Episode Report Card Sara M: F | Grade It Now! YOU GRADE IT Fostering Failure, Adopting Apathy
By Sara M | Season 9 | Episode 8 | Aired on 10.31.2004
RevCam: [looks up] I can't do this alone.
Ceiling: ...
RevCam: Come on, I just, I just need an idea, something I haven't thought of.
Suddenly, Annie comes barreling into the bedroom, just bursting with ideas! Oh, that is a good one, God. Seriously, dude. Nice. "Oh, you want me to give you an idea, do you, RevCam? Well, now you can stare at your shrew wife's Hagface. Ha!" Anyway, Annie's crap idea is that RevCam should get the whole church involved in helping Social Services kids. For instance, she and Lucy are going to become "licensed foster parents," although they won't actually parent any foster children. They'll just be able to better support those who will. In the spirit of Annie's generosity, I'm going to get certified in CPR, and then watch someone choke to death because I have too much going on in my life to do the Heimlich Maneuver. Annie says she thinks people aren't foster parents because they're "afraid." But if they weren't alone in the process, maybe they wouldn't be. Annie says that RevCam can help people do this, "those that [sic] are willing." And those would be Not Annie. I love how Annie just assumes that, if the potential foster parents are members of their church, they'll be able to provide children with safe homes. I guess she didn't hear about those church-going foster parents who starved their four adopted boys, which happened, ironically enough, in Camden County, New Jersey. RevCam's all crying and stuff, because it's always awesome when other people do your work and think of your ideas for you. I'll bet this is how Brenda Hampton gets ideas for this show.
Brenda Hampton: Please, ceiling. I need your help!
Ceiling: Perhaps another episode about gang violence in white suburbia? We haven't seen that enough.
Brenda Hampton: BRILLIANT! Thank you, ceiling! [runs out of the room]
Ceiling: Heh heh heh. Stupid bitch.
And we're in church! Apparently, they maxed out on the budget with Mackenzie Phillips's appearance, since they're only using the office set for RevCam's speech. That won't stop them from cramming an entire congregation's worth of extras in it, though! RevCam tells everyone about what we just saw happen not a half hour ago, then announces his intention to "find a home for the half-million -- half-million -- other children in America who are in some form of foster care right now." Wha?!? Three seconds ago, he couldn't even help ONE child, and now he's going to help five hundred thousand? RevCam pamphlets that there are over a hundred and thirty thousand kids in need of placement. Oh, there's Greta hanging out in the back, and she looks kind of pissed. Maybe it's because the body heat generated by so many people in such a tight space is making her uncomfortably warm. Or maybe she doesn't like the smell of the shit coming out of RevCam's mouth. Here's some more for the pile: RevCam says he's not just going to stop with kids in America -- he's going to help kids EVERYWHERE in THE WORLD! He doesn't mention anything about the pressing need for this help in Africa, considering the rapidly growing number of AIDS orphans, because we already had an episode about that continent. Nor does he say how, exactly, his piddly little congregation is going to save these children, especially when he won't be adopting any of them. Instead, he just utters a vague "with God all things are possible," although he chooses not to follow that up with an explanation about why God took these kids' parents away in the first place. "Let's do it," says RevCam, "let's save the world." RevCam tells everyone they can make a difference. Well, everyone except for him, since he's not taking any kids into his gigantic, empty mansion. Plus, he spent church money that could have gone towards helping foster kids on a new flat screen TV so he can play a video montage. That's right: another freaking montage. If they had to fill another five minutes, they could have at least had RevCam consulting the coffeemaker or Mackenzie blowing smoke in his face over and over again.