'Gentleman Jack' Season 2, Episode 2 Recap: "Two Jacks Don’t Suit.”

The episode opens with Lister, glamorous in a fashionable massively-sleeved gown, and Ann, also beautifully dressed, dining at a hotel restaurant in Paris. Lister shows off for Ann's benefit and probably for the other patrons. She talks loudly about her aristocratic friends, gesticulates, and shamelessly name-drops. Ann, bless her, gazes at Lister with rapt adoration listening to her story of meeting paleontologist George Cuvier and giving an impromptu scientific lecture from inside a whale’s skeleton. She doesn’t mention that her audience was a giggling, adoring bevy of well-born beauties, including Lady Vere Cameron (Jodhi May).

It’s only a matter of time before one of those old flames turns up, Isabella 'Tib' Norcliffe (Joanna Scanlan), a drunk, loud, indiscreet troublemaker. It’s clear she’s jealous, asking about Mariana, not only Lister’s long-term lover but also Tib’s, and Lister replies that she hasn’t seen her since she visited Denmark a year or so ago. Tib gushes, invites Ann to tell her all about herself, and then ignores her.

The next day, while visiting the Louvre and with Ann chatting to acquaintances, Tib tackles Lister: “She hasn’t got a clue, has she, about the vast tapestry of your fruity past?” Tib claims she’s happy for Lister but suggests Ann is a touch insipid for that force of nature that is Gentleman Jack. Although Ann continues to bloom during the European tour, we've all wondered that. But will Lister have to admit how very vast her sexual past has been after assuring Ann that she was her first love at the beginning of the affair?