The twins are in their high chairs, as they usually are at the beginning of the episode. This time, they're throwing their cereal at Happy while the rest of the family sulks at the breakfast table. Mary is missing. The bigger kids take the twins upstairs so the CamRents can argue about Mary. RevCam says that she needs a job, money, and good friends. Annie agrees with him. Then she says that another crappy job will force Mary to realize that she needs to go to college. RevCam says that she'll lose the car. Annie says, "So let her lose the car." RevCam reiterates that Mary's in trouble. Annie gets mad, yelling, "Just because I'm not a minister or a therapist doesn't mean that I don't know that she's in trouble. I'm her mother!" She accuses Eric of being a know-it-all just because he's the father. He says they need to take action now, but he doesn't know what action to take. Annie yells at him for being a minister and not knowing how to help his own family. RevCam yells. StuporMom yells. Let me sum it up for you: they're both clueless and they're taking out their anger on each other. RevCam needs to get out and run some errands. Annie asks why he's always the one who gets to leave. She wants to "get out" too. "So get out!" RevCam screams. Lucy comes downstairs, and Annie tells her to watch the kids so she and RevCam can run their angry errands separately. This was the closest thing to realism I've ever seen on this show. Don't get me wrong -- I'm not saying it wasn't dumb. I'm just saying that it was almost real.
Lucy's studying in the living room. The phone rings. It's a bitchy collections agent calling about Mary's credit card. She asks who Lucy is. Lucy asks who she is. The woman says, "I asked first," and Lucy hangs up on her. Heh. The phone rings again. Lucy ignores it. Simon comes in and says it's for her. Lucy picks up her extension and the collections agent says, "Hello, Mary." Stupid-ass Simon just says, "Mary, Lucy -- what's the difference?" This is the first of many moments this hour during which I feel like hitting one of the characters. The credit bitch refuses to believe that Lucy isn't Mary. Lucy finds out that Mary hasn't paid her bill and doesn't have a job. Lucy hangs up on the woman, who calls back again. Isn't that illegal? Isn't that harassment?
Sgt. Michaels is having a morning meeting like the one he saw on a Hill Street Blues rerun. Afterwards, the cop who stopped Mary a couple of weeks ago confesses to Sgt. Michaels that he made a mistake. He suspected that Mary had been drinking, but he didn't ticket her because she was RevCam's daughter. Sgt. Michaels is distraught.
At the Swinging Bachelor Pad, John annoys Matt with his pacing. After way too much over-acted dialogue, we find out that John's troubled because Mary asked him for a loan. John also saw Mary hanging out with Frankie and Johnny while they drank and smoked. He points out that desperate people do desperate things. I wonder if Mary will start stripping at the local topless bar. Glenoak probably doesn't have one, though. Maybe she'll just sell her plasma instead. Matt, with his slicked-back locks and Monkee-esque sideburns, says he doesn't know what to do.
RevCam goes to Glenoak Hospital on some pretext or another and runs into his brother-in-law, Hank. RevCam tells Hank that he's stressed out, and the filler scene ends. You all know that Hank is played by Ed Begley, Jr., but did you know that Ed Begley, Jr., had roles in Spinal Tap and Battlestar Galactica? Maybe you knew that, but did you know that our own Cate had a crush on Starbuck when she was a child? Okay, maybe you knew that, too, but you might not have known that my heart was torn between Starbuck and Apollo. Neither Cate nor I remember Ed Begley, Jr.'s role on the show, though.
Somewhere on the Promenade, Mary's holding up the line at the ATM. She keeps trying various cards with her mouth hanging open. The guy behind her gives her five dollars to "just walk away." She takes it. Downward spiral to prostitution, exit on your left, Mary.
Annie hangs out at the grocery store and picks up some of those tiny bananas. Sometimes I hang out the grocery store when I'm mad at my husband, too. I usually read magazines and mess with the cosmetic samples, though. Some guy recognizes Annie and introduces himself as Mr. Johnson from Johnson Insurance Company. He tells Annie that Mary's been driving without insurance. At first StuporMom doesn't believe him, but eventually he gets the concept through her big, square head.
Mary strolls into the CamPound, and Lucy asks where she's been. Lucy tells her about all the calls from the collection agency, and Mary acts totally ignorant. She brags about how easy it was to get the credit card, and then she asks Lucy for fifty dollars. Lucy tells her to grow up.
In the twins' nursery, Mary begs Simon for the money. He slams doors on her face and tells her it's not his problem. Mary whines that she is "out in the real world" and she needs "things." First of all, she is not out in the real world. Second, if she needs things like her Bedazzled jacket so badly, she should get a job at K-Mart so she can at least get a discount. The phone rings. Lucy brings it to Mary, saying it's the Collections Bitch. Mary hangs up on her as Ruthie beckons from her room. Ruthie has $20 that she'll loan to her sister. Instead of thanking her, Mary asks if she has any more. Ruthie apologizes, and Mary takes her twenty anyway. The phone rings some more. Mary hands the phone to Lucy and leaves the house. Simon answers, and the bitch tells him that there'll be legal action taken against Mary if she doesn't make her payment by the end of the day. "Don't let them put Mary in jail," Ruthie sniffs. Man, this episode is so incredibly annoying. And there's no cutesy subplot relief, either. It's all about Mary and what an irresponsible dork she is. The only redeeming detail of this scene is the appliqué on Ruthie's t-shirt. It's a cute orange monster. I'm going to make myself a t-shirt like that as soon as I'm done with this recap. Simon points out that the CamRents are eventually going to answer their own phone and find out how much trouble Mary's in. Lucy only knows one person they can call. When we were watching this, I said that she was calling Matt, and my husband bet it was "that minister guy." I had to tell him that the minister was their father. "Damn, this show is stupid," he said.
Matt's in the Camden living room, wondering what bank would give Mary a credit card. His siblings tell him about the arguments the CamRents have been having lately. Annie calls and asks for Eric and then Mary. Lucy says that Mary's out looking for a job. The CamBrats fret some more.
Mary walks through a parking lot, swinging her arms like a man. She holds up her twenty-dollar bill and says, "One, please." The guy working the ticket box at Flix asks if she wants to see the double feature. "Sure, why not? I have all day," says Mary as she careens down her self-constructed treacherous road.
At Eddie's Pool Hall, Annie asks the Bartender With No Name if he's seen Eric. He hasn't. He gives Annie a soda on the house and tells her all about how Mary got fired for being such a crappy waitress. Stupormom looks angry.
In the CamKitchen, Simon answers a call from RevCam, who says, "Why'd it take so long to answer the phone? Is everything okay?" It only rang three times, but whatever. Simon tells his dad that Mary's out looking for tricks -- I mean a job. We see that Eric's at Pete's Pizza Parlor. Sgt. Michaels walks up and tells him about Mary's drinking/driving episode. RevCam is shocked and dismayed. Just like Annie, he repeats what he heard as if he's a an ugly, beige parrot.
Mary sits in the theater, watching a Marx Brothers movie and laughing with her mouth full of popcorn. I sit here imagining the feel of her cheekbone against the palm of my hand as I slap her hard. I see the popcorn flying out of her open mouth. I hear the sound of flesh against flesh, and then I hear her say, "Hey, can you loan me fifty bucks?" I don't know what's worse -- the fact that she chews with her mouth open, or the fact that she's cracking up over the Marx Brothers. ["The colorized Marx Brothers, no less." -- Sars] Oh, and then there's that dishonesty thing, too.
Collection Bitch calls again, and this time Lucy hands the phone to Matt. Matt adopts a New York accent and introduces himself as "Bernie the attorney." He says Mary will sound a dollar a month to the bank, and then twenty-five cents a month. It might have been funny if it hadn't been Matt doing it. Collection Bitch is fooled and hung up on. The CamSibs decide they need to loan Mary the money without the CamRents' knowledge. Not one of them has fifty dollars to spare, though. Ruthie points out that the twins have "tons of money."
Sgt. Michaels bids RevCam goodbye at Pete's Pizza. Then Pete himself comes out and tells Eric the real reason that he fired Mary. He spills all the beans about Frankie and Johnny stealing beer after hours. Johnny's his nephew, and that's why Pete doesn't fire him too. RevCam says that he forbid Mary to see Frick and Frack anymore. Pete says he saw Mary hanging out with them just the other day.
Annie calls the car dealership from the pool hall and finds out that Mary's car is going to be repossessed if she doesn't cough up $300 in the seventy-two hours.
Lucy and the other hellspawn fret over the twins' piggybanks. Ruthie says that the banks contain almost $400. Matt pretends to believe that Mary will pay the money back. Ruthie really does believe it. They decide to go through with the thievery.
Mary emerges from Flix; once again, she's got a five-dollar bill in her hand. Sad clarinet music plays as she glances around. You can tell she's going to do something bad. Maybe she'll purchase a nickel bag from Crack 'R' Us. She sees the ice cream shop and walks towards it. No, Mary! NO!
Later, after the commercials, Mary walks into the CamPound with her ice cream pint. Matt starts laying into her. She's very nonchalant, telling him to calm down. Collection Bitch calls for the millionth time, and Bernie the attorney tells her that Mary's on her way to the bank to pay her bill. The brats give Mary the money. She thanks them. Matt tells her to thank them by getting a job and a sense of responsibility. Mary runs out the door. I guess she's in a hurry to catch another free double feature at Flix.
Annie shows up at the hospital looking for Eric. Hank, who apparently doesn't have any doctorly duties, strolls through the lobby and asks if something's wrong. "Is there something wrong?" Annie repeats. "No, there's not something wrong. There's a lot of somethings wrong. And everything wrong has to do with...Mary!" She's near tears. What a sissy. Hank leads her to his office so they can talk.
RevCam calls his CamPound again and tells Ruthie that if Mary shows up again, they're to keep her there. We see that Eric's at Julie's house. He falls back on her couch and bemoans his daughter's lying streak. Julie squints, then glares, into the distance as her brother babbles about the fight he had with Annie that morning.
Meanwhile, Annie's crying to Hank about the same fight. We go back and forth between the two scenes, hearing that each of the CamRents regret their argument and the way they've handled Mary. Then there's a split screen and Annie and Eric say, at the same time, "I feel like I don't even know my own daughter." Then the split screen shows us Hank's and Julie's pensive reaction shots. "Have you noticed anything? How was she when she babysat last week?" Eric and Annie say in unison. It's the corniest use of split screen I've ever seen in my life. I would have laughed if my ulcer hadn't been hurting so much. On the one hand, I wonder what I would do in the CamRents' place. On the other hand, I can't even imagine letting my kids turn eighteen without having acquired some kind of work ethic.
Matt temporarily leaves his parents' nest again, assuring Lucy that Mary will catch her snap. Then Ruthie says the same stuff. Simon and Lucy wish they had the same faith in their deadbeat sister.
At the bank, a representative is offering to extend Mary's credit line and lower her minimum payment requirement. "More credit?" says Mary. "Sign me up!" The woman across the desk warns that Mary's interest rate will go up and that she'll wind up paying more in the end. The end is far off to Mary, so she agrees to the plan. The woman asks her for thirty dollars instead of the fifty originally agreed upon. "I just made twenty dollars!" says Mary. I'm going to invite Mary to my house to play poker. I wonder if the woman earned a toaster oven for talking another dummy into increasing interest.
It occurs to Ruthie that the CamRents might rattle the piggy banks and realize they're empty. Lucy does the math and finds that Mary has a week before Annie makes the piggy-bank deposit. All they have to do is put a few pennies or pebbles in each bank so that they'll rattle. I guess these kids aren't wily enough to think of that, though. Can I help it if I'm a criminal mastermind?
At this point, I'm really wishing that Ruthie would expectorate, or that Simon would shoot up smack or something. This all-Mary-all-the-time episode is really working my nerves. She's at the car dealership, signing up for another high interest rate. She now has ninety-five dollars of the twins' money freed up. I wonder what she'll spend it on. A Three Stooges film festival, maybe?
Annie calls Eric at his sister's, and they apologize to each other. We find out that Julie spilled the babysitting beans to RevCam. Julie gets on my nerves.
Mary asks her insurance agent if she can get an extended credit plan there, too. The agent tells her that the payments are made over a twelve-month period. "Now, if the calendar ever changes and we have thirteen months a year instead of twelve, come on back and I'll see what I can do," she says ultra-sarcastically. Heh. She should work for MBTV. Mary shows her teeth, uncertain whether or not she's been dissed. Then she goes outside and sees a "Help Wanted" sign in a shop window. "Is this my lucky day or what?" she says to no one. My lucky day will be the day that I write my recap and Mary's no longer on the show.
Mary's turned in her application. The man behind the counter notices that she's had a lot of jobs in the past three months. She claims that she's still searching for the perfect one. He asks what salary she's hoping for. "Twice what I made waiting tables. That would be good," says Mary. The guy remarks that she has spunk. "Yeah. Spunk like a fox!" says Mary. Just kidding. She actually compares herself to Mary Tyler Moore. The shop proprietor gets all happy because that's his favorite show. He hires Mary at her exorbitant rate. Before leaving, she remembers to ask him what exactly the job is. "Oh, I think you know what I want you to do, you hot little minx," the guy says. Just kidding again. He says that she'll be a counterperson. Mary walks out as the guy's wife walks in. The guy announces that Mary's the new counterperson. "In your dreams," his wife says. "Not another pretty little high-school student who knows nothing about books." The guy tries to rebel, but his wife gives him the domestic smackdown. He'll have to call Mary and tell her she didn't get the job after all. Poor old guy. Guess he'll have to keep spanking it in front of his Mary Tyler Moore reruns.
StuporMom comes home to find Ruthie, Lucy, and Simon doing laundry and acting suspicious. Lucy tells her that Mary got an overdue paycheck and went to pay bills. Annie knows better and asks who loaned Mary the money. The kids play dumb. RevCam walks in, and the kids all run upstairs. The CamRents hug and apologize again. They share the gossip they learned from the citizens of Busybodyoak. Oh, sorry. I mean the citizens of Glennosy. They resolve to confront Mary with the "cold, hard facts."
At the hospital, Matt reprises his Bernie role for John. They gossip about Mary, and then that filler scene is over. I hope it was enough for the Chaz Lamar to pay his bills this month.
Mary returns home. Lucy hints, "You had one last paycheck coming!" from the stairwell just before the CamRents swarm in. Mary smilingly lies and then informs her parents that she got a job at the bookstore. She spackles on a bunch of talk about the new leaf she's turning over and then walks off. The CamRents weren't duped. Annie hysterically asks why they didn't confront Mary. RevCam says that they need more information before they forge ahead into battle. "The Art of War," he says, as if he just quoted Sun Tzu or something. "Is this war?" Annie quavers. RevCam thinks it is. It's a pretty lame war, then. My hamsters could do better playing Risk.
Up in their room, Mary tells Lucy about the job she thinks she has. "Now the trick isn't getting the job, it's keeping the job," says Lucy. Mary asks why she's being so snotty. Lucy points out how inconsiderate Mary's been lately. Mary apologizes and then says that from now on, honesty is her new policy. The guy from the bookstore calls to rescind his job offer. Mary says, "What?" They hang up and Lucy asks who was on the phone. "Oh, uh, wrong number," a lying, smiling Mary answers. Lucy looks suspicious as hell, the sad piano plays, and we fade to credits. Downward spiral alert! Treacherous self-constructed road ahead! Mary's on the Highway to Hell, y'all!
week: Mary is still losing her way, and her parents are still having their hearts wrenched in "an unforgettable farewell -- 'Mary's Goodbye,'" which can't come too soon for me.