Shout-outs to Mrs. Kathryn Adams and KentS.
Okay readers, I screwed up and had to have the tape sent to me, so I missed the teaser and the "last time on Now and Again," and the credits. All I remember from watching it was some characters I had never seen before and an old lady turning into dust, like when Buffy slays a vampire. Hoo hah?
We start out in a very sleek looking cage-type-thing with Artificial Guy doing push-ups. He's up to the seven hundreds and sounds a little tuckered. But hey, he's artificial, right? He should be up to this. Remember Jeff Goldblum in The Fly? He was pumped! But wait, there's frost on A.G.'s face and you can see his breath. Outside the little room there's an LED display, which reads "-34". Even with no Fahrenheit or Celsius sign or letters spelling out C-O-L-D, I can figure out that it must be COLD in the cage. Right on cue, A.G. starts whining and complaining about feeling like "the world's biggest Popsicle" and being part of a frozen TV dinner. He's the beefcake part! Dr. Mastermind, all checking A.G. out on the TV monitor, assures him that his heart rate and blood pressure are normal and to quit crying, take his dress off, and give him a thousand push-ups. "Forty years of conditioning" have trained A.G. to feel cold. So the room is -34 degrees, he feels cold, has a frosty face and yet isn't really cold. Because he's artificial. It's a psych-out. "Will you fergit that mind-over-matter mumbo-jumbo! I know when I'm cold, and I'm really cold!" whines A.G. He dances around a bit too, because he's only wearing sweat pants and the usual tank top. Don't you wish A.G. would ever TRY to get used to the idea that he has a new body that isn't human? Or enjoy it? Me too. Dr. M. is hard-hearted (hee hee) and whoops, here comes a knock on the laboratory door! Dr. M. has to turn off the monitor and remove his earpiece to answer the door, muting the sound of A.G. bleating for a break.
On the other side of the door is a gaggle of white-coated, serious-looking people. Scientists, I can assume, though I have no proof of that yet. The head egghead very distinctly states that he and his fellow geeks need the room at precisely 1 PM to make some very precise meteorological measurements. So, they need to use the room. While the head geek is spelling this out to Dr. M., a baby is crying loudly and, as many novelists have written, lustily. Dr. M. asks what the hell that is, and the egghead goes on to crisply explain that one of the doctors is a single mom and brings her baby to work. All the time. Sure, that happens. Most days, the egghead explains, the baby is fine but "today she's a little crabby. As am I." Mmm-hmm. So Dr. M. lets them in, and the white-coats swarm the lab equipment and start geeking out, or nerding it up -- whichever. The baby keeps crying. A.G. squawks in the re-inserted earpiece, "What is that?" Dr. M. stomps over to a lady with a baby (as if he can just ASK a baby to quiet down and it will), and starts lecturing to the back of her head about how this is a laboratory. She turns around and Dr M. melts into a puddle of goo because she's a PRETTY white-coated geek. "Are you talking to me?" she sweetly says, and Dr. M., with birds flying around his head and hearts in his eye sockets, says, "No, just...welcome." Bling! Then into the earpiece A.G. screams "Doc! Doc! Doooooc!" Seems that instead of doing his push-ups he sat on a metal bench and got stuck -- almost frozen -- to the metal wall against which he was leaning. "Let's get a heat lamp in here!" At least it wasn't his tongue.
Roger Bender is just waking up from a dream. It was about going out with the Wisemans for their anniversary dinner. His wife, whose face is obscured in shadow, starts bitching him out for waking her up. "What are you TALKING about? You know Michael's GONE. What do you MEAN, their anniversary?" Oh, she's so not nice. Yeah, Bender says, weird because their anniversary is just like three weeks from now. Um, you remember that? Bender's wife (with her face still obscured) says to IGNORE the upcoming anniversary because there is no marriage anymore. "Trust me, it's what Lisa wants." Bender looks doubtful and lies back down.
In another bedroom, Lisa pops up, sighing. Maybe she had the same dream! Some moody music starts playing. Cut to Heather's bedroom, where her mom is watching her sleep. Yuck! Heather wakes up and is like, are you okay mom? Yeah, she just had a bad dream. Then Mom starts babbling about going away up the coast, to stay in motels and eat fried food. Um, yeah, sounds like every teenage girl's dream. Heather murmurs about missing band and soccer and the school play. Mom gets pouty and fiddles with a lampshade. Heather makes a suggestion about continuing the conversation in the morning and Mom goes, "What, you have a PROBLEM with your MOTHER standing in your bedroom watching you SLEEP?" Uh, yeah, it's weird! But Heather is cooler than I am, because she throws the covers back and says, "Get in or get going." Mom leaps in and snuggles down. Heather sighs, then they both giggle. Who's mothering whom here?
Back at the lab, Dr. M. is peeling off a bandage to reveal A.G.'s perfectly good, smooth skin, revealed in the now ubiquitous tank top. "Damn I'm good," he murmurs. "Tell me how you really feel about yourself, Doc," cracks A.G. Forgive me for not actually slapping my knee. Then A.G. goes off about he's got some sense of dread and is worried about disappointing someone. Dr. M. reminds him that A.G. is in fact his bitch now, and the only person A.G. should be worried about is Dr. M. Insert whipping noise here. Then Dr. M. tells A.G. to hurry up so that they can make it to the weather lab 1 AM, and A.G. is like, why, what happens at one o'clock?
Inside the weather lab, A.G. is finishing a series of one thousand reps on a rowing machine. The little room is bathed in orange light because it's 137° in there! I think my apartment gets that hot in the summertime. A.G. finishes rowing to nowhere and starts -- guess what? Complaining. He's hot. "I feel like a leg of lamb. No wait, I always feel like a leg of lamb." Don't you mean a piece of meat? Outside the heated room, Dr. M. is miming a conversation, ignoring A.G.'s whining. Then, at 1 AM on the dot, the doorbell starts buzzing angrily. Dr. M. straightens his tie and cruises over to the door. On the other side stand the gaggle of white-coated geeks.
Dr. M. welcomes them in, staying on the heels of Dr. Pretty Lady with a Baby. He opens his mouth but nothing comes out, and he follows her around the room until she asks, "Why are you following me?" with that wide-eyed stare women use when they're humoring a desperate man. Dr. M. bumbles some attempts at conversation until she's like, can you go back over there now? Dr. M., clearly not a winner in the ways of love, is like watch me go! and goes back to the console, rejected. A.G. starts banging on the heated walls, forcing Dr. M. to hiss "What are you doing!" A.G. yells "I'm trying not to turn into a puddle of perspiration here! What are YOU doing, Romeo?!" And then he makes some crack about how Dr. Pretty Lady is an icicle. Because all women who don't immediately lay down at the feet of the men who speak to them are frigid -- sure. A.G. continues lambasting Dr. M, saying he has no game. "YOU suck like a Hoover! You have the conversational skills of a monk!" Dr. M. hisses, "What makes you an expert in the art of all things conversational?!" All the white-coats stare. Seems that insurance salesmen know something about talking to people; A.G. insists he "can sell holes to a donut." What talent! A.G. really, really wants to get out of the hot room, and as he complains, Dr. M. stares at Dr. Pretty Lady until some plonky, romantic piano music starts up and Dr. M. heads over to try again with her. A.G. squawks in the earpiece "Trying again with Frosty?" Some Steve Wonder vocals come in. Dr. M babbles on for a bit until, all Cyrano De Bergerac-y, A.G. starts feeding tender pick-up lines into Dr. M's earpiece. A.G. says 'em, Dr. M. repeats them verbatim. This works! And Dr. Pretty Lady gives up her name: Dr. Lauren Rivers. "Now sell her some insurance," A.G. chirps. Dr. M. looks ecstatic.
Commercials, all innocuous except for the two thick-necked dudes who argue about Whoppers. The are nails on a chalkboard. Onions rule, my ass!
After serving A.G. a silver tureen of what seems to be oatmeal, Dr M. speaks vaguely about sacrifice and relationships. Then he hops up and tells A.G. to start working out so that they can get to the weather lab. Then the two get into a fight, A.G. recalling (correctly) that he fed Dr. M. lines and that he would have "drowned in his own drool" if it weren't for A.G. Dr. M. draws himself up and gets snippy. He can talk to women just fine, thank you. The conversation ends with a good! Good! Fine! Fine! And they both stomp off.
In the car (Dr. M. and A.G. are always ferried around by an invisible driver; have I pointed this out yet?), some blues riffs play as the two ignore each other. Humph.
Heather arrives home, and her mom is locked in the bathroom. People only do that when they're smoking or reading books and magazines that they aren't supposed to, say Heather. "There are no cigarettes or Playgirls in here," Mom reassures Heather, while putting out the doobie she was sparking. Just kidding! Mom won't come out of that bathroom, so Heather makes a call on the cell phone and tricks her into coming out. Sneaky! Mom was dyeing her hair -- the same color as Heather's! Heather freaks, using the perfect teen logic that "moms aren't supposed to change! You're supposed to stay the same all the time!" Then Mom reveals that she's been missing her husband and that their 18th anniversary is coming up. But it isn't really, because her husband is dead. Then Heather offers to go on that weekend motel tour if her mom will act normal again. No, says Mom, she'll just dye her hair if that's all right. Heather says, "It is if I can dye my hair blue!" She is so cool.
A series of lapse dissolves between the clock, which says it's almost 1 AM, and A.G. running on a treadmill in the weather room. It's freezing again. The buzzer buzzes, A.G. yells, "I heard that!" while Dr. M. runs to the door. He latches onto Dr. Pretty Lady until she breathily asks him, "Is there something I can do for you?" Dr. M. actually says, "Coffee sound like to get perhaps?" She head-tilts and looks bemused and he tries again: "Walk with me, wanted and coffee get it." He then excuses himself, runs to the console, addresses A.G. who says, "Ask something me want to you?" A.G. is missing a verb, but whatever -- zing!
Cut to the street, where Dr. Pretty Lady is pushing the baby and walking with Dr. M. He did it! She's describing her baby's father who, like many men, did not want the responsibility of being a husband and father. A.G. is creepily following them across the street, feeding Dr. M. dialogue like, "Oh," and "I'm sorry." The baby starts crying (the same lusty track that played in the lab) and A.G. sees this as an opportunity to win points with Dr. Pretty Lady. "Say you wanna hold the baby!" Dr. M defers, saying, "it's small, and leaky." Hee hee. While Dr. Pretty Lady is bouncing the totally fake baby in her arms, Dr. M. basically HAS A CONVERSATION with A.G. across the street. She doesn't notice because scientists and moms don't generally notice little details like the guy you're walking with suddenly turning his head and speaking to the freaky-looking white guy across the street. Oh no, not in Now and Again's world. Finally, A.G. convinces Dr. M. to hold the baby, and to SING to it, and Dr. M. does, busting out with an old, old, OLD favorite, "A Bicycle Built for Two." The (now real) baby seems to like it, as does Dr. Pretty Lady, who takes his arm as they put on their Easter bonnets and promenade down the street together.
The screen reads "three weeks later." Dr. M. skips in whistling "A Bicycle Built for Two." A.G. slumps in a chair as Dr. M rattles on about the paper containing a silly story about a lady spontaneously combusting (as we saw in the teaser), and then about the date he had with Dr. Pretty Lady. He had fish. Then A.G. says he remembers what it was that gave him the foreboding feeling: His upcoming anniversary. He asks Dr. M. for the date, and Dr. M. is like, "I can't tell you that; you know that." Uh, no, tell me again. "Focus on your work!" yells Dr. M. What is that, I ask? A.G. eats and works out like a supermodel, but does far less work than one. What "work" is he supposed to be doing? "Dead men don't have anniversaries," Dr. M explains. "They don't have wives; they have widows." He leaves, and A.G. says "When you come back, don't be whistling."
is a very odd scene in which Lisa/Mom calls up her old college roommate, Claire, and has one of those totally artificial phone conversations, aided by a series of camera dissolves. We learn that Lisa's maiden name is "Schlegermelch." BA HA HA! The music playing is a misty piano solo of "Bewitched, Bothered and Bewildered." When she learns that Claire is divorced and lives in trailer with fourteen cats (one for every year she's been divorced), she gets off the phone quickly without making plans to see her. Guess her sense of revulsion is more acute than her loneliness.
In the car, A.G. is craning his neck all over Times Square to try to see the date. Dr. M. is not reading a newspaper as usual, so A.G. gets huffy. Then he attacks Dr. M for not being able to talk to his woman and Dr. M. says the words just "trip off his tongue." Whatever.
In the lab, A.G. is riding an artificial bike (built for one) in the pouring artificial rain. I feel bad for the actor, a bit. Then I get over it. Dr. Pretty Lady knocks on the door and Dr. M. excuses himself from A.G.'s turning up the rain to "Monsoon" and whistles the theme to Gilligan's Island. I'm not kidding! In the hall, Dr. Pretty Lady makes a move as if to dump Dr. M. Her husband has cleaned up his act. Dr. M. babbles, "What about the us of two? Move don't," and then runs back to the console begging for A.G.'s help. Oy. A.G. tries to get Dr. M. to give up the day's date and he won't -- or rather he can't. Then Dr. Pretty Lady comes in and offers to end the conversation another time. No no! This is the perfect time since Dr. M. is a boob and can't talk. A.G. feeds him a line like, "I know you have to go back to him today, the 12th." Dr. M. repeats the line and Dr. P.L is like, "It's the 17th." A.G. tricked them into revealing the day's date! What a clever little fucker! Good thing Dr. M. didn't see that one coming! Zing! "He's Kisa's father," says Dr. P.L., "I have to go to him." Then Stevie Wonder starts up again and, with the rain in the earpiece, it sounds like an ersatz Quiet Storm-style radio show with Dr. M. being fed lines like, "For a while, I was the keeper of your heart." Do you think Barry White wears an earpiece and has all of his lines fed to him by some white guy in a tank top? Me neither. Then Dr. M takes the earpiece out, and kisses the pretty lady. I can see her explaining this to her husband: "Oh honey, he was just a geek in the lab! He couldn't even speak properly! We went out for fish once! It was nothing!"
Heather, wearing a super-cute hat, is talking to Mom. She's going out to the movies with friends, and is that okay? Because tonight is a special night. What a considerate daughter. Lisa/Mom say's she looks forward to spending some time alone and gives her some mad money. Cool!
In the car, Dr. M. and A.G. are staring out their windows as the piano plays. A.G. says, "I just want you to know..." and then doesn't finish his sentence. Dr. M. stares at A.G. and wishes him a happy anniversary. This scene is so tender it makes me wish they would start kissing. But they don't.
The piano continues to the scene, in a candle-filled bathroom. Lisa/Mom is in an uber-bubble bath, drinking wine. Hey, that's how accidents happen, you know! She whispers "Happy anniversary, Mike." Aww.
Then, just like in the teaser, we cut to characters we don't know. It's a couple making love, then she stops, the she leaves, then the man spontaneously combusts. She screams. We care not. The end. Or is it..?