'Rooster' Episode 5 Recap: Who Is Doing The “For Katie” Graffiti? 

The 5th episode of Rooster finally introduces us to Greg’s wife in the form of Connie Britton’s confident and strong Elizabeth, or “Beth.” On the other hand, there’s some development in the “For Katie” thing, but we still have to wait to see why she’s doing it, and what (Greg) triggered her to do it. The show has been fun so far, and I can’t wait to see what it’ll throw at us next. This episode focuses on family dynamics and the way things have changed, or rather not changed, over the years in the 5 years of Beth and Greg’s separation. The 5th episode is the midpoint of the show, and we’re in a good position in terms of comedy as well as plot. Archie remains just as frustrating as ever, if not more, and there’s more depth to Sunny than we’ve been allowed to see so far. To be fair, I think I’ve liked her right from the start. Katie continues to be another lovable character who you can’t help but side with. But anyway, with that said, let’s jump straight into episode 5.

Spoiler Alert

Rooster episode 5 begins with Greg now having turned into a stud in his students’ eyes after his late night endeavours with them. Even the girls who hated him to start with now think he’s “kinda” cool, and he seems to be enjoying the job now too. But Tommy doesn’t show up and then proceeds to lie that he had an emergency. Funny guy. But when he gets home to Katie, they start to discuss a visitor – Greg’s ex and Katie’s mum, Beth, is showing up in town because a student center has just been opened in her name. Greg suggests they can do family night or something for all of them to hang together, but Katie tells her mum that she can stay in the spare room of her dad’s house. I guess that could be fun, eh?  

In the meanwhile, Cristle is giving me anxiety with the way she’s handling the “slept with Greg” situation. When he gets her a hot chocolate, she tells him to pretend it’s his and then proceeds to ask about it in front of Walt and Dylan, making it look like he’s hiding something. Almost as if she might want him to tell them about it? Later, she gets him to sign a photocopy of her frontside which completely confuses me, but nothing about this woman makes sense to me anyway, so that’s fun. Anyway, as soon as Beth finishes her speech about the green initiative and shows off her new center to a group of intellectual people, Walt, Dylan, Greg, and she meet up in his office. She learns about the drunken hockey coach and basically offers Greg up for the role of assistant coach to keep an eye on the guy. Ironically, Greg avoided this situation because he didn’t want to do it, but now Walt knows that he lied about his dislike of hockey. He says “you always do this” to Beth, which clearly implies that he needs her to back off right now, but old habits die hard, eh? And she was probably just trying to get him to have some fun. 

The real conclusion here is that Greg is still dependent on Beth in terms of needing someone to nudge him to take initiative. At family quiz night, Dylan’s there too, and we see Greg mess the situation up by calling out the fact that “one of his friends” slept with someone else, so he was left with only one. This is when Beth says she’s happy Greg’s found a friend in Dylan, who seems like a lovely person. Greg was trying to make a joke but the tension is palpable, he was simply trying to be funny but it backfired, and Katie also didn’t show up to the house, making him feel especially lonelier. Also fun to note how Dylan’s ears immediately perked up when she found out about Greg having slept with someone. Dylan might be jealous, especially considering what she said about her boyfriend. On the other hand, Beth might feel a little bit like Greg’s actually able to get things done even without her because of how much his students like him. She can’t believe they think he’s like “Rooster.” 

But in the ending of episode 5 when everything is sorted out and Beth isn’t upset anymore that Greg took a dig at her and is still stuck on her, 5 years after their divorce, Katie brings out a frame that she made fun of and thought Greg removed for her sake. Turns out, it was a picture from Italy of Beth and he, which means he’s still right at square one, while Beth has moved on in life in every way. She calls herself selfish, but realizes in that instant that she should not let the guy grow any more dependent on her. So instead of staying over for family wine and dine, she decides to head out. There’s a slight chance we won’t get to see her again on the show anytime soon, but seeing how afraid Walt is of losing his job to her, maybe I’m completely wrong. 

On the other hand, Archie continues to be really annoying, and instead of asking Sunny how her internship went, he proceeds to tell her about his book, and doesn’t even realize that she looks sad and tired. He doesn’t even want to sleep with her, but she doesn’t know that it’s likely because he’s been secretly doing it with Katie. Ironically, Katie tries to tell him that she doesn’t feel anything for him anymore, but then proceeds to kiss him when the lights go off for the green initiative. But, it seems she’s actually over him and this is just a physical thing? I don’t think she’s stuck like her dad, and might be a little more like her mum, actually. Anyway, Archie’s even annoying to the most annoying Walt, when the latter asks him about his ab workout and the former says he doesn’t like exercise. Walt even asks about carb-consumption, and Archie proceeds to express his love for different kinds of pasta. At least he throws him out of the sauna then. But finally, Walt notices that the person graffiting his walls is a student wearing pink shoes, and thinks it’s one of his students, Liv, who is a part of a duo who I would like to call Archie-holic. They both seem to be obsessed with him, and largely hang out with each other because of this obsession? Obviously, Archie is the kind of person who only notices the tall blonde girl and remembers her name, not the slightly chubbier Gina. I guess this might be the end of their friendship, or the next part of what ends up happening might make things better for them. Who knows? 

Anyway, Archie calls Liv in to talk to him because she’s got the pink converse on, and Liv thinks he wants to have sex with her, so when the lights go off again for the green initiative, she’s already taken her clothes off. Archie covers his eyes in shame and immediately tells her to leave the room. He hasn’t even realized he’s been giving her signals, but I guess it was a misunderstanding on her part (ever so slightly).  But, at the same time, we see Greg’s student, Zoey, who told him Katie was her favorite teacher and is the one who’s been graffiting everything, so yeah, there’s that. In the end, this is the perfect excuse for Dylan to get rid of the green initiative and get her reviews in print again for at least two years? We can see what happens later, later. The episode ends with Katie and Greg finally having a cute moment, only for him to ruin it because a good thing is too much for him to handle. Good stuff.