Episode Report Card Demian: B- | 1 USERS: B- YOU GRADE IT Shape of...a smackdown!
By Demian | Season 1 | Episode 3 | Aired on 10.20.1998
Later that morning in an outdoor café, the Ps gather to discuss the sudden reappearance of their deadbeat dad. Phoebe's stoked, and wants to head over to the hotel immediately to visit him. Piper's not quite as eager as the Feebs, but is nevertheless excited to see her father again after twenty years. Prue's outraged at the very idea, and wonders what The Teflon Dad wants. "Don't you find it a little suspicious that just when we find out we're witches, he shows up?" she asks. "Grams always told us he's a threat to us," she reminds them. "There's no reason to think inny of that has changed." Piper hesitantly concedes Prue's point, but adds that of the three, Prue is the only one old enough to have significant memories of The Teflon Dad. Maybe Piper herself and Phoebe would simply appreciate the chance to get to know him a little bit, and why is that necessarily a bad thing? Prue sighs and patiently explains, "Because we don't know why he's here, and until we do, we can't trust him." Piper bites her lip and stares into her coffee.
The "Beaumark." There is no Beaumark Hotel in San Francisco, and the establishing shot of the facade features a huge medallion over the entrance with an S encircled by a G smack in the middle of the thing, so I have no idea where the hell they are at the moment. The faithless Feebs raps on a door inside the hotel. From within, The Teflon Dad calls out, "Entrez!" "Entrez"? Cram it, you pretentious Muppet. Phoebe slides through the door and wanders down the short hallway into the suite proper to discover her father with a masseuse. No, not like that. He's actually getting a massage. "Daddy?" she bleats. When I first saw this episode, I was convinced that Milano and Denison had played Amy Fisher and Joey Buttafuoco in some horrifically trashy movie-of-the-week, and Phoebe's "Daddy?" therefore squicked me right out. To my abject dismay, I discovered that my memory had conflated two entirely different horrifically trashy movies-of-the-week into one great big waste of brain matter. Alyssa's Joey was a guy named Jack Scalia, while The Teflon Dad here appeared opposite Drew Barrymore, of all people. Yes, I apparently saw two separate Amy Fisher movies ten years ago. Let the beatings begin. Anyway, The Teflon Dad dismisses the masseuse for some quality time with Phoebe. Unfortunately, he gets her name wrong, calling her Piper instead. Back up there, Daddy. Didn't Phoebe reveal in the premiere that she went to New York to locate your Muppet ass, and returned to San Francisco only after she had found it? So why don't you know which P she is? Whatever. Let's just go with this brand-new version of Charmed reality. And this is only the third freaking episode, people. The Teflon Dad apologizes profusely for the error. Phoebe lets him off the hook far too easily, claiming that people mistake her for Piper all the time. Yeah, sweetheart. Try selling that one to the gang on the forum boards.