Episode Report Card Daniel: F | Grade It Now! YOU GRADE IT Love conquers all
By Daniel | Season 8 | Episode 12 | Aired on 01.11.2004
Everyone stands around making "what an asshole" faces like Vic just pissed all over the rug, like, so much for mustering as much love as they can from this judgmental group. Vic pleasantly says that if they're all finished staring at him, he's going to go home. He says he'll call Peter tomorrow. Paris and Peter leave too, and RevCam assures everyone remaining that "everything's going to be fine" like this is some kind of crisis. Lucy comes in talking about how Kevin said everything went really well. "I don't know how that happened," says Martin. Me neither. I mean, Vic has a sense of humour, for god's sake. What an asshole! "Does Peter have to see his father?" says Cecilia, who doesn't even have a dog in this fight, for crying out loud. RevCam makes some noise about how most kids want to see their fathers, even if their fathers are the worst human beings imaginable. Or something. Then he says that since they all love Peter, they're going to try to love Vic. "So what's your plan?" says Lucy. "All will be revealed in due time," says RevCam. Here's a plan for you all: stop being arseholes.
Annie's reading in the den when RevCam strides in. She's reading Hateship, Friendship, Courtship, Loveship, Marriage by Alice Munro, which made me sad, because there's more genuine emotion and more talent on any single page of that book than in all the 7th Heaven scripts put together. She asks what RevCam knows about the group Chandler's helping out. RevCam says they're very "nice people with something to teach us all" in that weird television-episode-summary style of speaking on this show, and right away I knew they were talking about retarded people. Annie's all, something to teach us about loving Vic? RevCam's all, uh-huh. And they prattle on a little bit more until Annie convinces RevCam to call Chandler to explain how this will all be to his benefit, or some other contrived explanation. Yeah, we haven't spent enough time on the telephone for my liking.
Chandler picks up, and he already knew that RevCam arranged for the charity work, and I'd say it took Chandler a lot longer to figure that out than it should have, considering that RevCam is the only one who knew about the C-Team in the first place. And I think it says a lot about RevCam usually having an ulterior motive when Chandler wants to know what's up RevCam's sleeve. But RevCam doesn't say anything, and we cut to...
Ruthie heading up the stairs to the Treehouse, and you can practically see her counting the steps to her mark, where she then looks up and asks if she can come up, and she's carrying a pie for Lucy and Kevin since she didn't want to show up uninvited and empty-handed, and they commiserate some more about what an ass Vic is. Then she recruits Kevin to help with tomorrow's move. He says fine, then goes looking for milk, and since there were two jugs of milk in there earlier, I'm assuming he's kidding when he says they're out of milk. "Could you get it, Kevin? I need a sister right now," says Ruthie, who then turns and studiously makes her way to her next mark and flops on the bed. She whines to Lucy about how angry Peter has been since his dad came around, and Lucy tries to explain how tough this is for Peter, that he was scared and angry before talking to his dad, and Ruthie says she's surprised he wasn't more scared and angry after talking to his dad, and I am quickly getting fed up with these people. Vic? Is NOT THAT BAD, and if anything, these people's refusals to give him anything resembling a chance is only going to make things worse, so when Lucy lectures Ruthie on how everybody has to get to know Vic before knowing whether he can be a positive influence on Peter's life, and how it's none of their business anyway, I was turning on the oven so I could stick my head in it, if only because some posters have said this isn't even the worst episode of the season. Also, we're getting close to the final fifteen saccharine and condescending minutes of this show, and I had no idea how awful it was about to become. Lucy says their dad's plan to get them all to accept Vic will be made clear tomorrow. They hug, and Ruthie leaves.
Kevin comes up, and we find out that they did indeed still have milk, so Lucy thanks him. I guess Kevin couldn't have just excused himself so Ruthie and Lucy could talk; he had to concoct some reason to leave the apartment. My wife and sister-in-law want to talk? Not good enough. I want milk? Time to leave! The phone rings, and it's that blonde cop again, only she's not in uniform and she's on one of those horrible fake outdoor sets, and she tells Kevin that Vic is squeaky clean, that he doesn't even have so much as a parking ticket, which is a surprise to Kevin, as I'm sure it will be to the rest of the Camdens, who seem positive that Vic must have done some time for murdering babies. NYPD Blonde says, "There's nothing wrong with him." "Oh, there's plenty wrong with him, there's just nothing legally wrong with him," says Kevin, like, how much do all these supposed Christians and their self-righteousness and sanctimony and hypocrisy remind me why I stopped attending church?