that he needs to fix it. “No, not this time,” he tells him. “This is your mess.” Horst asks for time to figure it out, saying that tomorrow is Blake’s funeral. Wagy tells him that he can’t protect him anymore.

Getting back into his squad car, Wagy hits his dashboard and mutters “Damnit” to himself when a voice speaks behind him. “Rough night, Sheriff?,” Cheyenne asks from the backseat. When he asks what this is, she says “The future, where annoying women run ranches, multinational corporations, even countries.” He tells her to shut her mouth and she tells him he doesn’t know who she’s messing with. “Actually, it’s the other way around,” she says as she opens the door to leave. “Welcome to the future, Sheriff.”

That same night, Arthur arrives at Scarlet’s with his new big rig truck and Phoebe is excited to ride in it. He reveals that he has already packed them up for a surprise camping trip, luring Phoebe’s excitement with the promise of breakfast s’mores. Scarlet wants to wait until the morning, adding that she still can’t find her phone, but Arthur pulls it out of his pocket and says he found it in the car. She reluctantly goes on the camping trip.

Alone on the ranch, Horst rounds of John Wayne (J.W.) and Rand, asking them both what they were thinking. JW replies with “‘Bout what?” and gets punched by his father, who promises to knock his teeth out if he lies again. Rand takes the blame, but adds that it’s Cheyenne’s fault for talking to Jenny Hoyt. Horst tells them that after the funeral tomorrow, they have to figure out what to do with the barrels on the back pasture, telling them that they’ll be literally digging their brother’s grave while thinking about how to dig the family out of their figurative hole. He ends his rant by saying that if they don’t figure it out, it will be the last they see of the ranch.

Jenny returns to Dewell & Hoyt, still scarred and scabbed from the attack at the motel. Cassie suggests that she see a doctor, which Jenny refuses, blaming herself for Angela’s death. Denise advises Jenny to take a lavender bath, but knowing that she won't, hands her an address she tracked down for Nora Danvers, the mother of Cole, the missing ranch hand. Jenny hugs Denise and thanks her, kissing her on the cheek.

Arthur pulls his big rig between several trees in the middle of a forest, looking at his phone and seeing that he has no service, breathing a sigh of relief. He looks on the bench seat behind him, seeing Scarlet and Phoebe laying across it sleeping. Underneath their seat is Mary’s body in a bag, which is leaking blood. Scarlet wakes up and looks around, saying she thought they were going to a campground and realizing that she has no service. Arthur tells her to take Phoebe for an exploration walk while he unpacks, insisting that they go when she says she wants to help. Alone in the truck at last, Arthur bends over to check on Mary’s body.

Back at Mary’s house the next day, Mark has found traces of blood in the house and says it looks fatal. Jerrie did research on Mary and learned that she grew up in Utah and ended up moving to Montana with her sister Scarlet. Cassie makes assumptions about the sequence of events, saying that it seems like Mary knew Ronald and the attack wasn’t random. In a tent outside, the body from the freezer has been identified as Steve Larin, who disappeared eight years ago. The cause of death was a icepic to the back of the head, which Cassie says is not Ronald’s style. Mark says he can’t see any immediate connection between Ronald and Steve.

Jenny pulls up to Nora’s house, finding her outside collecting firewood. Nora assumes she’s from the bank, but Jenny tells her she’s a private investigator and she’s looking for information about her son. “Who hired you?,” Nora asks. “Blake Kleinsasser,” Jenny responds, making Nora even more agitated. “No, you’re not coming around here and uttering that name.” Jenny reveals that Blake is dead because he was trying to go against his family. “I think your son knew something.” Nora says she isn’t interested in closure, but Jenny asks her if she’s interested in revenge.

Sitting down to talk on her porch, Nora reveals to Jenny that she warned Cole to stay away from the Kleinsasser’s, saying they used to be known as “White trash.” He never told her what he was hired to do at the ranch, but before he disappeared, he told her that he had seen something he knew was wrong. “And they make me into the nut for asking about it,” she says, explaining that a man named Gil was sent to tell her that Cole stole a truck from the ranch and ran off. Jenny tells her that Gil was the ranch manager until recently. “Well he was lying through his teeth like somebody put him up to it,” Nora replies. “Cole, he never called me after that. He just vanished.”

Cheyenne finds her mother getting ready in her bedroom, offering to zip up her black dress and refusing to give her a pill when Margaret asks. Margaret asks Cheyenne to tell her the truth about what happened to Blake, adding “Please don’t lie to me, I can’t take another one.” Asking her to stand up, Cheyenne says “It was J.W.” and she sits back down in shock, asking why. “He and Blake had an argument about that ranch hand I asked you about, Cole Danvers. I wanted you to hear it first.” Margaret asks if Horst knows and Cheyenne tells her she hasn’t told him. “I want to tell him,” Margaret says, telling an anecdote about the day she brought Cheyenne home from the hospital after giving birth and Horst expected her to make dinner. She tells her that she added rat poison to his slice and he ate it all, asking for seconds and then went to sleep, waking up fine the next morning.“I swear to God, that man is too damn mean to die,” she tells her daughter.

Out in the family cemetery, J.W. and Rand are digging Blake’s grave and Rand tells his brother that he doesn’t want to go to jail, adding that he’s scared. J.W. tells him Horst will take care of it and if not, he will, adding that they will soon run the ranch together and kick Cheyenne out. Rand switches to talking about his plans to build a scary maze on the ranch, talking about all the ways he wants to scare people and how he loves the way they look in that moment, adding that it’s like he can smell their fear. He goes on about how  he has drawings about it and it’s something he thinks about a lot in the woods, talking about a pit that he could drag people into to make them think they’re really going to die. “I could watch that all day.”

Horst struggles to get his boots on and Margaret gets on her knees to help. He thanks her and she tells him that she wants to say a few words at the funeral. “You don’t have to ask my permission, you just say what’s in your heart,” he tells her. “I don’t think you want that… do you know what’s in my heart?” She tells him that she used to love listening to him, trying to understand him. He tries to touch her cheek and she slaps his hand away. “What I need is to hear you tell me one thing that isn’t a lie. Before I put my son in the ground today, I want you to tell me one truth.” He thinks for a moment and then says “Here’s a truth. Every time I look at our children all I can see is everything that’s wrong with you.” He compares her to a pretty cow who keeps producing bad calves, saying in that situation, he would kill the cow to feed burgers to his family. “But you, you ain’t worth the slaughter no more. You’re just dog meat,” he finishes. She smirks, thanking him and saying it’s the first honest thing he’s ever said to her. He tells her he still intends to honor his marriage vows and she helps him into his jacket. “Now this is my family and my land and there ain’t nobody, not the good lord himself, that’s gonna tell me what to do with it,” he says. She tells him that his land won’t be worth a jar of cold spit and promises to tell him a truth, leaning in and whispering in his ear, “I will kill you.” He nods his head, responding “I expect nothing less.” They kiss and then join arms, heading to their son’s funeral together.

Jenny and Cassie arrive back at Gil and Rosie’s cabin where he tells them again to leave them alone. “We spoke to Nora Danvers, she said you spoke to her about her son,” Jenny tells him and he goes still. “I’ve been waiting for this day a long time, he confesses, asking Rosie to go inside, but she refuses. Jenny tells him that he can help make the Kleinsasser’s pay for what they’ve done and he tells her that he tried to help Cole, advising him to keep his head down and just take the paycheck. He kept asking questions and one  night, he got in a fight with Horst and Rand, who killed Cole thinking he was protecting his father. Cassie says that Gil knows what Horst was doing because he was helping the family, but he just says that Horst is the only reason he got out of the ranch alive. Rosie says she thought he was fired and he tells her he was actually paid off to leave. “What was Horst doing on that land?,” Cassie asks again.

Gil takes Cassie and Jenny to a river, explaining that it provides most of the water for the county and telling them how a big oil company had to pay a lot of money when it was discovered they had been dumping their waste into it. He tells them that they needed somewhere else to dump their waste and that Sheriff Wagy brokered a deal with Horst to bury it on their ranch. Jenny says there must be a paper trail somewhere and Gil tells her that all documentation and the back pasture are both under constant surveillance. Jenny suggests that with Blake’s funeral, the family might not notice an extra car on the ranch and it would likely be unguarded. Gil tells her he’s not dying on that ranch, but Jenny tells him “You owe it to Rosie to do the right thing.”

Cheyenne finds Rand in the kitchen making a sandwich before the funeral, telling him they’ll be eating when it’s over. He’s making the sandwich for J.W. and spills on his shirt, blaming Cheyenne for it, who comes to help him clean it off. “There you go, you almost look like a normal person,” she tells him, mocking his twisted impulses. He asks her to leave him alone and she says “I will if you just tell me what’s going on in the back pasture.” He asks how she knows about that and she tells him she knows a lot of things, including about what he did to the ranch hand and the motel. Rand picks up the knife and Cheyenne calmly asks if he’s going to kill her or if he needs to check with J.W. first just as John Wayne walks in. Cheyenne addresses him with all of Rand’s wrongdoings and says “I think the only good thing he’s got going for him is he ain’t killed his brother… yet.” She tells J.W. that she’s thinking about telling Sheriff Wagy everything she knows in an attempt to put herself in a position of power. “We don’t need your help,” J.W. tells her. “Oh yes you do, John Wayne. You just don’t know it yet.” She grabs half of the sandwich Rand made, taking a bite as she walks out.

Cassie and Jenny are driving to the Kleinsasser Ranch when Cassie gets a call from Mark. In researching Steve, they found out that he had a daughter with Scarlet, Mary’s sister. He adds that he’s still trying to figure out the connection to Ronald, but he can’t reach Scarlet by phone and is going to her house. After hanging up, Jerrie asks Mark if she can go with him to Scarlet’s house.

Ronald is in the woods dragging Mary’s body and a shovel when he hears Scarlet calling for him, seeing her through some trees and jumping behind a big tree to hide, holding Mary’s body and the shovel up with him. As Scarlet and Phoebe get close to the tree, he powers up his taser. Phoebe sees a leaf covered in blood and says “Eww, gross.” Scarlet decides to take her back to the truck.

At Blake’s funeral, Horst gives a eulogy and motions to Margaret to speak. Walking past her kids, she looks J.W. in the eyes and he tells her “I’ll miss him.” She embraces him in a hug, whispering “I know what you did.” Her hug turns into more of a strangle hold, causing J.W. to try to pry her off him, with Horst intervening.

Scarlet and Phoebe stand by the campsite calling for Arthur, who soon comes out of the woods and tells them he heard a hurt animal and went to go check it out. Phoebe tells him about the bloody leaf she saw and he tells her about the two types of animals, “Nice animals” (herbivores) and predators, talking about why this is a good thing. “We’re made better by the knowledge that there are things out there that can kill us.” Scarlet sends Phoebe to the truck, telling Arthur that he shouldn’t scare Phoebe like that, reminding him that she’s only ten.

Outside of Scarlet’s house that night, Mark asks Jerrie to stay in the car as he prepares to go to the door. She tells him that she’s already seen the worst in people and he shares some of his past, telling her he started by studying psychology and discovered that he was good at getting inside the minds of people like Ronald, telling her about his sister and how that cemented his future. “The job chooses you,” he tells her. “Well I have to close this chapter before I can start a new one and if I can be a part of taking down Ronald, all the better.” He gives her a gun and says “Up to you.” She takes it.

Cassie and Jenny pull up to the gate at the back pasture at night with Gil. Using flashlights, they open up one of the barrels, which lets out a terrible smell. Gil tells them that the illegal workers they hire would get poisoned moving the barrels, bending over to collect a soil sample.

Inside the Kleinsasser’s home, Sheriff Wagy tells Horst that it was a beautiful service and asks how Margaret is doing. After the small talk, Wagy tells Horst that the state is looking into what happened at the motel and he’s going to have to take Rand in for questioning. Horst tells him that the state can come to the ranch if they want to take him and see what happens, promising to use his 270.

Entering the living room, Margaret tears down a tapestry and hands J.W. something, telling him to hang it up. “I want everyone to see what lives in this house,” she tells him. Cheyenne asks if this can wait until the guests leave and Margaret demands they do it now. Taking the hammer and a nail Rand was chewing, Cheyenne puts the nail in the wall and J.W. hangs a framed picture. Horst asks everyone to leave as Margaret tells them she made it for Blake. It appears to be a square of the bloody shirt he was wearing when he died. On it, she drew the house with an X above it, pills, and a coffin. A dark ghostly figure is rising out of the front of the house.

Having cleared the house of guests, Horst tells the family they have to either come together or lose everything. Margaret tells him she wants to go to Paris and Horst yells at her. She stands up and leaves the room.

After knocking on Scarlet’s door and peering through the windows, Mark and Jerrie see a neighbor across the street taking their trash to the curb and they ask him if he knows Scarlet. He tells them that he heard a big rig truck pull up last night, which shook their house with its noise. He watched as Scarlet’s boyfriend got out and picked up Phoebe and Scarlet, driving them away in the middle of the night. Mark shows the neighbor a picture of Ronald and asks if that’s Scarlet’s boyfriend. The neighbor says it must be an old picture because her boyfriend’s hair is a lot longer.

Sheriff Wagy drives by the back pasture on his way off the ranch and sees two trucks parked outside the gate. He picks up his phone and makes a call, saying “Horst, we’ve got a problem.” Inside the back pasture, Gil holds up his flashlight, saying he thought he saw something. Headlights turn on behind them and start racing towards the trio as he tells Cassie and Jenny to run.

Arthur is wide awake in the tent that night while Scarlet and Phoebe sleep. He sneaks out quietly and grabs his flashlight, heading into the woods and digging a hole to finally bury Mary’s body. Noticing movement, he looks up from the hole and sees Phoebe. “What are you doing?,” Scarlet’s ten-year-old daughter asks. Ronald looks angry.

Big Sky returns on Tuesday, May 11th with the episode “Bitter Roots.” Here’s the official episode description from ABC:

When Scarlet gets an alarming call that her sister is missing, Ronald realizes just how twisted his situation has become and must decide his next move. Meanwhile, Cassie, Jenny, Gil and Rosie find themselves in a whole mess of trouble on the ranch, forced to face off against the worst of the Kleinsasser bunch. But this team is tough and even the strongest family trees can fall.