White House Plumbers Episode 2 is titled ‘Please Destroy This, Huh?’ and follows the two agents on a mission to make a mark. Directed by David Mandel, it is created and written by Alex Gregory and Peter Huyck, who are also the executive producers. The episode has a runtime of about 55 minutes.
The ensemble cast of the series includes Woody Harrelson as Howard Hunt, Justin Theroux as Gordon Liddy, Domhnall Gleeson as John Dean, Lena Headey as Dorothy Hunt, Kiernan Shipka, Ike Barinholtz, Yul Vazquez, David Krumholtz, Rich Sommer, Kim Coates, Liam James, and Kathleen Turner.
-White House Plumbers Episode 2 Review and Recap Contain Spoiler-
In the first episode, we are introduced to the events that happened a year before the infamous Watergate break-in, E. Howard Hunt and G. Gordon Liddy are tasked with investigating the Pentagon Papers leak, gathering a team of Cubans. Their task was to infiltrate whistleblower Daniel Ellsberg’s psychiatrist’s office. Meanwhile, Hunt and his wife Dorothy get to know the Liddys.
But things don’t go as planned and everything that they had thought of, goes to the bin. Despite failing in the mission & hardly avoiding getting caught by the police, Hunt and Liddy find themselves with a surprising opportunity to be on the Committee to Re-Elect the President.
The latest episode starts off on June 25, 1971, when a person is seen typing something confidential with the keywords like Nixon, convention and 400 thousand commitment before signing it off with ‘please destroy this’. Meanwhile, Howard and Gordon are busy coming up with various ideas that could help the President in overthrowing other party leaders.
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They even make a deal with the prostitutes so that they can spy on the Democratic convention or deliberately give them drugs so that they spill everything easily. All the ideas are part of the inclusive Project Gemstone which includes various plans of action titled Ruby, Emerald, Crystal, Topaz, Opal and more. All contained crazy plans, out of which some were not even approved by Howard, but Gordon was too passionate to show his enthusiasm about the work & present it to the committee head.
And as one would have expected, their boss John Mitchell orders to burn them all, along with their ticket to work for the President. Bringing them back to square one, with Howard resuming his old writing job. On the personal front, even when he took his wife out with Gordon and Fran for dinner, his children create a ruckus as Lisa fights with a man who said some racist thing.
It turns out she was the one involved in the car accident and was hit on her head badly. She is under medication but her family is not able to follow along with her ways, as she gets triggered on various things. On one such day, when she had locked herself in the bathroom, Howard gets a call from Charles Colson to help with an issue involving John Mitchell.
Apparently, the document that was seen at the start of the episode has been found by a newspaper & it accuses Mitchell & the lady, Dita Beard of making a secret deal for about 400,000 dollars. It stated how Mitchell promised ITT a favourable outcome in an antitrust lawsuit in exchange for a donation to the RNC convention in San Diego.
Now, Howard and Gordon are tasked with persuading Dita to change her statement & refuse everything. From using her heart issue to get her away from the trial to Howard’s emotional manipulation, it’s fair to say that they became successful in getting their Boss’ name out of the dirt. And the reward that they get is the approval of one of the Projects from Gemstones – the Opal.
Now, if you ask what’s the Opal all about, then the answer is quite clear – the topic on which the series is based, ie bugging the DNC office to keep track of their activities. However, they are given a budget that is less than half of what they had asked for.
White House Plumbers Episode 2: Final Thoughts
Episode 2 showed how the two white house employees had even ridiculous plans, before executing the Watergate. Especially the character of Gordon, who feels like an amalgamation of all the popular characters that he admires – James Bond or even Hitler. In the coming weeks, we will be seeing how the duo come up with more ridiculous plans with their Cuban mates & how their personal lives also deteriorate.
White House Plumbers is currently available for streaming on HBO Max.
Also Read: Read All of Our White House Plumbers Reviews Here!