HART OF DIXIE Recap: The Gambler

It’s the battle of the bands again and Wade is wasting no time practicing even if that means practicing in the back of a truck while driving through town.

On the other side of town square Lavon and Annabeth literally bump into each other. After a few awkward moments Lavon announces he is done with love for the time being so there is no need to worry that he will try to win Annabeth back. Annabeth doesn’t take that as joyously as you might think.

And over at the Butter Stick Bakery (still my favorite named eatery on TV) Lemon and Walt are having tea. Walt is going away for the weekend to attend a friends bachelor party and he suggests Lemon have her own girls weekend. Something she doesn’t want to do with Annabeth. She is still upset about the whole Annabeth/Lavon situation that almost was.
I think Annabeth is feeling entirely too bad about the whole thing since she takes Crickets advice and using Lemon’s phone GPS decides to “accidentally” run into her all over town. In my state that is considered stalking but maybe in Bluebell that is just being neighborly.

At the Rammer Jammer George and Tansy are witness to Zoe and Wade’s excitement over the upcoming Band Battle. Tansy muses that musicians are sexy leading George to assert that he is a musician in his own right. He did sing at last year’s Bluebell-a-palooza alongside Wade. Tansy doesn’t seem to believe him.

Lemon is moping around her Dad’s house when Magnolia comes home. Lemon is so happy to see her (as she is all alone this weekend) that she declares it a sister’s weekend. 48 hours of inseparable fun. Magnolia does a decent job faking her excitement.

George, Tansy and Zoe are over at Meatball’s barn where he and Wade are having band practice. It’s not good. The drums are fine, Wade’s guitar playing is fine but Meatball is singing in a death metal like voice and playing the cowbell. Let me say it again, It’s Not Good.

Zoe stops by George’s office the next morning to discuss how to handle the Battle of the Bands fiasco. She thinks they should kidnap Meatloaf because, “his voice sounds like a werewolf stuck in a garbage disposal.” George says Wade is way too excited, they can’t tell him but Zoe disagrees. She thinks George is just the person to tell Wade how horrible Meatball is.

Lavon is performing by proxy weddings for people in the military in his house. Wanda and Tom are standing in as the proxy couple and they take the you may now kiss the bride part quite seriously.
When Wanda leaves for work Tom tells Lavon he wants to marry Wanda. He wants Lavon to help him plan his proposal.
Tom: I was thinking we could do something with Ewoks and Avatars

Annabeth is putting her plan in action running into Lemon at every turn. It isn’t thawing Lemon’s cold cold heart at all.

And Zoe is putting her plan into action by bringing George by Wade’s place to talk to him about the band. George goes about this by asking to sing with the band for one night in Meatballs place. Zoe of course thinks this is a great idea. Just great. Wade passes much to Zoe’s dismay. Zoe decides to come clean and tell Wade Meatball sucks and he won’t win with him as the singer. Wade doesn’t listen to her at all.
The next morning Zoe apologizes for not being supportive but in her next breath thinks Wade should hire Lilly Anne back. Yeah, Lilly Anne who hit on Wade the last time he saw her. He voices this and she says bygones. Wade wants a truly supportive girlfriend and storms out.

Tom is at the Rammer Jammer to meet with Lavon and go over proposal ideas. Lavon has an idea involving a horse drawn carriage and a speech about timeless love. Tom is scared of horses but it looks like maybe Lavon can talk him into it.

Magnolia and Lemon are back at home where Magnolia is trying on all the clothes Lemon bought her while they were out shopping that afternoon. Lemon is so hard up to hang out with anyone other than Annabeth that she even agrees to let Magnolia get purple streaks in her hair. For someone as bell like as Lemon that’s almost blasphemy.

Wade is having band practice where he suggests that maybe they could do one “regular” song in their set. A cover perhaps. Meatball says absolutely not. He gets so offended by being asked to sing a cover he quits.

Walt comes back early and Lemon immediately opts to ditch Magnolia in favor of dinner with him. Magnolia looks a little disappointed but tells Lemon to go, have fun.

Zoe stops by the Rammer Jammer to see Wade and George performing with the band. They sound fantastic. Scott Porter has a good voice.
Zoe tries to congratulate Wade on how great they sounded by he is still a little annoyed by her earlier comments and it doesn’t go so well.

Lemon is at dinner with Walt when Annabeth and Cricket stop by. Lemon doesn’t even take the bait when Cricket says she is going to redo her kitchen with grey walls. Instead Lemon latches onto Walt even more than she was before. She makes plans for them every night of the upcoming week. Walt looks quite uncomfortable.

Lavon meanwhile overhears Wanda say she heard Tom was planning to propose. Something she says is a disaster. Lavon races to find Tom who is standing in town square with the horses and carriage. Lavon tells Tom what he overheard and Tom freaks out, spooking the horses who then drag him down the street. It’s more comical than it sounds, I promise.

Zoe pulls Wade aside at the Rammer Jammer and truly apologizes. She says she supports him 100% and even gives him a neon bar sign that says “Wade’s Place”. She knows he will win tonight. She believes in him. Wade stares at the sign and looks pretty emotional. Zoe has to rush off to help Tom after his run in with the horses but she promises to be back to watch Wade play.

The Battle of the Bands is in full swing and Wade is freaking out, George tells him to relax, they are going to do fine. Wade answers by downing a drink – that can’t be good.
Lemon finds Magnolia trying to get into the bar for Battle of the Bands and low and behold Annabeth and Cricket show up too. Lemon finally confronts them on how much longer this showing up thing is going to go on and Annabeth says until she will talk to her. Lemon isn’t ready for that, in fact she wants to dissolve their business partnership as well. Just when I’m starting to like Lemon the writers go and make her an insufferable wench again.

Tom gets a neck brace for whiplash when one of the town ladies comes into the doctor’s office to get him. She says there is an emergency in town square and they need Tom right now. They get to town square to find it covered in zombies and dry ice to look like eerie smoke. The music starts and Island’s in the Stream plays while all the zombies dance and sing. This happens to be Tom’s favorite song. Wanda “pops” out of a coffin – also in zombie makeup – and joins in the signing while she takes Tom’s hands. She proposes to Tom and Tom proposes right back. It’s really quite sweet despite the zombies.

George is looking around for Wade who is on the floor of the bar, drunk. The pressure has gotten to him. Drunk Wade insults Golden Boy George but George isn’t going to play along. He tells Wade to man up and work for his success just like everyone else has had to. George tries to get him to put the drink down but Wade isn’t having it. He fires George and rehires Meatball.
We don’t get to see Wade perform but we do see who wins and it isn’t Wade.

Meanwhile Magnolia and Lemon get back how where Magnolia yells at Lemon for being her friend one moment and ditching her the next to hang with her boyfriend. Lemon shouts right back that Walt dumped her. Looks like he thought Lemon was too clingy as well.

George finds Wade still drinking at the bar. George wants to know what is going on with him, there are plenty of other ways Wade could raise money for his bar. Wade says sure, plenty of ways to fail. Wade says he is sick of people thinking he can do better/be better than what he is. People will just be let down if they believe that. George says that isn’t true but Wade says he shouldn’t believe in him.
Then Wade says he is going to go back to being him and goes over to the woman who has been hitting on him all night and leaves with her.
Zoe shows up a short while later to find out how Wade and George did. George and Tansy tell her Wade lost and then they even cover for the fact that Wade left with another woman.

Lavon ends up at Annabeth’s house to declare that she is worth fighting for. He will wait for her.

Hart of Dixie airs Tuesday 8/7c on The CW