Episode Report Card Jacob Clifton: C | Grade It Now! YOU GRADE IT Elle In A Handbasket
By Jacob Clifton | Season 3 | Episode 11 | Aired on 01.08.2009
Now, we confirm at the end of the episode that Daniel's totally onto her, but it's almost worse that he is behaving like this even though he knows she's after Connor, because it makes Wili the fool for thinking she's fooling and manipulating Daniel (and Marc the fool for falling for it on his own). And of the three of them, you know I love Daniel, but of the three of them: he is the fool, in every scenario you can construct. Strike four, show, and Blonsky hasn't even shown up yet. Although judging by the chicken wing/ranch dressing scent wafting from my TV, she's getting closer.
Betty's first networking conquest: Ryan Richards, of The Gorgeous Gourmet. Not actually in the magazine industry -- or gorgeous, for that matter -- but the fact that Betty didn't immediately gun him down for not meeting her intellectual standards is a good sign that Betty's learning the basics. The basics of meeting other human beings. He hungrily reads her business card while Marc and Amanda dress her down viciously for spending twenty minutes on a caterer, but like: she's an assistant who throws about sixteen parties an episode, usually in the ten minutes before Wili starts shooting into the crowd, and he more than likely has a roster of entertainment and magazine clients already, so I'm not sure I understand why he's a bad contact. I mean, he might not count for this game, but -- and at least the episode follows up on this one thing -- that's a good card to have in your wallet. Even if it's just to whip it out during a conversation with somebody else and they're all "My caterer just cancelled," and you go like, "Call this guy, he's great." So even the episode is unclear on what "networking" actually means, which is just so great because we were already doing something stupid.
Marc explains that in this episode, "networking" means "acting retardedly fake while finding out what other magazines are doing right this second, in return for meaningless, made up gossip." The screen splits like mitosis and shows him doing this, but it's too stupid to tell you about, frankly, and basically you just: say your name, tell a huge stupid lie, then hamfistedly ask people about their secret stuff. So now you know what that's like when people say the word "networking." Oh, and then you tell them you'll be right back and walk away from their face while they're still talking. And that's how you succeed in business! Amanda's ghost like Swayze because she knows when to get the fuck out of a shitty episode, but Marc waits around for a sec so he can stupidly set up this whole Terminator-style eye-menu where Betty assesses the people and decides if they're worth meeting, then approaches them, and it's just so awful because I guarantee you that based on its context, this is not a reference to the show, but to the first or second movie. I'm pretty sure Dwayne Wayne or the Fresh Prince or Fred Mertz did this at some point, and now Betty's doing it. I sort of hate this show, come to think of it. Although you do get to see cute little Betty plop down in a chair and brightly say, "I know a murderer!"