‘The Couple Next Door’ Episode 3 Recap: Thank God Danny and Evie Finally Boned 

Starz‘s erotic thriller The Couple Next Door has been teasing couple swapping for weeks now and at long last it finally happened! The Couple Next Door Episode 3 “Blurred Boundaries” follows what happens with hot polyamorous couple Danny (Sam Heughan) and Becka (Jessica De Gouw) finally get Evie (Eleanor Tomlinson) and Pete (Alfred Enoch) where they want them: in a luxurious suite, drunk, and ready to bone…

**Spoilers for The Couple Next Door Episode 3 “Blurred Boundaries,” now streaming on Starz**

Now, we know all too well that Evie is dying to have sex with Danny. She’s nonstop fantasizing about the hunky motorcycle cop and making her own moves heavily hinting to pal Becka that, yeah, she and hubby Pete are totally up for a couple swap across the cul de sac (even if Pete is totally not).

So when Becka invites Evie and Pete to join her and Danny for an all-expense trip to a local resort, Evie believes her prayers have been answered by her creepy family’s cult god. This week’s episode of The Couple Next Door ends with an initially sexy sequence where the two couples flirtatiously broach the topic of swinging with each other. Pete reluctantly lets the gorgeous Becka come to him while Danny and Evie happily abscond to a private bedroom to get it on. Pete, wet blanket that he is, refuses to go further than a topless makeout sesh with Becka. Evie, on the other hand, lies about being on birth control when Danny’s condom breaks. Who knows what will happen in future episodes, but where I’m from, that level of foreshadowing all but ensures that she will get pregnant with the fertile cop’s sperm. Ack!

Elsewhere in this week’s Couple Next Door, Pete got even closer to connecting his incredibly boring journalistic investigation to Danny’s side hustle, Danny finally got to meet his cute kid Oliver, and Evie mistook mating foxes for women in trouble.

Things also got complicated with the neighborhood sex creep Alan (Hugh Dennis). Because he posted Becka’s private sex tapes online, he managed to get the judgy mums in her yoga class to turn on the hot Aussie. However, Alan didn’t get off Scot free with his revenge porn scheme. Wife Jean (Kate Robbins) finally managed to get a chairlift installed so she’s fully aware of her gross husband’s obsession with Becka. The episode ends with Becka learning she’s been publicly shamed just as Jean uses Alan’s telescope to watch him masturbate himself into a health crisis in Becka and Danny’s house!

So what else happened in this week’s installment of The Couple Next Door? Here are five moments we can’t stop thinking about in The Couple Next Door Episode 3 “Blurred Boundaries”…

1. Does Evie Want Danny? Or Simply To Make Pete a Cuck?

   Okay, of course Evie wants to bone Danny. That’s been the subtext and overt text of nearly every minute of The Couple Next Door so far. However, as I was carefully watching Evie’s main Danny fantasy this week — as one does — I noticed that what really turned her on seemed to be the idea of Pete watching her make out with Danny. 

   So what is it? Does Evie covet Danny’s hot body? Or does she covet the idea of cucking Pete? Does Evie like Danny because he’s a handsome alpha man? Or because he’s a handsome alpha man who makes Pete feel insecure? 

   Am I overthinking this? Probably! Is Pete clearly a participant in Evie’s fantasies of Danny? Absolutely! 

2. Ask Me How I Knew a Man Wrote This Show

   Maybe the most unrealistic part of The Couple Next Door — you know, besides the black market diamond empire in suburban Leeds, the old school milkman, or even the show’s insistence that Pete is not empirically fit — is how Becka’s yoga students respond to creepy Alan’s revenge porn scheme. In my personal experience, women wouldn’t just…quit on a popular woman for an anonymous troll linking revenge porn on their account? If I saw a weird link to my fave SoulCycle instructor, yoga teacher, or HIIT trainer’s personal sex photos pop up on their Instagram comments, I would rightfully assume they had been the victim of some messed up psycho’s disgusting games.

   I feel like the knee jerk retort to this would probably be something like, “Oh, but Becka’s followers are suburban housewives, ergo they are conservative and closed-minded.” Okay, but as a woman, let me assure you in that case those ladies wouldn’t publicly pile on Becka. If they were truly scandalized, they would conduct a quieter, dirtier war of attrition behind her back.

   Let’s just say, I’m not shocked that all six episodes of this show were written by a guy, David Allison.

3. Thank You, Intimacy Coordinators

   One of the most meaningful changes in the industry over the last decade has got to be the inclusion of intimacy coordinators on sets. Couple Next Door star Sam Heughan understandably sang the praises of Vanessa Coffey, his intimacy coordinator of choice, when DECIDER chatted with him this month. People like Coffey not only help the actors feel safe on set, but allow the inclusion of creative ideas to the process of staging these intimate moments for their characters.

   Case in point: the phallic champagne bottle. It’s a funny sight gag and it has to 100% be something that Heughan thought Danny would get a kick out of. (If I’m wrong and it was scripted, all praise goes instead to writer David Allison, who may not understand the delicate political balance of feminine friendships, but gets silly jokes.)

4. Never Underestimate the Power of a Chairlift

   I’ve said it before and I will say it again: I hate Alan the creep. (He is sooooo creepy!!!!) So when Alan’s wife finally got her chairlift installed, I was stoked. Then, the way she slowly, dramatically uses it to ascend to the upstairs, where she immediately discovers his gross stash of spy gear? DIVA!

   The chairlift was a moment of triumph and comedy for me, because as long as we’ve waited for its installation, Jean really took her sweet time patiently letting it scoot her up to Alan’s den of disgusting deeds.

5. Why Doesn’t Danny Simply Get a Vasectomy?

   I’ve been thinking about this too much, but in lieu of what I’m calling “Chekhov’s condom break” — like, come on, the foreshadowing is all there! — I have to wonder why Danny hasn’t considered getting a vasectomy.

   Even if you totally ignore the fact that Danny’s been forced to turn to criminal activity to pay child support in secret, this is a guy with a vested interest in ensuring he’s shooting blanks. He knows he’s fertile. He also knows he and his wife like to dabble in polyamory. Wouldn’t it behoove him to undergo a totally reversible procedure to ensure there are no more crimes he has to commit to financially support any additional by-products of his sexy fun times?

   Again, I fear I think too much and too hard for a show as effervescently light as The Couple Next Door, but this is what I do. I watch sexy television shows and I think too much about them.