Episode Report Card Grade It Now! YOU GRADE IT Pregnant cause
By Daniel | Season 9 | Episode 4 | Aired on 10.03.2004
And back at the hospital, Charlie's parents and Leanne's mom are standing at the doorway of Leanne's room, and she doesn't seem to be in labour anymore. And Charlie's dad tells Leanne's mom that he thinks the lovebirds are getting married, which he thinks is the right thing to do, because "with a baby, Charlie and Leanne will be tied together forever," and he's all in favour of this now, and while he's at the hospital maybe he can get himself treated for his bipolar mood disorder. And Charlie's mom has come around because of course she and her husband weren't much older when they got married, and things worked out fine. Oh, but it was the same for Leanne's mom and dad, but that didn't turn out fine! "But it can work out," says Charlie's dad, and I really really really have to take issue with the way this show presents the consequences of teen pregnancy as more or less a toss-up, when all the statistics paint a pretty bleak picture in terms of economic, social, developmental factors et cetera. And it's also a mixed message that this show is sending, like you have Lucy telling Ruthie that she's never going to be pregnant and not married, but then the lesson learned here seems to be that should the apparently absolutely unthinkable did happen and you got pregnant, just marry the teenage father because then everything will be just fine. So Leanne's mom reluctantly comes around and the three soon-to-be grandparents enter the room, all the better to shower love and unconditional support upon their idiot procreating spawn. RevCam and Annie, all proud of themselves for setting the young couple up for years of unfulfilled dreams (not to mention depriving a responsible, childless couple of a baby), stroll away.
Meanwhile, back at the CamPound, the three stooges inform everyone that the bird's going to be just fine, and Ruthie weirdly thanks them for taking the bird to the "Wildlife Rescue Station," like maybe Kevin might have forgotten where they just were. And after about five hours, SamVid sees the frantically gesturing crew member off-camera giving them their cue, and they start cheering. And Harry saved the shoebox so Ruthie would have something to remember the bird by. Yeah. You can just imagine Ruthie reminiscing about that time when she had a bird for a couple of hours and almost killed it. And Harry takes Ruthie outside to dump her. Only, they both say, at the same time (or as close to the same time as their rehearsal time allowed them), "I think we should just be friends." And they're both glad they feel the same way, and then they hug, or maybe that should be "hug," since that has to be the most awkward screen hug I've ever seen, like imagine Lurch hugging Wednesday Addams, but with less emotion, and you pretty much have an idea of what that looked like. And then they don't explain why they feel this way, and thankfully Harry doesn't outline his marriage plan, and he says he has to go catch his bus, and Ruthie says she'll get someone to give him a ride, and then Martin is all strolling out the door, and if you ask me, Martin seems to have some kind of weird fixation on Ruthie. And he asks if she's all right, like how long were Ruthie and Harry supposed to have been dating anyway? And Ruthie's figured out that Kevin and Harry went to social services to stop Harry from breaking up with Ruthie, which she appears to think is sweet, and not weird. And he agrees to take Harry home, and Harry says it hopefully won't be his home for much longer. Martin says that's great, because the place was kind of "terrifying," which is a pretty obnoxious thing to say, and in any case not at all supported by the brief scene we saw of the three stooges at the university-dorm-esque "social services" but Martin's talking like they were dodging bullets the whole time.