TV Review: RAY DONOVAN: Season 2, Episode 3: Gem & Loan [Showtime]

Showtime’s Ray Donovan Gem and Loan TV Show Review. Ray Donovan: Season 2, Episode 3: Gem & Loan featured one major and one character on the show receiving large reality checks right between the eyes. Mickey Donovan (Jon Voight) working in Mexican restaurant was a humbling experience for him considering all the things he had done in his life to avoid manual labor. The clever result of all the tender-loving-care Parole Officer Ronald Keith (Wendell Pierce) was showing Mickey was the viewer witnessing what a keen eye for detail Mickey possessed.

In this corruption-ridden world, how could Parole Officer Keith be stupid enough to wear a watch that costs thousands of dollars around fellow parole officers and criminals? How does someone on his salary earn the capital to afford a watch like that? This is what his fellow parole officers will be thinking. This is what criminals with an eye for jewelry will be thinking. Keith could have avoided all of this speculation by simply not wearing the watch to work. It was one of those idiotic moves that a savvy parole officer would never make but it had the affect of moving a certain storyline in this episode along. I wish that writer Michael Tolkin had summed the wits to do so without making his new character a moron in a critical area.

Stu Feldman (Josh Pais) feeling entitled rendered multiple laughs throughout Gem & Loan. Certain rich people believe their money can buy them anything and that includes sexual intercourse with someone (Tori Black) that is firmly off the market because of marriage. Even when that money fails him, Stu clung to that belief system. It was all he had come to know and it had probably gotten him out of every jam imaginable up till that point. It was gratifying to see that pride to some people, even in the adult industry, means more to them than money.

Marvin Gaye Washinton (Octavius J. Johnson) and Bridget Donovan (Kerris Dorsey) getting back together was a dubious prospect at best, especially considering the circumstance of their break-up and Ray summoning every ounce of self-control not to kill him. It looked as though Washinton’s new found fame, the length of time they were apart, and her original feelings for him were in just the right amounts for Bridget to start returning Washinton’s phone calls again. Unlike Stu, it looks as though Washinton has learned that he is not entitled to everything in this world but instead has to earn them.

Ray Donovan (Liev Schreiber) getting drunk with reporter Kate McPherson (Vinessa Shaw) was Donovan walking on the razor’s edge. Part of me believes that Ray likes McPherson or at least what he sees and hears. It looked as though their conversation started out with Ray was trying to probe her for what she knew and vice versa. It turned into them both saying things, small and inconsequential though they might have been, that they wouldn’t have under normal circumstances.

Since Ray and Abby Donovan (Paula Malcomson) are now in marriage counseling, its doubtful he will throw a monkey wretch into the situation with more infidelity but Kate McPherson is no Ashley Rucker.

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