The Chair Season 1 Episode 3 Recap – The Town Hall

While on their way to a meeting with the Dean and the Chief of Communications, Ronny, to mitigate the issue surrounding Bill, Ji-Yoon tells Bill to take things seriously. Once there, Paul and Ronny suggest that the best course of action is for Ronny and Bill to write an apology letter. Bill says he doesn’t co-write and believes he will be better off talking to the students. He maintains that he is not violating the faculty conduct because he is not a Nazi and does not joke about the Nazis. He asks Ji-Yoon if they will still have coffee, but Ji-Yoon says she’ll catch up with him. Paul tells Ji-Yoon that the situation needs to be rectified soon because the president has been receiving calls from donors and alumni, and he might ask for his resignation if things don’t get better.

Ji-Yoon confronts Bill for being arrogant and not wanting to do an apology letter. She adds that he has to realize that there are consequences to his actions.

Lila comes to Ji-Yoon’s office, asking her what she will say to reporters who have been calling her. Ji-Yoon says that she should not say anything because what happened was a bad joke, and Bill is about to apologize.

Elliot discusses Melville and Moby-Dick when a student asks if they will discuss Melville being a wife-beater. Elliot refuses to discuss this and says that they should focus on the text itself and Melville as an author rather than Melville as a human being. He continues to discuss despite the class wanting to cover the wife-beating aspect. Yazmin butts in and says that she’ll cover the topic in her section, including the contributions of other women in Melville’s life.

BIll’s Death and Modernism class gets postponed until further notice. He asks Lila to help him spread flyers of a Town Hall where he would like to speak with students. She helps him, and the announcement reaches Dafna.

While Ji-Yoon studies the list handed to him by the dean, Joan barges into her office and tells her that there is no Wi-Fi in the place where her new office has been transferred. Joan asks her to come with her so that she can pull her weight in the tech support. She says she can’t come because she has work to do, but she offers Joan her desk instead. Joan does not take her desk and instead lies on the couch. Ji-Yoon asks her if she thinks Bill having a town hall with the students is a great idea, and Joan says it is because the students love him.

Dafna comes to Bill’s office and closes the door. He is about to open the door again, but he gets distracted when Dafna says that the town hall will be a bloodbath. She explains that the issue is bigger than the school and that the meme has spread nationally. Ji-Yoon comes, so Bill asks Dafna to leave. Ji-Yoon tells him he should have opened the door and that he’s trouble. She then proceeds to ask him a favor. She says that she has nothing with Paul that night and he needs to take care of Ju Ju.

Joan comes to the IT department to report her Wi-Fi. The guy there says that he can get her a booster, but the chair needs to fill out paperwork. Exhausted, Jan walks away. She gets into her office and sets the student eval forms on fire. She throws them in the trash bin and creates a fire. She puts the fire out using the fire extinguisher, so her office becomes a mess. Another guy from IT comes and helps her with her Wi-Fi. After connecting her to the Wi-Fi, she asks him to read some of her students’ evaluations on RateMyProfessors.com. She asks him to read only what’s helpful, but all he finds there are harsh words and negative feedback. One particular feedback enrages Joan, so she asks the IT guy if she can trace who gave that feedback. The IT guy says he can trace that student, but that would be illegal.

Ji-Yoon eats dinner with Paul and Mrs. Whittenden, a trustee who endows the fund for the Distinguished Lectureship. Mrs. Whittenden tells Ji-Yoon that she has convinced David Duchovny, an actor, to do the Distinguished Lectureship. Ji-Yoon tells her that she has already announced that Yazmin will do the lecture because she thought the decision was the chair’s. Paul instructs Ji-Yoon to find an office for David on campus. After dinner, Ji-Yoon tells Paul she has Yazmin, a real faculty with real credentials who needs support. She tells Paul that David isn’t even an academic and that they should at least get a real writer. Paul tells her that David is a NY Times bestselling author. Ji-Yoon refuses to believe this, so Paul tells her to look David up.

Bill spends the night with Ju Ju. While reading a book, Ju Ju says she’ll have a baby at 25 because she doesn’t want to be really old like Ji-Yoon, who’s already turning 47, and she’ll be married. Bill tells Ju Ju that Ji-Yoon had to wait two years to get her and that she had to jump through many hoops. Ju Ju says that her teacher told her that she would lead the class for Dia de Los Muertos.

Ji-Yoon comes home and finds Bill sleeping on the floor with his hand holding Ju Ju’s. Ji-Yoon motions him to the kitchen, only to find out that he has already done her dishes. She asks Bill to tell her what he will say during the town hall, but he does not take her seriously. Instead, he shows her an article about David, and they verify that he indeed is a bestselling author.

A staff tells Paul that the tents for the donor event cannot be put up in the main quad because students are gathered there because of Bill’s town hall. Paul instructs him to start setting up after the town hall and bring the campus police to keep the quad clear after the students disperse.

Bill’s town hall starts on a good note but does not end nicely. He tells them that what he did is not the same as propagating neo-Nazism ad that what happened was a willful misrecognition of a hand gesture. The students say to him that they always get accused of being inaccurate. He tries to apologize, but the students are not satisfied with his apology. The dean comes to see how the town hall is going, and the students accuse him of supporting Bill. They also see the campus police and accuse Bill of calling the police for backup. They chant “No Nazis at Pembroke” and “Dobson Out.”