Land Of Women episode 2 on Apple TV Plus opens with a flashback to a year previously, where Gala (Eva Longoria) is sitting on the floor of her luxurious New York apartment and on the phone to daughter Kate (Victoria Bazúa), who was apparently just starting at boarding school at this point in time.
Gala is attempting to do the whole helicopter parenting thing remotely, and Kate is gently trying to persuade her mom to give her a bit of space while she's trying to settle in. Gala's clearly suffering from a touch of empty nest syndrome, so Kate suggests she find something to fill her time: a pottery class, perhaps, or starting a business, or "a long trip with Dad". Gala, deliberately not taking the hint, proposes that their long trip could be coming to visit Kate next weekend, and Kate, arriving late for art class, tells her mom that she to go — and this appears to be her first meeting with future girlfriend Maggie (Layna Sheppard).
Gala voices over that "sometimes our greatest adventures begin with the most unexpected of moments: a chance encounter with a stranger, a feeling of helplessness when someone we love begins to slip away. We never ask to go on the journey, but ultimately it reveals the truths we desperately needed to confront..."
And that brings us nicely back to present-day La Muga...
Small town girl
Gala, Kate and Julia (Carmen Maura) are still in the cell, and Gala is trying to think of a way to get them out. Kate suggests they call her dad, which Gala vaguely dodges without revealing that Fred has also fled for his life and she doesn't currently know where he is. Fortunately, they're spared from having to spend any more time coming up with a plan as Andreu (Pep Antón Muñoz) arrives to release them, explaining that Amat (Santiago Cabrera) felt sorry for them and won't be pressing charges, which Gala is characteristically ungracious about.
Andreu says he doesn't want to see them again — not at the station, anyway, and another brief flashback to that time he and Julia did some naked smooching in the river as teenagers suggests that he wouldn't mind seeing Julia again in that context. As they leave, Andreu tells Julia it's been lovely to see her again, and to meet Gala and Kate. Julia, however, doesn't seem quite so keen to rekindle their teenage years and bids him a hasty goodbye, bopping him on the cheek with her knuckles in what would appear to be a pretty clear friendzoning. Poor Andreu.
As they walk away, Gala wants to know Julia's history with Andreu, but Julia dismisses her with a blithe "this is a small town, honey, we all know each other" — and as they pass various other men in the street, it appears she had quite a lot of... friends when she was younger. Kate asks if they can go home now, and Gala says there are two things they need to do before they can do that: get the car, and get their money. (Also eliminate the threat from the hired goons, but given that she's not told Julia and Kate about that part yet, we can understand why she's choosing to omit that detail.) Kate volunteers to take care of the car by contacting the mechanic that Amat told them about in the last episode, so Gala suggests that she and Julia go to speak to Amat and they can meet in the bar in an hour.
On the way to Amat's house, Gala and Julia pass Amat and his entirely female workforce in the vineyard, and Gala tries to duck out of sight so they can get to the house without being seen and grab the money — which Julia assumes is drug-trafficking money. When they reach the house, Julia shows Gala the low-ceilinged tunnel into the cellar that she used to sneak out when she was younger, and Gala — who has dressed, impractically, entirely in white — is reluctant to go through it.
Once inside, Julia has a little bit of fun with her daughter by pretending she can't remember where she stashed the money — but when they find the bag, the money really isn't there.
Family matters
Kate arrives at the garage, and is surprised when the resident mechanic turns out to be an attractive young woman (María De Nati). They head out to collect the car, and on the way the mechanic tells Kate that Julia is a legend in the town, and asks whereabouts in America Kate is from, since she has a weird accent. Kate explains she was raised in Mexico before they moved to New York, and now she's at a boarding school in Rhode Island — but she's hoping to go away to college to study art. The mechanic tells her that she studied abroad in Berlin, although she didn't do much actual studying — but she had to come back after her mother passed away, because she didn't want to leave her dad, who owns the garage, alone. She asks about Kate's dad, and Kate goes misty-eyed as she flashes back to a memory of being in the car with Fred and Gala, on the way to meet Maggie's parents, Tony and Sophie.
In the flashback, the two families have a slightly awkward lunch together, where Tony and Fred bond slightly over the fact that they work in similar fields (Tony's in construction, Fred's in real estate development), and afterwards Sophie and Gala have a Mom Chat in the kitchen where Sophie asks Gala how she handled Kate coming out as a lesbian, saying that they struggled with Maggie's sexuality because Tony is Catholic. Later, Maggie and Gala meet in the bathroom where Gala suggests that Kate date around a bit in order to find the best person for her, which doesn't land well with Kate. She storms outside to speak to her dad, saying that Gala is incapable of listening to her and has no empathy. Fred reminds Kate about the day she told them that she was going to transition — he struggled with it, but it was Gala who told him that if he had any problem with it, then they were his problems and not Kate's. He admits that he did have problems at the time, because he didn't really understand what she was going through and he was afraid he wouldn't be able to protect her. He assures her that all he and Gala ever wanted was to protect her, and they hug.
Back in the present day, Kate borrows the mechanic's phone to call Maggie and tell her that she needs to get away. Maggie says that she'll get her dad to buy Kate a ticket home, and all she needs to do is get to the airport. Kate asks the mechanic — whose name we still do not know — to drive her there.
Sour grapes
Gala goes to find Amat in the vineyard to ask where her money is. She tries to shame him in front of all the women of La Muga who are working in the vineyard by publicly calling him a thief, but they aren't on her side: Amat has spent the money on a new tractor and equipment for the vineyard, and as far as the locals are all concerned, Gala owed them that money after ruining an entire crop of grapes the day before with her careless driving. Gala, displaying an almost impressive inability to read a room (well, a field), continues to shout at Amat and the women, demanding her money back. Amat offers to call the police, as long as she's happy to explain where the $50,000 came from in the first place. Gala grudgingly backs down, and Amat drives off in his tractor - splattering her white outfit with mud. At least we hope it's mud.
Gala and Julia return to the bar, where Gala immediately makes for the bathroom to clean herself up while the rest of the patrons openly stare at Julia. In the bathroom, Gala tries to call Fred, but he isn't picking up. When she returns, Montse (Ariadna Gil) pours Gala and Julia a glass of the local wine made by the cooperative. Wine expert Gala pulls a face, and Montse admits that the current vintage is not their best work. She offers up a toast to Gala and Julia as newcomers who spent their first night in La Muga in jail, and Gala immediately pivots to her favourite subject: how much she hates Amat. Julia airily says that she rather likes him, but Gala insists that he stole from them. (Gala, seriously, your beef here is with Mariona, not Amat — she's the one who sold the house without permission. Take it up with her!) Montse says that she thought Amat was rude when he first came to town, but he worked hard to help the cooperative and earn everyone's trust. Also — and this is the crucial bit — the word on the grapevine (pun fully intended, yes) is that when he bought the house, Mariona told him that Julia was dead and that she was the sole owner.
To bee or not to bee
Having found an entirely new (and more fitting) target for her righteous anger, Gala goes to Mariona's house and starts banging on the door — only for Andreu to open the door. Gala's surprised to see him there, especially when he reveals it's his house. Realising she was jailed by her uncle of all people, Gala is furious once again and barges her way in to have it out with Mariona — although she pulls up short when she spots Mariona (Gloria Muñoz) in the garden surrounded by bees as she tends to her hives. Andreu wisely makes himself scarce, and Mariona asks what they want. Gala tells her that it was illegal of her to sell the house in the way she did, to which Mariona responds that it's perfectly legal to declare someone dead if they've been missing for more than five years — and it's been 40 years since she last heard from Julia. This is news to Gala, because Julia told her that she still talked to her sister from time to time, and Julia plays up the "oh, my poor elderly brain gets confused sometimes" angle that she leans on heavily every time anyone asks her an awkward question. Gala asks Mariona if she might at least put the bees away while they're having this conversation, but Mariona clearly quite likes having this eco-friendly barrier between them. Gala tries to plead her mum's case — that she was a scared, pregnant young woman who ran away and ended up on her own when Gala's father died. Mariona scoffs at this idealised picture of Julia as a virtuous widow and tells them both to get out.
As they're beating a retreat, Gala asks Julia what Mariona meant by that, and Julia dismisses Mariona's comments as nonsense, spoken in anger. Julia assures her daughter that the story she's always told her is still true: Gala's father died before she was born. Gala, no longer buying this, tells her mom to prove it.
The plot thickens
Julia takes Gala to a cemetery, where she lifts some flowers from one of the other plots to drop on a grave with no headstone and tells Gala the story of how her father died by drowning. Gala waits for her to finish and points out that Julia previously told her that her father died of a heart attack. Julia pivots and says it was a heart attack caused by the fear of drowning, and adds that he died without ever knowing she was pregnant. Gala, still not buying any of this, squats down and rubs the surface dirt off the grave to reveal a marker saying whoever's in there died in 1912. To be fair, Gala's looking pretty good for someone who's apparently around 112 years old.
Julia has a flashback of the doctor telling her that she's pregnant, to her obvious horror. He tells the younger Julia (Helena Ezquerro) that she'll start showing in a few weeks and the neighbours will be gossiping, and suggests she tell the father and her parents. Julia panics.
Back in the present day, Gala demands to know who her father is, and Julia admits she doesn't know: "I was pretty busy back then. I had several suitors." (Is anyone else expecting the two of them to burst into an ABBA song round about now?)
As they make their way back into town, Julia explains that she left because she wouldn't have been allowed to raise Gala as a single mother, and she didn't want to be separated from her daughter. She also wanted to protect Mariona, presumably by not being associated with the public shame of having an unwed mother in the family. She claims that she did make several attempts to call Mariona and explain, but it got harder every time she tried. Their argument is interrupted by the mechanic's tow truck passing with their car. She eventually catches up with the mechanic outside the garage, who tells Gala that the car is pretty badly damaged and she's not sure she'll be able to repair it. She also tells Gala that Kate's gone to the airport to catch a flight home, so Gala panics and asks her for a lift. The mechanic points out that she is not operating a taxi service and, spotting Amat sitting outside the bar, suggests he can take them instead.
Flight risk
On the way to the airport, Gala and Julia resume their argument. Julia points out to Gala that she can't just expect a young girl like Kate to start a new life, in a new country, far away from all of her friends at the drop of a hat — and she's clearly missing her father. She adds that it's clearly Fred's fault they've all ended up here, and asks Gala what's going on. Gala declines to answer, instead telling Amat that she just found out that her father isn't dead (that they know of, anyway) and could be any one of number of men in La Muga.
Arriving at the airport, Gala leaves Amat and Julia outside in the car (despite protestations from both of them) while she runs in to look for Kate. Except she doesn't get very far, because she doesn't have a ticket, so she runs outside to ask her mother for money. Julia hasn't got any, and suggests that Kate getting back to her old life and her girlfriend wouldn't be such a bad thing. Gala, knowing full well why that would be a very bad thing, gets increasingly frantic and Amat hands her a wad of cash to buy a ticket. Gala, gracious as always, sarcastically thanks him for "letting me borrow my money".
Finally gaining access to the airport, she runs to the gate where a flight is about to leave for Boston, and finds Kate. Kate tells Gala that it's fine if she can't afford to pay her school fees any more — she'll get a job or a scholarship, but she can't leave her old life or Maggie. By this point, they're scanning their tickets to board the plane (wait a second, was Amat just casually carrying around enough cash for Gala to buy a last-minute plane ticket from Barcelona to Boston?? Gala, sweetie, all you needed was a ticket, any ticket, to get through security. Why not a domestic flight? It would have been much cheaper!) and Gala, out of options and desperate, tells Kate about the very dangerous men that Fred borrowed money from and that it's not safe for her to go back home right now. She promises her daughter that this is the whole truth, and she just needs her to stay long enough to formulate a plan to keep them all safe.
Wine and wisdom
Gala takes Kate back to Amat's car, and he asks where he should take them. Gala, unusually cowed, says she doesn't know: they have no home and no money. She walks off tearfully and Amat goes after her. He tells her he's sure he's going to regret this, but they can stay with him — he knows how it feels to be desperate. He sits on the kerb next to her and says that the cooperative — which the whole town relies upon — is going through a rough time, and that's why he took her money, even though he knew it was the wrong thing to do. He promises to pay her back with the money they'll make from the wine, if she can give him a couple of months. She asks if it's the same wine they serve at the bar, and when he confirms that it is, she tells him that he'll never make her money back — the wine is awful. However, the grapes are good, and she's got the expertise to help him make better wine, so there's still a chance to salvage things. They shake on a tentative deal.
Back at the house, Amat shows them into the room where they can stay, which is filled with junk. Gala and Kate are unimpressed, but Julia is delighted — it was hers and Mariona's bedroom back in the day. In a flashback, it's the middle of the night and Julia is telling Mariona (Carla Campra) that she's leaving to go to America. Mariona wants to go with her, saying that she can't live without her sister. Julia says that she doesn't want to be parted from Mariona either, and suggests she goes first to find somewhere to live, and promises Mariona can join her when she's settled.
Meanwhile, in Boston, poor, poor Maggie is waiting at the airport and slowly realising that Kate wasn't on the plane. (Really, Kate? You didn't even call her to say you weren't coming? You didn't think that was an important thing that your girlfriend might need to know?) She calls her father in a panic, saying that Kate didn't get on the plane and she's worried that she's in trouble. Tony asks if she knows her Kate is, and Maggie says that all she knows is that Kate's in "some wine town in Catalonia" with her mother and grandmother. Tony tells her not to panic and assures her Kate will be in touch soon. He hangs up, and it turns out — plot twist — Tony is the dangerous man who Fred owes money to!
Back in La Muga, Amat has made a delicious-looking dinner for his houseguests. He goes out to sit in the garden with his dog while they eat, but not without casting a wistful look back at Gala...
