Hacks just dropped two episodes last week for its concluding season. The episodes “Who’s Making Dinner” and “D’Amazing Race” close in on Deborah’s unresolved “issues” with her late husband and collaborator, and then with her sister, and with her daughter in a full-circle moment for the comedian who wrestled all-series-long with the baggage they inflicted on each other.
“Who’s Making Dinner,” the season’s fourth episode, takes its title from the sitcom Deborah and Frank co-created and starred in together in 1973, whose rights are all under her husband’s name. 50 years later, she finds an opportunity to set the record straight at the opening of an exhibit celebrating Who’s Making Dinner. Except, because of a gag order, she can’t speak in public. The episode flashes back to the time the couple was still together shooting the show, and the cracks that formed in their relationship that famously led to Deborah losing everything, allegedly burning down Frank’s house, and — thank god — going the standup comedy route to fend for herself and their daughter after the fallout.
Speaking of daughter, Deborah Jr. Vance, is back in Episode 5 to convince her mom to do Celebrity Amazing Race with her. Not since Season 3’s Episode 3 “The Roast of Deborah Vance” (one of the best IMO) have we seen this mother-daughter duo go at it in a fun yet heartwarming way. Deborah agrees if only to promote her Madison Square Garden show. And despite struggling through the race, milking a goat and doing a clown dance together, we arrive at a sincere moment in the end, where DJ realizes their time on the show is more than she had ever spent with her mom in years.
Meanwhile, Ava’s Mall Girl script receives rave reviews but for the same reasons a TV exec loved it (“nuanced, specific, original”) it’s not good for TV. But that’s good enough to get her a blind script deal. Midway through watching Who’s Making Dinner, she realizes she wants to make a reboot of Frank and Deborah’s show but starring their Gen Z grandkid, who has to live with roommates in order to afford the house; a commentary on “chosen family, a generation who’s never going to find the success that their parents found, community building, downward mobility — but funny!” Deborah gives Ava her blessing to do it, but because Frank posthumously left the rights to Kathy, now they have to convince Deborah’s estranged sister to give them up.
These are just a few themes that Hacks is revisiting in its final season in a bid to close out all loose ends. Here, we list down other plotlines that the series is circling back to.
The Little Debbies
Deborah tries to win her Little Debbies back in Season 5 — all of them, including one who’s basically a stalker, the head of the fan club (who IIRC, she sued in Season 3 for profiting from her unofficial merch), and even young new fans, who tricked Ava into thinking they’re her fan when really they want to take her job. Cindy, third-generation Little Debbie, also agrees that Ava’s tweets were “not jokes, but thought poems” (Deborah, Season 1, Episode 2).
DJ and D’Jewelry
Deborah finally makes good on her promises to her daughter, one, by joining her on Celebrity Amazing Race for when DJ became sober, and two, by letting her promote her line of “mall kiosk” jewelry, D’Jewelry on QVC. (She tumbles her own rocks!) Deborah also finally realizes DJ is much tougher than she is. “I over-corrected. I didn’t let you try enough, ‘cause you could have handled it,” she tells her DJ.
The Writer-Actors Are Back
Joe Mande and Pat Reagan, Hacks guest writers and part-time actors, make a comeback in the latest episode in the Hospitality Olympics, where Deborah, Marcus, Damien, and Josefina scout talent to staff the Paradiso, which they’ve decided to rebrand as The Diva. Mande was first introduced as the concierge at the Las Vegas hotel casino where Ava was previously staying. Reagan starred as a bell boy in Season 3 and wrote, what IMO, are some of the best episodes of the show, including “1.69 Million” and “I Love LA.”
The Antiques Dealer and the Shaker Collection
Deborah’s rarified salt and pepper shaker collection was first shown in Season 1. But it wasn’t until Season 5 that we learned its origin. Turns out her sister also has a collection inspired by their mother’s love for quirky shakers. And as a condition to give up the rights to Who’s Making Dinner?, she asks Deborah to return the pair she got from home: a pair of cherubic porcelain blonde girls that their parents thought looked like Deborah and Kathy. Deborah refuses to give them up so Ava returns to the antiques dealer from Season 1 to have replicas of the shakers made.
‘Mall Girl’ and Ava’s Reboot
“Your TV show is my personal favorite thing that you’ve ever done,” lied a desperate Ava interviewing for a job with Deborah in Season 1. That can’t be truer now that she’s decided to reboot “Who’s Making Dinner” with the blessing of Deborah. We may never see the adaptation of Mall Girl, but it will always live in our hearts.
Hacks is currently streaming its final season on HBO Max.
