Tiny Pretty Things Episode 4 recap: Monqiue’s shocking romance

June and her mother battle it out on legal grounds in Tiny Pretty Things Episode 4.

It turns out Neveah isn’t the only person having nightmares about Cassie. Tiny Pretty Things Episode 4, “Dance Dance Revolution” opens with a nightclub sequence showing Cassie and June dancing — and kissing! Then Cassie offers to do shots with her roomie and June starts freaking out and subsequently jolting awake.

Outside of her dreams, things aren’t looking all that great either. Monique is not pleased with June’s emancipation plans, even if she does have Alan in her corner. “We should protect her dreams the same way we protect her body.” To put it bluntly, Monique tells June she’s not talented enough for the school to put its reputation at risk in a legal battle.

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June’s hearing is rough to watch. Her mom is well-spoken, eloquent and persuasive when discussing why she wants to send June to a preparatory school to learn skills for a “real” career.

Her mom also calls her a “glorified piece of scenery” since she isn’t good enough to get a principal role. It’s harsh, and when June gets to speak on her behalf, she tells the judge that she would rather spend her whole life dancing in the back row than turn into an ice queen who has forgotten what real passion feels like.

Over dinner, June’s mother offers June a deal. She can finish her year at Archer, and then return home — otherwise, her mother will abandon her, for all intents and purposes. Tearfully, June says goodbye. “I’ll see you in two years, when I graduate.” Later, we see her credit card getting rejected.

Tiny Pretty Things Episode 4: Cassie’s health takes a turn for the worse. How does Nabil cope?

Gushing in the afterglow of their first kiss, Neveah and Nabil are spending quite a bit of time together, taking a romantic stroll through the park and bonding. Neveah informs Nabil what she heard about there being a strange guy in a hoodie on the roof the night Cassie was pushed. Before they can start theorizing, Nabil gets a call. It’s Cassie, and it’s not good.

She has a seizure caused by sepsis. Nabil is devastated when he sees her seizing and turns to Neveah for comfort. At least, initially, then he starts feeling guilty for “betraying” Cassie by canoodling with Neveah and pushes her away.

Later, Nabil visits the roof (Why do these teens insist on rooftop retreats after what happened to Cassie? Shouldn’t it be banned or something?) and sees a memorial made in honor of Cassie. He thinks it’s a sham since barely any of her classmates have actually visited her at the hospital. He runs into June up there and presses her to tell him what she saw that night. June admits to seeing someone in a gray hoodie with a red zipper, they left via the fire escape.

Neveah tries to offers Nabil some friendly comfort later, but he tells her he doesn’t want to talk about it, with her. Ouch.

Toward the end of the hour, Nabil finds the assailant’s supposed hoodie and confronts June. He tells her she needs to show someone, but June doesn’t think there’s any point, since she’s leaving. “Then you have nothing to lose.”

Back in Cassie’s hospital room, Neveah stops by to read to Cassie from her favorite book, The Secret Garden. Nabil apologizes to her for snapping at her, he just felt bad about cheating. But Neveah points out it was just one kiss, it doesn’t have to mean anything.

Tiny Pretty Things Episode 4: Neveah convinces Bette to help her take a stand against Ramon.

While getting fitted for their Ripper costumes, Shane and Neveah gossip about the recent reviews of Delia’s ballet. While Delia was praised to the high heavens, many of the critics ripped into Ramon and his choreography. Neveah notices prints of the ballet’s concept art. The costumes are pretty risqué and she’s not thrilled by it. “It’s bad enough he wants to glorify a serial killer, but this is how he does it?” Shane echoes her sentiments, labeling Ramon a “sexist prick,” but he warns Neveah not to get into a “pissing match” with the choreographer.

As expected, Ramon’s ego has obviously taken a massive hit from the scathing reviews. He takes his frustrations out on the dancers by harshly critiquing each dancer in rehearsal. It comes to a point where it appears Ramon is hurting Bette and Oren speaks up, earning his dismissal. “Is that right Ms. Whitlaw. Was I hurting you?” “No, sir.”

Seeing Ramon’s treatment of Bette, Neveah decides to forgo Shane’s advice and takes a stand against Ramon, calling him out for being a jerk to everyone. “I get it, I’d be angry too if I just had my a** handed to me by every reviewer in Chicago.” Ramon snaps and throws a ball at Neveah, barely missing her and shattering one of the mirrors behind her. Everyone is shocked, but both Oren and Shane agree that Neveah is right. Ramon shouldn’t be treating them like this. The other girls think it’s his right as the choreographer.

Shane and Oren’s relationship is no better than it was last week. Shane finds Oren eating ice cream alone in a bathroom stall and Oren immediately lashes out at him. He tells Shane he wishes things could go back to the way things used to be, that Ramon got their casting wrong. “What me the funny fairy and you dancing the prince?” “It’s what works. For both of us.”

Neveah takes her concerns about Ramon to Monique. “No one was hurt.” “Tell that to the mirror.” Monique basically tells Neveah to get over it and “put up or shut up.”

Neveah’s next plan of action is trying to get the other girls to write down anything they’ve experienced they think is unfair. None of them are willing to bite, as Bette points out, they still dance on shoes from the 1800s. if Neveah wants change, she should “go dance contemporary.”

Unfortunately, Bette’s perspective is shared by almost all of the students. No one is willing to come forward and help her with her crusade against Ramon.

Outside of Archer, things get really weird with Delia and Ramon. Sulking in the aftermath of the critic’s harsh words, he tells Delia they can’t just go back to Paris — although he neglects the mention his threatening text messages, just that he doesn’t want the critics to win. He asks Delia to dance for him and they start getting hot and heavy, but then Ramon tells Delia that she “smells like her sister.” Ew. Delia slaps him and threatens to “cut it off” if he ever mentions Bette again.

When Ramon returns to teaching the class, the girls perform some of Bette’s fine-tuned choreography. He’s pissed and calls Bette out on impersonating a choreographer. “Darling, you’re barely even a dancer.”

Since Bette is the one in the firing line, she finally decides to do something about Ramon and teams up with Neveah. Bette has the other half of the now-infamous Cassie photo, the guy in it? Ramon. Ramon was sleeping with a student in Paris. They immediately bring it to Delia, but they don’t get the reaction they want. Delia already knew and since Ramon just choreographed her to the best reviews of her career, she’s not going to ruin his career. That leaves them with the petition option.

With Bette on Neveah’s side, it should be much easier for them to get support. Neveah also happens to mention to Bette that Shane broke things off with his booty call and has been pretty hurt by it. Bette is intrigued by this. Will she figure out that Oren was the guy he was sleeping with?

Bette later watches a basketball game between the boys and notices unmistakable tension between Shane and Oren. Later, she makes some cutting remarks to Shane that would imply she knows what went on between them.

We pivot back to Neveah, Bette and the other dancers. Bette and Neveah convince the other girls to get together and stand together as a united force instead of constantly letting Ramon turn them against each other.

In class, the girls plan a silent protest, refusing to dance or talk to Ramon. He goes to Monique and demands her to get the girls in line. Topher, Monique, Alan and Ramon argue about the best way to handle things. Alan argues that the girls aren’t part of a factory, they deserve a degree of self-determination. Monique tells Ramon to make a ballet worthy of the girls. “They’re not worthy of me.” I hate this guy.

It works though, Ripper gets canceled — at least the previous version. Ramon makes a snide comment to Neveah about ruining her career by headlining this crusade against him. But she points that his past is her future, and shows him the picture she has saved of him and Cassie.

The next day in class, Ramon says he’s remade Ripper to embody the brutality of this specific bunch of dancers and teenage gossip as a whole. There will be no leads, no story, no fancy costumes, but each dancer will be forced to wear the gray hoodie with a red zipper that was last seen on the person who attacked Cassie. “Don’t worry, I’ll make sure it fits.”

Tiny Pretty Things Episode 4: Bette turns to a surprising source to get more pain pills.

Bette is in dire need of more pain pills, but after the scene she made at the gala her mother doesn’t think she can handle any more “adult medication.” Bette will have to get creative if she wants to keep pretending her injury isn’t going to cause her serious problems down the line.

She works off some of her pent-up stress on Oren as the couple takes a page from Nabil and Neveah and relax in the park. Matteo passes by and asks Bette if she still has the flyer he gave her. Bette pretends not to know what he was talking about when Oren asks her.

Clearing her head with sex doesn’t work the way Bette intended. “I thought this would clear my head but Ramon got in there first.” Much to Oren’s annoyance, all Bette can do is obsess over Ramon’s choreography.

It also looks like Oren isn’t the only one with a wandering eye outside of his relationship with Bette. Despite dismissing Matteo at the park, Bette does make an appearance at his show to hear him perform. It doesn’t take long for Bette to reveal her motives — she’s looking for pain pills. “I figured if you weren’t the guy, maybe you know a guy?” Like that’s not insulting as heck? Matteo puts Bette in her place, faking that he is a drug dealer when in reality he just gives her some breath mints. “I came to you for help!” “You thought I was a drug dealer! What, because I’m poor? You don’t have a clue, do you?”

Bette does make amends with Matteo, apologizing to him for her judgment, explaining her desperation and injury. He later comes through for her and gets her some Vicodin.

Tiny Pretty Things Episode 4: A shocking reveal about Caleb and Monique.

So, up until Tiny Pretty Things Episode 4, I’ve been wondering what Caleb’s deal is. From his Islamophobia toward Nabil to sporadic dance appearances, he hasn’t had much of a plotline. Well, in this episode we find out why he got so pissed at Nabil last week. They’re sleeping together and have been for a while now. Why does every teen drama need some inappropriate adult/teen relationship?

What did you think of Tiny Pretty Things Episode 4?  Let us know your thoughts and opinions in the comments below!

All ten episodes of Tiny Pretty Things Season 1 are now available to stream on Netflix.