After the whirlwind, practically non-stop fuckfest that was the first episode of Fellow Travelers, we viewers needed a moment of comedown—the cigarette after the sex, if you will. If the series were to throw its gratuitous, pearl-clutchingly great sex scenes at us for an entire hour, eight straight weeks in a row, we’d eventually grow tired of it (even as great as that sounds). Instead, the Showtime drama slows down a bit in its second episode, just enough for everyone on both sides of the screen to catch their breath.
Now, do Jonathan Bailey’s hands slap against Matt Bomer’s bare ass cheeks while Bailey blows him from the front, just five minutes into the episode? Yes. But there is more narrative-building here, I swear! Going from foot-sucking and kinky sex games in the premiere episode to a single offscreen blowjob in the next is a big step toward making Fellow Travelers much more than the sex scenes the show wisely used to attract viewers. Now that the show has built an audience by luring them in with a little lewdness, it can focus on commanding its dance between carnal lust and gripping drama, which it does with a strong sophomore installment that deftly builds on the hype of its premiere.
At the end of last week’s episode, Hawkins (Bomer)—later in his life, in 1986—heard the payphone ring inside of the San Francisco diner where he was waiting for a call from his old flame, Tim (Bailey), who is dying. We learn at the top of Episode 2 that the call was not from Tim, but rather his sister, Maggie (Edie Inksetter). Tim has sent Maggie in his place to reiterate that he doesn’t want to see Hawkins, after Hawkins broke Tim’s heart while the two of them carried on their covert relationship during their time in mid-twentieth century Washington D.C.
“[Tim] ever being able to have a real partner, you stole that from him,” Maggie tells Hawkins, referring to him stringing her brother along through the decades. “I think you’ll be relieved to not have to see him.” When Hawkins asks why he would fly 3,000 miles if he didn’t really want to see Tim, she responds, “I don’t know, so you can say that you tried?” The series’ writers do a fine job of quietly inferring Hawkins’ continued capriciousness through the years while teasing it out slowly back in the earlier part of the show’s dual timelines.
A few decades back, it’s now 1953, and Hawkins and Tim have been seeing each other for almost a year. They’ve developed a tender closeness, and Hawkins has finally abandoned his fear of post-coital intimacy. But just because they’re cuddling doesn’t mean that they’re courting. Tim and Hawkins’ relationship is still being used largely as a basis to supply Hawkins with information on what’s happening on the Republican side of Washington, so he can provide his Democratic senator boss with enough gossip to fight Senator Joseph McCarthy’s anti-communist tirade. Tim also serves as a cover for Mary (Erin Neufer), Hawkins’ assistant, who Tim learns is a lesbian, living with her girlfriend, Caroline (Gabbi Kosmidis).
Ben Mark Holzberg/Showtime
When Tim asks why he needs a beard and Hawkins doesn’t, the answer is simple: Hawkins is a decorated war veteran, and his medals make him bulletproof to the prying eyes of the government. Stripping a vet of his job would be as anti-American as Communism in Hawkins’ eyes, and this so-called impenetrable status allows Hawkins to bask in the allure of danger. He enjoys the thrill of keeping his queerness as close to an open secret as possible—even amidst McCarthy’s newly imposed Lavender Scare executive order, which calls for the outing of any closeted queer person in Washington to strip them of their post to avoid national perversion.
Though Hawkins is able to avoid the criticisms of his government colleagues, he can’t quite manage the same when it comes to his own family. His mother, Estelle (Rosemary Dunsmore) confides in Hawkins that his father is dying—she thinks it’s for real this time—and that he’s had an uncharacteristic change of heart. While his father isn’t jumping to reinstate Hawkins in the will, Estelle believes that there’s a way Hawkins can find his inheritance restored if he comes home to visit with his family. But this opportunity has a limited window, and given that sappy overcommunication isn’t Hawkins’ thing, he avoids telling Tim where he’s going entirely.
Hawkins heads east to his family’s sprawling estate and walks into a dinner with extended relatives already in progress. He’s well-versed in fielding their questions about bachelorhood and dating, but it’s when he meets with his father, Russell (Peter Millard) that he stumbles. “You were good at a lot, son, but you were never good at concealing yourself,” Russell says to Hawkins. Hawkins lies and tells his father that the circumstances of their falling out—his gayness—have changed. “Then all that remains is your apology,” his father replies.
Hawkins asks his father what he owes him an apology for, to which Russell explains that he endured a lifetime of strife after walking in on Hawkins performing oral sex on his friend from the high school tennis team, Kenny. Kenny was Hawkins’ first sexual experience, his first romance, and his first brush with the loss of a loved one. Kenny died in World War II, and Hawkins’ developing relationship with Tim—whose sweet earnestness reminds Hawkins of Kenny—has Hawkins viewing the entire calamity with his father in a different light.
“I’m sorry that you’re dying…” Hawkins begins. “…that not a single fucking soul gives a shit, and that you didn’t knock first.” Bomer sells this line with unassailable conviction, elevating already sturdy material to new heights. It’s a reminder that, though Fellow Travelers can sometimes veer a little too close to a The Other Two-esque parody of gay media, its two leads are talented enough to help it transcend that dreaded plateau every time.
Jonathan Bailey and Matt Bomer.
Showtime
Hawkins returns home to Washington and immediately goes to see Tim. He doesn’t explain his absence, telling Tim that it doesn’t matter where he was, despite Tim’s confusion. “I’m home now,” he says before kissing him. It’s just the right kind of affectionate moment that we need before the depressing events that permeate the remainder of this episode. Mary and Caroline are outed by a government worker, and Hawkins encourages Tim to write a letter on Mary’s behalf, saving their mutual friend but leaving Caroline out in the cold without a job. Hawkins’ insistence on writing the letter is only proof that, as warm as he can be, Hawkins can turn cold in a minute, especially when friends become liabilities to his own personal safety. It’s that iciness that chills Tim, who tells him that he’s done doing Hawkins’ dirty work.
Back in 1986, Hawkins is proposed for sex by two young men at a gay bar while he waits for Tim to come around. Witnessing the horrors of the AIDS crisis, Hawkins has his reservations about the kind of wanton, unprotected group sex that the men are suggesting. “You’re bulletproof,” Hawkins says, alluding back to the time in 1953 when he said the same thing to Tim about his veteran status. “You know what it’s taken me a long time to realize? Not everybody else is.”
Tired of waiting, Hawkins goes to Tim’s apartment and knocks on the door. Thinking it’s Maggie, Tim yells that the door is open, and Hawkins walks in to see his lover, laying on the couch and staring back at him. Though Tim is older and physically weakened by complications with HIV, he’s as handsome as ever, and there’s no denying that he and Hawkins still share their same innate chemistry. Tim reluctantly lets Hawkins stay for dinner, and the episode comes to a close.
Fellow Travelers may occasionally feel a bit bloated with its consistent hour-long runtimes, but it’s moments like this ending that make the show’s writing feel so marvelous. In the ’80s, the plot has barely moved an inch. But back in the ’50s, things have advanced enough to fill in all of the necessary narrative gaps across both timelines, at least up until this point. And it does it all without the abundance of sex scenes that the first episode used to do this same thing. It just goes to show you: Sex might not always be a narrative device, but it certainly can be. Take that, Gen Z celibates!
