Previously: there was The Nana, she was played by Linda Lavin, she was painted as a holy terror of a woman, and she had cancer. She also hated sunshine and the ocean. I think that about covers The Nana.
Is there a rule that every episode has to begin in the Cohen kitchen? We're at the fifth episode in a row that's bowed in this particular room, making me wonder if the scripts have become templates, wiped and re-filled with the droppings of typewriter-monkeys. Seth is reading a music magazine, marveling that Bright Eyes has two albums out that are in the top ten right now. He feels like the world is finally catching up to his musical tastes, making him depressingly less avant-garde and the show depressingly more arrogant about itself. The phone rings. "Setheleh," says The Voice on The Other End. It can only be The Nana. "How are you?" Seth asks. "If you were all that interested, you would have called me," The Nana yawns. She then orders him to cash The Birthday Check, to which Seth offers an ungrateful quasi-apology that he's sure that whopping twenty-dollar discrepancy in her records is really vexing The Bank of The Nana. Seth shouldn't look a gift Nana in The Mouth. Dentures can be dangerous things. The Nana wants to talk to The Son, but Sandy isn't around, so Seth idly mentions that The Hussy is available. As The Nana, on her end, holds the phone away from her ear in disgust, Kirsten pantomimes her frantic disapproval of this turn of events. Just in time, Sandy shuffles in to take the phone. "Awkward family moment, avoided for everyone but me," Seth mumbles into the phone. Well, it was, until you verbalized it, brainiac. "Love you," he says. "Could've fooled me," The Nana replies.
Sandy takes The Phone and leaves. Ryan asks how The Grandma is feeling, because he learned nothing from the last episode in which she appeared and we were assaulted by the phrase "The Nana" to the point that my cranial bruises never quite healed. Seth corrects Ryan: "'Grandma' evokes homemade cookies and someone who's actually nice to you." And crocheted afghans. Kirsten agrees that The Nana is not nice to anyone, but does exposit with a smile that she's in full remission and doing splendidly. Can you go into remission when you have advanced lung cancer and a four-to-six-month prognosis? Did the writer forget to return to "The Nana" before writing "The Return of The Nana"? Seth wonders if The Nana is immortal. How about just being happy that she's alive, douchebag? I'm suddenly worried that the excellent Linda Lavin will have to endure a relapse episode the time the show gets desperate for some genuine emotion. Suddenly, Sandy booms his way back into the kitchen. "The Nana! Headed for The Altar!" he sputters. They're all stunned. Sandy suggests that they pack their bags, y'all; they're going to Miami. Seth is thrilled at the opportunity to play shuffleboard while eating dinner at 4 PM with people whose teeth are in jars to their cafeteria trays, rather than bared or clenched in anger at his every move (see: Summer). "This is going to be the best spring break ever!" Seth crows. We smash to the credits.