This week's Ugly Betty comes with a super-special treat: Christine Baranski! Honestly, once Baranski's involved with something I'm hard-pressed to be very critical of it. She is pitch-perfect as Betty's new boyfriend's upper-crust snob of a mother who disapproves of our young heroine. As usual, Betty is desperate to please, but winning over Matt's mom looks like it's going to be an uphill battle.

Meanwhile, Hilda reluctantly accepts love into her life post married dude, Daniel wants to fight Molly's cancer, and Wilhelmina faces losing her daily champagne and caviar snack in the wake of the financial crisis plaguing Mode. Fun episode, so let's talk about it! Just read more.

  • Matt's now comfortable having breakfast at Casa Suarez even though Betty's not calling him her boyfriend yet. Justin asks totally inappropriate questions like, "How rich are you? How much money do you really have?"
  • Another fella who pops by in the morning is Archie (Ralph Macchio)! I was concerned they might not make him a love interest of Hilda's so I'm glad he's back. How cute is it that he shows up for haircuts?
  • Oh, snap. Hilda tells Betty she's not sure about Archie, saying, "He's missing something," to which Betty responds, "What, like a wedding ring like your last boyfriend?"
  • One of the funniest lines of the night comes from Wilhelmina when she tells a photographer how much she loved his Brad and Angelina Brady Bunch shoot, and then asks, "How on earth did you get Jennifer Aniston to play Alice?!"
  • Matt does weird stuff. First, he forgets his wallet all the time, then he does the shady secret check to Betty's family thing, and then he just sort of lies about telling his mom about Betty and even tells the whole Suarez family his mother says Betty sounds like the daughter she never had.

  • Later, after an awkward run-in with Matt's mom, in which she mistakes Betty for a member of her domestic staff, we learn Matt lied. Betty kind of brushes this off, but Matt's becoming someone who seems really comfortable lying, which is worrisome. I'm trying to keep an open mind, though, because he looks like Josh Groban and seems to really like Betty.
  • Oh man, and the whole Willie's-out-of-money bit was killing me all night. I love this line of Marc's: "Willie! Selling your possessions? Isn't that like one rung up from being on a reality show?"
  • When Marc finds her in bed with all of her furs I died of laughter. That's the Wilhelmina Slater I love.
  • I also enjoy Amanda's uncanny ability to boil down Betty's relationship to a tacky stereotype, citing Betty's potential entrance into the "Golddigger Hall of Fame."
  • Claire is so cute and surrogate motherish to Betty. I love her anecdote about attending an Arianna Huffington party with torture as its "topic," saying with glee, "We waterboarded Liz Smith." Ha! There's a visual.
  • Back home, Ignacio has invited Archie to dinner unbeknownst to Hilda who gets pretty stressed about it. Enter Justin handing her a glass of wine: "Mom, here's your medication." I hope and pray I raise a son as knowing as Justin one day.
  • Another good quote? Marc nicknaming Daniel "the boy blunder." Fun times with wordplay.

In the end Matt stands up to his mom, but I still can't tell if Victoria is someone who will respect Betty's chutzpah or if she subscribes to the Wilhelmina Slater theory of winning at all costs — even if it's immoral and evil. Time will tell. Also, Molly and Daniel. Man that's boring. I mean, it's sad but this whole "live life to the fullest" thing is sort of clunker of a subplot in the midst of fun, pointed stuff like Willie lying in a bed of fur coats in the middle of an economic meltdown.

Photos copyright 2009 ABC, Inc.

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