Episode Report Card Grade It Now! YOU GRADE IT James And The Giant Truck
By Stee | Season 9 | Episode 10 | Aired on 08.20.2000
Kathryn, driving, asks Holly if she can look at the map. Okay. So, they're lost. I get it, as James, still hyper, yells, "We're pretty much going en Fuego." "James is basically a frat guy," voice-overs Msaada, adding that his energy is hard to take sometimes. The mixed-up blondes ask James to "chill" and "shut the [beep] up" as they look at the map. "Dude," says Kathryn, "Dude" Fever now spreading like small pox in the Shasta. "You have a silver spoon up your ass," Kathryn adds. James calls Kathryn "Pi Beta Phi," suddenly speaking Greek, and warns her never to say that he has a silver spoon up his ass. Yeah, it's platinum. She should know better. "Phew," says floaty James. No, really. That's the whole floaty. A sigh. Shasta driving. Bad drum and bass music that B/M pimps on their website, to which I refuse to link. Night-time. Holly voice-overs and then floats that James has been driving for a long time and is tired and cranky. Shot of James driving as Holly navigates. They're going to stay at an RV Park for the night, and James is "not happy about that," reports a super-Scaryteeth Holly. James and Holly argue for a while about the RV Park, which has, as Holly reports (calling him "dude" -- damn, people!), pool and air hockey and other crap like that. James complains that the beds on the Shasta suck and though they just spent a whole bunch of time in a hotel, they deserve to spread out every once in a while. Holly says, "You're just such a whiner." Oh my lord, James is acting like a little bitch. Oh shit, James comes back with, "Holly, you're the one who's crying after events.…" Oooh. We get a classic shot mostly on Theo, sitting shotgun, sleeping, with total slack-jaw, as Holly goes, "Excuse me!" "Well, don't call me a whiner, dude," says James, all Taking Back The "Dude." Holly voice-overs that James brings "it" on himself by saying "...something that's a complete, back-handed-jerk thing to say." Floaty James is in the House, saying, "I can't stand Holly right now. There's nothing about her that makes me want to be ten feet near her." Okay, now listen: I only have two choices here. One: I defend Holly. Two: I just move on. Yeah, I thought you'd pick that one. Sonofabitch. The blue light twirls. The Bloated One comes on his little screen. The kids react as usual: Holly laughs like a schoolgirl who's in love with her ugly P.E. teacher. RM blahs: "I've written a little song about tomorrow. 'Well, there've been too many crashes, on the road to love.' I think it's going to be a huge hit." Blah. Catchphrase. Been there, hated that. Oh my Lord. As RM says "hit," we get literally twelve little screens of the doofus. That has to be a record. Seriously. This episode should be so proud. The Shasta is at the RV Park as Holly voice-overs that their next stop is Augusta. That's Georgia, right? Cool.
"Stuck" reads the next Graphic of Stupid. Okay, do I even have to comment on that one? James and Theo are babbling inside the Shasta that night at the RV Park. James dudes that he doesn't even know how to act on this trip, that he loses a part of who he is. Well, he obviously hasn't lost the annoying part of himself yet. That's something. Theo responds that he likes being part of the group but everyone is different, and James interrupts that he hates the group. "None of the girls, I think, are funny. None of them I hang around. None of them are patient with me. None of them are patient with...I don't know, dude, like, I'm not comfortable around them." James is pretty drunk here, it sounds like, and I certainly hope he is because he's making very little sense. Theo responds, and I swear, they have their own language, because I have no idea what he's saying. Theo says something about perceiving that James usually deals with situations and people like this by saying, "Deal with it, dude." Deal With It, Dude: that's the name of my sixth album. Holy Dude! James throws a massive tantrum about how normally he could just says "Fuck You" to someone who doesn't like him, and walk away, but here he is the aforementioned "stuck" in "this shitty RV." He starts talking shit about the Shasta and throwing stuff, and it is all very very funny, and not in a "James is an intelligent and thoughtfully troubled young man" way, ether. Okay, James really starts to scare me, and Theo as well, by going on about how he's stuck and he "can't be stuck in these walls!" and how usually he could just rip shit off the wall but here he cannot...so he does. He rips some panel off the wall and indeed, it is a shitty RV and poorly decorated to be all retro-space-aged and I don't blame his aesthetic sensibilities being insulted, but he does look like a fool as he talks about all the stuff inside of him and grunting and acting like a big freak. "There's so much [beep] energy with me, every day. That I can't..." Theo is very funny as he is obviously scared (and/or turned on) and keeps saying, "I know. That's what I like about you, dude." This is reminding me of the episode of M*A*S*H where Hot Lips and Hawkeye were stuck in a tent somewhere and the bombs were falling right on top of them and they were scared and then mad and yelling and cursing the bombs, and then suddenly they started making out furiously. I keep waiting for Theo to grab James and say, "It's not your fault," over and over until James breaks down and Theo gets an Oscar™ nomination. Finally James leaves and crawls on top of the Shasta (now that's getting away from the "walls" he hates so much) and Theo floats, looking very much in love, that people think James is tough (who thinks that?!) but he's really "sensitive" and "sentimental". James then takes over the floaty detail: "It's like, the missions and the money are really the only thing that's, like, keeping me here." Psst. Hey B/M. Take away the missions and the money. Please. Just until James leaves.
Morning. James wakes up on top of the Shasta and we're suddenly at the Augusta/Richmond County Civic Center. The Shasta pulls into the lot and the kids "ooh" over this wrestler-looking guy getting out of a car; he is draped in chains and holding a skull. The crack B/M editing staff continue their assault on our eyes and production sensibilities by using crazy split-screens and stutter-effects and multi-shots. Inside a shitty auditorium, the kids hoot and holler as monster trucks drive around a course. Kathryn voice-overs that she loves driving trucks -- but I think she means that she loves being driven in trucks. James, having suddenly gotten over his ennui, screams and cheers and pumps his fist even more vehemently than when he saw Mommy last week. Somebody have the crash-cart waiting nearby because I think James is about to have an embolism. And...commercial. Damn, this is just the first commercial. I'm about to start ripping shit off my walls. Too bad I can't go sleep on the roof. You know...the pigeons.