Episode Report Card Deborah: B+ | Grade It Now! YOU GRADE IT "Anonymous" Was A Woman
By Deborah | Season 1 | Episode 20 | Aired on 04.29.2004
Joan's at the yearbook office, where Brian's working up to ripping her a new one: "I thought you said you were a photographer!" Joan: "I am! Those are photographs! I took them!" Brian is wearing a shirt and tie, which would get him beaten up pretty regularly if he ever left the yearbook office. Joan is wearing a very cute outfit: a sort of soft chartreuse cardigan over a dark coral T-shirt, and a full, gathered skirt in a light beige colour with some kind of vintage-looking print on it. It doesn't sound as good on paper as it looks. I love the way she dresses, particularly in skirts and dresses. Brian, standing next to Iris at a light table, says the photos aren't useable. Joan offers to redo them. Brian: "It's crunch time! I need someone who can deliver -- now!" She says she will. Brian: "Look at Iris's work. Now look at yours. I have a responsibility to my readers." Joan: "Brian, you're not publishing Rolling Stone here." No? You'd almost think. I was on the yearbook all five years in high school, and I was editor in the third year. Actually, I was co-editor, because the normal policy was that only people in Grade 13 could be editors, so I talked them into letting me do it in Grade 11 by offering to have a co-editor (yo, Libby!). Anyway, I know that was back in the Mesozoic, but we had nothing on the order of the Arcadia High yearbook office, which is huge, with lots of its own equipment (copiers, light tables, computers, etc.). We did all our layout by drawing and pasting things up on specially designed grid paper provided by the yearbook printing company, and all of the class and club photos were done professionally. Only candid shots were done by students. And I definitely did not go around berating people and blathering about my responsibility to my readers. In fact, if I recall properly, it was more like twisting people's arms and cajoling them to get them to do much of anything. The typing teacher was our advisor (yo, Mrs. K!) and I don't remember actually having an office -- I think we just had some space in the typing room where we kept our stuff and we worked in there after school and during spares (and quite a few weekends, in order to get things done on time). ["We had to use the library." -- Sars] Despite our best efforts, it was all very quaint and amateurish. But I suppose things have come a long, long way now. I would have killed to have a tenth of the operation this guy's got.
Brian tells Joan to return her equipment to Iris, who's been listening to all this quietly with guilty glances. Joan pleads, saying she'll try harder. Brian says he already told some other kid "in Layout" that he can take over. They have a Layout Department. Sheesh. The argument has caught Helen's attention, and she's come out of her little advisor office to listen. Joan: "You can't do this! I'm supposed to be here! You can't take this away from me!" She turns around, somehow knowing her mother's standing there, and says, "Mom, you want to jump in here, advise Brian not to fire me?" Oof. Bad move. Asking Mommy to help you out? Besides, she has to try to be impartial -- she's there as a teacher, not a mother. Helen: "I think you can risk a little more time, Brian." Brian refuses, saying he's not going to cave into nepotism. Joan, weakly: "We won't tell anyone." Brian: "Substandard performance as yearbook editor will affect the extracurricular portion of my college application." Joan doesn't know what to say to that; she glances at Iris, who quickly looks down. Joan turns to her mother and pleads quietly, on the verge of tears, "Mom?" Helen: "The school policy is clear, honey -- I'm not supposed to affect decisions." Then why did you just try? Joan: "This isn't Star Trek! You're not going to disrupt the space-time continuum or something!" She adds, "Or you know what? Maybe -- maybe you will, because maybe I guess I was only supposed to feel good about myself for, like, a minute." She rushes out.