Episode Report Card M. Giant: B | Grade It Now! YOU GRADE IT A Doctor Time Out
By M. Giant | Season 1 | Episode 3 | Aired on 01.26.2011
In a hurry? Read the recaplet for a nutshell description! Finished? Click here to close.Just because there's some kind of annual festival going on doesn't mean that the jungle has given up looking for ways to kill people. Exhibit A is a young pregnant couple who crashed on a mountain road. As the expectant mom is rushed to the clinic for an emergency C-section, her husband is injured in a mudslide, but not so badly that he can't give Plastics some unsolicited life advice.
And as if a C-section on the patio isn't already bad enough, a partygoer manages to not only electrocute himself but knock out all the power in the village, including at the clinic. Also, the expectant father remains stranded out in the wilderness with Plastics, Clark, a broken leg and a bashed-in lung while the mother gives birth to a badly jaundiced baby and almost bleeds out herself. They both need Daddy's blood, but he didn't survive the night, forcing Plastics and Clark to drag his body back for a transfusion from his corpse. And then the new mom doesn't want the blood anyway. Of course this is all secondary to how Lily blames Ben for lying to the patient about her husband's condition, unable to pick up on the redolent waves of tragic backstory rolling visibly off of him.
As for the electrocution victim, Mina's so distracted by figuring out why he wasn't killed that she ignores his sob story about losing the love of his life. Too bad we can't. And then in the end Mina helps them get together anyway. Dammit, Mina!
Plastics manages to succeed where Lily failed and convinces the new mom to take dead dad's blood, so now everyone can go back to the party. Otis and Zee seem to be properly dating, Plastics uses his one word of Spanish to try not to flirt with a bartender, and Clark informs Lily that Ben lost his wife and kid. And, thanks to half a bottle of whiskey, consciousness. Oh, heal thyselves already, people.
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Want more? The full recap starts right below!Looks like there's some party planning going on. Stalls have sprung up around the Cantina, busloads of revelers are arriving, extra tables and chairs are being put up, and colored lights are being strung up over the plaza. All signs of impending fun, which means they look totally out of place at the beginning of an episode of Off the Map. One of the stalls is selling candy, and Otis and his sweet tooth are standing impatiently in line, clearly jonesing. Ben visits him in line to tweak him for it a bit, and Otis says he's eight months clean, so he's doing what it takes. Eight months without candy? That's rough, man. Also not true, because we saw him sucking on a candy stick on his way to go patch things up with Papa last week. Anyway, Otis is curious about the reason for the upcoming festival, so Ben explains that it's about drinking. No patron saint of something, Otis wonders, obviously on the colonialist assumption that everyone down here is Catholic? "Drinking," Ben insists.
A non-specific festival for a non-specific location; sounds right to me. Presumably this is an annual thing. Remember how Dr. Fleischmann on Northern Exposure experienced a new annual event in Cicely every week for six years? Not that I think this show is in any danger of that. Ben goes on to remark on all the recent rain, although he slept through the storm last night. Otis asks if Clark did as well. "I wouldn't know," Ben grumps, and asks about Zee. Otis says maybe this festival is about the patron saint of Mind Your Own Business. Both Ben and I know what he means, but having grown up Catholic I can tell him that we don't have one of those. Suddenly one of the guys hanging lights is knocked off the ladder in a shower of electric sparks, but he's okay. Although tragedy was only narrowly averted, because Otis nearly lost his spot in the candy line.
Back at the clinic -- right outside it, actually -- Zee is giving the n00bs a little seminar on some of the handier local plants. Ben happens along and uses the occasion to flirt with Lily a bit, and then Plastics calls out a friendly (and toolish) "'Sup?" to Clark, who's walking by just as he's nibbling on a fresh leaf that Zee just handed him. It's for erectile dysfunction, so of course Tommy spits it out, assuring everyone he doesn't need that. No shit, Coat Rack. A bored Mina turns to Lily and whispers, "Can you ask your boyfriend where all the sick people are?" After the obligatory denial that Ben's her boyfriend, she says he told her the clinic is usually fairly dead during the three-day festival. That sounds like a pretty shitty festival, actually. Zee briefly calls their attention back to another plant, but then immediately loses Lily when she recognizes the plant from Ben's book, which she read twice. Banter between Lily and Ben continues until Otis charges past, announcing there's been a car crash up in the mountains. The relief of Mina and Plastics is visible, if morally reprehensible. Ben taps Plastics and Lily to come along and mentions that Clark will be joining them as well, leaving Mina to stand there looking completely dissed. But at least she's not bored any more.