Episode Report Card Al Lowe: A | Grade It Now! YOU GRADE IT Yo, NBC Saps!
By Al Lowe | Season 1 | Episode 4 | Aired on 03.23.2010
l!" Adam says, throwing up his hands. "That's right! You go up to your room, because you're grounded!" Kristina concurs. "Ja wohl mein Führer!" Haddie yells, and running into her room, wastes no time in climbing right out the window. It strikes me as unlikely that Ms. Goodie Two Shoes would have the institutional knowledge to do this, but she makes her escape like a pro. Little does she know, however, she is observed from the ground floor by Max.At her office, Julia is visited by Sarah. "How did you know I was working on a Sunday?" she asks. Sarah mumbles about how she was just talking to Joel and yadda yadda, she's there to passively-aggressively confront Julia about canceling Amber's babysitting job. Julia says if her firm had her way, she'd never get to go home. "Is that why you cancelled on Amber?" Sarah asks. Julia, obviously lying, says uh, yeah. "Really?" Sarah says, going in for the subtle kill. "Because Joel says it was because she didn't know the area?" Julia's eyebrows are working overtime trying to think of what to say. She stammers that, um, it was a combination of those things. Sarah says that thing is, it's just that Amber was so upset about being cancelled. Amber, she says, thinks it's because Julia considers her irresponsible. Julia says that Amber did not give her the impression that she was that upset about the whole thing. Oh, but she is, Sarah says, since Amber had such a sterling rep as a babysitter back in Fresno. "I didn't know that," Julia says. Probably because it's not true, but whatever. Sarah doesn't want her kid -- and by extension, herself -- to be thought poorly of. Poor Julia is always having to learn the Apologize When Appropriate Lesson. Finally, she breaks down and does it. "Don't apologize to me," Sarah says, in her most smug mom voice, and heads out leaving Julia feeling all guilty once again. Two moms protecting their daughters for very different reasons. It's sad, but sweet.
Drew is washing Zeek's truck at the house when Adam rolls up for his Man Club chat. His opening salvo is about as awkward as possible. "I hated washing that old truck," Adam says. "But, there was something I really enjoyed doing when I was your age..." Drew: "Oh, yeah? What?" Aw, innocent Drew. "It's perfectly natural," Adam goes on. "You know, Woody Allen said masturbation is having sex with someone you love." Nice. I thought I was done writing about things like this back in my Deadwood recapping days. Of course, I shouldn't complain. No one is getting gut-stabbed or beating up whores... yet! Drew asks if his mom made Adam talk to him about this. "No, no... well, she may have mentioned it," Adam says. He goes on that he just wants Drew to know that it's normal. "And, I want to make sure you don't feel weird about it," Adam says, "and you know, so we can just... air it out." Heeee. Yes, that's not weird. Drew: "Air it out?!" Adam says you know, he wants to be sure Drew knows there's no hairy palm stigma attached to it, and that he can talk to Adam about anything any time. "Can we just not talk and say we did?" Drew asks. Adam, painfully, goes on. "Pimples, girls, birth control. You know about rubbers, right?" Haa! I never realized that uncles had it so tough. Drew: "We can just not talk, too, right?" Hee. Adam says yes, no big deal, and tells Drew to keep up the good work. "I mean, washing the truck!" he fumbles. "Or, the other thing, too, if you want, because uh..." With that, he escapes saying he's glad they had this talk.
Julia comes home from the office to find Joel already apologizing. He got flustered, he says, when Sarah was questioning him about Amber babysitting, and blew it. "That's all right," Julia says. "I blew it, too. We should never have cancelled in the first place." Joel is skeptical, but Julia, offended, says she trusts her sister. "Oh, geez, I'm sorry. I forgot the cardinal rule," Joel says. "Only a Braverman can criticize another Braverman." Julia, again, must apologize. "You're right," she says, "that's a total double standard..." Joel: "Thank you." Julia: "...one, about which, we can do nothing." Good one. She says she thinks they should go ahead and call Amber to see if she could still come over that night. Joel asks if she's sure about this. "No," Julia says, "but I'm optimistic." Trying to get into the spirit, he gives a little cheer and says "so am I." Yay, date night is back on. I loathe the expression "date night." I can't even explain why -- just go out together, people. You don't have to have a cutesy phrase for it.
Adam is back home after his super successful chat with Drew. "You didn't use the word, did you?" Kristina asks. Adam asks why. "Because it's just so clinical, you know? 'Masturbate,'" she says. Yes, it is, I suppose, but what on Earth would be the alternative? I will let you imagine said substitutions rather than Google-associating my name with yet another collection of blue terms. Perhaps to replenish his energy after such a trying afternoon, Adam is eating peanut butter straight out of the jar. They are just discussing freeing Haddie from her room when suddenly, Max appears to bust him on the PB, declaring such behavior to be against the rules. "You are absolutely right, buddy," Adam says closing the jar. Max: "Does that mean I can?" Adam and Kristina say no, it doesn't, that Daddy broke the rule and won't do it again. They ask him if he can tell his sister to come downstairs. "No," Max says, surprising them with the news that Haddie's not in her room. Moments later, the three of them hit the pavement. "YoYo lives here?" Adam says as they stroll up in front of a lovely home with a well-manicured lawn. "Honey, don't judge a book by its cover," Kristina warns. "You can cook meth anywhere." They are about to continue on their way when the door of the house opens and YoYo's parents come out. They come rushing out, really, like the house is on fire. "I'm out," Kristina says, and is about to bounce, but these total strangers recognize them all the way from their doorstep. "You're Adam Braverman!" the dad says. "And you must be Kristina and Max," Mom of YoYo cheerily adds. "Yeah," the dad says, and nicely goes to shake Max's hand. Max, naturally, avoids him and walks straight to their porch to begin messing with the flowers. "He's fine!" the dad says, and the YoYos start gushing about how great Haddie is, how much they just love her, how she's told them everything about Adam and Kristina, including "the situation" with Max. This comes up because Max, you know, is pulling the petals off all their flowers. "Would you like to come in?" the mom trills, "Seeing as how we're Facebook-officially related!" Finally, Adam and Kristina have to admit that they're just strolling by to check them out. "I understand," YoYo's dad says. "If I had a daughter, I'd want to know where she was hanging out, too."
Well, right now she's hanging out with her cousin Amber. I guess they've patched things up from their rough night at the police station. Also, can you just walk everywhere in Berkeley? How do these kids get around? Amber's advice on this whole thing with YoYo is that Haddie needs to realize that it's her parents' job to make her life miserable. "Okay," Haddie says, "so, what's my job?" Amber says it's to keep her parents out of her personal life as long as humanly possible. "Which isn't easy," she says. "They're like termites. They're relentless." Amber, by the way, is maintaining her street-cred by smoking a cigarette. Haddie asks what she can do to make the termites stop. Amber shrugs. "Deception? Misinformation?" she says. "You flat-out lie to their face if you have to. Although, that does tend to backfire. Really gets them riled up." Ah, the bad girl with the heart of gold. Not really, because: "Just remember," she adds. "They brought this on themselves."
Uh, oh -- Haddie's busted, again. "Thanks for responding to my APB," Adam tells Sarah as he pulls into the driveway. The shoe is now on the other foot as Sarah is the one ready to give advice. "You know what you're gonna say?" Sarah asks. Adam: "How about 'get the hell in the car?'" Sarah agrees this is a great opener. "But after that?" she asks. "What's your plan? What are you gonna do?" Adam says he doesn't have a plan. "No? Have you met this guy?" she asks. Adam says, no, he's just heard his voice on the phone. "He's one of these Yo, yo, yo guys," he says. Sarah: "That's bad!" Heee. Cringing, she asks him if he thinks Haddie's having sex with this boy. Adam's face drains. "Haddie is 15," he says. Sarah says yeah, Amber was 15 when she hooked up with Damian. Adam: "And they were...?" Sarah, flabbergasted, says yes, they were. "She wanted to move in with him," she says, almost laughing, "and start their lives together." Poor Adam says he is sure Haddie's not there, yet. Trying to convince himself, he adds that he's positive she's not. "Okay, I believe you," Sarah says. "But... it's right around the corner, and you have to do everything you can to postpone it." Silence reigns. "Do you know how to do that?" she asks. He says no. "Oh, my god," Sarah says. "You have to shut them down!" No phone, emails, texting, anything, she says and then, when that doesn't work, he has to go to Plan B. "Which is what?" Adam asks. Sarah: "Move." Love this scene. Adam smirks. "Thanks for that," he says. Sarah: "Welcome to my world, brother!"
On the ride home, Haddie thinks she's going to win her little privacy argument, but it so isn't going down like that. "What if I don't want you to know what's going on with me?" she snits. Adam: "I don't care, Haddie!" Yes, exactly. She says she has a right to privacy, and he plays the ultimate parent card: "Not in my house, you don't." No doubt she is about to come back with some perfect teenage put down, but he continues, pulling the ultimate weapon. "Maybe it's different over at Steve's house," he says, "with Marjory and Dale." Awesome. Endless props to Sarah Ramos for playing this so utterly brilliantly. Oh, man, isn't it hard being a