Getting Married Today

Three days before her wedding, Gabrielle wants to know why Carlos hasn’t responded to her wedding invitation and he tells her he's not going because it’ll be awkward. She insists that Edie can’t show up alone because everyone will think she has a problem with him seeing Edie. He says he’ll burst out laughing when she swears “Till death do us part”, so she gives up and tells him he can just come to the reception.

Lynette asks her sister Lucy for a loan to pay for her upcoming medical bills she’ll incur in treating the lymphoma, but she is also strapped and can’t help out. She orders her not to tell their mother Stella, but she shows up anyway with her luggage.

Gabrielle and Victor have a fight regarding his intention to run for governor of the state. She tells Victor that she was already married to a man who put his career first and she swore never to do it again, while he has vowed to never again let a “stupid woman” hold him back. He tries to apologize, saying he has been under a lot of pressure and she tells him he now has one less thing to worry about since she's intending to cancel the wedding. He says it's too late to cancel but she responds that it's “just in the nick of time”. The next morning Milton shows up early on her doorstep to apologize. She tells him it's not his fault and he insists it is, since Victor has always been desperate for his father's approval, especially since he's never gotten it. She wonders why she should marry a man who values his father's opinion more than hers. Milton tells her that after she left, Victor called him up and “tore him a new one” and blamed him for driving her away. Just then Victor arrives with roses and Milton sneaks out the back. He looks on approvingly as Victor and Gabrielle embrace.

Susan is busy planning her wedding with Mike. However Mike is alarmed at how much it may cost as Susan longs for white doves and a champagne fountain. Susan says that with Bree and Gaby marrying with such extravagant ceremonies, she wants to match theirs. She offers to use her credit card, but Mike tells her that it may not be a good idea to start their married life in debt. That night, Mike sets out to work telling Susan he gets triple time on night jobs to pay for the wedding.

Gabrielle is ready to walk down the aisle but is freaking out because Bree is late bringing her “something new” which is a bracelet from her honeymoon trip to Switzerland. When she finally arrives, Susan, Lynette and Gabrielle's jaws drop. Bree's pregnant. Later, a flash back shows that Bree and Orson are ready to go back to Wisteria Lane after their honeymoon and it shows that Bree and Orson are planning to fake a pregnancy that could help Danielle. While packing she tells him she wouldn’t blame him if he ran like hell. He swears to love and raise the baby as if it were his own.

Edie is feeling guilty about deceiving Carlos into thinking she's gone off the pill and is trying to get pregnant. He, meanwhile, has been doing research and is coming up with ways for her to get pregnant faster. She urges him to “let nature take its course”, and he says that at their age, nature isn’t on their side anymore and that her eggs aren’t “farm fresh”. He also forbids her to drink alcohol, at least until after the baby is born and she's done nursing.

She's on her way to Gabrielle's wedding and tells Carlos she’ll see him at the reception. Just as she's leaving, she runs into the paper boy and asks Carlos if he’ll pay him. Carlos is short of cash, so he goes through Edie's purse and finds her birth control pills. At the wedding, Edie is taking the opportunity to quaff some forbidden Scotch when Carlos shows up early and catches her. He holds up the birth control and tells her not to bother explaining. In full earshot of the wedding party, she runs after him, calling his name. She tells him she really does want to have a baby but that she wanted to give him a chance to fall in love with her first. He tells her he doesn’t believe her and he won’t ever trust her again and Edie dissolves in tears.

At the reception, Lynette wants to know when Bree's due date and she vaguely answers, “the early fall” and changes the subject. Bree says she can’t believe everything she's missed, especially with Susan and Gabrielle are both getting married. She asks Lynette what's new and she states everything is fine. Gabrielle has gone to fetch Victor so he can meet Bree when she overhears Milton telling Victor that by marrying her, he's secured the Latino vote and the Governor's Mansion is “as good as his”. Victor's not sure he can talk her into him running for Governor but Milton assures him that now that he's her husband, the rules have changed and that a few pricey gifts will “tame that little spitfire”. Gabrielle leaves without letting on what she's heard.

She sneaks into an unused room and finds Carlos downing champagne. He says he hopes he didn’t ruin her wedding, but that he's also ruined his life. He laments that a few years ago he had it all - her, the home, the career - and now he has nothing. He's sure she wants to go find Victor but instead she grabs him and kisses him passionately.

Lynette keeps sniping at her mother and Stella asks her if she doesn’t think people can change. Lynette says they can’t, so her mother wonders what happened to Lynette, the perfect wife and mother, once Rick came along. Lynette swears nothing happened with Rick because she's nothing like her mother. Stella reminds her that when she got breast cancer, Lynette told her it was “God’s punishment” and she asks Lynette if she feels she's the one being punished now. Lynette orders her out and insists she doesn’t want her money but her mother refuses to go. Stella tells Lynette she can fight her, or she can fight the cancer, because she won’t have the strength to do both.

Julie welcomes Bree and Orson home and asks where Danielle is. Bree tells her that she's spending a year abroad in Switzerland. Julie wonders why Danielle hasn’t returned any of her calls or emails and Andrew blames it on the poor reception in the Swiss mountains. “This might not be as easy as we’d hoped”, Bree frets after Julie leaves. Bree, pretending to be Danielle, types an email to Julie and just then Danielle calls from the nunnery where they’ve stashed her to ask to come home. Bree vows she's not coming home until after the baby is born but that they’ll be up to visit her this weekend. She then removes her stomach padding and Orson notes that soon it will be time for the six-month size.

Susan feels so guilty that Mike fell asleep at the reception due to all the night jobs he has done for her plans, so she asks the reverend if he has time later that night. Mike receives another late-night plumbing call from a "Mrs. Walcott" on the phone. As he rushes out, it is revealed that it was Julie on the phone, to divert Mike. When Mike arrives at “Mrs. Wolcott’s”, he finds the reverend with a suit. He leads Mike into a glade in the woods, where Susan is waiting for him in a white dress, under a display of Chinese lanterns. He wants to know if she’ll really be okay with this simple ceremony and she says only one thing has stayed constant in her wedding plans which was him. He tells her he's never seen her look so beautiful. Under the stars, with Julie as their witness, Mike and Susan are finally married.

Distraught over her breakup with Carlos, Edie leaves a note for him and then steps onto a chair and attempts to hang herself.

• This episode had 18.8 million viewers on its original airing.
• The two final episodes of the third season were originally planned to be one two-part episode entitled “What Would We Do Without You?”. They changed plans and decided to entitle the next-to-last episode “What Would We Do Without You?” and give the season finale its own title.
• This is the first Desperate Housewives season finale in which Mary Alice (Brenda Strong) does not appear.
• This is the last finale that Edie Britt (Nicollette Sheridan) features in.
• This is the first finale in which no one dies, though Edie does fake a suicide attempt.
• This is the only finale in which there aren't any flash-backs.
• This is the one of three season finales to feature a wedding. In this season's finale both Gaby and Susan get married. In season 4, Bob and Lee have a civil ceremony and in season 5, Mike marries Susan again. In season 8, Renee marries Ben.
• By the end of this episode, all four main characters are now actually "wives". Bree is married to Orson, Susan is married to Mike, Lynette is married to Tom, and Gabrielle is married to Victor.
• After spending most of her time during the third season hiding her pregnancy, Marcia Cross straps on a pregnancy harness for Bree's new storyline.
• This is the only finale that doesn't feature the resolution of the season's mystery.
• This is the only season finale not to feature someone dying in a flashback, while in the previous seasons it had been Deirdre, Melanie, and in the future, Dylan, Lila and Paige.

Song from the Stephen Sondheim musical, Company.

• Croatian: Udajem se danas (I'm Getting Married Today)
• French: Rien n'est plus important au monde (Nothing is more important)
• German: Hochzeitsfieber (Wedding Fever)
• Hebrew: היום מתחתנים (Hayom Mitchatnim; Getting Married Today)
• Hungarian: Ásó, kapa, nagyharang (Only Death [Can Part Us])
• Italian: Oggi Sposi (Just Married)
• Polish: Dziś jest mój ślub (My Wedding Is Today)
• Spanish: Hoy nos casamos (We're Getting Married Today)