The Affair Review: 407 (Season 4 Episode 7 )

The Affair Season 4 Episode 7, “407,” takes us into the home stretch. The boys begin their road trip to find Alison. Before that, we’re officially not sure if anything matters.

At the beginning of the season, LA was an interesting place for Noah and Helen to begin. We were hoping it wasn’t the endpoint. We were hoping for the Hamptons to be the endpoint.

The Affair was best in the first season, which is never a viewer’s hope. Ideally, we want our shows to get better and better and end on a high note, while not overstaying their welcome.

This show has gotten farther and farther from its core with each respective season. We were giving Season 4 and L.A. a chance because it was closer to the show’s first storyline and physical location than Season 3’s arc of Noah in Paris.

But Helen Solloway at a spiritual retreat in California?

We understand the point. She has enough motive to go, a journey while she’s  there, and a clear awakening to lead her back home.

We just wish the show would do a better job of helping us understand why we should care.

So, Helen doesn’t want Vic to die, and even though Vic has been acting like he’s given up all season, he doesn’t want to die either. This isn’t exactly surprising. But we want to know why any of it matters.

What does Vic’s cancer and Helen going into menopause have to do with Alison or Cole or even Noah?

The first season of The Affair centered around one affair that affected four people’s lives.

The actual affair was a flashback from years before, but there were stakes in the present day incident too. Someone had killed Scottie Lockhart, it could’ve been any of the four people affected by Alison and Noah’s affair, and each week a new detail of their current lives made the stakes of it all more intriguing.

As soon as Noah stood up in court and confessed to protect Helen, or as soon as Helen confessed to driving the car that killed Scottie to her parents, or as soon as Noah and Alison divorced, the threads that connected the four lives were completely cut off.

There were a couple of seasons of good material because everyone was connected, but they sped through it all so fast.

Now? Cole is the only person truly affected by Alison’s disappearance. So, Alison matters this season.

Cole also does because he’s finally ready to admit he’s in love with her. He has a stake in her being okay beyond the fact that he has a kid with her. Luisa matters too, because she’s married to Cole.

Noah and Helen really have no stake in the bigger conflict, even though they have their own personal shit to figure out. One of their perspectives could’ve been swapped out for Luisa’s to tighten up the season.

But “407” makes it clear that even just connecting Helen and Noah’s stories to each other more clearly would improve the show’s quality.

The Affair could focus a little bit more on Trevor’s journey to understand his sexuality. It would make more sense than having Noah take Anton across the country to visit a college for his boss/the woman he’s hooking up with.

At the beginning of the season, we were excited to learn how Anton influences Noah’s life. We’d love to get to know him, but so far his only purpose has been to literally get Noah on the road to finding Alison, and to strengthen Noah’s connection to the woman he’s hooking up with this season.

Even though Sierra going down on Helen had very little point, at least it’s weird that both Vic and Helen have both cheated on each other with the same person. At least when they find out, there will be a really messed up fight.

It is actually disappointing that Helen doesn’t figure it out this episode. She’s smart enough to catch the hints Sierra drops.

Noah hooking up with Janelle has no real story behind it. It’s just something that’s happening.

This season’s stories aren’t going to suddenly change in the three episodes that are left. We only hope that the four (or five or six) perspectives that we’re being shown this season come a little bit closer together.

While is definitely good to see Helen relax a bit on her retreat, we wish we could see what this journey means for the bigger picture of The Affair.

It would’ve been nice to be excited by something about this episode. I wish I was struck by someone’s acting performance, or that I cared more about Sierra going down on Helen than to ask “So what?”

It would’ve been refreshing if Helen being allergic to sage was mentioned for any reason besides making a random reference to season one, but it wasn’t.

We’re holding out hope for this season to feel like it has a point. But, we’re definitely not going to find it in Helen or Noah’s stories.

What did you think of the episode? Leave your thoughts in the comments below!

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The Affair airs Sundays at 9/8c on Showtime.

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