Welcome to our weekly recap of The Affair Season 3! Each week we’ll go over the latest developments on the show, point out Hamptons locales and scenes (when applicable), and occasionally poke some fun at the often-dark drama.

Read our recap of last week’s episode here.

This week: Remember the touching moment between father and son last week, where we kind of started to feel for Noah? Yeah, that’s about to go out the window. Brace yourself, folks.

Season 3, Episode 7

Helen
Helen drives Noah home after finding him despondent at the lake. He’s completely out of it. Helen leaves a long, harried voicemail for Nina and says she’ll take care of Noah as sets up the basement for him. Nice guy Vik is less than pleased, and asks Helen what she’s thinking. Pushing his good nature, Helen asks Vik to take a look at Noah’s wound. Vik reluctantly examines Noah, who just wants more Vicodin. After Vik refuses, he warns Helen that she can’t take care of Noah and that he needs to be in rehab. Helen appeases Noah with some Tylenol with codeine and ambien, then calls his parole officer, who has been calling nonstop. The madness continues, as Whitney shows up for a tent—she’s going camping with Furkat! Whitney quickly realizes that Noah’s in the basement and loses it with Helen. As the two fight, they realize that outside, Furkat is inexplicably beating the crap out of Noah. After breaking up the fight, Whitney asks Helen why she hates herself so much to continue to stand by Noah. After she leaves, Helen ignores a call from Nina. At dinner, Trevor talks about being cast in the school musical, Jane Eyre, and notes how it goes from being a romance to a thriller. Hearing a crash from the basement, Vik realizes Noah’s still downstairs and breaks up with Helen. Noah apologizes to Helen for causing trouble (“It wasn’t because of me, right?”) and Helen asks him why he is so self-destructive. “I forgive you,” Helen whispers to a flabbergasted Noah. The two begin to have sex, but Noah pauses. What’s going on here?

Noah
On the way home, Noah stops at Gunther’s family’s store. Gunther’s mother is there. Noah buys a knife on clearance. He asks about Gunther, and his mom notes that he never comes around anymore, having moved away a long time ago. Noah goes home with Helen, and many of the same events happen from Helen’s segment, except much more sinister. Vik is much less kind this time around, refusing him Vicodin in a much meaner way. Helen is also much stranger, acting almost like a prison ward. She bribes him with codeine so he’ll chat with her. Noah is his usual hostile self with Helen, but she takes it in stride, shrugging off his outbursts. He falls asleep and dreams of his time in prison with Gunther. The crazy Gunther wants to know why Noah had an affair and tries to get Noah to say that Gunther’s life is better than Noah’s. He refuses and earns himself 90 days in the hole. Noah wakes up after hearing Whitney’s voice and goes outside, where he meets Furkat, who punches him out after listing his grievances. A while later, Noah has a fever dream in which Gunther tries to kill him. After he snaps out of it, Helen shows up with his antibiotic and Vicodin. The two talk and she continues to tempt him with pills. Again, the two begin to have sex, but this time, Noah stops when Helen whispers, “I know you.” “You don’t know me,” he replies, before getting violent with her, despite her telling him to stop. After the deed is done, Helen turns around, crying, and Noah looks up, horrified by what just transpired.

Our Take
Did Noah just rape Helen, or is that his perception? Either way, this felt like one of the darkest episodes in the show’s history. Helen has reached a new low, if she was in fact tempting him with pills. The he said/she said has never been more fascinating. There are only three episodes left, so it will be interesting to see how (if?) the stories are wrapped up.

Oh, and fans rejoice—The Affair has just been renewed for a fourth season on Showtime!

Catch up on The Affair Season 3 here!