“ Now, Freddy Rodriguez is a great actor, so I feel kind of bad pointing out that he's tiny, and therefore given the way this shot is composed to make him look taller, probably grinding his pelvis somewhere in the vicinity of Justina Machado's bellybutton. ”
So I went to bachelor party last night, and during the course of the evening, all of the following topics came up naturally in conversation without any prompting from me: cock-piercing, threesomes, incest, ball-shaving, auto-erotic asphyxiation, having your mother walk in on you while you're engaged in oral sex, and the many varied and complicated rules to follow when staging a Jewish funeral. Now is this a case of life imitating art? Or do I just have really strange friends?
And while we're going off on tangents, here's some quick business: First off, Happy Mother's Day, Mom! Do me a favor and ignore that last paragraph, okay? Also, let's give major props to "Dave" for emailing to point out that I completely missed the best joke in last week's episode, which was the mural of a humongous baby's head that loomed over Nate and Lisa during their cheese vs. vomit dip argument at the art gallery. Thank God for TiVo, because that was fucking hilarious. And finally, you'll all be treated to a super-special guest recapper again week, because I'll be too busy spending my days packing up everything I own so that it can be moved a grand total of seven-tenths of a mile to my new apartment. So, you know, don't get worried and think I'm off missing somewhere when the recap comes in without my name on it.
We open on a group of young kids playing soccer in the park, and for the third time this season we're quickly teased with the death of a character we know and love. This time it's young Taylor, who gets a dramatic introduction when the camera pans up to show her sassing one of the other players about his kicking skills. This is immediately followed by a truly hilarious shot of her being menaced by the blades of a gigantic lawnmower that's creeping up behind her. Hee! Ahh, the opening gimmick. I've missed you so. Elsewhere in the park, Keith's parents (a.k.a. Kersh and Mrs. Kersh) are chatting with Mrs. Kersh's Aunt Jeanie about the questionable quality of her buttermilk pie. Taylor joins the conversation just in time to see Aunt Jeanie get stung by a bee, and it's soon obvious that her aunt is suffering a severe allergic reaction. She gasps and wheezes and eventually collapses to the ground, where Taylor hovers over her looking extremely worried. Kersh frantikally kalls his kontacts at the FBI to find out if this was one of those evil, genetically-engineered super-bees, but it's to no avail. Fade to white. Farewell, Jeanette Louise Bradford. I'm sorry that Keith, Kersh, and Karla had to kill you just to get some skreen time.
Fade back up on fucking. No, Nate and Brenda aren't back together. Yet. This time it's Rico and Vanessa. Now, Freddy Rodriguez is a great actor, so I feel kind of bad pointing out that he's tiny, and therefore given the way this shot is composed to make him look taller, probably grinding his pelvis somewhere in the vicinity of Justina Machado's bellybutton. That can't be good for her baby. You know, if there is one. Rico enthuses at length about the epic quality of their dry humping on this particular occasion, noting that it's especially great that Vanessa actually "wanted to." "I mean, it's been a long time since you" he says, trailing off into silence. I'll leave you and your very dirty minds to finish the rest of that sentence. In a fan-fic, no doubt. Vanessa's new medications are obviously working, because she's all peppy and cheerful, and she even signed the two of them up for a dance class that evening so they can learn the salsa, the tango, and the merengue. "The merengue!" exclaims Rico. "My mother used to do that. She won trophies. Little tiny trophies, but trophies nonetheless." Vanessa doesn't even bat an eyelash at the mention of a non-dead mother, and instead leaps out of bed to go make coffee and wake the kids. Rico just lies there grinning like a fool, acting all manly and puffing out his freshly-waxed chest in a silent indictment of the crappy sex life of his significantly hairier co-star.
Everyone Leaves
Oh my God! It's a car scene filmed in an actual moving car! Wow. What's , an episode without the word "fuck" in it? David and Keith have hit the highway to drive down for Aunt Jeanie's funeral, and David is examining the culturally-correct black Barbie they've bought as a present for Taylor. "When I was a kid I used to have GI Joes," he reminisces. "They were always getting court-martialed, which in my version meant they had to stand naked in front of the other dolls." Hee! "So is that something you'd like to act out?" asks Keith, sending all those fan-fic writers scrambling for the "New Document" button in Microsoft Word. "I think we've had enough excitement for a while," wet-blankets David, who is finally beginning to verbalize his discontent with the constant threesomes. "Oh, really?" Keith snarks. "So that wasn't you the other night begging us to arrest and interrogate you?" Heh. That's funny, but doesn't anyone else remember the days when Keith used to hate being the "Big Black Sex Cop" all the time? David grudgingly admits that the sex is "fun," but he still can't shake the nagging suspicion that the constant presence of strange men in their bed doesn't bode well for a healthy long-term relationship. This escalates into an argument about their respective communications skills as a couple, with David noting that Keith always wants him to express himself, but every time he does, Keith just "shuts down." Having failed to win the debate through the clever use of psychobabble, David decides to switch tactics and try a little exposition instead. "You're just tense because we're going to see your father," he says. "I don't have a problem with him," insists Keith. "I've been working on all that stuff in my individual therapy. That's all I talk about." David complains that Keith never mentioned any of this to him, and also grudgingly points out that he tells Keith everything. "That's because you want my approval," says Keith. "No, it's because I love you," David answers, with just the right amount of sarcasm. Incidentally, Mathew St. Patrick gets bonus acting points for this scene because he actually remembers to keep his eyes on the road while "driving." It's amazing what being in a real car can do.
Back at the Fortress, Nate is meeting with a HITG because the DGDJ is being buried somewhere else. The actor's name is Lenny Wolpe, and he's most memorable to me (and most of our forum denizens) as the Tourette's Syndrome sufferer from that one episode of L.A. Law. Oh, boy! Here, however, he's just a tearful guy trying to buy a casket for his dead wife. I have to admit that I really liked this scene the first time around, but I'm finding that it doesn't really hold up well under repeat viewings. It's just so blatant in its All-About-Nateness. The little details are all great (like the slow-to-illuminate fluorescent bulbs in the Coffin Wall), but the rest of it just seems like we're working down a checklist of Nate Fisher characterizations. You see, unlike the greedy and sanctimonious David, Nate has a "gift," which is why he tries to stop Mr. Wolpe from spending money on an extravagant casket that he doesn't really need. And you probably don't even need me to tell you that Mr. Wolpe's marital status mirrors Nate's own turbulent relationship. It seems Lenny took his wife for granted for many years, and even went so far as to cheat on her. But then one day he contracted anvilitiser, "cancer," and finally wised up and realized that he really did love her. And then she died. Crushed by the massive Anvil of Foreshadowing, I suppose, only there's no body, so we'll never really know (StC is now at an incredible 5,987 and STILL counting). The scene ends with Lenny collapsing to his knees and shouting, "Oh, God! Oh, God! I loved her!" Oh, come on. Two "Oh, Gods" and not a single "Oh, boy" shout-out? Although I guess this season's obvious move away from all those wacky dream sequences would also preclude making such an obvious David E. Kelley reference. It's still a shame, though.
Everyone Leaves
“ Oh, yeah, that's a shout-out! Woo-hoo! Creepy Jesus has returned at last! Thanks, Scott Buck. Just for that, I'm going to pay to see Tremors 4: This Time They Finally Eat That 'Family Ties' Guy. ”
Cut to the kitchen, where Nate shuffles in and gets a drink out of the refrigerator. He sits down at the table, and an unfortunately framed close-up confirms my suspicion that Peter Krause has been getting consistently hairier as the season progresses. The pointy sideburns are back, and he's almost regained that tousled "I Just Walked Through Three Hurricanes And A Tornado And Don't I Look Fabulous?" hairstyle that served him so well for the first two seasons. Ruth starts babbling about something or other in the background, but Nate isn't listening. Instead, he's bawling like a little baby. There's been much speculation in the forums as to the reasons behind this, so I won't go into that here, but I will mention that Ruth doesn't seem fazed in the slightest by this somewhat odd behavior. She just walks up behind him and starts to massage his shoulders (StM = 462), saying, "I used to do this for your father all the time. His shoulders would get so full of knots. It's such a stressful job." The crying and massaging goes on for so long that Lisa actually has to tag in for Ruth and take over, yet none of them ever even think to ask Nate what's gotten him so upset. I was going to argue that it would have been more in character for Lisa to freak out and wonder what was wrong, but then I remembered that she reacted pretty much exactly the same way when Nate broke down in Seattle, so I guess that's not really true. In any case, this little Nate-centric segment of the show was very weird, and really the only unenjoyable part of an otherwise stellar episode.
Over at The Brotherfucking Boudoir (or, as E-Mail Dave suggested I call it, Billydelphia -- The House of Brotherly Love), Brenda and Billy are just waking up. Be sure to note, incidentally, the very clever way in which this scene makes it appear that Billy is the normal and well-adjusted one, while Brenda seems to be regressing back to childhood and hiding from all her emotional problems. That'll be important later. Billy is fully dressed and reading the newspaper here, whereas Brenda is huddled under a blanket with her nose buried in a Nathaniel & Isabel tome. "I don't remember these books being so dark," she announces. "These kids in the orphanage are being tortured." "That's the best part," replies Billy. There's some more of the de rigueur Chenowith psychobabble about "dark fantasy," and then Brenda comes across a particularly nasty section and exclaims, "Oh, Jesus!" Billy responds to this with a "Hmm?" that seems to say, "Are you talking to me?" Oh, yeah, that's a shout-out! Woo-hoo! Creepy Jesus has returned at last! Thanks, Scott Buck. Just for that, I'm going to pay to see Tremors 4: This Time They Finally Eat That "Family Ties" Guy. The disturbing section in question involves the Evil Nurse making Nathaniel and Isabel cane each other as punishment, and Billy wants Brenda to read that part out loud. Yeah. Of course he does. "You're sick," she mutters. "If by that you mean suffering from bipolar disorder with occasional psychotic episodes," he replies, "then yes, I am." Heh. And you don't even know the half of it just yet.
“ is acting out that infamous Tom Cruise 'Old Time Rock & Roll' dance scene from Risky Business, only he's wearing jeans instead of tighty-whities, and he's carrying a baby instead of doing splits on the sofa. So actually, it's really nothing like that scene. ”
David comes back out of the kitchen at this point to stand in the background and listen, but Keith seems to have decided that the argument is over. He turns to walk away, but Kersh tries to grab his arm, which causes Keith to react and shove his father away. Violence appears to be imminent, but David suddenly positions himself between the two men, and tries to calm things down. "Your son was only trying to reach out to you," he explains, but Kersh only gets angrier. When David tries to justify his presence in this family quarrel by saying that he's "the man your son is in love with," Kersh tells him that their relationship makes him sick to his stomach. "How the fuck can you act so goddamn superior when everyone here knows you beat your kids and you cheated on your wife?" shouts David, but Keith has finally had enough. "This isn't the place for you to say any of that stuff," he tells him. "This is my family. Stay the fuck out of it." "Then I can't be here," replies David, before rushing out the door. Well, that wasabrupt, I guess. And to be honest, I kind of have to side with Keith on this one. Family is family, especially when things get ugly. If they'd been together for twenty years, maybe David would have a point here, but these two can't even have sex anymore without picking up an extra boy-toy or two in a bar first, so it's not like he should really expect Keith to take his side over Keith's own father. In any case, Keith doesn't even try to run after him, which is probably somewhat telling. "You should have knocked his teeth out for what he said to me," snipes Kersh, just to prove once and for all that he really is a bad father. "You're pathetic," replies the angry son. Andscene. Whew. That was almost as bad as a break-up. Probably because it might actually have been a break-up. We'll just have to wait and see on that one.
Schrödinger's Flat. Nate is acting out that infamous Tom Cruise "Old Time Rock & Roll" dance scene from Risky Business, only he's wearing jeans instead of tighty-whities, and he's carrying a baby instead of doing splits on the sofa. So actually, it's really nothing like that scene, except in the sense that he's blasting music and dancing around like an idiot because no one else is home. "I know it's a little bit different than the music Mommy plays," he explains to Maya, "But I just don't think I can stand to hear The Wiggles sing 'Dance The Oobie-Doobie' one more time without tearing my head off." Heh. Doobie. Leave it to Alan Ball to sneak a pot reference into a children's song. A knock at the door interrupts their little sock-hop, and Nate shouts for their visitor to come inside, on the assumption that it's the pizza guy. "Are you ready for your first taste of pepperoni?" he asks Maya. Aww. And what with the diet of strained tofu and fenugreek-laced breast milk Lisa probably has the kid on, I'm betting pepperoni would really hit the spot right about now. Mmm, processed meat. Unfortunately, the "pizza guy" turns out to be Brenda, who's standing in the doorway looking sad and lost and apologizing because she "didn't know where else to go." Some brief chitchat establishes that Lisa is gone for the evening, and then Brenda responds to Nate's question about what's troubling her with one simple word: "Billy." Sensing that this conversation might take a while, Nate decides to place Maya in her playpen, and then sends us into another scene so that he and Brenda can have time to prepare.
Inside the house proper, Ruth and Claire are curled up on Claire's bed, drinking tea and commiserating about the sorry state of their love lives. "Ever since your father died," sighs Ruth, "I've just flitted from man to man. I'm so embarrassed. Especially about Ed Begley Jr. I mean, what was I thinking?" Mindful of the lengthy string of abject losers Mom has managed to notch on her headboard of late, Claire tries valiantly to put the best spin on things. "You got married when you were nineteen," she protests. "You never even got to have your sexual twenties, so why shouldn't you do it now?" This leads Ruth to tell the story of how she got pregnant the first time she ever had sex, only Claire initially misinterprets this to mean that she might have "like a love-child half-brother somewhere." "No, no. It was Nate," corrects Ruth. "Nathaniel and I had to get married right away. Both our families were mortified. It changed my life forever." When her daughter asks if she ever wonders how her life might have been different, Ruth replies, "I used to. Not anymore." Then she takes a long sip of her tea, as if perhaps to cover the little white lie she's just told. "Were you and Dad in love with each other?" wonders Claire. "Oh, yes," Ruth assures her. "Despite how we grew apart, your father was the great love of my life." This sends Claire (and a significant portion of the viewing audience, as well) to the brink of tears, as she laments the fact that she never really got to know The Late Nate as an adult. Or at least the live Late Nate, that is. After all, she's probably got the best post-death relationship with him out of anyone on the show. "I miss him, too," confides Ruth. "There will never be another man who will love me when I'm young and pretty and then always have that picture of me somewhere in his heart." "Oh, Mom!" responds a shocked Claire. "You're so pretty! You're beautiful. Why do you think all these men are always hitting on you?" Heh. "You're so sweet," Mom replies. "But look at the men! I'm sitting here crying over Arthur. Arthur! And I thought Ed Begley was bad!"
Claire's advice on how to handle The Arthur Incident is rather succinct, although no less worthwhile for its brevity: "Run," she suggests, before turning the conversation back to her own screwed-up romances. "I feel sorry for Russell," she admits. "I mean I hate him, but I feel sorry for him. Why is it that I attract every screwed-up guy in the state?" In the state? Oh, sweet, naive Lauren. You've gone national now, babe. "It's because they can see what a kind soul you have," explains Mom. "That you're caring and sensitive, with flowing red locks and skin like pale moonlight reflecting off the ocean waves. Not to mention the way you look so cute when you're nervous, and that little thing you do with your" "Mom!" interrupts Claire. "Stop channeling Aaron and help me with my problems, dammit!" "Sorry," agrees Ruth, before cutting to the heart of the matter. "The real question is why do you like them?" "It's like I'll fall for any guy who shows an interest in me," answers Claire. Well, not ANY guy, apparently. Sigh. "I guess we all want to be loved," replies Ruth, imparting the wisdom of the experienced. And also the desperate. "It's hard to say no to that, no matter who it's coming from. Unless it's some freak on the internet, of course. Then you just need to run." Aww. Sniff. Best. Scene. Ever.