This is the first full recap I've written since returning from up north, and consequently the first chance I've had to thank Wing and Glark in a public forum for their ridiculously comprehensive digital cable -- er, I mean "hospitality." Also, hi Sars. Just because.
Fade up on a nighttime shot of O Little Town of Roswell, the jaunty, Christmas-themed soundtrack, lighted wreaths hanging from newly-emergent Dickensian lampposts, and unsettling absence of the expression "we have to do something, Maxwell" within the first twelve seconds all conspiring to alert us that this is a stand-alone holiday episode, and we should abandon all hope of continuity, ye who enter here. Panning across Main Street, we see only half of a green banner advertising "Roswell's 23rd Annual" something, the rest of which I suspect reads, "Half-Assed Stab At A Cheesy Theme Party Somehow Involving Maria DeLuca Singing…This Month ALONE." Down on street level, a thirtysomething Dad prototype hitches a Christmas tree to the roof of a respectable, dark-colored SUV and turns to his impeccably dressed blonde daughter holding her pink teddy bear and politely requests she "go grab that bag of mistletoe." Holy domestic bliss, Batman! When did "the societal construct of Suburbia" get its own product-placement department? Anyway, Cherubic Near Orphan looks adoringly up at her father with that all-I-want-for-Christmas-is-my-two-parent-family-my-two-parent-family-yes-my-two-parent-family gaze, before obeying his request and running off to complete the errand with as much "I love you dead guy -- er, I mean 'Daddy'" emoting as she and her small, near-orphaned frame can possibly muster.
On her journey, she runs through an outdoor Christmas tree vending locale and right past Max "Have Your Pecs A Merry Little Pecs-mas" Evans and his non-right non-hand non-man Michael "That Shook When He Laughed Like A Bowlful Of Jelly" Guerin. Michael, hunched over and shaking and doing his overall best impression of Acting Cold For Dummies while standing on a toasty LA soundstage representing an even toastier desert southwest, clutches a hot cup of Weather Channel and reports to Maxwell that "it's freezing out here" and begs him to "pick a tree." Max responds that it's "not so simple," adding that the tree needs to fall within "certain parameters," indicating an elaborately-drawn diagram starring a tree and reading "Douglas Fir" across the top to illustrate this point. He adds, "You know how Isabel gets this time of year." Michael makes like Basil Exposition's helmet-wearing cousin Rupert, who's spent most of his non-expository life locked away deep in the Exposition family's attic, as he garbles in response, "The Christmas Nazi, driving everyone insane while trying to have the perfect Christmas."
Hmmmm. Maybe I'm not the most appropriate spokesman for political correctness in everyday speech (see recent, indefensible "helmet-wearing" reference for a bit more on this. And I can't even count on two hands how many "make the yuletide gay" nicknames I kicked around for Max for this holiday-themed episode), but "Nazi"? Won't the statute of limitations barring cavalier use of that word not expire for, like, another five thousand years? Especially when used in reference to The Most Aryan Woman In Show Business? I guess I missed the evolution in language when that word shifted in meaning from "one of Hitler's minions who willfully assisted in the systematic annihilation of eleven million people during World War II" to "a little controlling and stuff." Ah, well. Semitic, semantic. Around the holidays, it's all the same. Whatever. Sorry. A choir of children just appeared outside my window singing "Away In A Soapbox" in delightful harmony. I threw them down a quarter to go fetch me the biggest Christmas turkey there was in the whole market. So I guess I'll get back to that whole "recapping" thing now. Now that we're alone again. ["For the record, I -- who recently got voted one of the ten biggest WASPs on the Web -- found that a little offensive too. You don't put 'Christmas' and 'Nazi' together. Hi. Kristallnacht. Look it up. Okay, we're done here." -- Sars]
Here we go: Michael warns Max not to play into the Isabel's controlling wiles, warning, "You gotta fight her. You gotta fight the Christmas Nazi." Sigh. As Max pulls out a tape measure to survey a nearby tree, Michael takes a healthy gulp of his steaming All-About-Me-O-Chino, changing the subject accordingly: "C'mon, I gotta get to the hardware store before it closes. I gotta get Maria her present." Max volleys a wacky quip about Michael buying Maria a "ratchet set" (accidental viewers of Home Improvement will remember that tool-oriented humor is just about the least satisfying topic for comedy since, well, genocide), and Michael purses (no, really) his (no, REALLY) lips (ah, forget it) and claims that he's under "a lot of pressure." Why? Michael continues, "She's been busting my ass for weeks about this present." Busting his ass, eh? The whole thing? And only for a few weeks? Man. She's gonna need to hire a team of specialists if she wants to cover all that ground in time for New Year's. Of 2017. Ha. Duh. Anyway. Michael continues, "She says it's gotta be significant." Max warns, "Then you might want to steer clear of the hardware store." And also steer clear of the point of this entire episode, while you're doing general steering-clear-type things. Oh, wait. You're already doing that. Awww, thanks, guys. Merry Christmas, me.
But steering clear won't be part of anyone's Christmas this year (viva la segue!), as a car and a small pick-up truck nearly collide on the non-icy thirty-miles-per-hour street just beyond. Cherubic Near Orphan stands in the direct line of impact of one of the skidding cars, throwing her pink teddy bear up in the air and looking the very picture of innocence. Seeing the oncoming collision, Dad pushes his daughter out of the way (NB: a frame-by-frame of her hitting the ground yields much unintended Saget-esque hilarity), and the squealing wheels head right for him. Skidding on dry pavement. Wheels. Windshield. Dad. Smoosh. He sails onto the roof of the car and then slumps onto the ground. Near Orphan screams a plaintive "Daddy!" or two while a crowd quickly gathers, murmuring phrases of the "Call an ambulance!" and "He's still breathing!" and "Rhubarb rhubarb rhubarb" variety. Max stares and stares. Michael ups the dramatic ante with his full-name usage: "Maxwell, let's go." What would the Christmas Nazi have to say about this sad turn of events? I know he was downed in the process of buying a tree and all, but we can at least hold out hope that he was at least half Jewish.
My Roswell Christmas stocking was stuffed with tertiary characters this year, as we cut to Chez Evans to join Diane "She Bangs" Evans and Mr. "The Ghost Of Christmas Why-Won't-You-Just-Get-In-The-Past-And-STAY-THERE" Evans, flanking Max on either side while Bangs regards a newspaper heralding, "Father of Two Dies Heroically in Tragic Accident." The cutaway is too quick to know for sure, but I think the smaller print just below the headline trumpets, "Autopsy determines no numbers found tattooed on upper forearm; townsfolk instructed to be saddened by death after all." Bangs recaps for our short-term convenience, "This man gave his life to save his daughter. This man is a true hero." Mr. Evans, momentarily relieved that mid-season contract negotiation didn't leave him the dead "father of two" in question, at least for the time being, takes pains to establish himself as an essential component of the episode, asking Max, "Where's the Christmas Nazi?" Oh, you're so in, Mr. Evans. Max responds that the Christmas Nazi was outside examining the Christmas lights for "errant bulbs." I guess any of the bulbs determined to be unfit for Christmas are removed from the house and forced at gunpoint to dig their own graves in the backyard with tiny shovels. This goes for the red lights, the yellow lights, the ones shaped like pink triangles, and especially -- ESPECIALLY -- the black ones. It will be a white Christmas for the Christmas Nazi, snow or no snow.
And finally, she appears. The Christmas Nazi, a.k.a. Isabel "God Chest Ye Merry Gentlemen" Evans tears into the kitchen, dragging the tree Max bought behind her and sniping, "Max, this is by far the most pathetic Christmas tree I have ever seen. Did you even refer to my diagram?" He grouses that "something came up" and that he had to get the tree that very morning instead of last night. She berates further, preaching that she could have "squeezed in time to get it [her]self between the hunger drive and Christmas dinner at the nursing home." So mean to him she is! Way to slice up the fruitcake, Isabel dear. If you know what I mean, and I think you do.
Bangs vamps that Joe Dead Guy's family lived four blocks from them, and the spacey jams kick up and Max looks across the room to spot Joe Dead Guy sitting on top of the washing machine with his hands clasped together and looking very, very blameful. Creeeeeeepy. Max stands up and approaches, as Isabel spots him walking away and fumes, "Oh, great, he's doing laundry now." Because the dual concepts of "Christmas" and "laundry" are so mutually exclusive. More staring. Max speaks: "I'm sorry." Max's newly acquired, external, ghostly conscience speaks: "How could you let me die?" Shut up, loser dead guy. Shut up, Jacob Gnarly.
Opening credits: Christmas is coming, the goose is getting fat. Please to put a penny in the old man's hat. If you haven't got a penny, a ha'penny will do. If you haven't got a ha'penny…you can still afford to double this show's F/X budget. Nice green wall, Good King Pecs-ceslas.
The Djb Store has sold out of "my last nerve," so much have I already had it with the kitschy soundtrack, which greets us upon triumphant return from commercial with a ditty by the Barenaked Ladies' non-union counterpart "The Clothes-Free Females," or whatever, who let us know that they want "an alien for Christmas this year." Maria is behind the counter at the Crashdown, and Michael rings the bell from behind the short-order window and beckons his good woman over. She calls him "spaceboy" to remind the viewing audience that Michael is, in fact, an alien, seeing as nothing else in this episode has thus far fulfilled that task. He comes clean in telling her, "We got three days till Christmas," and politely requests that they wait until after the holiday to exchange gifts. He's working every day? Well, I guess after the nine-week sabbatical he just wrapped up a few weeks back, it makes sense that's he'd have to string a few days together. Maria asks if he needs "a little wiggle room." Gack. Not in those jeans, Puffy. And for the love of Jack Frost, I don't ever want to think about Michael Guerin joined with the words "wiggle room" ever, ever again. Either way, Maria thinks she's cloaking her sarcasm marvelously, at least through the line, "How about the second week of January?" She guilt trips about Christmas being "the birthday of our Lord and Savior," and tacks on a classically in-the-spirit-of-said-Lord-and-Savior rider with the galling threat, "You give me that damn present on December 25th or I'll never speak to you again." She smiles wanly and walks off, to…
…inside of Simon from Go's office at the UFO Center, donning her now some truly gay apparel of a brown, burlap-y poncho thing, adorned in orange shag-carpet trim ripped right up off the floor of the seventies basement rec room set of a new ad campaign the FBI was finally able to stop Calvin Klein from shooting. She calls Simon's name repeatedly, even though he's sitting right there in the corner of a not-really-that-dark-after-all room. He says hi, and she launches into a prepared speech about her "non-boyfriend, Michael Guerin," which he is quick to shut down. "It's just not really a good time." Awwwww. No flirty, here's your sandwich, "pepperjack-frost-nipping-at-your-nose" chattiness for Maria and Simon this week, I'm sad to report. He expositions with a little more grace than the aforementioned Rupert, but the dialogue is still so transparent and deliberate that he's still less Basil and perhaps more their solid but predictable uncle, Carl Exposition. And this is what he says: "Listen, I'm gonna be away for a couple of days. You don't need to bring my lunch." She asks if everything is all right, and he lies and tells her yes with a "fine" that says "let's forgo garlands this year and decorate the tree entirely in foreshadowing." She makes for the door with a "Merry Christmas," which he whispers in return all ruefully after she's out the door. This involves the looming specter of death, I bet.
Den of Porno. An unacceptable shot of Porno blocking a television screen with the entirety of his close-up ass (Hi, Santa? When I asked for a porno featuring some different positions, this is SO not what I meant. Ew. Just kidding) bent over for the benefit of an entire viewing audience, as well as a nearby and near-faint cameraman whose only Christmas wish is that the SAG strike will somehow start right. Now. Over on the couch, the always hilarious Kyle "Let's Go For A Slay Ride" Valenti sits on the couch. After the football play unfolding on the TV fails and Porno returns to the couch, Kyle notes that "his mind and body are in deep conflict." Porno glares. Pause. Porno: "I'm very concerned that you're starting to make sense to me." Because we like Kyle, we'll hear the rest of his football banter: "All I'm saying is that if the guy can't visualize his journey to the goal, he has no chance of takin' the rock downtown." Good enough. Tess enters, all a-twitter about how crowded the stores are and blah, and sits on a chair right in front of the television (which there is in every self-respecting house containing good country folk in the mind for some ol'-fashioned dudes-watching-TV-hijinks) while Porno and Kyle lean simultaneously to one side and then the other to get a glimpse of the blocked set. As Tess finishes the portion of her speech about "people dragging Christmas trees on top of their cars," the New Mexico Chalupas (or whatever…this expansion craze is getting out of control) convert for a first down, and Porno and Kyle cheer in tandem. Tess noses around under the brown-toned plaid couch and at the bottom of an empty bottle of generic-brand beer the set designer saw fit to place in front of a seventeen year-old, but she still fails to sniff out any holiday cheer at all inside the Porno house. So she volleys, "But clearly you guys don't bother with Christmas trees?" It's in the garage, where they see fit to leave it. Bachelor banter. Football. Porno barks, "Visualize!" at the TV, then makes a please-score-a-touchdown face that so morphs him into one giant yellow tooth that I almost wish I were staring at his ass again, were I given a choice between those two images. ALMOST. Tess hedges around the notion of Christmas dinner, and Kyle provides the information that they "usually hit the Crashdown for turkey." Tess sulks while the boys parse the hidden meaning behind the script's insistence that they experience a "simultaneous football orgasm" at this moment. Everyone and everything about that house is brown.
Isabel and Michael are inside of a pharmacy. He hands her an electric toothbrush, telling Isabel that that will be Maria's present. Michael defends his choice of this gift on the basis that "she set a price limit. If I exceed that budget, then there's gonna be hell to pay." Isabel believes there will be "hell to pay" if he gives her an electric toothbrush for Christmas, adding, "You're better off getting her no present at all." Michael claims that he "tried that last year" (this is where I would ordinarily link to the episode in question, but considering the non-artistic misdirection of the show at this time last year, if there a Christmas party to be had, the viewing audience sure as hell wasn't invited to it, so we're forced to settle for this revisionist history instead), and Isabel snarks that last year was their first year together (it was? IT WAS???) and he didn't give her anything. Dental hilarity (which is about the third funniest arena for comic exploration, right after power tools and genocide) ensues, and Michael claims the whole holiday is nothing more than a marketing scam (just like those clothes he's wearing, this soundtrack, and probably even the toothbrush itself…you sure picked a fine time to go Mennonite on us, didn't you, WB Boy?). Isabel snarks, "Well, you can write that on the card when you give her a dental product for Christmas." Whoa. Apparently the Nazi movement doesn't discriminate on the basis of teeth whiteness. He reaches out. She advises thusly: "Go home, think about all that you and Maria have shared, all that she means to you. Then start coming up with some ideas. Okay? A Christmas gift should be personal, thoughtful, and something someone would never get herself." She checks her planner and begs off, her corkscrew tresses (which, incidentally, look kick-assedly good in this episode) flying behind her as she tears out the door to go ladle candy-cane soup with reindeer meatballs into bowls at a shelter or some such other altruistic and festive thing. She turns to leave. Michael: "Hail the Christmas Nazi." She turns back. "What did you say?" Michael denies saying anything, and she smiles broadly and leaves, keeping her Auschwitz about her all the while. Seeing how not acceptable this is yet?
Ouch! My ears done bleed figgy pudding at the start of this scene, and the reason for it, amazingly enough, is not Maria's singing. For once. The reason is the deafening shout-out of the Christmas carolers who stand in front of Jacob Gnarly's house, treating the bereaved wife and her two young children to a rollicking rendition of "Jingle Bells." Maria and the other carolers are singing from a book called Christmas in Song, which is the exact book I use when I…okay, fine, I sing Christmas carols at a restaurant in New York during the month of December with a quintet. In a Santa hat. For money. Sigh. Don't we all feel better now that it's out in the open? Anyway, the book they're using, this Christmas in Song, features an elaborate color drawing that takes up the front and back covers of the book, an artist's rendering of a group of happy carolers in hats and scarves standing in front of a horse-drawn carriage and entertaining a group of party revelers who have come out of a house to see what's going on outside. Oh, and it's all so very merry indeed. So merry, in fact, that we started conversationally referring to the book as Gay Christmas in Horse-Drawn Song, which is even more hypocritical than the nice Jewish boy from Long Island admitting he's a caroler-for-hire, considering the amount of grandstanding I've done so far in this recap about how words can hurt and all that. Oh, and have I mentioned that my insistence that we arrive early and act professionally both towards the restaurants' patrons as well as its owner has earned me the informal nickname amongst my friends of "The Christmas Nazi"? Oh, I didn't mention that? Well, maybe that's because this recap isn't all about me. Or, at least, it's not supposed to be. I'm glad we were able to clear the air on some of this. I've never felt so close to you all in my life.
So Maria and the Mariettes sing "Jingle Bells" in unison, which we professional carolers [buffing fingernails against shirt in the ultimate form of smug self-satisfaction] know is not at all how it's written anywhere in the pages of Gay Christmas in Horse-Drawn Song. Mrs. Gnarly looks sadly down as her daughter, holding her best friend Snuggle The Fabric Softener Bear, smiles at the carolers. I don't want to be crass here, but don't they have things to do? Like, say, making funeral arrangements? Or contacting his parents? Or getting that little girl who watched her father get mowed down by The Ford Fiesta Of Doom to a crisis counselor, like, immediately? Or any number of non-"Jingle Bells" oriented activities I might take the time to list here? Max stands back in the shadows, several feel behind the carolers, looking upon them as if to say, "Caroling, whatever. My upper body is the original Jingle Bell Rock. Right here." But these muses are presently interrupted by the walking-dead presence of Jacob Gnarly, who sidles up to Max and accuses, "What are you doing out here?" Max responds that he wanted "to make sure they were all right." Gnarly claims that "they're not." Max defends himself with an oft-heard truism, "If I had exposed myself last night, there were people I would have put at risk." Jacob Gnarly rehashes the old "it was okay for you to heal Liz Parker blee blah" story which still reigns supreme as the most significant plot development this show has to offer THIRTY-TWO EPISODES LATER. Max promises to look after Gnarly's children, "until they're okay." Gnarly fumes, practically screaming, "They'll never be okay, Max. Don't you understand that? They lost their father last night!" Oh, boo hoo, Mr. Self-Important. I mean really, they look fine. Did you know that the second verse of "Jingle Bells" ends, "He got into a drifted bank and we, we got upsot"? It does. It's right here. Right here on Page 17. Heh. "We we."
Crashdown. Liz "The Worst Noel" Parker sits at a table near the locked front door. She spies Max, who we see in a reflection against the glass door, approaching. She opens it. He speaks: "You know how we said that we were gonna try to be friends?" Turns out, she does. He continues, "I think I need a friend." She invites him in, stammering "oh." And so I'm offering this simple phrase to kids from one to ninety-two. Although it's been said many times, many ways: SHUT UP, LIZ.
Maria is down from five carolers to three, one of whom announces, "Okay, last house of the night. Five-year-old girl with cancer." Hmmmm. I guess "dead father" ranks five carolers, but the Tragedy/Caroler Conversion Chart stipulates a lower conversion rate if it's conclusively shown that the troubled soul in line for some caroling fun is, in fact, still alive. They begin to sing a version of "Deck The Halls" (p. 10) that is such a different arrangement than the one in the book that it's really going to mess my yuletide shit up hardcore when I stop recapping and put on my Santa hat. And sing Christmas carols. Tonight. What has become of my life, people? Anyway, a little girl is all ready to walk out the front door for some reason, and after a moment, she calls, "Daddy, come here." Daddy exits the house. It's Simon. He and Maria lock eyes. Maria flounders but keeps singing. Heh. They said "gay."
Max is in a light barn jacket and Liz no coat at all, because it's New Mexico and the script doesn't specify that it has to be really cold out because no one is talking about Christmas. Max breathily opines (He does. He "breathily opines." What do you want me to do about it?), "There was a crowd. A huge crowd, and everyone was watching. I could have healed him. But I didn't." Liz responds that Max can't hold himself responsible (easy for you to say, Little Miss Broke-The-Bottle-When-You-Fell with your still-beating heart), and Liz rationalizes that it would have been irresponsible of him to risk exposing Michael, Isabel, and Tess. Again. From the far side of the roof, Jacob Gnarly appears and chides, "That was the sugarcoated version, Max. Tell her what you were really thinking." And so he does: "I wasn't thinking about Michael and Isabel and Tess. I was thinking about myself and the white room and being tortured. I didn't heal that man because I was protecting myself. Why couldn't I trade my life for his?" Ew. Like you would have made a less annoying ghost. Jacob Gnarly rips another page from the shooting script of Ghost (which is only good news because I'm guessing he's finally digested the relevant pages of Victor Pascow's dialogue in Pet Sematary), substituting "Henry the Eighth" (not that I've ever seen that Ghost movie) for a heartfelt version of "Amazing Grace." Max tells Liz that he's being "haunted," as Gnarly walks along the ledge of Liz's roof and drops backwards off of it. Okay, that moment kind of chilled me a little. He then appears right between Max and Liz and comments, "You can't get rid of me that easily, Max. I got no place to go." Why, look at that. A significantly less chilling moment. Gnarly informs him, "You need to restore the balance." Hey, there's a word that was done to death last season. There was even an episode named after it and everything. Max opens his mouth to explain to a confused Liz, "I need to restore the balance." Meanwhile, a certain River Dog I might mention here spots that line on the closed-captioning from way at the back of the unemployment line, reaches into his rucksack, and shoots the TV in fury.
Simon from Go exits the front door of what we have recently discovered to be his house (because he's an independently wealthy millionaire who lives alone in a modest ranch that looks exactly like the house I, independent non-millionaire, grew up in) carrying a few empty gift boxes. Hey, there's Maria. He asks why she's there, guessing, "You're wondering about Sydney." Kick-ass name for a girl. Simon's cache increases yet again. Simon explains that she's staying with him "for a few days. Y'know, for Christmas." Maria awkwardly pries, "She has…" Tact? Oh, no, that's you, Maria. Oh, wait, it's not that either. This is so far from being any of her business that my brain just exploded trying to comprehend the distance.
But Simon even finishes Maria's sentence, obliging, "…cancer. It's in her bone marrow. Inoperable." Holy Jesus. The man practically apologizes for withholding this information in the past, casting a downward glance and noting, "I know you and I talk a lot…" They do? THEY DO? They went to the Crashdown for breakfast -- ONCE -- and other than that, they've shared a veritable lifetime together cultivating a relationship that revolves around the existence of two words and two words alone. Say it with me, people, sing it if you know the words:
Pepper. Jack.
Leave the poor man alone with his family. He continues, "It's hard. To talk about it." Maria responds, "If there's anything I can do. Anything at all." Oh, logic dictates he is so going to take her, his food-service professional, up on that offer. Just like that time I ended this really long relationship and later poured my heart out to the pizza delivery boy. Or that other tragic time in my life when I found out my parents were getting divorced, and I knew the only person who would truly be able to understand me was the check-out girl at my neighborhood Food Lion. But you all knew that. Because we've all been there. Who hasn't, really? He tells her that she already helped him "last night," at which point, for some reason, I keep picturing the randy Married With Children studio audience responding with that arcing, highly sexualized, "Oooooooooh!" that would do this moment such justice. Oh, but he meant her singing. He tells her, "You have a beautiful voice." Oh, blah. Like he could even hear her. The rules clearly state that if you can make out an individual voice within the blend, that person is singing too loudly. Not to mention the fact that once the four-part harmony kicked in, the girl was lip-synching like Milli Vanilli at a damn karaoke bar. Sydney steps out onto the porch in a pink gown, announcing to her father, "I can't get my crown to fit right." She regards Maria: "Who are you?" Exactly. We learn that Sydney is going to be in "the Christmas pageant this afternoon" as Simon helps Sydney with her crown and Maria stares on in awe. There is a dry eye in the house. It is mine. This is so out of place and emotionally manipulative that I vow my gift to you all is to throttle Katims and the damned one-horse open sleigh he rode in on. Darn. I wish I hadn't tossed away that "Cloys For Tots" reference in the recaplet. 'Cause hark if it wouldn't have made the perfect ending to this paragraph right here.
Over at The House That Government Subsidy Built, Isabel enters with an armload of gifts and freezes in her path when Michael unearths a dirty-ass car bumper and informs Isabel, "It's a bumper." For a Jetta. She responds, "Yes, I see that." Thanks, so did we. She puts down her wrapped gifts and approaches, asking him how her speech to him the day resulted in this present. He fills in all of the criteria of it being a thoughtful, personal, original gift Maria would never buy for herself. Blee blah blook. Isabel takes a deep breath and pulls out her planner, promising, "I'm gonna take the Christmas Dog Show off my calendar and take you shopping and rectify this situation." Pity. How much fun would "Roswell 210: The Christmas Dog Show" have been for an episode? Paging Fred Willard. Much better than this, I'm telling you that. Whatever. This episode hasn't even started getting bad yet.
Michael snipes that he doesn't want this to become a big deal that makes everyone miserable, and Isabel takes it personally, accusing him, "Are you saying I make everyone around me miserable?" before launching into the woe-be-it-to-my-martyred-alien-self speech o' the week: "Is it too much to ask that one day a year I can be a normal human being with a normal life and have a merry Christmas?" Well, she's not human. So, no. Maybe that's the point of the speech. I'm too busy giving a CRAP to know for sure. Michael adds, "No, mein fuehrer." I guess I have no leg to stand on with the whole Nazi thing, so that's over. Drugstore sequence retread. She indicates the pile of gifts she put down on The End Table That Government Subsidy Built, imbuing them with a presently pointless level of importance in asking, "Is it all right if I leave some gifts here? I have more shopping to do." She leaves. Even before I watched this episode in its entirety, I knew we were paying a severe amount of attention to those packages, so clunky was the process of pointing them out. When the "I guess she bought foreshadowing for everyone this year" jokes are handed to you, there's not much you can do but step back and point out where they might have gone. Here, for instance.
Holy supermarket sweep! A new set! We're inside of -- no, really -- a supermarket. Porno is hurling TV dinners with pictures of turkey on them in Kyle's direction, repeatedly yelling the words "Meaty Man" in a way I never, ever want to hear him say ever again. He continues, "Meaty Man, in case the game runs late on Sunday," even though the clear intent is to consume those delicious morsels on Christmas day, which falls on a Monday. Would that have been so hard to check on? Tess stands to Kyle, who catches the Meaty Man (dude, I can't even believe I have to write that nasty sentence) dinners Porno is throwing his way. From behind Porno approaches the cart of -- oh, man, it's Maria's ersatz Jewish mom, DeLucawitz. Hey, Nazis! Sic 'er! Just like a Nazi: there's never one around when you need one. Porno gets all flustered and greets her, his voice cracking like a jeopardized member of Menudo in wishing her a "Merry Christmas." She bids hello to Kyle and greets who she believes to be Tess, turning back to Porno and telling him that "this is what Christmas is all about. Opening your heart and creating new family." Porno tries to act the modest one, claiming "it's just a temporary thing," but she begs him to admit that "this is a very special year" for all of them. Porno looks back at his kids and finally, God help us, breaks into one of those big creepy smiles we haven't seen with any regularity since the long-forgotten days of Renee. He then repeats "very special" and breaks into a cackle that sounds less like a jubilant cry than a really sinister private joke that only he knows. He flashes the pearly yellows once more, the sheer stomach-turning impact of which causes all of the fresh meat in the desert southwest to spontaneously spoil. Thank goodness, then, for the copious frozen provisions of a certain Meaty Man I might take the time to mention here. DeLucawitz indicates some Christmas tree ornaments in her cart and product-places "the secular concept of holiday celebration" with the oddly Laura-Linney-in-The Truman Show line, "I always say: You can never have too many ornaments, right?" Tess grabs at some nearby ornaments and gleefully agrees that that's what they always say, too.
A butcher's hands appear out of nowhere just over the counter from DeLucawitz, and place a raw turkey from the planet "Whoa, Big-Ass Turkey" right in front of her. Tight close-up of raw meat. Um, gross. But not as bad as the laugh. Or the ass. DeLucawitz picks it up and places it in the cart, embarrassedly informing Porno on departure, "If you ever want to stop by, there'll always be a DeLuca Christmas pie waiting." He looks around, confused: "Is that sex? Does she mean sex? That means sex, right?" DeLucawitz wheels her cart off-camera and right back behind River Dog onto the aforementioned unemployment line, as Porno, Kyle, and Tess stand in silence for the length of a close-up on The Meaty Men Of Shame and the furrowing of brows all around.
While Isabel shepherds the kids from the Christmas pageant onto an outdoor stage, we cut over to Maria and Liz sitting among the excitement while Maria finishes passing along the details of not her life story, downcasting, "I've been crying all day." Lizbot can't operate the battery-powered Emotion Pack 2001 that people keep giving her for Christmas this year (like that year we all wanted to give this increasingly mono-browed friend of ours some eyebrow trimmers, like "hint hint," guy) in attempting to communicate that she too is sad at the prospect of another human being becoming disassembled, Stephanie. Maria claims that she wants to "be there" for Simon and Sydney, and Liz is soon to figure out that Maria is lapsing back into wacky mode when she veers into psycho territory with the line, "A girl needs a mother." Yikes. Liz reminds Maria that she is seventeen and in high school, and Maria begins to fake cry and talk about how sad the whole situation is. "My mother was married when she was seventeen." Liz asks if Simon said something to her about this potential arrangement ("He said he liked my voice!" Gack), and this fairly snaps Maria into reality with the sentiment, "I'm gonna marry Brody?" Who? Oh, yeah. "What am I, crazy?" Liz says she's not. I say she is. Shut up, Liz. Liz suggests that the best approach she could take is to just "leave them alone. Their time is precious right now." Maria weeps on that "it's Christmas, and Christmas is supposed to have happy endings and miracles." She probably keeps talking, but whatever speech she might have cobbled together is instantly drowned out by the dulcet tones of Foreshadowing climbing onto the Christmas Pageant stage, commandeering a nearby mic, and crooning the entirety of "O Come All Ye Contrivances" in both the English AND the Latin. 'Cause that man has talent, people.
Liz spots Max and hugs Maria as we cut to Isabel introducing herself to the pageant attendees with her laundry list of holiday-themed accomplishments, up to and including, "The Christmas Nazi." If there were any Jewish citizens of Roswell, New Mexico, they would now take the time to become as incredulous about the nickname as I once hypocritically pretended to be. And so the pageant begins, as a number of tykes make their way on stage wearing fairy costumes and the like. Slo-mo of Liz running up to Max and whispering in his ear. Close-up of Simon. Close-up of Sydney. Slo-mo coma sets in. Jacob Gnarly shows up out of nowhere (because that's what they DO, people) and informs Max, "Looks like we have a plan." "We"? What are you, his partner? Do you get a commission with God for completing the pass on this? You didn't do anything. Sigh. I hate dead people.
The House That Government Subsidy Built. This scene has been lifted almost verbatim from every script of this show ever, with the addition of a new character possessing almost as much in the way of charisma as any of the other characters in the room. That's right. The Jetta's bumper, front and center. Michael is angry and obstinate; Max attempts a yawning sense of reason. Michael: "You heal her and you leave behind a silver handprint. That's a big fat clue, seeing there's aliens in Roswell." Wha? Max retorts that Nasedo-as-Pierce destroyed the Special Unit's files, and that "it's possible that no one even knows who we are or what the silver handprint is." Well, taking for granted that internal logic, the central conflict of the show has been resolved and the series can be cancelled, no? I'm just sayin'. Does this episode seem like it's taking place completely out of sequence from everything that's happened in this series ever? Isabel reasons that what they've been though in the past year "starts to take its toll," agreeing that if Max feels strongly enough about this, then he has to go ahead and do it. Ditto Tess. Michael observes, "I guess that makes me the odd man out," adding, "call me a selfish jerk [okay, you're a…oh, not me? Sorry], but I don't think we should risk everything so you can feel a little better about yourself at Christmas." Hey, that's true. And, um, why can't Max tell them why he has to restore the balance? Max admonishes, "Michael," and in the process sounds exactly like William Daniels as KITT admonishing an oft-recalcitrant Hasselhoff on Knight Rider. "Michael." Hee. Now that's TV for you. Michael grouses amongst his broken-down apartment and his trash-heap Christmas present that he's being voted down "three against one." Way to help out the cause, Little Slummer Boy.
And back at the Den of Porno, Kyle and the house's namesake resume the position on the couch, this time watching…bowling? I know I used a line once about The World Championship Olympics of Data Entry, but I don't know if was in a Roswell recap or somewhere over on Twin Peaks, but if I've never used it here, that's what I think they'd be watching if it were on TV right now. 'Cause man, they'd watch bowling. So really, they'd watch anything. Tess enters through The Door Tess Enters Through -- the one that momentarily obscures the boys' view of the TV when she walks in front of it -- and asks Kyle to go fetch some chairs for a beautifully decorated dining room table. Kyle responds that they "don't have any other chairs." She asks if only having two chairs seems a little odd for any reason, and Porno pulls off my favorite line of the night, deemed so because it really makes me laugh every time I see it and I have no freakin' idea what it means: "Well, we used to have more chairs. But over the years, our collection has dwindled." Porno scarfs a chip and informs Tess that they usually eat in front of the TV, as Kyle ad-libs (there's no question in my mind) an equally delightful line as Porno's, "He's never gonna pick up this spare. Look within, you putz!" Oh, yeah.
Tess takes a sidebar and chooses this moment to melt down: "I have been cooking for twenty hours, while you two have been sitting on the couch like two beached whales." Tess pronounces the word "been" with an "e" sound longer than this episode has dragged on so far, and on the whole the speech sounds like an exercise in trying to contain her Australian accent from leaping into the room like Paul Hogan shilling an Outback or two when a static audience suddenly presents itself. Porno suggests using his desk chair. But what about Amy DeLuca? Where is she going to sit? Dude, can we reestablish some "can manipulate molecular structure" continuity here, since the "writers" seem to be ignoring the whole of the last eight episodes or so? Why can't she turn a marble into a chair, or a pork chop into a chair, or Liz into a chair? Oh, wait, scratch that last one. Already done. Liz = chair. Really, what's the big deal? Manipulate. Ditto Michael's present for Maria.
Anyway, Porno freaks at Tess for inviting Amy. He leaps off the couch and commences a shirt-tucking-in dance I will uncleverly but appropriately refer to as The Porno Dance. His wailing "when is she coming" question is answered by the ringing of a doorbell and Tess's response, "About now, actually." Porno finishes too-tightly tucking in his pants (more crotch-cam for Porno, thanks) and races for the door as Kyle hastily tries to clean up some chips. Porno opens the door. Amy thanks him so much for inviting her, adding, "I loved your note." Porno tries to go casual. She confidentially adds, "I missed you, too." Where's her turkey? Where's her daughter? Isn't it Christmas? I have Christmas dinner with my family. WHAT'S GOING ON? Is it Christmas Eve? Christmas Day? Christmas Day observed? Purim? Is it Purim?
The cover of darkness reigns as Max approaches the front door of Simon from Go's house. He puts a hand on the door and breaks right in, entering all stealthily because it would have been way too easy, and way way too not time-consuming, for him to have just walked up to Sydney after the pageant and patted her on the back with a cancer-be-gone tap. But success in the ol' search-and-seizure approach is exclusively the domain of one Michael Guerin, as Max slides in to discover Jacob Gnarly sitting in a chair in front of the tree (hey, make yourself comfortable, Spiteful Claus. Did you find the cookies? Good. Because they weren't for you), again looking admonishingly up at Max. I don't know about y'all, but this cat is really starting to piss me off big time. His faux-concern escalates: "It's too late, Max. They rushed her to the hospital." A pause. "Boy, do you have a dilemma." The pages of Ghost and now Pet Sematary completely chewed and spat out to within an inch of their basic papyrus-related properties, Jacob Gnarly is now the Matthew Perry character in the short-lived eighties sitcom Second Chance. Remember that show? It sucked.
Cut to Max knocking on the door of The House Government Subsidy Built. Michael opens the door, and Max takes no time in informing him, "She had a relapse. She's in the hospital in Phoenix." Michael grabs The Coat The Government Subsidy Sewed and insists that he's going with Max, claiming, "I just want to keep you from getting us all killed." Because the man knows his breaking, people. And he sure as hell knows his entering.
Back at the Den of Porno, the place is full-tilt festive because wine, like, totally rocks and stuff. Porno and DeLucawitz rehash their past dealings, including the amount of times Porno arrested her and how he knew her when she was just seventeen which, if you'll refer to whatever recap it was in which we first meet her, is believed by me to be her present age. Tess is putting dishes on the table, and Kyle looks at her in awe when she puts down some glassware containing "three-cheese potato gratin," which Tess remembered was Kyle's favorite. Whoa. I smell a future "Roswell Trivia" quiz. See you in three years in that still-burgeoning thread on the forums. Tess retires to the kitchen, and Kyle follows her in, thanking her for the great bounty before them and blah. He asks if she needs help carving the turkey, and she runs a hand across the top of it and the thing separates into cleanly carved slices, which I guess is a practical trick but is a pretty yucky effect (listen to the sound editing on that shot…actually, lunge for the mute button if you have a shred of sense left in you) overall. ["I could practically hear Ron Popeil having an aneurysm during that shot." -- Sars] Kyle tells her that it's hard to conjure the Christmas spirit with just him and his father doing their brown guy things in the brown guy house, and Tess stares in at Porno and DeLucawitz yucking it up and observes, "Well, it looks like he's got the spirit now." Kyle thanks her for "the great gift" she gave him. She tells him that this whole thing is a "great gift" for her, too. She's thanking him for being allowed to prepare an entire meal and clean house for the sole express purpose of pleasing her master, the lord of the manor? I guess her "great gift" of the season is a little feudal construct I like to refer to as "indentured servitude." Nice job with the giant feast and all. Now back in the bottle, Jeannie. Master says it's time. Good thing they're cute together.
The light tone of the episode is now juxtaposed against possibly the most offensive cumulative chunk of screen time I've ever had the misfortune to experience on the WB. And this includes Movie Stars, people. All three episodes of it. We're inside of a hospital, and Max and Michael walk down a hallway bedecked in hospital scrubs. Their hair -- both of them -- is slicked back in ridiculously greasy pompadours. Is this hospital located in a corner of New Mexico called "The 1950s"? They go over signals for protocol in the room they're nearing. Michael: "One knock means be on your guard. Two means the coast is clear. And three will mean we're screwed." Oh, I guess they edited out Michael's description of four knocks, which I'm guessing from the heinous coifs means, "Gus Van Sant called and wants to make a shot-by-shot remake of Billy Joel's 'Keeping the Faith' video." Good thing they turned up at the stylists when they did, then.
Max opens the door to a room marked "Pediatric Oncology" and closes it behind him. He spies Sydney lying in a bed, and as he approaches her, some sort of ethereal and unholy Enya/Dido/Amy Grant alliance product-places itself all over a cancer ward. For children. On Roswell. Max surveys the room and notices that it contains about six sleeping children. He kneels down over Sydney, who opens her eyes and asks, "Who are you?" He responds, "I'm just a dream. Go back to sleep." She closes her eyes, and he places a hand above her stomach, experiences a flash of images from her past including general babyhood with Simon from Go, and steps back. So then she's fine now, I guess. Max, meanwhile, is about a swarm of black flies away from the legal team for The Green Mile happily arriving with empty suitcases just in time to pick up their box of cash. Max stands up, breathing hard. Jacob Gnarly is behind him, smiling and proud that he's finally able to start working off those community service hours he accrued while, I guess, really pissing off St. Peter before he'd been in heaven for a full five minutes. Whatever. Max notices the other children in the room and breaks a real sweat, healing them one by one. A little girl wakes up and looks him right in the eyes: "Are you an angel?" The soundtrack rages. Y'know, I hate to be preachy, but my sister is a psychologist in the pediatric oncology ward of a hospital for terminally ill cancer patients. That's children, people. She lives this shit every day. Not that this holds a place in heaven for me or anything, but I've been around it enough to know that to reduce it to the status of "climax of a very, very special Roswell" is, I think, a pretty heartless creative decision. Children with cancer do not need to be exploited on a middling series with middling talent and middling ratings in this cloying and, quite frankly, vaguely fetishistic way. Children with cancer cannot be reduced to a fucking WB fucking product-placed fucking soundtrack with Jason Behr playing the role of God and children-as-angels lying like Jesus in the manger while a character takes it upon himself to cure cancer and expect us to find it airily inspiring rather than sickly, desperately sad. I find this sickly, desperately sad. Sorry. But this is just appalling.
Michael knocks three times, but Max is inside on a damn goodwill tear. Max plunges to the floor, weak from all of his goodly greatness, and a nurse calls for security to come in and chase down whatever is going on in that room. Michael makes it to the other side of the door and seals it shut with his hands. He runs over to attend to the fallen Max, and as the clamor of the law-enforcers outside the room grows, Michael looks up at the sky and reverently whispers, "If there's a God, please help us now." There's not. No just God would allow for it. For this. No one. Cancel Christmas. Yuck.
Commercials: Actually, never mind. I'm still mad.
The gaggle of nurses and security guards finally breaks down the door to the room with a chair, entering to find the children of the pediatric oncology ward jumping on their beds and singing merry songs. Because when helpless children are no longer afflicted with the egregious scourge of TV Cancer, they automatically become a group of happy, well-adjusted youngsters. And they also know how to play patty-cake! Cool. The security guard looks at an open window across the way, and an attending nurse takes the time to smile warmly, because I guess she somehow knows an alien cured cancer. I hate this show.
Chez Evans. The family sits at the kitchen table watching a news report showing a mother holding her son and wailing, "Our baby is okay. The cancer is gone. It's a miracle. We prayed every day. And…and God spoke." Oh, fabulous. Just what the world needs: six more happy blond families of born-again Christians. I look forward to meeting with them again sometime, perhaps handing out leaflets in an international airport near me or knocking on my door with inspirational hymns at the exact same moment I choose to sit down to dinner. Bangs notes, "Now that is a miracle." Mr. Evans says something about the news report saying the kids were all on experimental medication, and perhaps that was to thank for their rush to recovery. Bangs counters that each of the children had a handprint on their stomachs, and actually deigns to add, "If that doesn't get you to believe in God, then I don't know what does." Dude, if I weren't so busy writing this recap, I can tell you that I would be using my incredibly fast typing fingers to compose a strongly-worded letter to the WB about that last statement right there. I'm too swamped to go all Abe Simpson on their ass, but know I'm peeved. Again. Bangs asks if this miracle of life is enough to get Max to join them for "midnight services" tonight. It's day again and it's still Christmas Eve? Either way, it's kind of late in the episode to be plot-developing for the snowy dénouement to come, don't you think? This moment comes to us compliments of Basil Exposition's well-meaning but chronically tardy second cousin, Monty Exposition.
Maria tears into The House That Government Subsidy Built as Michael finishes polishing up The Bumper That Government Subsidy Soldered, Sanded, And Polished. She thanks him for his actions with Sydney, and he responds that he was against the whole thing to begin with. Maria claims that this experience has served as a big ol' wake-up call, telling him that she doesn't need a silly gift. Michael smiles and tells her, "I actually got you one." She's happy, and grabs the covering off the bumper, which now gleams like new. She tells him it was very thoughtful of him. That it was original of him. That she never would have bought one for herself. He kisses her on the cheek, and a not-wholly-awful "Merry Christmas" is administered. Pause. "So you want to exchange gifts now?" See, because she thinks there's another present besides the…oh, you say you get it? Maria indicates the pile of gifts Isabel left behind, asking repeatedly which one is hers.
Michael slowly approaches the pile ("Look through the paper," I bellow from my couch, amazed that I'm still invested emotionally in this episode at all. "LOOOOOOK THROOOOOOUGH, DAMMIT!") and picks up a small package with a card reading, "Michael, Just in Case. Love, The Christmas Nazi." He pulls off that card to find another one reading, "Maria, Merry Christmas. Love, Michael." Relieved sigh. She unwraps it gleefully while he prays in a far more Lord-in-vain way than he did in that earlier scene. Pearl earrings. Real pearls. Maria sits on the big lug's lap and frets about "the fortune" he must have spent on them. She continues on, "I don't need this gift. This year my gift is you." He asks hopefully if she doesn't want the earrings. Oh, but she's keeping the earrings. They hug and hug.
Liz primps for God in front of her mirror when Max appears at the window to her room. She lets him in with a self-satisfied "I hear you went to Phoenix." She marvels at his ability with "healink all those kids," and he gets all hushed tones with the rationale of why he decided to heal them all: "After I healed Sydney, I looked at the face of the boy lying to her, and thought, 'How can I not? How can I not use my gift?'" Liz responds that it's a beautiful sentiment for him to want to save everyone, but goes on, "Maybe there is someone or something out there that's planning all of this. And maybe you have to respect it." It's true, again, but the taker of the Hypocritical Oath shouldn't be the one giving this speech. Because by Liz's logic, her continued existence on this planet is nothing more than a gigantic cosmic mistake. One which must be rectified with all great haste. More Liz: "You're not God, Max. You're the one who told me that." She asks if he'll come to the midnight service (is the word "Mass" on strike? ["non-Catholics don't go to Mass" -- Sars]), and he responds that he wants to, but "I don't believe in God." I've been at funerals of family members I've actually liked that have laid it on less thick than this.
Max and Jacob Gnarly walk like old friends through the darkened streets of Roswell. Gnarly tells Max, "They'll be okay. My wife, she's pretty remarkable. If anyone can get through this…" Way to tell him that before he want on his child-saving binge of retribution around the entirety of the Four Corners. Bastard. Max promises that he'll always "be there" for Gnarly's family, and Gnarly responds that he's sure that's true, lightening the mood and telling Max, "Get out of here." But Max doesn't know where to go. Gnarly: "It's Christmas. You should be with your loved ones. That's where I'll be. That's where I'll always be." Oh, look. They're in front of Gnarly's house. Gnarly walks through the front door as the plaintive strains of "Unchained Melody" do not play and his wife does not sit in the living room shaping clay into a large messy bowl. Thank God.
The House That Government Subsidy Built. Michael enters the living room dressed entirely in black denim, a clear sign, at least to Max, that Michael intends to attend midnight services. "But," Max protests, "you don't believe in anything." Michael says something about hedging his bets and how his prayers have been answered twice in the last day, blah. Michael tells Max that "he's pissed" about what happened in Phoenix, and Max's defense of "I couldn't stop myself" (which also goes over like gangbusters in cases of date rape, in case you're ever hauled in) is quickly set aside so Michael can clarify, "I'm pissed that I don't have the ability to help the kids in the hospital that you couldn't get to." Michael has a Christmas present for Max. Dissolve to Simon from Go's house. Max and Michael stare through the window as "O Come All Ye Faithful" plays in a too-soulful a cappella as they spy in on Simon and Sydney. Dissolve again, this time to said choir singing at midnight services, as the entirety of Roswell's citizens hold candles. They wear scarves. Because this scene is about Christmas, so clearly it's cold out. Max kisses his mother hello and takes a seat to Liz. She takes his hand and remembers from three seconds ago, "I thought you didn't believe in God." He deadpans, "I believe in you." The song kicks it up a half-step. We pan back and up, over the crowd. It starts to snow. No big deal, I think. I mean, is it really so outlandish an idea to have well-timed Christmas snow in the middle of the desert? After all, cancer is cured. After all, Max is God. So why wouldn't a snowball finally have a chance in Hell?