I recap sitcoms. I recap sham weddings. I recap John Doe Unpluggedconcerts. This week, I recap music videos. Once upon a time there was the artifice of an actual show buried underneath all this excess media somewhere. But that was a long, long time ago.
Fade up on The Bar That Carding And Bouncers Forgot. Liz "Toys For Bots" sits to Kyle "Julian Lennon" Valenti, the latter of whom watches in horror as Porno and his Shickers of the Kit jam out with renewed vigor as special guest Maria "I'm With The Bland" DeLuca sits in on vocals and general underage whoring. On a stage decorated with strips of flowy silver foil that announce "I'm a rockin' car wash" as much as they announce "I'm a rockin' Chinese restaurant and right back there are the restrooms" as much as they announce "please fail to take my non-legitimate musical enterprise the slightest bit seriously," they gamely fight their way through a rendition of Meat Loaf's "Paradise by the Dashboard Light." Oh, sorry. "Meat Loaf Aday." The scene's single saving grace is that we join the song somewhere in its ninetieth marathon hour, after Mr. and Mrs. Loaf have met, after they fall in love, after they're glowing like the metal on the edge of a knife, glowing like the metal on the edge of a knife, glowing like the metal on the edge of a knife, after the words "Phil Rizzuto" and "sex" are no longer mutually exclusive, to my continuing shock and horror. And then Maria: "Stop right there!" Good advice, Jamie-Lynn Sigler Lite. May I suggest you take said advice and apply it to your own singing career? As Maria vamps functionally through the girl empowerment verse, she stands back-to-back with a glistening Porno in a pose that's two parts "Olsen Twins photo shoot" and one part "David Bowie and Mick Jagger in that really, really gay 'Dancing in the Streets' video from 1985." Either way, it's just not right. And Kyle, head buried in his hands, knows it. He asks Liz, "Am I the only one who sees the creepiness in this?" Liz counsels him to -- and this is really what she says -- "get a grip. They sound amazink." Get a grip. Which is one Queer Dialogue Step above telling him to "take a chill pill," which I'm sure she also totally thinks he should do. Liz frets her way into a plot development snit, looking around and asking, "Where's everyone else?" Far, far away, Liz, exercising their divine rights of free will and self-preservation. Kyle, meanwhile, continues his own brooding: "There are so many other duets out there. Clean duets. Aaron Neville and Linda Ronstadt can keep their hands off each other. So can Elton John and Kiki Dee." Liz, cultural barometer and sexual deviancy witch hunter, sets Kyle, uh, straight, with the quip, "Elton John likes boys." Insert Max/Jesse/Kyle barbed retort here. Thanks. Kyle shoots back, "Yeah, but did the Captain ever grind on Tennille?" Well, kind of. Depending on what the "that" modifies in "Do that to me one more time." Is it sex? I think it's sex. Kyle finally freaks out and disappears from the table, exclaiming, "I've gotta wash my eyes." On his victory lap in Operation Avoid Liz At All Costs, he walks past an interested-looking woman with curly hair, who looks curiously at the stage before taking a pen from her jacket and writing something -- perhaps "this is where the plot should be" -- on a copy of the script with large chunks of text mysteriously missing from it. From the stage, Porno requests that he be allowed to "sleep on it," promising he'll "give [her] an answer in the morning." But lo, it's not good enough for Maria. Before they go any further, she's gotta know right now does he love her, does he love her forever. God. Phil Rizzuto wept. And he didn't even know he was sad. Or even still alive, maybe.
Liz sits alone at the table for just a minute, until Max "Elton John" Evans makes his way over to the table and kisses her on her shiny, shiny hair. Liz informs Max, "You missed half the set" (meaning "the first nineteen verses of this song"), punishing him appropriately by continuing to talk to him, asking, "Are Isabel and Jesse coming?" Good God, I do hope not. What about Michael? The damaged ex-boyfriend whose heart the bitch broke? No. No, I don't think he'll be coming either. Now Liz is mad: "This is a big thing for Maria. She's been practicing for, like, over a week." Over a week? Now that's dedication, yo. And also a brilliant way to legitimize this huge, not-at-all-continuity-defying event in Maria's life that we heard of for the very first time ever not two TV minutes ago. Liz drives it home: "None of her friends showed up." Translation: she hates you, Max. Max notes Maria up on stage, cowboy hat in hand, eyes squinty, singing the same damn verse again, and (gack!) smiles, "I don't think she's gonna notice." Liz is not amused. Or bemused, even. So Max tries the old sweet touch, putting his arm around her and apologizing. Liz regards him all, "Don't even dream of touching me unless I can't stop the bleeding myself, thanks," and fires a really unwarranted dagger: "I'm not the one you should be apologizing to." Max senses that this can't be all about Meat Loaf Aday -- is it ever? -- so he turns the topic to the Liz-being-a-total-bitch thing, asking, "What's wrong?" Liz thinks on it. This has nothing to do with Meat Loaf Aday: "I think I'm coming down with somethink." He notes that there is a "bad flu going around." And then this line really, actually happens: "It's terrible. Fever. Sore throat. And an uncontrollable urge to dance." Nice! So what kind of fever would that be? Dance Fever? Night Fever? Disco Fever? Um. Max? Max, if you don't tell us, how are we supposed to get the proper shot? Max? MAX? Damn. Now I'm dancing and I feel like crap.
And so they dance their dance of lies. But on her way from the table, Liz puts a hand on the plate that held her dinner, and in doing so melts a large portion of the ceramic from the complete opposite side of where her hand was. A busboy just then comes to clear the plate, which is really hot to the touch and causes him to pull his hand back, all, "That plate is really hot to the touch!" Screw you, wage slave. There's dancing to be danced!
Opening credits: Shut up, bitch.
Liz is the only good friend in the whole of the infinite universe. And she wanted you to know. We're over at the Crashdown, Maria sitting alone at the bar drinking what appears to be a strawberry shake. Liz approaches with a plate and announces loud enough for those-who-hold-God's-checklist-to-heaven hear, "Pluto potato skins, on the house." Pluto what skins huh? Liz offers congratulations, then tells Maria that she's going to "call it a night." They share a brief kiss (I guess just saying his name was enough for Liz to catch a case of the Elton Johns…that condition must be really contagious), and Liz takes off. But rock stars can never brood alone for long, and Liz is soon replaced at Maria's side by Porno, who slides Maria a wad of cash and tells her, "Before I forget, here's your cut from Cow Paddy's." From, uh, what? While he's there, Porno casually asks if Maria would like to "sit in with the Kit Shickers on a more permanent basis." Maria smiles, rock-star cool, and asks, "No shick?" This show! The scandal! They're almost cursing! He tells her that she "wouldn't just be singing back-up, either," adding that he's been "working on a set list" that includes "'Baby, It's Cold Outside' done rockabilly," which Maria likes, "'Stop Dragging My Heart Around,'" which she proclaims as "classic," and "'Islands in the Stream,'" about which Maria proclaims, "Not so much." Boo-hoo, sister. You had me, then you lost me -- that song rules, and it should be a deal-breaker for an artist of Porno's integrity. Besides, once you use the word "rockabilly" with a straight face, as a point of sale to increase the cool cache of your band, no less, there's just no going back.
Anyway, Maria agrees to sit in more often. But she agrees just for a moment, as just now Blonde With Pen from the non-bar bursts in the front door of the Crashdown, marches up to Maria, and announces, "I…am loving you." Porno thanks her kindly, but the woman's eyes are focused entirely on Maria. She continues her prepared speech: "Dominique Lazar, Medusa Records. I was at your show. You were really good. P.S., I never say that." Porno tries with the chit-chat, but the hard-boiled New York record exec from the fake indie label (who, at least at this point in the recap, is who I'm guessing she is) only wants Maria: "Maria. Maria what?" Maria offers her last name, which Bizarro Michelle Gellar considers for a second and announces, "I can work with that." Maria puts the women in check, offering a deadpan, "Earth to the lady with the really great boots, by the way." Earth! Maria, you don't want to give away the identities of your alien friends to this latest in the endless parade of alien hunters and interstellar spies, do you? But no matter. Maria is on permanent vacation on Planet All About My Alien-Free Plot Line, informing so-called Dominique, "I don't know who you think I am, but I guarantee you've got the wrong gal." Dominique explains, "I am an A&R executive. I have been scouting the Southwest for talent. Sweetheart, anyone with a voice like that who can work an outfit like this is definitely not the wrong girl." Because I totally need to explain to all of you that this is exactly how people become famous. Dominique strides away. Maria follows. Porno looks dejected. Dominique is most strident. Shut up, Tommy Not-tola.
Crashdown kitchen. Liz enters to find Slackjaw doing ambiguous kitchen duties and judging her, judging, judging, judging. She doesn't look at him, like she's got something to hide, which I think she doesn't. Slackjaw puts down his ambiguous cutting tool and walks over to Liz: "Mrs. Fleischer called from the Guidance Office. Two Cs in Spanish and AP History?" Jesus, Mrs. Fleischer. Step back, wouldja? She didn't get Fs. It's not like she set off a fire alarm and threw Mr. Fleischer into the pool. It's more like she returned a library book late and didn't show up for "Jump Rope For Heart," even though she'd gone and collected all those sponsors. It's a C. On a quiz. Put down the phone, Mrs. Fleischer. Keep kids off drugs. Liz claims that she had two quizzes on one day or something and that everybody failed, and Slackjaw inserts "Plot Point A" into "Interlocking Contrivance B" in developing, "Is that the same excuse you're going to use at your Harvard interview?" Liz claims a headache and tries to take her leave, but Slackjaw's got some speeching to do: "Y'know, I backed off the whole boarding school thing because you promised you were going to get your life together." But no. No studying. No focusing. No acting lessons. Nothing. But wait! Slackjaw's not done: "Going to Harvard has been your dream since you were what, six?" Just saying it once doesn't make it true, people. So Slackjaw tries the supportive route: "You have got more brains and talent in your little finger than all the kids in Roswell have in their entire bodies." Well then, maybe they should have gone ahead and cast Shiri Appleby's little finger in the role of Liz and put one of those googly-eyed finger puppets with the really long arms on it and had the googly-eyed puppet fall in love with Max after being shot right between the really long arms. I'm just saying, if that little finger is the untapped locus of this as-yet-unseen "talent" we keep hearing so very much about. Slackjaw keeps going, saying lines of the "ruzzah ruzzah ruzzah SET-UP blah blah" variety to prepare for the "blee blee blee feh PUNCH LINE" that's all poised to come barreling in from the dining room. Oh, you say you want the actual line? Well, fine: "I mean, how many of them are even thinking of going to college? They're all just hanging around, watching MTV, dreaming about becoming rock stars." What a Cyndi-Lauper-esque 1983 kind of rebellion he's painted. Wait! Punch line as yet undelivered! The kitchen door bursts open. Maria enters and announces, "A label wants to sign me, I'm gonna be a rock star." Damn. I loved those little puppets.
Wait now. What's that sound? What's that ringing bell? What are those fluorescent lights and blackboards and microscopes and students and…IS THIS SCHOOL? Dude. I thought that set had been scrapped and sold to some Head of the Class reunion movie somewhere. But no. Even the same bio teacher is there, though I'm fairly certain he played a history teacher once on this very show sixty-seven seasons ago. Max swiftly makes his way across the room (on the verbal cue of the bio teacher loudly saying the word "fruit fly," just by the way) and wakes up a sleeping Liz, who apparently fell into a deep slumber during the fashion generation known as "Ferris Bueller's Girlfriend" and woke up here in 2002 when weirdly Eurythmics suit jackets with exceedingly wide lapels are no longer appropriate for the daily wardrobe. Max points out a "bit of drool," which Liz proclaims as "disgustink." And, really, it is. Mr. Nerdy Bio Glorified Extra makes his way over to Max and Liz's lab table and asks, "Mr. Evans, Miss Parker, is there a problem in your corner of teen angst?" Callous, uncaring dork in a sweater vest. Why, I oughta…anyway, who cares? Max asks Liz if she's feeling worse, and they walk to the other side of the room because there's about to be some really queer CGI that requires the use of a mirror. And that appears to be the only reason. Max humorously (though I have no idea why this is funny) informs her that "it's mono." Maybe it's because it's the kissing disease. Hoo hoo ha ha ha! Infection! Liz continues that she would have stayed home today, "if my dad wasn't on my case about this interview." What interview is that? "I have an appointment with the admissions person from Harvard in two days." Max broods at the thought. That blasted MTV is to blame for Max's resentment of higher education, with its money for nothing and its chicks for free! Liz walks over to the mirror for her visit from crappy CGI. She holds a beaker and stares and stares. I know, Liz. We can't believe the suit, either. But who am I to disagree? I've traveled the world and the seven seas. Everybody's looking for something. She stares into the mirror. Her face disappears. Then it reappears. Liz looks woefully concerned. Maybe Max could amble over and loudly announce the word "polio" and lighten the mood up again like his rollicking "mono" quip of a few moments back. Hey, Liz. Consumption. Bah ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha!
Liz goes to the doctor and has to put on a backless robe because she thinks she might have, like, a cold. For heart surgery, you need the robe. I was under the impression that for a garden-variety full facial disappearance, you got to at least keep the pants on. That's what happened to my cousin when his face disappeared, anyway. The doctor pulls back a curtain and allows us behind the looking glass, informing Liz, "Your white blood cell count is normal, which eliminates any bacterial infection." He asks if she's dizzy. No. Coughing? No. DISAPPEARING OF FACE? Well, that he doesn't ask. Damn HMOs. He then asks something else, but through the sometimes-disappearing eyes of Liz, the doctor's speech becomes all choppy and cut off, but only for a minute until the world returns to focus, in time for the doctor to ask, "Are you sexually active, Liz?" She responds with a vehement "No!" Then a faltering "no." Then a more secure "no." And yet, mysteriously, they all sound exactly the same. He doesn't believe her: "When you are young, Liz, sometimes you overlook the consequences of knowing someone intimately. And there's a possibility that you might catch something, even from someone you love." Hi. I'm Troy McClure.
Over at an ambiguously automotive locale, Liz sits brooding as Kyle kicks things off segue-style: "Strange symptoms. Shoot." Liz shoots: "Well, fatigue. And a total inability to concentrate." Oh, come on. Epstein-Barr is so five minutes ago. But wait! There's more. "I've been having some hallucinations." She tells the tale of being at school and having her face disappear, and Kyle starts cracking up, all, "You actually went to school? What about that reunion movie? Doesn't Howard Hesseman really need the money?" But Liz assures him that she's totally serious, and he logically asks why the hell she's telling him all this. So she compares her situation to Kyle's, as they are the only two people who have been "brought back from the dead" (not at all what happened) "by an alien." Kyle hides in Buddha, unearthing some kind of picture book and telling her, "This book has gotten me through some very tough times. Here, young grasshopper, take." She regards the book for a minute, gets all, "I got a C in Knowing How To Put Stuff Down," and slams the book awkwardly on top of some car part. When she raises a hand near an ambiguous part, it smokes and glows green. She notes, "Kyle, I think I'm changing." Just like in the title. And the song. But with notably fewer "ch's" in the title than one might reasonably expect.
Oh. We're still here. Liz responds to something Kyle evidently said during the commercial. Oh, the blissful, blissful commercial. Liz responds (to the Blistex commercial), "No, I don't want to tell Max. Not yet." Liz is scared to tell him, because "he risked so much when he healed me. It's what made me fall in love with him." Kyle fills in the requisite funny/and maybe I'm gay! dead space with a "Yeah, me too." Liz gets snippy -- she knows who Max would pick -- and Kyle claims he's just trying to lighten the mood. Maybe he should take the King of Comedy's route and just scream out "whooping cough" until the whole place is in stitches. Kyle offers to talk to Max in her stead, and she asks, "Can you just respect my feelings?" Kyle promises he will, tacking on, "Let the record show I think this is a bad idea." Liz gets up, claiming she has to leave. Kyle promises her that she's "not alone in this," asking her to call if she needs anything, not even hazarding the tiniest "rubella" before Liz is out the door.
Maria does the pee-pee dance outside of The House That Government Subsidy Built. Michael "Part-Time Lover" Guerin finally comes home, carrying two Grocery Bags That Government Subsidy Asked If He Wanted Paper Or Plastic, armed also with his excuse for being a bad friend: "Look, I missed that thing with you and Valenti last night because I had to pick up an extra shift." She's excited about something and not listening. Regardless, he keeps on: "Sitting in bars and listening to music doesn't put Snapple on the table." But mentioning it just then put about twelve cases on yours, you…you…you Kiwi-Strawberry-loving whore! Maria dances in ahead of him and tells him she has news. Michael remains aloof: "Later, all right? The Daily Show starts in five minutes and I've got Lean Cuisine to heat up." He starts removing The Tater Tots That Government Subsidy Preheated from the bags as Maria launches in: "A woman from a record label who saw me perform last night offered me a demo deal." A what? Whatever. A deal where they record demos. Maria continues ranting that "stuff like this happens to Alicia Keys or, like, Fiona Apple or something, but not me, not in Roswell." Hey, that's right. Not in Roswell. At least someone around here knows how the music industry works. It happens in New York. Or L.A. Or, if your last name is Carter or your first name is L'il or your whole name is "Ashley Angel," then sometimes in Orlando. Sometimes. But high-powered so-called "talent scouts" aren't marooned a hundred miles from the nearest interstate unless they fucked up that Tasmin Archer deal so badly that an open-mic night at a diner in New Mexico is the only trump card you've got for getting back on top. Michael and his palpable disinterest in the subject matter seem to know this better than anyone else. Meanwhile, back in the scene I'm paid to allegedly be recapping, Maria tells Michael that he was the first person she wanted to tell when she found out. He breaks down and admits he's happy for her, because he seriously wants to get laid. So there's smooching to be had, and The Daily Show to be missed. Meanwhile, Jon Stewart sits in the Comedy Central productions offices reading his morning clippings and asking anyone who will listen, "Wait, we were mentioned on what show, again?"
day, Maria's bedroom. Maria stands in front of the full-length mirror; Liz sits like a lump on the bed, listening to Maria vamp, "This so does not mean that we're back together." She terms the whole thing thusly: "It's a boy/girl friendship with a twist." Liz terms that "so romantic," and she says it sarcastically because apparently she's never had one. Maria keeps talking, but Liz goes through some ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-changes (I thought I'd front-load the amount of "ch's" and balance out the average) and drifts her into her Land Of The Bar Mitzvah Video Special Effects and gets all hallucinated again. She comes back into focus and tells Maria, "I have to tell you something." But no! Because Maria is way too caught up in her own narrative, callously speeching at Liz, "It is not a coincidence that my life has started around the time Michael and I broke up. You have no idea how liberating it is to just be free of all this alien chaos." Liz quietly agrees, "Yeah." God, rock stars can be so thoughtless. And I'll confirm that theory for you in the unlikely event that we actually find one somewhere on this show. One who isn't John Doe, of course.
And we're singing. Maria sits in a recording studio, strumming her acoustic guitar, being deep and message-y while Clive Davis's Castoff stands to the side nodding her head. And this is the first honest depiction of the entertainment industry we've had. People perform, and everyone else not performing nods their heads. And holds cell phones. And sends angry faxes. Ladies and gentlemen, the industry in action. No need to come to L.A. now. You've just been given the tour. Anyway, Maria sings a forlorn ballad that would only be deepened emotionally should she have to spend a few years living with her mom in a van before she finally reached the big time. The song goes a bit like this:
You're like an angel with the sweetest smile
But when you use it you're one evil child
Oh, oh
And that's what brings me back again
We get along but only half the time
The other half you ain't no friend of mine
Oh, oh
That's what brings me back again
And then there's a bit more tone-deafness to endure, but Lazar has some more angry faxes to send, so she waits patiently for the song's conclusion and turns the topic to Maria's personal life. "So, Maria, do you drink?" No. "Drugs?" No way. She asks how old Maria is, and Maria retorts, "I just turned eighteen." Lazar shoots back, "Oh, great. That's what you're going to be telling people for the three years." Hard-boiled! And just then, Michael saunters out of nowhere (hey, doesn't he need a drive-on or something?) to muck things up just as Lazar asks Maria when she can travel. Ooh, to where? "New York. If my people love what we did here, then we'll record the demo over there." Because of how well this show did that city the first time around. Michael asks how long she'll be gone, and Lazar laughs a laugh of provincial hatred, snorting, "Best case scenario? Forever. She can buzz back through this town when the mayor's gonna cut a ribbon for something." Eh?
What appears to be "semaphore flag practice" takes place on the football field, and Max approaches Liz on the otherwise empty bleachers (that semaphore flag squad is in some serious trouble, is it not? With its current viewership of one, I'd say they're going to be cancelled after…oh, say, three complete seasons spanning two separate networks) with a book entitled College Interviewing For Morons. Max knows his audience, and promises he's going to help her get into Harvard. They commence a mock interview, where Max asks why Harvard and Liz doesn't cop to "having seen a cute teenage girl wanting to go there on the frighteningly superior Gilmore Girls" and deciding it was the place for her. Instead, she tells a story about an article she read on molecular biology once, which…zzzzzzzzzzz. Max smiles wanly; he is of the dumb. Liz asks why Max is helping her, adding, "If I get in, Cambridge is really far away, Max." Well, I think she's found her answer right there, then. Not to mention that with a straight-C average, a prison record, and "short-order waitress" as her only extracurricular activity, he can appear to be the nice guy who can also feel bad for her when a valedictorian class president from Exeter with a 1600 and a gold metal in curling or semaphore just happens to take her slot. Maybe that's why she wants to join the team so badly. Liz helps Max for his help, then gets up to leave. And then she falls down in a faint. She goes to pick up a book, which bursts into flames in her hand. Max notes, "I didn't do that." Liz retorts, "I did. You healed me and now I'm different." Blah blah blah Max is usually the "flaming" one blah.
Max and Michael dig and fight. I don't know what they're digging for. Or what they're fighting about. Digging! Liz! Risking exposure! FBI! Max: "There is something wrong with her, Michael, and I don't know how to fix it." Bringing the season commitment down to eighteen episodes was an excellent start. What other tricks are there? Max continues, "I have screwed up hundreds of times since we found out what we are. Do you know how many times Liz has?" Wanna play Price Is Right? I guess four. And I think the detergent costs $2.49. "Never." Damn. I went over. No Showcase Showdown for me. And I so need a new Winnebago.
And now, back at school. Liz sits in the guidance office and answers a suited man's question about why she'd like to go to Harvard. She gives her stock answer by naming a professor she once read one article on, and Harvard man tell Liz, "I think you two would really hit it off." He nods approvingly and makes a note -- "straight C average, truancy record, and interstate prison record notwithstanding, has heard of one professor on staff" -- while looking around for the rubber stamp that reads "Accepted!" and ruing the same quota that demands that a certain amount of talentless singer/songwriter guitar-playing girls from rural New Mexico have to be signed to lucrative record contracts every year or the whole record company goes to jail. Y'know. That quota. But uh-oh! The interviewer's question goes all choppy and the Bar Mitzvah video effect kicks in again, leaving Liz unsure of what the questioner has questioned. She asks him to repeat the question. It's something about contributing to the community. We can see his lips move. She tries to answer, answering, "I guess. I'm not quite sure." Quick! Name that professor again! It's your only chance. But things are spinning, spinning, spinning, and in a moment Liz is cowering in fear and running out of the room yelling, "I'm sorry!" over and over and over. Don't be. This show's lack of irony at least assures me that the inevitable "now I probably won't even get into Vassar" crack isn't just around the corner for once. Which you wouldn't, Liz. I mean, probably. Oh, who am I kidding. Welcome to Poughkeepsie, here's your diploma.
Crashdown, and Maria does look good, doesn't she? She's decked out in black with a giant rock-star cross and funky pulled-back hair. She sees Porno sitting at the counter and approaches all tentatively, apologizing, "I just feel like I took something from you." Porno assures her that he would have done the exact same thing, had a sham record-company nobody come along and promised to rescue him from this hell-hole. Maria makes her way through to the back of the Crashdown, passing Michael in the kitchen on her way. He informs her that Jesse is on his way over (Nooooo!) to take a look at her contract. She tells him that he doesn't need to be maintaining such an active role in her life, tacking on the dig, "Our lives are no longer linked." He recaps, "Didn't we just sleep together?" Turns out they did. But while "it was great, it was just a spontaneous thing." Michael grouses, "Crossed signals, it's no big deal." She asks him to wish her good luck, and he just plain doesn't.
Kyle shows up in Liz's room, Liz apologizing for making him come over, but "I just didn't have anyone else to call." She takes a moment to ask how he's doing, and he claims that, though he is not yet experiencing any symptoms, "Max healed me like a year after he healed you, so maybe I have this really cool window of time where I just get to obsess about it." Knock knock knock on the window, and Max climbs in. He asks, "What happened?" Liz takes her hands out from inside her sweater and shows him that her hands are glowing with green lines of electricity. She asks, "Am I gonna die?" They exchange "that really depends on who gets to decide" glances, and the audience stands watch outside with blazing torches and pitchforks, continually waiting to render a decision of our own.
Back in the straight-to-UPN version of How The Music Industry Isn't Run At All, Vol. 19, Tommy Not-tola applies her fiftieth layer of lip gloss and mixes up "New Yorker" with "Borscht Belt comedian" again when she so-Great-Neck-she-might-as-well-be-saying-it-in-Hebrew-ily informs Maria, "So Adam Chase is on his way. He is a legendary producer, honey, and if he likes your stuff, you can clear off a shelf and hire a maid to dust your Grammys." She notes Maria sniffing out of a vial, because this is apparently the third episode of Season One for so many reasons, and asks, "What is that?" Maria explains that it's "eucalyptus," and Tommy Not-tola tells her to put it down because, and I quote, "You smell like J. Lo." And you smell like Lou Perlman. You keep pointlessly name-dropping musicians, and I'll keep name-dropping creepy execs that your misguided power reminds me of, okay? Excellent. Through the door walks an absolute greasy mess of a human being who has never procured a Grammy for anyone. American Music Award, maybe. But I think you just get those from sending in all those UPC symbols from the Quaker Oat Squares anyway, so I'm still not impressed. He swaggers in and gives Not-tola a big hug, asking, "What's happening, baby?" She shoots back, "Clearly you, looking all hotty-totty." Hello, east coasters! Who has beamed me back to my homeland, I ask you? Because this genuine display of the NYC lexicon is exactly how people talk. And I think they might be flirting. Not-tola introduces the two, and Greasy Music Svengali notes after a "dramatic" "pause," "It's a single." Greasy Music Svengali tells Maria that he's been "messing with it," taking her over to a console and playing a remixed version which, basically, is the same song but with a bossa-nova drum beat kicking almost imperceptibly underneath it. But the vocals are still flat and colorless and lacking in vibrato. So if the basic integrity of the work is still inherent, what are we really complaining about? Not-tola tells Maria that she should think about whether this is really what she wants. Sucking in poverty, or sucking with a drumbeat.
Later. Maria shows up outside of Michael's, and he snarks at her entrance, "Lemme guess. You bumped into George Lucas at the video store and he wants you in his movie." Maria has clearly read The Glossary Of Debased Music Industry Terms, the one remaining book in Roswell Liz has not yet set on fire, and goes from A-Z with said terms, though perhaps not in order, braying, "Those label people are bogus. They want to turn me into some bubble-gum pop princess." Michael doesn't even bother feigning sympathy, keeping his hard candy coating around him and asking, "Why are you here?" She tells him that she needs someone to talk to, and Michael retorts, "Let me get this straight: you dumped me so you could go live your dream, and now you're telling me you're dropping that too?" She apologizes, telling him she just needs some advice. He reminds her, "We're not like that anymore," adding, "I could invite you inside, tell you to stay in Roswell because that's what I want, but you know what? I'm not going to be the guy you blame for ruining your life." She says that she would go talk to someone else about it, but that Liz is all "pissy and preoccupied and won't return my phone calls." Michael lashes out, "She might be dying, Maria!" Maria's eyes brighten. Maybe they don't. Maybe those are my eyes.
Desert. Night. We seem to be on holiday at the scoping fjords of Sandy Land for some reason, and Max lays a semi-conscious and very glowing-green Liz out on a stretch of sand between two cars. Kyle wisely asks to be brought up on the salient aspects of plot that, by and large, don't seem to actually be occurring on camera this week, and Max fills us all in: "According to the book, I can use the healing stones to amplify my powers. If we do that, it might wipe out whatever's happening inside her." Well, that clears it up. Except for…what the fuck? What stones? What book? When did this happen? Why is Liz levitating? And yelling "I can't" over and over? She falls back to the ground all out of breath and demands, "Stop hurting me." Max defends himself with, "I wasn't trying to." But she's at the ready with her retort: "But you do. You always do." Ooooh. It's an allegory. I get it. Max crawls over to her to see if she's okay, but Liz stops him in his tracks by asking, "Why did you sleep with her?" Scary minor chord, which much of the remaining audience drowns out in their deafening whispers of, "Sleep with who?" and "What baby?" and "Isn't there, like, a rerun of Arli$$ or something on right now? Liz screams at him to "stay away," adding, "You're doing this!" Doing what? I really have no idea what's going on right now. Let's go back to the Crashdown. At least the blazingly implausible pop star subplot I totally understand.
Kyle drops Liz off at home. She frets that she told Max how she really feels about how he hurt her, but Kyle nice-guys that she has to take care of herself. Up in her bedroom, Maria runs in and puts a hand on her, saying, "I'm here." Here on a park bench, where we illogically cut to , Maria repeatedly apologizing for not being around for her whole glowing green episode. Maria tells her, "We're best friends, Liz Parker, so don't even." Liz tells her not to let "this music thing go," and Maria tells her, "I'm not a sellout." Liz recycles the inspirational words by buoying her spirits, telling her, "You have more talent in your little finger than anyone else in this town." Maria agrees to go to New York, asking, "Can life be anymore complicated right now?" Honey? Wait 'til you get to New York. I'm just saying.
Max skulks on Liz's balcony, and Liz comes in to find him. She tells him that he can't be there, and he guilts her that he's "been calling." She's been out. He thought something happened. He leans in to tell her they can drive to L.A. (lose my number, children), but she actually recoils from him and says they won't be going anywhere together. He wants to talk about it. She wants to fake-cry poorly. And so she does, closing the window on him as The Mandolin Of Sadness takes the soundtrack by storm. He makes his way off the balcony and a light rain falls because people are sad. Downstairs, Liz approaches her father and finally finds herself in a moment of clarity: "My life is out of control. I want to go to boarding school." Because it is often in that bastion of normalcy where teenage girls in cloistered seclusion adjust perfectly to all of life's experiences.
"Dear Max," a dictated letter to Max begins over a montage of Liz packing, "What's so great about normal? Do you remember when you asked me that? Back then, the answer was, 'Nothing.' Because of you, Max. Because of how much you loved me." And around and around it goes, Liz telling him that she needs reclaim normal by being away from Roswell. And as romantic a notion it is to see the open road of the desert stretching before a relieved-looking Liz, she's gonna be bumming somewhere around the Kansas/Nebraska border when she's suddenly all, "Why the living fuck wouldn't they just let me take a plane?"