Boom Crunch

"Boom Crunch" is the 121st episode of the ABC television series, Desperate Housewives. It is the tenth episode of the show's sixth season and was broadcast on December 6, 2009.

Plot

Jeff and Daphne are having trouble in their marriage since she complains about everything he does. While flying in their single engine plane, Jeff asks for a divorce but Daphne tells him that since he started the business with her father's money she is entitled to half of everything and plans on selling it. During their ensuing argument, Jeff suffers a heart attack and dies, leaving an untrained Daphne alone in the plane just as it flies over Wisteria Lane. The episode flashes back to three days before and leads up to the plane crash.

The residents of Wisteria Lane are busy decorating for their annual Christmas party but Gaby and Lynette's feud intrigues them more. Gaby reveals to them that Lynette is suing Carlos and Lynette counters by saying it was because he fired her; Gaby then tells them it was because she lied about being pregnant. Bree and the others are shocked to hear that Lynette is pregnant with twins. Just as Susan tells them to put aside their differences and come together to celebrate, an ambulance arrives to take a wounded Katherine to the hospital. Everyone is gathered at Katherine's and Karen informs everyone that someone stabbed Katherine, who points at Mike.

Mona Clark checks to see how Danny is doing and calls him by the name of Tyler which startles Danny. He covers it up by saying he was dreaming. Nick and Angie are in a bind because of some unforeseen expenses and since they do not have insurance with their current identities, they eventually settle with refusing to take assistance from government programs as they would have to give out their information. Mona speaks to them privately and tells them that she knows (at least in her belief) that the Bolens are part of the Witness Protection Program but agrees to keep it a secret. Later, after Danny's official discharge from the hospital, Mona drives the young teenager home. Upon hearing that his parents had told Mona everything about their "situation," Danny accidentally reveals to the nurse the truth about his family, not realizing that Mona had sided with a far less incriminating story about the Bolens. With Danny's confession fresh in her mind, Mona resorts to blackmailing Angie into giving her $67,000 in exchange for her silence so that she can quit her job as a nurse and start anew. When the Bolen's are only able to come up with $10,000, Mona sternly demands for Angie to reach the full amount by the end of the day or else have her family face prosecution. After Angie finishes telling Mona her entire secret, she notices the plane descending onto the street so she runs away without warning Mona. Mona turns around and is hit by the wing of the plane, dropping Angie's envelope of cash.

Bree informs Orson that she has filed for divorce and tells him that if he tries to send her to jail for insurance fraud then he is going with her. Orson reveals that he was bluffing throughout the entire ordeal and defeatedly agrees to sign the divorce papers upon realizing that his wife had truly believed that he would have sent her to prison, even when it wasn't his intention. Later, while Bree is telling Karl the good news, Orson walks in and discovers that Bree was having an affair but still unaware of with whom. She tells him she will not go public with her new relationship until after the divorce is final. Meanwhile, Karl hired the Bicks to fly a banner behind their plane with the message "Will you marry me, Bree? Love, Karl" over Wisteria Lane and also gives Jeff his card as he is a divorce lawyer. During the party, Karl shows up and tells Bree about the banner that will be flying overhead. Worried about embarrassing Orson, Karl tells him the truth and the two get into a fight in Santa's Workshop. Bree notices the activity going on inside Santa's Workshop, and goes in to stop Orson and Karl from fighting. When the plane slides into the party, it smashes into Santa's Workshop and after the crash a bloody hand is hanging out from one of the Workshop's windows.

At the hospital, Susan is accompanied by Bob who reminds her that she is to act like a best friend to Katherine for the latter's accusation against Mike for attacking her with a weapon could cost him a lengthy jail sentence. After some light convincing from Bob to not be hostile, Susan then enters Katherine's room just as she finishes talking to Dylan over the phone. Susan engages Katherine by trying to understand as to why she would believe that Mike would stab her. Katherine responds by telling her that Mike had become enraged after informing him that she was in love with another man. Upon her exit, Susan then tells Bob of her skepticism towards Katherine's intentions for her stories and simply expresses her desire to have Katherine "put away" in an institute. Bob informs Susan that only a family member can commit someone into a mental institution. With this idea in mind, Susan has the nurse at reception contact Dylan's number in Maryland through the hospital's incoming phone records and hands the connected call over to Susan. Susan then adopts the persona of a Fairview Memorial doctor, complete with a British accent, and informs Dylan that she is concerned about Katherine's well-being and recommends for her to visit her mother immediately. Upon Dylan's arrival to her old home on Wisteria Lane, Susan runs over in an attempt to talk to her, but is instead greeted with hostility. Susan is shocked to learn that for the last few months, Katherine had been imposing onto Dylan with the lie that she was Mike's wife and that Susan was the one who had stabbed her. Susan is then forced to reveal to Dylan her wedding album to which Dylan is left stunned at the fact that her mother had been lying to her this whole time. When Dylan visits her mother at her hospital, Katherine unfortunately finds herself caught up in her own lies when Dylan adds her input to her mother's stories. When Susan comes in, Katherine tries to run out of the hospital in an attempt to get to Mike. Susan and Dylan watch on as Katherine suffers a complete nervous breakdown while being restrained by hospital staff.

Lynette and Penny are cutting out coupons and Penny asks if they are poor. Since Lynette was fired, Tom is forced to drop out of school and learns that he will not be given a refund for any of his tuition. Tom tells Lynette that she should try to apologize to Gaby and Carlos. Carlos tells Gaby that if the lawsuit goes to court he will lose his job and even if it doesn't he still may lose his job. At the same time, Lynette drops by to apologize, but Gaby slams the door in her face. During the Christmas party, Lynette tries several times to apologize to Gaby, but she refuses to hear it. While singing Christmas songs, Gaby and Lynette get into a fight that results in knocking Bree to the ground, who then demands the two work out their differences. Just as the plane slides into the Christmas party, Celia is directly in the path of the plane, but Lynette quickly pushes her out of the way. The plane crashes into Santa's Workshop, with Bree, Karl and Orson inside.

The episode ends with the camera zooming onto the window of the crushed Santa hut from which a limp blood-soaked hand hangs out.

Notes

• The episode pulled in 14.86 million viewers, the second-most-watched television show that night, beating the previous high of the 14.72 million viewers of the November 15 episode "The Coffee Cup".^[2]
• The title of this episode is taken from the Sondheim show Into the Woods. The song was replaced by "Last Midnight" during the San Diego production.
• Although credited, Maiara Walsh (Ana Solis), Charlie Carver (Porter Scavo), and Mason Vale Cotton (M.J. Delfino) do not appear in this episode. Andrea Bowen (Julie Mayer) is not credited and does not appear.
• Kyle MacLachlan, who plays Orson, told E! News that he survives the plane crash: "You heard it here first! I make it through and will be returning to the show".^[3]
• The only characters shown after the plane crash are Lee McDermott and Tom Scavo. However, Susan Mayer, Mike Delfino and Katherine Mayfair were not on Wisteria Lane when the crash happened. This is the second time Susan and Mike haven't been affected by the disaster, because in Something's Coming, pregnant Susan was in the hospital after falling down the stairs.
• This is the fourth time that Lynette was the biggest victim of the housewives from the "Disaster Episodes". In season three's "Bang", she was a hostage and was shot in the arm. In season four's "Something's Coming", she nearly lost her entire family to a tornado. In season five's "City on Fire", her son Porter was accused of being the arsonist forcing the Scavos to sell their restaurant because the lawyer had to be paid. And in season six's "Boom Crunch", she saved the life of Celia Solis, but miscarried one of her unborn twins.

Reception

In 2015, Gavin Hetherington reviewed all five disaster episodes of the show, including Boom Crunch.^[4] Upon reviewing this episode, Gavin reviews it favorably though it placed fourth out of the five disaster episodes. He comments that the crash, in the moment, was exciting but was too short a disaster, but drew emphasis on Dana Delany's performance of Katherine Mayfair in this episode due to her breakdown. Dana Delany even thanked Gavin in a tweet for his review.^[5]

References

International titles

• German : Der große Krach (The great crash)
• Italian : Buon Natale (Merry Christmas)
• French: Un Noël pas comme les autres (A Christmas not like the others)
• Polish : Wesołych Świąt (Merry Christmas)
• Arabic: حادث تحطم الطائرة (Air Crash)
• Hungarian: Kő-kövön (Stone on Stone)