Nothing is more telling for Nashville fans than the dramatic announcer throwing out a tease before an episode begins. “TONIGHT will Juliette FALL to her DEATH?” Well, man who probably gets paid $40 an hour to record questions anyone with half a brain already know the answer to, I’m gonna guess if Nashville kills off a main character due to post-partum depression when the actress who plays that character just went into rehab for post-partum depression they’re going to have a bit of a PR disaster on their hands. I was confident that Juliette would not be fallin’ to her death tonight but I never would have predicted who did instead, and for that I simply offer up a golf clap to the writers who I’ve mercilessly harassed with these recaps.

Before I slobber all over the writers though, let’s not forget that this show is still not what it used to be and get the boring stuff that happened out of the way first. Gunnar turns into a glass case of emotion when he bangs the newly unemployed roadie and wants her to stay for pancakes, coffee and perhaps the rest of her life. Edgy roadie is like nah, I’m gonna uber home. Pls don’t call. Gunnar then gets down on his hands and knees scouring his floor for something she left behind and finds an earring and decides this means she wants him to call her. Like the lifetime movie that is Gunnar’s sad love affairs, he stalks the shit out of this girl to snag her digits and then tells her at length what he had to do to track down her number. Smooth. Obviously dying to hang out with this modern-day Romeo, who is definitely not a cr33p, she ditches their “date” and goes out with her gal pals instead. After getting intoxicated because that’s the only way she’ll sleep with Gunnar, she shows up at his door again and he cries about how she only wants to have sex. He’ll probably write a song about it one day but until then, you are a loser, Gunnar.

The woman Gunnar is actually longing for in his bed is still in Nebraska or wherever the hell she grew up in middle America with that lounge singer mom of hers, who remains dead but is still haunting us. Please go peacefully to eternal rest now, Bev and stop reincarnating in ghost memory form. The gist of Scarlett and Deacon this week is that they’re still sad about Bev’s shitty life but then they feel a little better because her friends at the lounge really loved her and miss her. Scarlett performs a Bev original at her memorial and surprise, surprise, Deacon closes his eyes for a minute too long and when the camera pans back, there’s Bev singing a couple verses. THIS BETTER BE HER SWAN SONG…FOR REAL THIS TIME. On the way back to Nashville Deacon calls his sponsor, who owns a struggling bar and asks if he can buy in JUST so he can rename it The Beverly. Deacon says this with such pride like he had the greatest light bulb of an idea and not like it’s the worst thing I’ve ever heard. We’re gonna have an alcoholic buy a bar just so he can name it after the sister whose death he’s inadvertently responsible for. Good call.

Keeping tune with decisions one will come to regret, Maddie is grounded and has her phone taken away for getting boned by Colt in a backstage trailer going onstage to sing with Juliette. She spends her time on probation doodling hearts around her and Colt’s names like someone in a mature sexual relationship would do. Her idol Marcus Keen—who has now forced Rayna to produce his album—tells Maddie she crushed it onstage and gives her a fist bump, which gives Maddie the right to revert back to her surly asshole days because she thinks her punishment is undeserving.

Marcus plays a song for Rayna then tries to fire her like she’s Avery 2.0 because she gives him feedback like a producer would do. Since Rayna is a gem and knows how to communicate with people, she finally gets through to the diva and wants to show him Maddie & Daphne’s interpretation of his song so he can stop being such a buhhole about country music. Daphne doesn’t want to sing because biddies talked shit about her the last time she did, so Maddie more than willingly rips the spotlight from her sister and performs it solo. She also steals Daphne’s celly later to call her boo, who was bored on his dad’s tour and therefore low-key got hammered by himself and stumbles up to his room to get rid of the spinsies. But seriously, no one is a more low-key drunk than Colt, whose only sign of being intoxicated is that he looks more confused than he usually does under that stupid shaggy hair of his.

And now onto our main event, the hot mess express that goes from 100 to 1 million real quick. (Obviously the phrase is 0 to 100 but she got shot up with tranquilizers recently so realistically girl has never been at 0.) At the beginning of tonight’s episode Juliette sits in a dark room crying, probably over her grossly chipped nails, then throws on some aviators and a hoodie to leave the hotel. As she’s walking across the lobby and everyone’s staring at her as if they’ve never had greasy hair that needed to be hidden before, one brave fan approaches asking for a selfie. I guess Juliette must not have been in the selfie mood because she drops the fan like a MF’er and screams and beats the shit out of her. Thank God the fan didn’t have a selfie stick as I can only imagine how quickly that would’ve been fashioned into a weapon. Either way, this fan beat down was the most exciting thing to happen in Nashville all season. It was like a world star hip-hop video in my living room as my dad and I oohed and aahed and yelled OH SHIT (that was just me.) I love watching a good girl fight from a safe distance. It was like WWE Smackdown all up in that hotel lobby and I was more than happy to pop some popcorn and watch scary Juliette with glee.

Anyway, I’m getting distracted…Luke tries to figure out why Juliette has suddenly turned into the Hulk and she responds like a teen being punished–yells LEAVE ME ALONE and shuts herself in the bathroom with a bottle of vodka. Jeff follows Luke and takes a different approach with her, a little good cop, bad cop parenting, if you will… he basically tells her she’s a waste of life and when she hurls herself at him and tries to rape him he tells her she was a one-time broom closet bang. Boom, bad copped.

Side note: I hate that Jeff is like turning his life around and trying to be a gentleman now and I’m on his side. When he delivered that sick burn to Juliette I was like YEAH, then I thought back to how he drugged his current girlfriend and left her to die facedown in his swimming pool and I’m like uh?

But whatever, he’s gunning for CEO of Luke’s new label thing with the woman whose name I still don’t know. He promises to clean this Juliette disaster up if he can get the job. Then Layla sees claw marks on his chest and immediately assumes he slept with Juliette because trust is the #1 pillar in their relationship and he informs her they’re going to move in together once he gets this job. Because when you don’t have trust in a relationship you fix it by moving to the next level. And obviously something seems like a red flag here but he gets the assaulted fan to make a public apology admitting she’s been stalking and harassing Juliette and she deserved to get several haymakers to the face and body while she lie helpless on the hotel lobby floor. So all in all, win win for everybody.

Meanwhile, Juliette mixes up a nice cocktail of uppers, downers and vodka in her room, texts Avery (who has finally been convinced by Glenn to cut her off emotionally) “I’m sorry” and goes for a little walksie on the roof. Right as she’s about to stumble off the edge, Jeff finds her, pulls her back and THEN TUMBLES TO HIS DEATH. I mean, logically I should have seen this coming as Oliver Hudson is the lead actor on a show that people actually watch and therefore probably didn’t have time to keep flying out to Nashville to film a few scenes every week…yet at the same time I wouldn’t have predicted them killing him off. Naturally just as we start to like Jeff he’s offed and I have to ask God WHYYYYY wasn’t it Zoey?!?! Or Scarlett….Or Gunnar…Really the list could go on for miles. Oh yeah, Colt witnessed this whole slow motion death scene from his balcony where he was gulping some fresh air because baby bitch can’t hold his alcohol. While his dad has relations with no-name PR or whatever lady who was REAL adamant about not mixing business and pleasure but it’s okay because Luke fired her and will rehire her in the morning after he’s been inside her all night. She really stood her ground on that one. What a strong female character.

PS Cadence, or in Will’s words “Cady” appears twice in this episode and neither time she is wailing…she even smiles once. THINGS ARE LOOKING UP FOR OUR EARS. Also if you feel like I never write about Will it’s because his story hasn’t changed in 3 weeks. He still hates being gay and would like to continue to flirt with women in public while his gay fans stay 40-60 feet away from him at all times.