Episode Report Card Aaron: B+ | Grade It Now! YOU GRADE IT A Matter of Life and Death
By Aaron | Season 1 | Episode 11 | Aired on 08.11.2001
In another part of the hospital (or possibly in a different hospital altogether), Claire walks into Gabe's room carrying a stack of magazines and the still bleeding remains of my heart. SadMom, by the way, seems to have gotten over said sadness, and will henceforth be christened MeanMom (as Mommie Dearest is almost, but not quite, already taken). MeanMom tears into Claire right away, claiming that she doesn't have any more money to pay the funeral home because Gabe ODed and now she has to spend it all on his hospital bills. Then she announces that she's heading out for "coffee and smokes," and disappears. For once, she and I agree on something. I'll be right back. Flick. Ahhhhhh. Okay, so Claire finally steps into the room, and after she stammers her way through the obligatory anti-drug PSA, Gabe gets all hostile and starts screaming at her to mind her own business. "Well, excuse me for giving a shit," replies Claire, which is oddly enough exactly the same thing I said to her lawyers when they contacted me after last week's "Marry me, Lauren"-fest. And while that whole recap probably was a little over the top, I figured nobody would understand over the top better than the SFU staff, right? Well, maybe Sylvester Stallone, but that's a different story. And besides, the forums made me do it. I mean, you guys saw that, right? Those weren't just voices in my head, right? Right? RIGHT!?! At this point, Claire magically deduces that Gabe's OD was actually a suicide attempt. He subtly tries to tune her out by raising the volume on the TV, and then overtly tries to tune her out by shouting, "I wish you would just fucking leave already." Claire, suddenly mesmerized by the spinning dots on Gabe's hospital gown, shouts, "Anne Bowman invented revenge!" before tossing the stack of magazines onto the bed and stalking out of the room.
Now we're finally in Vegas...uh, baby. Nate, David, and Brenda are affixing name tags to their shirts. Brenda has decided to pose as "Jasmine Brecker," who is either a "federal judge or a sex surrogate." I'm not sure what either one of those people would be doing at a funeral directors' conference, but whatever. Brenda leads them into the next room to do some mingling, and they're all shocked when they discover that it's a big coffin showcase. Brenda takes off straight for the bar, and the boys look around. They're mortified (get it?) to find a casket painted with the Last Supper, but as we've learned in the forums, that's not even close to being the most tasteless thing in which you could bury a loved one. Suddenly Gilardi shows up and starts taunting the boys. It's all blah blah threat, blah blah sleaze, bling blah go back to that last-ever Twin Peaks recap where you belong, buddy. Nate pulls him aside and says that he has a gift for Gilardi. "This is a pack of matches," he says, and then pulls out a dollar bill before adding, "This is for a can of lighter fluid. Next time you need to unload some cumbersome real estate, you'll be all set." You know, what bothers me most about all this is wondering how the hell the Red Headed Jew even knew about it in the first place. Did Gilardi blab at the company picnic? Anyway, as Gilardi leaves, David tells Nate that what he just did wasn't smart. Nate disagrees, saying, "I should have set his fucking hair on fire." I think you've got the right idea, but just the wrong guy there, Mr. Mutton Chop Man. Brenda returns with the drinks, and all three down theirs in one gulp.