Smoke Recap ‘Strawberry’: Nobody knows Dave

In the fourth episode of Apple TV+’s Smoke, Calderone discovers that Gudsen has had previous police partners, including one who suspected him of being an arsonist.

Smoke Season 1 Episode 4 Recap and Review

For the briefest of moments, Gudsen allowed Calderone to see who he was, interestingly, whilst wearing another disguise. Calderone had attended one of Gudsen’s rather informative and entertaining fire lectures. He had an arson investigator conference coming up out of town, and Calderone casually said she wanted to come. Gudsen played the naughty horny co-worker and mentioned he got a suite, an effective and rather obvious way to get Calderone to back off.

Did Gudsen already suspect that his partner suspected him? Perhaps his caution was little more than wanting some time away and privacy to do what he wanted. Perhaps he was wary of a partner following Ezra Esposito's voiced conviction that he was an arsonist.

Calderone had to get Harvey Englehart drunk to finagle that bit of information out of him, after finding Esposito’s old cards stuck inside the desk she now occupied. Calderone didn’t have details yet, but she now knew she was not alone in her suspicions. 

All this was happening whilst Gudsen faced more stress at home. His efforts to connect with young Emmett fell through when he forgot to pick him up after practice, and instead of apologising to his very upset wife, he tried to justify his thoughtlessness. Husband and wife argued loudly without realising that Emmett, who got a ride from Calderone, was already home and could hear them. In her anger, Ashley touched on a sore spot, Gudsen’s writing, and told him his book was ‘mediocre, pedestrian, predictable’. Ouch. 

And so Gudsen went to his go-to place to de-stress, the potato chip aisle of the grocery store. Only this time, a woman flirted with him and took him to her home, where they engaged in some BDSM. Gudsen got to indulge his fire fascination via 'streaking', which I’m not going to Google but suffice to say, though his lady friend was initially frightened, she got into it once she was certain she would not get hurt. 

We are deep into the whydunit of Smoke, and that meant seeing more of Gudsen’s internal life. In theory, an episode like this ought to be darkly compelling. ‘Strawberry’ felt a bit disjointed, kept afloat mostly by the always excellent cast, especially Taron Egerton and Jurnee Smollett . 

Though his scenes were briefer, the episode did better with showing the slow, dark descent of Freddy Fasano back into his serial arsonist ways. The promotion he wanted was not going to happen. He returned to the salon, to the kind woman who introduced him to hope, and asked that she change his haircut and make it so that no one could see him again. She waited for him to come back after hours, but he never did. Instead, he shaved his own head, and got on with preparing multiple ‘milk jugs’ wrapped in black plastic. 

Smoke is in a challenging place where it is not a breezy procedural, but it is also not quite and not yet the character study that it seems to aim to be. When I think of individual scenes – Gudsen telling Calderone about his mother disappearing when he was 15, Gudsen and his wife loudly arguing, Gudsen’s mask drop when Calderone suggested joining him out of town, Gusen’s dark dance with his lover handcuffed to her bed – they were executed very well. Viewed as a single continuous episode, however, the story did not flow as smoothly as I thought it would by now. But, I’m still hooked and I look forward to next week’s episode.     

Rating: B

Strays

🧑‍🚒Word of the episode: transmogrification - to change or alter greatly and often with grotesque or humorous effect

🧑‍🚒Young Emmett listened to Gudsen’s recording of his book and was disgusted. He was the one who casually told Calderone that nobody really knew his stepfather.

🧑‍🚒Calderone had the idea of using bird tags attached to black plastic bags to hopefully track the Milk Jug arsonist. 

🧑‍🚒Files concerning Esposito were sealed due to a gag order. Based on what Harvey told Calderone, he accidentally shot himself on the foot during target practice, was fired, sued the department, and retired with full benefits and pension. 

🧑‍🚒Gudsen’s glasses are fake?

You can access Recap Lab’s coverage of Smoke via this link.

Episode Title: Strawberry

Episode Writers: Molly Miller and Kary Antholis

Episode Director: Joe Chappelle

Original Air Date: July 11, 2025

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