WARNING: The following article contains spoilers for Mayans M.C. Season 3, Episode 9, "The House of Death Floats By," which aired Tuesday on FX.
The previous episode of Mayans M.C., "A Mixed-Up and Splendid Rescue," set up a lot of potential directions and deaths for Season 3's final two episodes, especially since Miguel Galindo discovered the truth about his mother's death. Now, those plotlines come to a bloody head in "The House of Death Floats By." Here's a spoiler-filled recap of what happened in the episode.
"The House of Death Floats By" opens with EZ in jail after assaulting two men who were harassing Gaby. EZ soon gets out, where he's met by his brother, Angel Reyes. Angel apologizes for his bad behavior at the brunch EZ and Gaby held for the family, revealing that he was breaking down as a result of having seen Adelita a few days prior. Angel then explains that his son with Adelita died and expresses his insecurities about everything that's happened. And soon after, Angel tells EZ that Nails is pregnant, which he believes is his second chance to be a father. EZ, for his part, tells Angel he'll be a good father, though he really needs to start using a condom considering just how many women he's gotten pregnant.
Following that meeting, EZ goes to see Felipe Reyes at his butcher shop. An irate Felipe interrogates EZ about accidentally hitting Gaby during the aforementioned confrontation. When the older man asks why EZ did what he did, the young biker talks about Goya's "The Dog," in which one of the painting's titular good boys is about to get swallowed up by a wave and drown. "I've always felt like I'm about to be swallowed up by something, "EZ says. "Pop, I spent my whole life trying to lock it away, but now the things I've got to do for the club, the things that I've done [...] Gaby, she feels like a lifeline. I can't lose her, Pop." EZ then leaves to find Gaby.
When EZ gets to Gaby's house, she initially tries to pretend like she isn't home. However, as EZ starts walking away, Gaby comes out of the house. EZ tries to get close to Gaby and apologize. And while she acknowledges what happened was an accident, Gaby says, "Last night had nothing to do with me. I asked you to stop, EZ. [...] Don't say you did it for me. I couldn't live with that." Gaby then tells EZ about the real violence she's faced in her life and affirms her desire to never have to live through those things again, which means breaking up with him and leaving for Lodi and nursing school. "I love you," Gaby says. "And if you love me, you'll let me go." She then walks back into the house as a devastated EZ looks on.
Coco's harrowing story of drug addiction continues to run parallel to the main story, and in "The House of Death Floats By," his story takes a decidedly awful turn. Waking up after starting the process of getting clean, Coco finds Leticia in the living room, having cleaned the house while he slept. She then apologizes to Coco for what she said to him just prior to his overdose and explains that she's made a list of real rehabs for him to go to.
While Leticia thinks Coco's Mayan brothers would help pay for rehab, he responds that telling them about his drug addiction would be a death sentence. Things collapse again when Leticia tells Coco that Hope has left, as he believes she did something to make her leave. Coco then realizes that Isaac -- who has been blackmailing the Santo Padre Mayan -- is going to make good on his threat of killing her. As an armed Coco leaves for Meth Mountain, Leticia begs him not to choose Hope over her.
At Meth Mountain, Coco goes into Hope's trailer, where he finds her passed out with several other people. He picks her up and starts to take her away, but once he exits the trailer, a woman ambushes him, holding a shotgun to his head while a man takes Coco's gun and Hope. Isaac then ties Coco up and tells him that, essentially, hooking people and bringing them into his circle is something Hope does accidentally. Isaac then injects Coco with heroin and promises to torture him as a result of all of the things he's done.
The action then moves to Emily Galindo, who has bruises on her neck from Miguel choking her during sex the night before, taking her morning medication. Soon after, Emily goes for a run, and when she comes back, her sister, Erin, is waiting for her. Erin asks Emily about the marks on her neck, thinking that it might be the result of abuse. "You think that wedding ring protects you from what he really is," she says. However, Emily responds by saying she knows who Miguel is and what he does. Erin tries to reach out to Emily and appeal to her through her own life experience. Emily, though, becomes angry at what her sister is saying. She pulls out her cheque book and gives Erin a blank cheque. Erin, though, replies that she came to help her sister, not for her money, and storms out.
As that's going on, Miguel calls in Marcus Álvarez for a meeting, revealing to the Mayans Godfather that he knows his mother Dita Galindo was murdered by the Reyes family and Emily. However, Miguel doesn't let on that he knows that Álvarez covered up the murder by not telling him about the motorcycle tracks at the scene of the crime. Instead, Nestor lies and claims that he alone saw the tracks.
Still, Miguel isn't ready to let Álvarez off the hook and asks him to kill EZ, who he knows is responsible for his mother's death. That night, an introspective Álvarez laments that his son, Isai, didn't get to see him change from the bad person he was to who he is now. Álvarez fears becoming that person again and hurting his family in the way that he did.
Miguel then returns home, where he finds Emily distraught over her fight with Erin, who has left for good. They hold hands as the sun sets on their estate, and Miguel becomes unusually affectionate. Afterwards, Miguel prepares a bath filled with rose petals for Emily, and that's a pretty good sign about just how badly things are about to go for everyone.
Miguel pours wine for Emily, poisoning the drink with some of her medication. After Emily loses control of her muscles and passes out, Miguel pushes her head under the water and she starts drowning. He then goes back to their bedroom and cries over his pretty shitty behavior. Miguel soon gets up, though, and runs to the bathroom. The cartel boss pulls his wife out of the water, and she starts coughing up water. And while Emily will live, the damage is done.
There are two more plots running parallel to the main story in "The House of Death Floats By," and they're just as bloody. In the first, Luisa Espina/Adelita tells Mini that she is now Adelita. "Free Mexico," she says. "Kill the Devils." And as a newspaper behind them shows Miguel's confrontation with Governor Montserrat Palomo from several episodes prior.
Several of Adelita's followers turn up to a rally for Montserrat and try and attack her with knives. This leads to Montserrat being rushed to the bathroom, where Luisa kills Montserrat's security guard. After lecturing Montserrat about what she's done and how she's hurt Mexico, Luisa reveals that Mini is now Adelita. This new, younger Adelita stabs Montserrat several times, seemingly killing her. After they finish their bloody deed, the old Adelita says that she needs to go off on her own to do something, though just what isn't specified.
The other plot in "The House of Death Floats By," which takes place in Tijuana, sees El Palo and El Banquero meet up with Canche. El Banquero explains to Canche that they can prove mutually beneficial to each other. In exchange for supplying Canche with heroin, the Yuma Mayans will help El Banquero take down the Santo Padre Mayans and damage the Galindo Cartel. Palo, for his part, will become a Yuma Mayan and leave Vatos Malditos behind. Then, towards the end of the episode, Palo takes the next step in his sinister plan and confronts his sister Laura, who has been working with Santo Padre Mayan Taza, at her home.
Well, that was intense. Let's switch focus to the Santo Padre Mayans, where things somehow end up getting even worse. At the clubhouse, Nails tells Steve about Chucky, mentioning that he "fell in love and moved to Ohio," finally explaining what happened to the classic Sons of Anarchy character. The Santo Padre Mayans then come in and tell Steve to details their bikes, lamenting that they'll miss him when he's gone, as they'll be having a vote on his membership status. This leads to a private conversation between Nails and Hank where the former apologizes for telling the latter about her pregnancy. Hank invites Nails to dinner, and she accepts.
Outside the clubhouse, Steve stops EZ and reveals that he's been traumatized after having killed a man during an assault on the Santo Padre Mayans. EZ, though, tells him to lock those feelings away. "This is what we signed up for," EZ says, clearly disturbed by his talk with Gaby. "This is who we are. Everything else is a fucking lie." Soon after, a vote on Steve's membership status occurs, and he's officially patched into the Santo Padre Mayans after only four months. However, this comes at the expense of Coco who, having missed another meeting, is officially kicked out of the Santo Padre Mayans.
At the party for Steve, Angel announces to everyone that he and Nails are engaged, which devastates Hank, who does his absolute best to hold it together in front of Nails. EZ congratulates Angel, saying their mother would be proud of him. As the party progresses, everyone has a good time except for Steve, who is clearly unhappy about everything that's happened. And while Steve wanted so badly to be a member of the Mayans M.C., the violence and bloodshed that come with it prove too much. Steve pulls a revolver out from his cut and says, "I'm sorry EZ. I don't think I can put it away." He then shoots himself in the head.
As the police investigate what happened, Hank breaks down crying over everything that's happened, while EZ rides off to see Gaby. EZ then tells her that he's going to go with her to Lodi and that he's choosing her over the club.
Created by Kurt Sutter and Elgin James, Mayans M.C. stars J.D. Pardo as EZ Reyes, Clayton Cardenas as Angel Reyes, Sarah Bolger as Emily Galindo, Michael Irby as Obispo "Bishop" Losa, Carla Baratta as Luisa "Adelita" Espina, Richard Cabral as Johnny "Coco" Cruz, Raoul Trujillo as Che "Taza" Romero, Danny Pino as Miguel Galindo, Edward James Olmos as Felipe Reyes and Emilio Rivera as Marcus Álvarez. New episodes air Tuesday on FX and are made available the following day on Hulu.