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Post by sbtbfanatic on Jun 25, 2015 11:52:59 GMT
Episode 3x14 "A Kiss is More Than a Kiss"
Sooooooooooooooooooooooooo Cory and Topanga are still interacting with each other even though they broke up a couple episodes ago. Shawn does not approve, but Cory insists that it's completely innocent. Further, he insists that participating the "Fall Fashion-Wear Fest" with Topanga is also innocent, since he agreed to do it back when they were still dating. This event apparently consists of students modeling formal-wear for the prom. They say and react to that explanation like it actually makes sense, like "oh, of course, modeling outfits for the prom, that's a thing." Also Topanga's hair is way too long.
Cory wants to prove that he's over Topanga, so he agrees to go on a double date with Shawn. Shawn recruits the first two girls who happened to walk by, and they agree because he's Shawn goddamn Hunter, and it helps that Cory's actually starting to not look like a 9 year old anymore.
On the Matthews' backyard patio, Eric opens the response to his application to Penn State. He reads the rejection out loud and Mr. Feeny overhears and offers some sincere advice.
Ain't that beautiful? I'm concerned by the timeline here, I don't know what college still has applications open by the time rejections/acceptances start goin out, but we'll just have to put up with Hollywood on that one.
And then something TERRIBLE happens! Muhhuahauahahauahha *lightning*
Inside, Eric and Mrs. Matthews are prying into Cory for more information about his date that night, and then Cory makes a pretty meta comment about how Morgan never tries to get into his personal life, Morgan hasn't bothered him for a long time. And then Morgan comes downstairs and we meet the new actress who I guess is better, but fuck, that's like replacing M. Night Shyamalan with Michael Bay as director of Last Airbender and saying "yeah I mean... it's technically better, but... it's really just less bad."
She's looking into the camera while she gives these lines. Is she looking at me? I don't want her looking at me. I don't want some tongue in cheek fourth-wall breaking shit here, just say your lines and let's move on.
Wow, this shit, this the Eli treatment right here. This is almost the exact same formula as the scene where we saw Eli for the first time. Joke after joke after joke from the new cast member while the audience loses their minds. But right off the bat we can tell what we're in for for the rest of the series. She's gonna be snarkin it up at the expense of her brothers, no real character development, no arcs, no depth, just wisecracks. I honestly have no problem with a little sister being on this show, and this new actress is perfectly fine, I just hate how she's written. Blugh.
Fuck, I'm only four minutes in and it's been an hour. Long way to go. I need a drink.
WHAT THE SHIT they made ANOTHER joke about Morgan being in her room for a long time? That's TWO in like a minute, come ooooooooooooooooooon.
Heh heh heh... I love making those...
Her mom finally gets her the fuck outta there so Eric and Cory can talk, and his best advice is to not talk about Topanga at all on the date. At Chubbie's later, Shawn and his date are vigorously making out on their side of the booth while Cory makes awkward small talk. He even got the cuter of the two, he's definitely still hung up on Toperoski.
That line is absolutely timeless. Cracks me up every time. His delivery is amazing. We jump ahead to Cory and his date (her name is Melissa) on Melissa's doorstep but he just doesn't seem to have the nerve to kiss her goodnight, even though she explicitly states that she wants him to.
At the school's lunch the next day, Eric goes to Eli, Turner, and Feeny to show them his acceptance letter from "Boris College", and they try not to tell him directly to his face that Boris doesn't exist.
Across the lunchroom are Cory and Shawn. Apparently Cory gave Melissa a handshake the night before instead of kissing her, but evidently she found that gentlemanly and approaches Cory asking him for another date. Afterwards, Cory is still unable to kiss her, and invites himself in to meet her parents.
Cory admits that he's not over Topanga, and insists that she's not over him either. But then he turns around to see her kissing some Brad at one of the booths there at Chubbie's. That's some real shit right there, folks. Real as FUCK. I'm sure most of us have been in this position before, and it SUCKS. I'm wary of some sort of Disney movie ending to all this, but it is Boy Meets World after all, so I expect something more meaningful.
And indeed, back at Shawn/Turner's apartment, Shawn gives a very well delivered, impassioned speech about how Topanga's doing exactly what she's supposed to be doing: she's met someone new, she's moving on, just like Cory is supposed to. Hell to the hell yes. I've said it before, but most of the best episodes of this show are about dating. It's by far the most realistic and mature examination of teenage I have ever seen on television. Anyway Cory storms over to Melissa's house to throw down some moves (not entirely realistic but shut up).
That's awesome too! "Well we tried, oh well, peace out." I love this show.
The Brad surfer dude guy is hangin out at Topanga's locker the next day and Cory jumps on his back in a blind rage. He bails and Topanga's like "what the fuck dude", but she also understands why it's hard for him to see that stuff. They argue, and it ends with Cory saying he doesn't want to be friends anymore. Harsh.
At lunch, Feeny finally decides to tell Eric that Boris College doesn't exist. Eric had already figured out it was a scam, and just went on pretending because he wanted to be a part of the good time that everyone around him was having. Like all of the conversations between these two, it's genuinely sentimental and well written. And funny.
At home, Cory throws all the stuff he has left over from his relationship with Topanga into the family's trash compactor, and his parents come downstairs in response to the noise. They give him the same sort of talk Shawn gave him earlier about dating other people.
Out of everything I learned from this show, that line is one of the ones that hit me the hardest. Obviously I'm not in high school anymore, but that shit hit me like a freight train when I was younger. It's brilliant. That's precisely the kind of thing teenagers need to hear. Nowadays everybody is searchin for their goddamned soul mate in English class instead of finding out what kind of people they're compatible with. Rock on, Boy Meets World. A round of applause, please, for Alan Matthews, partly in remembrance of times long past, when he gave us this kind of wisdom on a much more consistent basis.
They go on to say that even if Cory and Topanga are right for each other, then dating other people will still serve to confirm that, and that it's a good idea to not completely throw away their friendship in the meanwhile. This episode, you guys. It's just a BARRAGE of life lessons today. I love this show.
Back at school later that night, it's time for the Prom Fashion Fest. Turner remarks "Parents, if you see anything you want for your kids, there's order forms in the back." Okay fine, that actually does make a decent amount of sense. Anyway Cory shows up in time, and he and Topanga hash things out and Cory agrees to stop bein a dick.
During the credits Mr. Feeny finally brings Eric a letter of recommendation and tells Eric to go ahead and read it.
Go ahead, grab a tissue. I'll wait.
I love that scene. You know, some people don't really get this show, and this is one of those scenes that'll completely divide a room based on who gets this show and who doesn't. Some people are like "oh Feeny's just a teacher on a TV show." NO. NO HE IS NOT. Mr. Feeny is the essence of having someone who believes in you. We saw it earlier this season with Shawn, and now Eric's getting the same treatment. We loved him in the first two seasons, but this season is really showing us what an amazing person George Feeny really is.
Plot: 1.0 - Boris College was a little silly, but I liked everything else.
Character Development: 1.0 - F-F-F-F-F-F-Feeny. And Cory and Topanga.
Humor: 1.0 - It's the reason we came out of the trees, man.
Life Lesson: 1.0 - "You're supposed to date around, that's how you find the right person." And all associated bits of wisdom. I covered most of them already.
4.0 out of 4.0. This episode kicks ass by dealing with a very real teenage problem. Two actually. Eric's college admissions struggle is also very real. The resolution of Cory's story wasn't the Disney movie I was afraid of, we got to see Alan for the first time in a while, and the Feeny/Eric relationship hit one of its best moments. The craziest part is that as soon as Morgan came back, it got a perfect score. What's that about.
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Post by sbtbfanatic on Jun 25, 2015 11:53:41 GMT
Episode 3x15 "The Heart is a Lonely Hunter"
If you haven't seen the teaser for Girl Meets World yet, consider the two following questions:
"Should you go watch it?"
"Do you want to be disappointed?"
Those two questions have the same answer.
Who's Shawn on a date with this week? Could it beeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee DANA PRUITT? Played by the lovely and talented Larisa Oleynik?
Yes.
That is who.
Larisa played Alex on The Secret World of Alex Mack, and a bunch of other cool stuff (just go to IMDB) all the way up to 2014, and you better believe I was excited to see her on Mad Men. And this actually isn't the first time Larisa and Rider have met, they played opposite each other in Les Mis a few years before BMW started airing. So this is a real treat.
Anyway, these two are lockin' lips here at Chubbie's and start planning their next date. Dana suggests working a volunteer booth or a picnic, but Shawn's not keen on either of those activities: it's apparent that he really just wants to makeout some more, so Dana ultimately declines a second date.
The gif tells us the plot in a nutshell. Shawn's super interested in this "nice girl" but because he's a hit-it-and-quit-it kinda guy, the odds are against them.
Off to the side, Eric's discussing his recent shitty grade on a paper with Eli and Turner. Our boy Rico explains that he's trying to turn things around so he can get into college, and the teachers tell him about an internship at the local news station. The competition's rough, but Eric thinks the other applicants will all cancel each other out, leaving him to steal the spot. Eli's not so sure, but Turner's convinced.
That might be THE most meta thing I've ever heard. Imagine you're on your couch, watching this episode, and in between spoons of chocolate pudding you're like "pfff how the hell would Eric ever get an internship pfff", and then your cynical, smartass buddy is like "it's a fuckin tv show, what do you expect." That's what Turner is saying, on the meta level anyway. In context it's just, sure, Eric can get a job at a silly tv station, but he's also saying "we're on a tv show, of course he's going to get it." Funny stuff.
Back on the other side of the hallway, we learn that Dana wants a date with Cory, and Shawn is supportive, though hesitant. He quickly finds some "bad girls" in leather jackets to take his mind off of Dana.
Home girl on the right has her shirt tucked in, even the dangerous girls weren't safe from the power of the 90s.
At the Matthews house later that night, Shawn's hanging around in the kitchen even though Cory left for his date after dinner. He's just waiting for Cory to get home so he can ask how things went with Dana. Morgan is lurking around too, and she's got some boss ass comfy slippers.
Look at those slippers. Are those little cows? That's awesome, I want that shit.
Anyway, Mr. and Mrs. Matthews go to bed, and Cory comes home shortly after.
This is one of those rare times where I just have no explanation for why something is funny. But I love that line. And look at Shawn's hair bounce, god damn.
So Cory didn't kiss Dana on the date, but he had a good time. It quickly becomes apparent that Shawn has very real feelings for this girl, and Cory agrees to back off. I'm not entirely sure what purpose this served, except to show us what kind of guy Dana is typically interested in.
At school the next day, we meet one of the smarty-pants guys Eric's competing against for that internship. His name is Arthur and he's played by Danny Strong, another actor I saw on Mad Men recently. Maybe that's just the way of things. You got Alison Brie on Mad Men too, sitcoms and Mad Men, folks, it's destiny.
On the other side of the hall, Shawn talks with Dana about her date with Cory. Turns out, she thinks Cory is the kind of guy you could get serious with (yeah no kidding), so she didn't want to rush things by kissing him. But on the other hand, she kissed Shawn on the first date because he's cute but not "boyfriend material". Ouch. At lunch, Cory and Shawn discuss their respective identities as the "nice guy" and "bad boy". Topanga comes around and lays down some fuckin truth about how Shawn objectifies women and needs to grow the fuck up.
This is good stuff! Up until now, the show has mostly been glorifying Shawn's dating habits, but now we're seeing the dark side of it.
At the news station, Arthur's just finished his interview for the internship and it looks like it went pretty damn well, and a sweaty, nervous Eric is up next.
In Feeny's class, the man himself mentions that if the media had been as invasive in the past as it has become in the last few years, some people, including Kennedy, might never have been elected. True enough. Shawn opens up a debate in the class about whether Kennedy could be considered a good president. The first time I saw this I didn't know about Kennedy's numerous affairs, so I was like what the fuck, of course he was a great president after the Cuban Missile Crisis. But now that I know the full context, it's actually a really interesting discussion. Dana believes "less of a husband, less of a leader", so we see how this debate about Kennedy is analogous to the conflict in this plot. And that's pretty awesome. I always say this, but I love when the lessons in the classroom directly reflect the lessons in the story. Very good stuff.
Now we're... back at the news station... I guess the interviews are during school hours...? Anyway, Eric comes out even sweatier than he went in, and the interview was clearly pretty shit. But he starts chatting with some guy who appears to be a janitor, and helps him clean up the studio. As he does so, he explains that all the other applicants just want something to put on their resumes, and that he really needs this job, and that he would put his heart and soul into working there. In all honesty, he explicitly said earlier in the episode that he just needed some stuff to help get into college, but we'll accept that he really does want to work here.
Anyway the old janitor guy turned out to be Pat Darby, the station manager (come on Eli, it's television!) and so Eric gets the internship.
Pat is played by Brandon Maggart, who was a big deal in the 80s and had a recurring role on Sesame Street in 1970, so he's alright in my book!
At Turner's apartment, Cory searches for a lost mitten while Shawn gets advice from their English teacher. Cory finds the "scarf he lost last year" under Turner's couch cushions. BUT WAIT! Shawn only moved in with Turner at the end of season 2! This is strong evidence of my "a year passed between seasons 2 and 3" theory. Cool. Turner advises Shawn to show Dana he really cares, rather than just telling her. That's the abridged version anyway. It's actually some of the best we've seen of Turner this season. Is it mere coincidence that Eli isn't around for Turner's good advice? THESE ARE THE QUESTIONS, PEOPLE. THIS IS WHY WE'RE HERE.
We're seeing a lot of this, where Shawn and Cory trade off between being either goofy or the focus of the story, and it works really well. And honestly, I think I like it better when Shawn's getting the character development and Cory's doing the jokes. Cory's humor is more silly and witty, while Shawn's is mostly centered on him being dumb in one way or another. Either way, it's definitely working in this episode.
Next, Dana finds Shawn outside Chubbie's.... somehow... and he shows her that he was listening when she suggested they go on a picnic and bleeds his heart out for her, so she agrees to a second date. It's pretty compelling and sweet. Usually this kind of scene is really hard to watch, but they're both so solid in these roles and the writing is pretty good, so it's definitely easy to watch. I do have two things to point out though.
1. Dana explicitly suggested they go on a picnic at the beginning of the episode, but in this scene she tells Shawn he's silly for trying to have a picnic in the middle of winter. MAKE UP YOUR MIND, DANA PRUITT.
2. For as long as there have been shows and movies, there have been stories of the guy who "just needs a chance" and ultimately gets the girl, like we saw here. But almost never is there a girl who "just needs a chance", you know? This is a great episode and all, but like, why don't we get one where, I dunno, Trini gets a date with some football player who's willing to "give her a chance"? You know what I mean? I'm not trying to preach, I'm sure BMW isn't gender biased or anything, it's just sort of a double standard. Then again, Cory kinda gave a chance to Topanga back in season 1... I dunno. Leave a comment.
During the credits, Eric and Morgan pour coffee for the entire staff of the news station.
Plot: 1.0 - Great stuff for both Shawn and Eric. Why is the "it's television" excuse okay for Eric here? Well, this episode is more of a setup for him. The news station plays a big part in coming episodes, so we cut a few corners here for the sake of a later story. And that's fine.
Character Development: 1.0 - Shawn's journey of self discovery continues. Shawn and Turner talk about dating stuff, making Turner look more and more like a father, which is always cool.
Humor: 1.0 - Everybody did a stellar job in this episode. Even Morgan was tolerable.
Life Lesson: 1.0 - We learned about what to do and what not to do in dating, and Eric showed us that passion is highly valued by prospective employers.
4.0 out of 4.0. This is one of my favorite episodes. The Shawn and Dana pairing is great, Cory is hilarious, Feeny's history lesson relates to the story, Turner acts like a father figure, and Eric gets a little bit closer to college. Recipe for fuckin success right there.
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Post by sbtbfanatic on Jun 25, 2015 11:54:38 GMT
Episode 3x16 "Stormy Weather"
Well I'm a minute in and already my hopes are down in the gutter. They already threw about 10 punchlines at me in that span of time and it's just an insult to my intelligence. The gist of it though is that Eric is working way too hard at his news-station internship and thus neglecting his other responsibilities, including going to class. Mr. Feeny's class ends as he mentions that Lincoln freed the slaves for political as well as moral reasons, which is just the realest shit you'll ever hear. I hope everybody at home was listening to that.
As he tries to make his way out of the room, Eric is stopped by Feeny, who informs him that if he doesn't do the paper due Friday, he's not going to pass the class and therefore won't graduate.
At Turner's apartment, Shawn and Dana Pruitt are hangin out, doin some homework. I don't think Shawn's had a girlfriend for more than one episode before, so good for him. Turner comes home just in time for Dana's mom to show up, and the sparks flyyyyyyy.
The whole exchange here is pretty great, and really shows off the chemistry these two have built up over the last two seasons.
At the news station, we see John O'Hurley, who I only know as J. Peterman on Seinfeld, is doing the weather, and Eric watches with stars in his eyes. We see how really invested in this internship Eric has become and then a guitar riff plays over some stock footage of cars driving in the snow. Wasting a lot of time here. At the station again, the weather guy is AWOL and who else would be chosen to fill in but our boy Eric. God knows they couldn't just not have the weather.
Eli is there because his contract said he had to be in a certain number of episodes and the writers didn't know what the fuck else to do with him.
Eric does a great job as a weather man, and everyone congratulates him at home, including Mr. Feeny. I don't know why they were all watching the weather at the same time, but sure. Oh okay, Feeny is actually here to remind Eric that his 2,000 word essay is due by Friday. Eric says he doesn't have time for it with this weatherman stuff, but that's bull shit. 2,000 words is for children, what the fuck is he gonna do for the rest of the night? Just write it now, jesus. Anyway, here's the big conflict of the day, Eric has to choose between the weatherman stuff and actually graduating from high school. No surprise, he chooses the weatherman stuff. He is also turning 18 at midnight that night, so he's feeling like he can make his own life choices and all that other shit that always happens on a sitcom when someone turns 18.
The next morning they do the whole "OH YOU WANT ME TO PAY RENT?" thing, and Eric storms out. Heh... Storms... Weather... Whooooooooooooo that's about as funny as anything this episode. Where's Dana? It's not all bad though, we're getting to see that tough love that Alan Matthews is famous for. We've missed out on that this season, so it's good to have it again.
Oh here's Dana. And Shawn. They're waiting for Turner and Miss Dana's Mom to come back from their date.
So Turner and Madame Mother Of Dana have decided not to see each other again since it would be too awkward for Shawn and Dana. What a riveting conclusion to this story arc that we saw 30 seconds of. Anybody else would have forgotten about it by now.
At the station, Eric finishes his weather cast and is approached by the station manager. He's got a real weatherman coming down to take the job since Eric is just an inexperienced kid. Eric wants his old internship position back, but that's only open to students, and since Eric sort of dropped out over night, he's screwed now. Woops.
Alan shows up next. He tells us the story of how he went into the Navy after high school, to his father's great disapproval, and that he doesn't want to make the same mistakes his father made. So they reconcile and I don't know how I feel about it. Eric was already fucked, this doesn't influence his decision to go back to school at all. He was gonna have to go back regardless. It's just like "hey I'll support your decision to do the thing you can't do anymore." I dunno.
Anyway bak at school, Eric hands in his paper to Mr. Feeny. The old man is hesitant to just welcome Eric back with open arms, but Eric explains that he's learned how tough the real world can be, and that he'll never be able to find a job without a diploma. Well fuck the 90s. 20 years later you're gonna need a DEGREE in a STEM FIELD to have a CHANCE to find a job. Those high school diploma days, man. My poor generation. Feeny is moved by Eric's new value of education and welcomes him back school.
During the credits, Shawn and Dana are making out at Chubbie's and then they see Turner on a date with Dana's aunt. Because where the hell else would two full grown adults go on a date. God damn, Turner, this is why you're not married. You keep fuckin takin these girls to god damn Chubbie's. That's never going to work in the long term, man.
Plot: 0.5 - It wasn't bad, it was just frustratingly predictable.
Character Development: 1.0 - Eric's finally gonna start learning some shit at school.
Humor: 0.5 - Shawn was consistently funny, but he only had about a minute of screen time.
Life Lesson: 1.0 - Let's see what we learned here. Even a sure thing can go horribly wrong. Fathers shouldn't abandon their sons. The real world is hard, especially for dropouts. The entire Pruitt family is good looking. I'd say that's worth the point.
3.0 out of 4.0. - I think this was a somewhat shorter review. There really wasn't a whole lot going on in this episode. It's another example of my flawed scoring system, I would never really seek this one out to watch, but that's a pretty good score. Oh well. What the hell happened to Eli? We never saw him again past the 10 minute mark. And Eric needed that internship to pass the journalism class. Whatever.
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Post by sbtbfanatic on Jun 25, 2015 11:55:23 GMT
Episode 3x17 "The Pink Flamingo Kid"
I've been putting this one off because I remember it specifically as being terrible. Like, one of the lowest lows of the series. But I guess it's time. Time for a test of my willpower.
So Cory's got a camera and he shows up at Turner's place, and Shawn's on the phone with his dad since it's his dad's birthday. No sign of ol Chet Hunter's return yet, and Shawn's a little broken up about it. They resolve to go to Shawn's old trailer park and film him and his relatives as a birthday gift/general update for Chet.
I don't think that's particularly funny, but if you do, congratulations: that's every punchline for the first half of this episode.
Maybe 30 seconds later, we're at school and Shawn's already made another joke about his family being criminals. Eli comes along and informs Cory of some contest at a news station, but the deadline for submissions is two days. Could this conflict with his commitment to Shawn? Gollypops. What a compelling story. The Ericlogue begins. Eric's hauling some junk to Feeny's office for no reason, apparently Feeny's going to be auctioning off some stuff from his attic. Why the hell does he need to bring it to school? Because it's convenient for the production crew, that's why.
We're at the trailer park now, and we first meet Shawn's uncle Mike, who is shockingly both a character we've met before, and is played by the same actor. Don't get used to that. They make a few jokes about how he's a criminal. Uncle Mike calls out the rest of the Hunters, and they make a joke about how they're criminals.
After like 8 more jokes about how literally everyone in the Hunter family is a criminal, Cory ends up filming this.
Special Boy Meets World Fan Challenge: Why are they all hidden? I suggest you watch the episode because there's no way anything I've said so far will direct you to the answer.
Uncle Mike steals Cory's wallet, and then we meed Eddie, some sort of gang leader, but he's certainly lacking the class and relative charm of Harley Keiner. He gives the boys a hard time about not including him in their video, and tells them to get the fuck out before he starts to do gang leader things to them.
At home, Eric has cleaned out his own attic in hopes of finding something of value, like Mr. Feeny did. I think this would be funny under different circumstances, but I'm pretty numb to the idea of humor after all the criminal jokes. Anyway his parents trick him into thinking he'll find valuable stuff if he cleans out the attic and the garage.
Oh bless you William Russ and Betsy Randle. Bless your experienced acting. Will Friedle is doing well too, I'm just sour about everything before this. But this is good. Great, maybe. Something to keep me going, a reason to keep fighting.
At Turner's apartment, Cory and Shawn are reviewing the footage and see that they accidentally filmed that Eddie guy hauling around some presumably stolen computers. How the fuck was Eddie dumb enough to let that happen? How does this guy get dressed in the morning? Cory and Shawn were practically right next to him, it's ridiculous. Regardless, Cory wants to use this hardware thievery ring as the source material for his news-station contest project thing. Shawn doesn't like the idea.
Gee that was mature and rational. What the fuck. It's not like the tape had any sort of conclusive evidence. Shawn would rather protect this trailer park gangster piece of shit than send the tape to his dad as a birthday gift. I can't even begin to understand how this makes sense. "It's my family, I can do whatever I want" is his justification. Cory's pissed, by the way. He's also as confused as I am. The next day at school, Cory demands an explanation.
Shawn refuses to provide one, so they tackle each other and grapple a little bit, it's honestly not the worst act-fighting I've ever seen, and the extras react by crowding around and shouting "fight!" which is about as realistic as it could be. Turner and Eli break up the fight and Cory says he thinks that Shawn is just jealous of his skills with a camera, which is just completely fucking retarded.
And because I know we all want it,
Cory is going to go down to the trailer park to get more footage of Eddie stealing shit. Shawn warns him one last time, but Cory doesn't listen. So now Feeny is left to give advice to the frustrated Mr. Hunter. Shawn is playing the whole "who needs friends when you have family, family is always there for you" EVEN THOUGH HIS PARENTS ARE BLATANTLY NOT THERE FOR HIM so I just don't even know how the writers could have POSSIBLY thought this made sense. Mr. Feeny points out that you "don't have to be blood to be family", which is pretty great advice that Shawn really shouldn't need to hear after all these years.
We can always count on Eric. His parents try to convince him that he's getting scammed by both them and the appraisal place, but he's too far gone.
At the trailer park, Cory is a complete fucking idiot. He's already got the thugs on tape hauling their stolen stuff, about a thousand times more footage than he had before, but "I gotta get closer". No you don't Cory. You're already withing not-moron seeing distance. Jesus this is ridiculous. Eddie and the gang catch him, break his camera, and are about to beat the shit out of him.
PFFFFFFFFFFFFHAHAHAHAHAHA
aaaaaaaaahahahahahaha
Shawn threatens to call the cops on Eddie, who responds with "Come on man, I'm your brother." Shawn sticks to his guns and the trailer park gang crew squad decide not to kill Shawn and Cory. Shawn clarifies that Eddie is merely his half-brother, and that his existence "just didn't seem worth talking about." Shawn and Cory reconcile, Shawn points out that Cory is his "family" and that Eddie is only "blood". I feel like he should have known that already.
During the credits, Eric's fuckin loaded, apparently he sold some mask he found while he was cleaning for $4,000. Feeny shows up and inquires about the mask, apparently it was his, Eric gives him the money. Poor Eric.
Plot: 0.25 - Eric's wasn't terrible.
Humor: 0.25 - Eric, Amy, and Alan were good.
Character Development: 0.25 - Development occurred but it was LONG overdue. How fuckin long have these guys been friends? And Shawn only now realizes that Cory is his real family? It's just not even remotely believable.
Life Lesson: 0.50 - "You don't have to be blood to be family."
1.25 out of 4.0 - Just not a good episode at all. Obviously they're never going to MENTION Eddie again. I mean shit, there are several very important Hunter related events in the future and this guy isn't even whispered about. The only remotely reasonable thing is that he's Shawn's mother's kid from a previous husband, but even then there are a lot of places where he should come around. This was a complete fucking mistake by the writers. Just make him a cousin or something for crying out loud, what were they thinking? In the past, Shawn's mentioned a sister, as has Topanga, but they were never actually on screen. This half-brother was on screen and had lines and directly impacted the story, and is immediately erased from existence. What a complete waste of time.
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Post by sbtbfanatic on Jun 25, 2015 11:56:09 GMT
Episode 3x18 "Life Lessons"
Fuckin real talk right there. The extras groan and Cory assures them that if they devote the next two weeks to studying, they'll have nothing to worry about. The scene immediately cuts to Shawn and Cory watching TV in a few different locations, and then they're finally cramming with only two days left before exams, wondering where all their time went. Honestly, that explanation really doesn't do it justice. It's about 30 seconds long, too long for a gif, so I highly recommend finding this episode just for the first minute. It's so spot on, I can't even handle it.
Some "tough" looking guys come up to Cory and say they need to "get rid of Feeny", since he's the mastermind behind this diabolical exam schedule. It's hilarious that backward baseball caps were perceived as "tough" back in the 90s. These guys look pretty ridiculous. I bet they're in a garage band or something.
Cory does that thing sitcoms do where he manages to get the attention of a large group of people just by saying "listen up gang", and they all decide to go talk to Feeny as an organized unit. Buuuuuuuut the scene cuts to them all watching TV at Chubbie's. It's pretty funny, I actually didn't expect that. We're doing good so far.
At school, presumably the next day, the mob of students, lead by Cory, ask Mr. Turner why the exams have to be jammed together in such a demanding schedule.
Apparently cut-aways to the punchline are the name of the game today. And that's fine, it's definitely working.
Feeny is adamant. He goes on to explain that the schedule should be hard, to make sure the students are actually learning all the material. To give my own insight, I believe the reasoning is that you can't cram for three exams, right? You can cram for one, maybe two, but three would be difficult. That's just my two cents. Anyway, Feeny. though steadfast, agrees to hear out the students' concerns. Naturally, Cory is chosen to represent the students. That tough guy from before in the leather jacket, apparently his name is Denny, which is just the least intimidating name he could ever have, tells Cory that if he can't change Feeny's mind, the rest of them will take matters into their own hands. This guy's tone really pisses me off. Who hired him.
Needless to say, Cory is unsuccessful. It's interesting to think about how the target audience feels right now. As a middle/high school student, we would probably sympathize with Cory, but as adults we remember all of the exams we passed without actually learning anything by studying the night before, and so we understand Feeny's intentions.
The students are unhappy with this outcome, so Denny and his Ragtag Gang Of Hilarious Thugs, henceforth abbreviated DR. GOHT, band the unhappy students together and march off to enact some unspecified revenge against Mr. Feeny. It appears that Shawn goes with them.
At home, a leggy redheaded woman named Brenda arrives at the door and Eric lets her in. She's been set up on a date with Mr. Turner by Amy Matthews, and she mistakes Eric for Turner, so they have a humorous exchange.
I was sitting here like damn, I know I recognize this woman from somewhere. And then I was CERTAIN that she is currently playing Zelena on Once Upon A Time. Like, the resemblance is RIDICULOUS, their mannerisms, their voices, everything. It's insane how similar they are, but alas, they are not the same actress. This is Lisa Akey who really hasn't done anything worth mentioning. I was so excited too, dammit all. She also kinda looks like Rachel, who comes into this show in season 5.
Anyway, Turner had to cancel the date, so Eric offers to take her to dinner in his stead and she agrees. Quick reminder, Eric did indeed turn 18 a few episodes ago.
That saxophone riff plays as we jump ahead a few hours. Through his kitchen window, Cory sees DR. GOHT tp'ing and shaving-creaming Feeny's house. They break a window, alerting Feeny, and they run off. Feeny comes out and makes eye contact with Cory as the sad clarinet music plays.
That's some crazy shit. Not much to say about it except that's pretty compelling.
The next day, Feeny's class ends and Cory talks with him about the exam stuff again. The teacher explains to his student that the pressure caused by the difficult schedule is what forces them to really learn, but in greater detail than how he explained it to Mr. Turner earlier. He goes on to tell Cory that he's decided to retire at the end of the year, since he believes himself no longer capable of earning his students' respect.
In the hall, we learn from Shawn that he didn't actually take part in the vandalizing, but Cory thinks they're both responsible since they knew about it and didn't do anything to stop it.
This is heavy stuff! Not only have the terrorists convinced Feeny to retire, our heroes feel like it's all their fault. It's hard to pretend that this would ever happen in real life, but in the Boy Meets World universe, this is a great story so far.
Later, Turner comes to Feeny's house to convince him not to retire.
Wo-hoah! That legendary stern Turner voice I've talked about before! This really shows us how the dynamic between these two teachers has changed since the beginning of season 2. Mr. Turner giving a stern life lesson to Mr. Feeny... Who woulda thought! It works though, for sure. I think the key here is that this is the kind of advice we would expect Turner to be giving to his students, right? At its core, this episode is about bullying. Feeny is being bullied by DR. GOHT. Indeed, what we're seeing is that you don't have to be a student to learn from a teacher. Further, the fact that it's Turner in particular is critical. Imagine if that was Eli instead of Turner. It would be a disgrace. Turner's character arc over the last two seasons is what allows this scene to work. Awesome. Sadly, Feeny is not convinced.
In the Matthews kitchen, Eric tells his parents that he's going out with Brenda. Amy realizes it's the Brenda she was setting up with Turner and forbids Eric from seeing her (because of the age difference), but Alan encourages him, even so far as to lend Eric his car. During the date, Eric and Brenda aren't hitting it off, but Turner arrives just in time to swoop in and take over the date. Eric meets some other girl his own age. That's the end. Why on earth did we do that? I mean, it was fun, but that's a somewhat unsatisfying conclusion, especially since Turner just got done with something much more important.
Back at home, Cory and Topanga are studying when Shawn bursts in. Apparently DR. GOHT are up to no good at the school. I guess... they walk there...? Either way they're at the school in the next shot.
DR. GOHT have made a mess of the parking lot and spray-painted all over the walls. Denny's got some bolt cutters and breaks the padlock on the door to the school. Cory and Shawn get kinda preachy about how Mr. Feeny cares about his students, and Shawn explains that he learned about freedom of assembly from Mr. Feeny, but that it only applies to peaceful assembly. It's just sort of showing us how this education is applying to real life, I guess.
That definitely could have been written better, but woaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaah damn! That's powerful. Throwback to City Slackers right there. I pointed it out several times, the development between Feeny and Shawn during this season. I wasn't just makin that shit up, it's all come to fruition here now. Again, the actual wording isn't amazing, but the essence of what he's saying here is really satisfying.
So anyway, Feeny comes out through the now open door and DR GOHT run off. They were all really bad at saying their lines. Feeny reveals to our heroes that he's not going to retire after all, and then they help him clean up the parking lot.
During the credits, everyone learns their exam scores. Shawn got mostly C's, Cory got mostly B's, everyone's happy.
Plot: 1.0 - Despite the unsatisfying conclusion of Eric's story, everything else was good.
Character Development: 1.0 - Turner has clearly earned Feeny's respect, Eric learns a little about why age gaps can in fact make a big difference in dating, and the heroes obviously get a little closer to Feeny. But we can't leave out the old principal himself, who shows us more of what makes him human and vulnerable, as well as displaying his true passion for teaching. Great stuff.
Humor: 1.0 - The cutaway gags at the beginning were great, and it's consistently funny throughout the rest.
Life Lesson: 1.0 - I've already talked about the lessons from this one at length. After all, the episode is named "Life Lessons". What did you expect?
4.0 out of 4.0. That's the third perfect score this season. Great episode. No reason to miss this one.
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Post by sbtbfanatic on Jun 25, 2015 11:56:41 GMT
Episode 3x19 "I Was A Teenage Spy"
This episode is kind of a silly waste of time. It starts at Chubbie's, Eli and Turner recruit Cory to pass out some fliers for the school's spring dance. Why Chubbie's? Why is everyone always here? I really don't know. Anyway the dance is themed as a 50's sock-hop which I guess influences what happens later. At home, Cory's writing a 10 page term paper on Sputnik. They had final exams in the previous episode so this seems like odd timing. Why not just air 3x18 later? Who knows.
The audience doesn't laugh at that, but I think it's hilarious. Booo audience. Booo.
Anyway Cory wants to cook his little frozen pizza there, so he plugs in the microwave (Eric had unplugged it earlier) and it shocks him back to the 50s. At Chubbie's, except it's called Slim's back in the 50s. So not only does it transport him through time, but also through space. Okay.
Topanga is also there, but she doesn't recognize Cory. And she looks all 50's and everybody's chewing gum and shit. Everybody goes back to school and Cory meets Shawnzie Hunterelli, an exaggerated 50s version of Shawn. Feeny is pretty much exactly the same, and Turner is basically Minkus. This is probably going to be my worst review ever. There is nothing to talk about.
Somehow, today's topic for discussion is "what will life be like in 40 years", which lets Cory look creative and smart, but that lasts about 45 seconds because now it's time for the "nuclear bomb scare drill" of the day. There are some funny gags throughout this whole scene, but it's really just like "haha what if we were in the 50s look how different it was". In an unusually insightful move, Cory buys all of the currently available shares of IBM. Then we meet 50's Eric who's really smart and doesn't care about girls. WEEEWOOHEEEHOOOOOO IT'S SO CRAZYYYYYYYYYY HEREEEEEEEEEEE
Sigh...
Feeny rushes into the hallway and announces that Russia has just launched a spy satellite. Cory's like "nah it's just Sputnik" which is the opposite of insightful, since now everyone thinks he's a dirty commie.
But Topanga and Shawnzie help him escape. They're oddly okay with some guy they've never seen before knowing a bunch of shit about them, Topanga in particular. He escapes to the place where his 90s house lives, and Morgan treats him like her brother so I guess whatever. Their father is played by Tom Bosley, who is credited as playing himself in the credits, so I don't even know who he is or what's going on. Apparently he was on Happy Days. Anson Williams shows up at the door, and just sort of walks in like "hey I'm Anson Williams who else would I be" and I just understand absolutely nothing about these references. He was also on Happy Days, and that show was set in the 50s, but it still seems like a pretty desperate attempt at some celebrity special appearances.
WHAT IS GOING OOOOOOOOOOONNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNN
At jail, whoever Betsy Randle and William Russ are supposed to be show up. Oh okay they claim to be Cory's parents, but I don't really think your parents can bail you out of being charged with TREASON but whatever. Either way, oh, they're actually Russian spies, which is a throwback to an underdeveloped joke they made at the beginning of the episode.
Topanga and Shawnzie Hunterelli show up and help Cory escape from jail.
WHAT
IS GOING
ONNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNN
WHO MADE THIS? WHO LET THIS HAPPEN!
AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH
So the gang arrive at Shawnzie's secret makeout apartment. Topanga kisses Cory and the audience goes so crazy you'd think they'd never seen it before. Cory realizes that it's better to live in the 90s where there aren't constant bomb scares. Golly. What a revelation. Hey all you people that are like "man I wanna live in Mad Men", maybe you should watch this episode of Boy Meets World, I don't fuckin know.
To help Cory get back to the future, Topanga and Shawnzie decide to take him to see the "Wise Man". Cory doesn't wear the chicken head this time, I don't know why. They find the Wise Man at Slim's, which is very convincing evidence that Slim's is equivalent to Chubbie's in every way except name. The Wise Man is actually played by Pat Morita, better known as Mister Goddamn Miyagi.
His advice is to get shocked by another microwave. EXCEPT THE FIRST COUNTERTOP MICROWAVE WAS INTRODUCED IN 1967, TEN YEARS AFTER SPUTNIK WAS LAUNCHED. But fine, I guess there was some prototyping of large, unwieldy microwaves between WWII and Sputnik, so whatever. It's not like it matters. The same kid who knows how to buy shares in a company couldn't think of that solution? Whatever. Oh okay, Cory says "WAIT IT'S 1957 THERE IS NO MICROWAVE", so that's good at least. The mob shows up to arrest Cory and he hits his head on the wall and wakes up at home.
At first I thought that was just a funny thing for Shawn to say, but then I realized it's a reference to Fonzie, so I don't know how I feel about it now. At least he doesn't try to do the voice, he just kinda says "hey".
During the credits, a power surge causes Cory to lose all his work on his paper. Oh okay, the power surge brought him to the future this time.
Plot: 0 - WHAT THE FUCK IS ANYTHING
Character Development: 0 - They didn't even try.
Humor: 1.0 - Yeah sure whatever.
Life Lesson: 0 - The 50s were worse than the 90s.
1.0 out of 4.0 - An absolute waste of time, but I guess it was pretty funny.
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Post by sbtbfanatic on Jun 25, 2015 11:57:12 GMT
Episode 3x20 "I Never Sang For My Legal Guardian"
Welcome to another episode of Boy Meets World, or rather, Shawn Meets Angst. Except that's a terrible title because Shawn already met angst, and they got married and then had a child. This episode is that child.
So yeah, Shawn hasn't heard from his father, Chet, for a long time. But Cory learns from Mr. Turner that Chet sent him the documents to become Shawn's guardian a few months back. Turner's first solution is to find a new apartment for him and Shawn to occupy since his current one is too small. It's mostly just an excuse for Shawn to pout around, but the good news is that Cory is a lot of fun in this episode. He's invested in the happiness of his best friend, so he effectively becomes a real estate agent to help Shawn and Turner find a place.
Shawn doesn't want to move though, which is probably setting up for something. Eli shows up and says some stuff that's not funny and then Shawn storms off. It's business as usual. At school, Feeny hands back a D on a paper to Eric and suggests he tutor some football player. Why are these kids still in school? They had final exams two episodes ago.
On the other side of the hallway, Cory tries to convince Shawn to go with the condo that they looked at the day before.
This is yet more evidence that the best humor comes from Cory's silliness in Shawn-centered episodes. Cory's just off the side being a real estate agent. I think that's hilarious.
Shawn insists that they're not going to move because he's sick of moving, and storms off full of angst. Back at the apartment, Turner tells Eli that he has almost finished the paperwork to be Shawn's legal guardian. Shawn comes home, Eli bails, Shawn throws out a letter from his dad because he's angsty, and Turner reveals his pending guardianship. Shawn's like "I thought you did that months ago, sorry you didn't have time for me" and storms off. Holy Moses and Mary how many times have I typed that. Take a god damn chill pill Shawn.
Now we're at Chubbie's and Eric is tutoring that football player, whose name is Jeff, on European history. It's made abundantly clear that this guy is even dumber than Eric. Their studying is cut short when some girls want to go for a ride in Jeff's Porsche.
I'm not really sure what to say about this. Feeny's intentions with this setup are unclear. He didn't say this was worth extra credit or anything, so that leaves two options. Either he wants Eric to understand how frustrating it can be to try to teach someone who doesn't give a shit, or he thinks Eric will "accidentally" learn all the material by trying to teach it to Jeff. I guess we'll find out. Either way I think we're in for a good Eric/Feeny moment. But again, finals are already over, it's way too late to be applying to colleges.
Shawn shows up at the Matthews house and tries to recruit Cory for an impromptu visit to Shawn's dad, who's at a truck stop about 50 miles away. Shawn has apparently stolen Turner's motorcycle and plans to drive it there. The audience goes "oooooooooooh" like Shawn just offered Cory some heroin or something. Are you fuckin joking with me right now? He coulda just asked Turner to take him, he probably woulda said yes. I don't know anymore. Predictably, Shawn gets pulled over/arrested.
Like, we understand that Shawn is troubled. We get it. And you know why we get it? Because we've done this before. Several times now. There's sad music and everything, they're trying so hard to manipulate the audience's emotions, it's honestly annoying at this point.
The next scene opens at Turner's place and he's got Shawn with him. I honestly expected Shawn to call his dad from the police station, so that's a relatively nice surprise. They hash things out, including Turner pointing out that he could have driven Shawn to see his father, and they realize that they're both just scared of making their living arrangement permanent. The next morning, Shawn informs Cory that he's going to move into his Uncle Mike's trailer back at the shitty trailer park, because "at least I'll be surrounded by family." WE DID THAT ONE ALREADY. UGHHHHHHHH. Remember "you don't have to be blood to be family"? I guess Shawn's just making up excuses at this point because he doesn't know how to deal with this situation.
I think they deliberately bring out Shawn's leather jacket when he's being angsty. I should have been paying more attention to that, but I don't think we've seen a whole lot of that jacket lately.
Eric explains to his parents the trials of trying to teach someone who doesn't want to learn (well how bout that) and then Cory talks to them about Shawn. They advise Cory to go see Chet and tell him what's going on. I still don't know why Shawn and Turner haven't come here yet, but I guess the story's gotta keep moving. So Cory and Topanga are now at the truck stop where Chet's been staying. Oh great, that's good, they got here by bus. So there was another option besides stealing Turner's motorcycle. Good. That's good.
Anyway some older woman with a southern drawl starts hitting on Cory.
Are we done with the real estate agent bit? Well it was fun while it lasted. Topanga takes this cowgirl outside to tussle or rumble or whatever the country word for fighting is. Brawl? I don't know. Oh hey, Chet's here, working until he can pay off some parking tickets and hit the road again. The most surprising thing is that Chet gives a shit about parking tickets.
Cory explains to Chet that Shawn really needs him, but to no avail. Topanga and the chick whose hair looks like a pineapple come back inside, apparently they're friends now. The audience laughs, but...
What good things can I say about this... Well it's cool that they've got the same actor for Chet Hunter. I talked before, I think it was "Career Day" about how great this actor is, particularly in the role of Shawn's father, and he maintains that standard in this scene.
Back at school, Feeny just finished grading the most recent tests (even though they already took finals) and Eric tries to pre-emptively explain why Jeff may not have done very well.
Turns out, Jeff got a C+ and Eric got an A. Spectacular! This is a finely crafted and executed Ericlogue. The foundation is relevant to the overarcing story of the whole season, it starts off believably, builds up at a decent pace, and concludes with Eric learning a lesson he didn't even realize he was learning. That's about as good as it gets, folks. Awesome stuff. Eric realizes that Feeny's intention the whole time was just for Eric to learn the material himself while he was teaching it to Jeff.
I don't really care what happens now, this Eric story was good enough on its own.
Regardless, we're back at the police station with Shawn. Apparently Uncle Mike up and left the trailer park, and some cop found Shawn sleeping on a park bench. Conveniently, Chet arrives at the police station, he and Shawn have been chatting for a bit now and we still don't know why he's here. Chet insists that he can still find his wife, but Shawn convinces him to stay. It's actually pretty moving, and Rider Strong nails the fuck out of his lines in this scene. Shawn is actually real and vulnerable here, not the angsty annoyance he's been up until now. I love this scene, and I always have, but the best is yet to come.
Turner arrives to bail Shawn out and confronts Chet. Ah okay, Chet got caught in a speed trap on his way into town, having been persuaded by Cory's words, and got arrested for all his unpaid parking tickets. He reveals that he's staying to take care of Shawn, and Shawn asks his father to give him a moment alone with Turner. Grab your tissues. Goddddd I can already feel it welling up in me, this exchange has stuck with me since the first time I saw it.
I love the last frame of that gif. It freezes on that shot and fades to black, the one with Chet standing directly between the two of them. That's a dam good shot. And that touching saxophone or clarinet or whatever music plays. It's actually appropriate here though.
During the credits Cory and Chet help move Shawn out of Turner's apartment and Chet steals Turner's television.
Plot: 1.0 - Like I said, Eric's story was excellent, Cory's little real estate business was fun, and even though Shawn's lines were a little ridiculous sometimes, his story was good overall too.
Character Development: 1.0 - "I'd do it again." Eric developed too, thanks once again to Mr. Feeny.
Humor: 1.0 - Cory's silliness triumphs again. Eric and Mr. and Mrs. Matthews were pretty funny in their scenes as well. Eli kinda sucked, but whatever.
Life Lesson: 1.0 - "You can't teach somebody if they don't want to learn."
4.0 out of 4.0 - Yeah I know I was bashing this episode for most of the beginning, but that's all in the details. Looking at the big picture, this episode has everything you could want. Shawn's angstiness is annoying, but we're sort of used to it by now, so it's not a huge deal. I've seen this episode a ton of times, and I never get tired of it. There's a famous play called "I Never Sang For My Father", which inspires this episode's name, but the plot of that play isn't really similar to this at all, so it was sort of an odd choice. And it's worth pointing out that Turner never actually did become Shawn's guardian, he said he just had "a few signatures" left.
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Post by sbtbfanatic on Jun 25, 2015 11:58:43 GMT
Episode 3x21 "The Happiest Show On Earth"
Time traveling after being shocked by a microwave is more possible than this episode.
So Cory's dancin his way away over at Chubbie's with a girl that we've seen before. The actress's name is Hillary Tuck, and she played Sarah in On The Air. But for absolutely no reason that I can come up with, her name is Kristen now. Why is this? It doesn't make any sense at all, there would be no problem if it was the same girl from On The Air. I would say it's laziness, but lazy would have been keeping the same name! I just don't know how this happened.
They take a seat in a booth and Cory lays down the smooth moves. Apparently he's been serial-dating recently. They smooch, and Cory calls her "Topanga" afterward. Stay classy, Boy Meets World.
In Turner's classroom the next day, Cory and Shawn discuss Cory's new plan to re-date Topanga since he's clearly not over her. Turner begins class and we learn the results of some environmental essay writing contest. The winners who will be receiving a trip to Walt Disney World are Kristen, some dude who's not nearly as cool as Shawn named Ronnie "Lips" Watterman, and Topangarino. So Cory's plan to woo her is over before it begins. Later than night, Eric's advice is to just run off to Disney World ASAP to chase after her.
Well.... I don't know how to feel about this. It goes without saying that he is in fact going to run off to Disney World. So are we okay with it? Surely the writers know this is ridiculous, and they just wanted to use their "One Disney World/Land Episode" voucher that all the sitcoms got in the 90s. I can't wait for the stock footage, yum yum.
But don't worry. Eric's got a plan.
This is actually one of my favorite gags. Once again Eric's got the episode on his shoulders.
I just want to point out again that they already took their final exams. Why are they still in school? Just air that episode later, for crying out loud, this stuff is so simple.
Shawn comes along with two plane tickets to Florida. He got them from his "Uncle Mickey". So I guess Shawn is coming too. Cory tries to save them both the trouble by spilling his heart to Topanga before she leaves. How incredibly rational. But she gets pulled away for a minute, and in that small window Kristen manages to sneak in.
She promises to patch things up when she gets back from Florida and kisses him, but Topanga sees and gets pretty upset. I guess we're going to Disney World.
AW YEAH BABY look at all this delicious stock footage. Got an aerial shot, the monorail, the Epcot golf ball thing, Cindy's castle, the works. Was there a law that said every show had to do this in the 90s? I guess it's just the law of "show our park on your show and we give you money". Shawn and Cory arrive, apparently those tickets were for a cargo plane, which is slightly more believable than otherwise. They don't have much of a plan here, just "find Topanga". Back at school, Eric's plan is working, as he receives praise from an offscreen teacher.
That is hysterical. A lot of it is in the way Eric says "thank you", so it's somewhat lost in the gif, but god damn, it gets me every time.
Mr. Feeny sees Eric stuff the dummy into his locker, and in the spirit of the running joke, thinks it's actually Cory. They have a really funny exchange, and ultimately Feeny does not find out about the dummy. So this plan is lookin pretty rock solid.
There's some bull shit with the essay winners and some dolphins and the dolphin trainer, and because this is a TV show, Cory and Shawn arrive on the scene. Buuuuuuuuuuut Kristen sees Cory before Topanga does, and she thinks he's there for her. This is girl is fuckin FRUIT LOOPS people, just complete wackadoo. But it wouldn't be a sitcom without these ZANY MIXUPS WEEEEHEHEHEHOOOOO. Kristen kisses Cory after proclaiming her love for him (re: fruit loops) and Topanga's lookin piiiiiiiiiiiissed.
Shawn and Cory spend the night in the log flume ride. There's some more stock footage and a little montage of Cory and Shawn asking Beast and Mouseketeer Goofy for directions or if they've seen Topanga or something, I don't know, the only sound over this footage is some whimsical flute montage music. You know what I'm talking about. Then we get another montage of Cory showing up wherever Topanga and Ronnie "Lips" Watterman are.
Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz but hey, I'm sure they got paid a lot of money to give us this many different shots of Disney World. Either way, Cory's hard work isn't paying off. Topanga tells him to stop chasing her, quite sternly.
Hey. Fezzes are cool.
Anyway, Topanga thinks they're all just meaningless gestures, since every time she turns around, Cory's got Kristen's tongue in his mouth. And right on cue, Kristen shows up behind him. Once again, Topanga storms off.
Cory goes back to the dolphin place, and, completely unsupervised, starts telling all his problems to one of the dolphins as he feeds it little fish.
Are you fucking me right now? Did that really just happen? I am so ready to be done with this.
Anyway she chases after him like "oh Cory I heard what you said blah blah blah, thank goodness I was suspiciously spying on you in this random unsupervised and likely off-limits location." And then they kiss in front of some fountains because that was literally the only way this was gonna end.
Also, Cory is seriously overdressed for Florida in April/May. Everyone else is wearing as little as possible, but here's this guy in a full wool sweater. Whatever. The good news is, the audience doesn't go "wooo".
During the credits, we're at the Matthews house. Cory gets grounded for a month, and Morgan gets her first genuinely funny joke, perhaps the only one, of the series.
It's bleeped over, obviously, and she's probably just making random sounds, but it kinda looks like she's saying "ass shit cunt". Either way, definitely unexpected, definitely funny.
And finally Mr. Feeny finds a body in a shallow grave in his garden.
So there we go, there's our 22 minute Disney World advertisement. Where magic happens, or whatever. I wonder what happened to Kristen? I mean she did sort of tell Cory that she's in love with him. She's probably gonna hook up with Ronnie "Lips" Watterman on the rebound, poor girl. That dude's a real douche.
Plot: 0.25 - Disney World/Land episodes are notoriously terrible. I don't need to explain why this story was ridiculous.
Character Development: 1.0 - Cory and Topanga are back together.
Humor: 1.0 - Humor was definitely on point today. Every scene with Eric was hilarious, Shawn had some good stuff, so did Cory when he wasn't being an emotional wreck. AND MORGAN. Never thought I'd say that.
Life Lesson: 0.25 - If you actually love someone, you should give it a honest try, but for fuck's sake don't chase them to Orlando if they're coming back in a few days.
2.50 out of 4.0. It's worth watching just for the humor. The delivery adds a lot to the jokes, so it's significantly better in video than in gif.
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Post by sbtbfanatic on Jun 25, 2015 11:59:10 GMT
Episode 3x22 "Brother Brother"
Is the title a play on Sister Sister? I don't know what else it could be, but that would be a pretty dumb title.
It's the end of the school year, finally, so Eli and Turner are giving Eric back the things they've confiscated from him over the year(s?).
The real Feeny comes up to Eric to chat and the joke-bat keeps hitting home runs. The chemistry between Eric and Feeny is completely undeniable at this point. They're just too perfect together. Aside from the laughs, we also learn that Eric's been turned down by a few more colleges and is on the waiting list for North Southwestern San Diego State. Further, he plans on traveling the country during the summer. That was a pretty damn good minute and a half. That's honestly one of the strongest opening scenes so far in the series.
On the other side of the hall, Cory and Topanga are clearly still high on getting-back-together. If you've ever "gotten back together" with someone, I don't need to tell you about that first week or two. Regardless, Topanga's going away to summer camp, and Cory wants to go with her, mostly-jokingly.
Topanga lookin 90s as fuuuuuuck.
So yeah, Cory's super bummed out that his girlfriend is going to be gone all summer, and it doesn't help that Topanga isn't nearly as upset about it. Or upset at all, really. Eric tries (unsuccessfully) to cheer his little brother up.
The Feeny puppet would cheer me up in ANY situation. Seriously, that is the funniest thing I have ever seen. Cory's just bein a big ol' Debbie Downer. Shit, who's good at crafts and stuff? Start mass producing Feeny puppets, make millions of dollars, and send me one for free.
Actually, send me two. Shut up, you can afford it.
Now Shawn and Cory are at a park somewhere, which is new and exciting. But uh oh, Shawn's gonna spend the next two months traveling with his dad. What's a poor lonely Cory to do.
Now we're in Cory's kitchen and he's the mopiest mope ever. His parents suggest hanging out with Eric before he leaves on his car trip, but Cory fires back with all the times his brother has bailed on him for shitty reasons, and it's actually pretty emotionally charged. It's about time Eric had to face what a shitty brother he's been. Morgan offers to hang out with Cory, but then remembers that she has "day camp" all summer. So why isn't Cory going to camp, you ask? Apparently his parents tried to send him once before, but they had to come get him after only a few days.
Okay so that's basically all of the setup, I think. Just explaining why everyone is unavailable for the summer so that we can really hash things out between Cory and Eric. And sure enough, after Cory goes upstairs he has another argument with Eric. "We only spend time together when you're stuck with me", "I'm your last resort", that sort of thing. Things escalate, they tussle, and Eric resolves to leave the next day. My only real problem with this is how overdue it is. But I guess Eric leaving for college is enough of a catalyst for Cory to finally want to deal with this shit.
We jump forward to Eric's going-away dinner at Chubbie's the next day. Naturally, none of Eric's friends are here because we've never met any of them on the show. Except Jason, God rest his soul. Feeny, Turner, and Eli are here though, as are Shawn and Topanga, so... this is more or less the shittiest party Eric has ever been a part of, but he's taking it in stride. Feeny gives a nice little speech and shows Eric his framed diploma.
Feeny pretends not to love that hug, but we know the truth. I would love to get a closer shot of all those signatures on the banner. I would say that the party happened earlier, and Eric's friends have all gone home, but none of the food has been eaten, so I can't really piece this one together.
Cory decides to say a few words, the essence of which is "we shared a room for fifteen years and I don't even know you". Then Cory slinks off. And I mean, he's not wrong. All they've ever really done is take jabs at each other, except the one time they were "THE MATTHEWS BRUTHAAAS". But this is pretty much the exact opposite of "THE MATTHEWS BRUTHAAAS".
The next morning, Cory's already gone off to say goodbye to Topanga by the time Eric wakes up. We get like two and a half minutes of Eric having a heart to heart with his parents. It's pretty well written, but it's definitely not tuggin' my heart strings like it's supposed to. I think that comes from the fact that Eric's interactions with his parents have been really limited this season. Morgan comes down too, and her cuteness is exploited by putting her in goddamn footie-pajamas and she gets sad and stuff. She said "ass shit cunt" in the previous episode, so I think she's a little old for footie-pajamas.
We jump over to the park where Cory says his goodbyes to Shawn and Topanga, and tries his damnedest not to show them how upset he is. It's dusk now, lookin like Twilight Princess in here, even though it was morning in the last scene. Cory sucks at solo-basketball for about 20 seconds, and then Eric shows up. Apparently he was "halfway to Jersey" and came back for a proper goodbye.
Cory reveals that he swiped the most recent letter from North Southwestern San Diego State from the mailbox out of spite a day earlier, and now gives it to Eric to open. (Recall that Eric was just on the waiting list.)
Ho Ly shit, where are the tissues. That shit breaks my heart every single time. WHY ARE YOU SO REAL, BOY MEETS WORLD? How do I even process this? All season we've watched Eric try to get his act together and make it into college, but it wasn't enough. No Hollywood magic here folks. This is one of the best decisions they ever made on this show, painful as it is. And you really have to hear it to get the full effect, Eric's tone is the most hollow and lifeless thing you've ever heard, it really is devastating. And that's good television.
Eric is about to cancel his celebratory road trip, but realizes a better idea is to take Cory along with him.
The credits-scene is much more lighthearted, and is basically just the boys joking around with their family and Mr. Feeny before taking off on their trip. Nothing really worth quoting in a gif. Eric's definitely told everyone that he didn't get accepted to college, since Alan reminds him to check out some colleges while he's on the road. So there was a HUGE opportunity that's been wasted here. I would give every penny in my bank account to see Eric telling Mr. Feeny that he got rejected from North Southwestern. Can you even imagine? Just thinking about their facial expressions is making me well up.
*At Feeny's back door* "Uh, hey, Mister Feeny." "Ah, Mister Matthews, one hug isn't enough for you, hm? This is an exciting time for you, I'm surprised you haven't already left." "Mister Feeny they rejected me. I'm not going to college, and it was silly of me to ever think that I would." "...Your dreams, Mister Matthews, are not silly."
Buuuuut that's not how it went down. Oh well.
Plot: 1.0 - It's about time Cory and Eric bridged the gap between them. This was a good story that definitely needed to be told. And like I said, the part where Eric reads the letter, that's some good writing.
Character Development: 1.0 - Eric and Cory get closer, Eric is faced with the fact that he's been rejected from college.
Humor: 1.0 - Consistently funny, and of course THE FEENY PUPPET.
Life Lesson: 1.0 - Brothers are important, and don't assume you're getting into college until you actually get accepted.
4.0 out of 4.0. This is the last episode with Eli, if I remember correctly, and Turner has a considerably smaller role in the next season. They each got like two lines in this episode, so that was a little send off for them. It's funny, it's powerful, and it's real as fuck. That might as well be this show's motto.
So that's it, season 3 is over. 3 out of 7. Almost halfway. The MVP for season 3 is, without a doubt, Eric Randall Matthews. Consistently hilarious, an engaging and compelling character arc, amazing acting... Definitely the best character this season. I think that might be what sets us apart from everyone else. The people who really love Boy Meets World understand how incredibly important Eric is to the central themes in seasons 3 through 7. Once you stop seeing him as a side character, and instead see him as the other main character, there's a lot more to appreciate about this show.
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Post by sbtbfanatic on Jun 25, 2015 12:02:30 GMT
Episode 4x01 "You Can Go Home Again"
So yeah this is the season with the car intro, where clips from previous seasons are playing in the various mirrors, and it doesn't really make a lot of sense. I guess it's intended to be a play on the word "reflections", but a title sequence is supposed to show you about the current season, not old ones, so I think it's dumb. ON THE OTHER HAND, the music is pretty damn sweet, I'm not gonna lie. I like the song a lot. Also, you can see Eric in the driver's seat there for a split second, he's blatantly not watching the road or even steering the car.
Anyway, recall that Cory and Eric left on a cross country road trip for the summer at the end of season 3. We're coming up on the end of that road trip now and, to Eric's great annoyance, Cory has been talking about Topanga no matter where they go.
It kinda defeats the whole "let's get to know each other" resolution they made at the end of season 3 though.
They're currently three hours from home, but Eric's stalling with an impromptu stop at Pottstown, home of the world's largest yogurt cup. Pottstown is a real place, but it does not have such a cup. At the Matthews house, Mister and Misses are going out to the "Grocie Awards", and Shawn and Topanga show up to wait for Cory. They banter, nothing important.
As you can see, this is the season where Rider Strong has obtained perfect mastery of his pouty-lips.
Some saxophone music takes us back to Pottstown with the Matthews Brothers. Eric's busy chatting up a local girl named Irene, who works at one of those restaurant-but-also-a-convenience-stores, so Cory goes off to the "Parade Of Sprinkles". I've never understood sprinkles on yogurt. Yogurt is not ice cream, nor is it cupcakes. It should not have sprinkles. People also should not be topped with sprinkles, but Pottstown is doin their own thing, clearly unhindered by my oppressive sprinkle fascism.
Amy and Alan come home from the Grocies, and Alan won a Grocie, in an unspecified category. Amy's pretty proud of him, the supportive wife that she is, but Alan is suddenly unsatisfied with his life, terrified by the thought of feeling pride in being a grocer. "Sudden-Onset Acute Midlife Crisis," Doctor House exclaimed, with an air of arrogant satisfaction. Wonderful. It's been a loooooong time since we've seen character development from Alan, and if you've been with me since seasons 1 and 2, you know how much I love Alan's character. It seems the writers realized that Eli was a mistake, and now we're back on track.
We return to yogurtopia. The boys have a motel room so Eric can get cleaned up for his date with Irene, and we hit the essence of Eric's current crisis.
"All my friends did". Jason got into college, confirmed, it's canon.
It cuts to the motel room again, I guess it's later that night after Eric's date, and Eric is putting on a different shirt. So, I mean, draw your own conclusions. Cory really wants to go home so he swipes Eric's keys and bolts. For some reason the motel leads into the... convience store slash... restaurant.. place... where our pal Eric hoodwinks his little brother.
Cory makes the world's worst Braveheart reference and goes off to, I dunno, hitchhike I guess. Irene comes up behind Eric, surprised that he hasn't ditched town yet. Eric is being the sweetest guy in the universe right now, it's honestly heartwarming. Irene is really insecure around Eric, since she's lived in Yogurtville her whole life while he just got finished traveling the country, and in her frame of reference Eric comes off pretty smart. I mean let's face it, there probably aren't any Mr. Feenys in Pottstown. She gives him a kiss because he's being so sweet and making her feel special. Awww.
Think about what's going on here. Eric is suddenly the big man on campus. For the first time, he has the most life experience and education out of everyone in the room. He's spent his entire life being really challenged by his environment, forcing him to grow and explore his potential (thanks in large part to Mr. Feeny). But Pottstown is the opposite. Irene is the anti-Feeny. He's completely content here, no one has expectations for him, he's already impressed the most attractive girl in town. There's suddenly no room for improvement. This is a fantastic test of Eric's character. One of my toughest professors in college told me once, "If you want to be the biggest fish, stay in small waters." Obviously Eric isn't going to stay in these small waters, but I'm excited to see him arrive at that decision.
Side note, Irene is actually a pretty good actress. She's played by Marisa Ryan, who was on 96 episodes of a show called Major Dad from '89 to '93, but not much else since then, which is a shame.
Back in Philly, we get some more time with Alan and Amy in their back yard. Alan's still down in the dumps about, in his opinion, not doing anything with his life. Right on cue, Mr. Feeny comes out to join them. Fuuuuuck yes. This is a treat we have not seen at all in season 3, I don't think.
Is that the first instance of profanity on this show? I think it is... Neato. So yeah, Mr. Feeny explains that doing something you enjoy is really all that matters. The talk wasn't all that I was dreaming it would be, but it was still refreshing to see this dynamic in action again.
Cory time again. He's walking along the road, looking for a ride, when something peculiar happens. An Amish guy rolls up in a horse-drawn carriage and offers to take him as far as "that farmhouse, there". If you've seen this episode you surely remember this scene, it's really just bizarre. I mean, it's funny, but it's just a total non sequitur. It would be a waste to try to explain it further, you have to watch it to understand. Ultimately, Cory declines the ride, so it's a uniquely strange scene.
Back at the restaurant store, Eric enjoys pea soup and pie prepared by Irene. Those are not sexual euphemisms. I don't think. Maybe. When she hands him the plate of pie she says "it's the pie that keeps you here forever", and we see an old guy who's been here for a long ass time.
Eric learns that the storestaurant is most likely going out of business, now that a new highway is diverting traffic past their town. Eric suggests they put up billboards for miles leading up to the town advertising their pie and pea soup to bring in more people. This impresses the shit out of the local products of incest, who tell Eric that he could do really well in Pottstown. So we're seeing some more buildup of that contrast between Eric's life in Philly and the one he could lead here. Good stuff.
Prince Cory decides to call whatever the word is for the father of a king Alan, who shows up a few hours later. Papa Alan pulls Eric aside and they hash things out. Alan doesn't say it explicitly, but it's clear that Pottstown for Eric is analogous to his own job at the grocery store. It was the easy and comfortable choice, and Alan spent his life trying in vain to convince himself that it was what he really wanted.
Fuck to the fuck yes. A+++++. That's what I'm talking about! That's Boy Meets World right there baby. Telling teenagers that real shit they need to understand. Welcome the fuck back, Alan Matthews. I missed you.
Eric explains further that he's scared of going back home, and then his father tells him that you can always go home, which is almost verbatim what Alan tried to tell Shawn back in season 2 when Shawn blew up that mailbox and tried to run away from home. It should be clear by now that the "Boy" in the title isn't just Cory. It's Cory and Shawn and Eric. And Alan. Even Feeny and Turner, and Joey and Frankie. All different walks of life meeting the world in different ways. I love this show.
Eric waves a wordless goodbye to Irene, who returns the gesture with a look of hopeful understanding. During the credits, Cory reunites with Shawn and Topanga in the kitchen, but Cory's been a side-character this whole episode so who cares.
Plot: 1.0 - The Pottsyogurtville Adventure was a great contrast to the Ericlogues we've seen in the last three seasons. Alan's story was great, and the two plotlines merged together smoothly at the end. My one complaint is that they didn't address whether Eric and Cory had successfully gotten to know each other and become closer as brothers. That was the intention of the road trip, and it was sort of left by the wayside.
Character Development: 1.0 - Eric has made the decision to grow and face his fears rather than settle into complacency. Alan made some personal progress as well.
Humor: 0.5 - It wasn't exactly a standout episode for humor, but it was still fine. It's not that the jokes were bad, there just weren't very many of them.
Life Lesson: 1.0 - If you want to be the biggest fish, stay in small waters.
3.5 out of 4.0. A fantastic start to the season. We're left hopeful for the further development of Eric and Alan as the season progresses. Cory is pretty much exactly where we left him, but that will probably change in the next episode.
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Post by sbtbfanatic on Jun 25, 2015 12:03:02 GMT
Episode 4x02 "Hair Today, Goon Tomorrow" Eric and Cory wake up in the morning and the status quo is accurately depicted below. Yes, Cory has reached the phase of teenagerhood where he hates what he looks like, and who can blame him. Contrast this with the studly ass perfect-camera-angle-holy-shit-those-bangs Eric beside him. And honestly, I can't blame him. He's lookin like a big ol goofygoof right now, so the makeup crew or lighting crew or whoever are doing their job. At school, everybody's fixing their hair in their locker-mirrors, except Topanga, who doesn't need to exert effort to look nice. As such, some guy tries to hit on her and then gives her his "card", which, I dunno, there's just no way people actually do that, but what do I know. Cory's not doin himself any favors with his pants up to his nips like that. Topanga starts doin that "it's what's inside that matters" self righteous crap, and Cory points out that it's real easy to think that way when you're naturally good looking. THIS IS THAT REAL SHIT. Every other show is gonna end on "looks don't matter", but Cory knows what the fuck is up, and he calls Topanga out. To try to prove her point, Topanga pulls out a pair of scissors and cuts off a big chunk of her hair, but she quickly freaks out. Cory chases his girlfriend into the girls' bathroom, where the roles are reversed. Cory is now preaching that looks don't matter while Topanga has begun to have self esteem issues. There's really not much to say, it's basically the same conversation they had in the hallway. I don't think I've ever heard "goosey goosey" outside of this scene, but it sounds funny. Let's all make "goosey goosey" a thing. Then Topanga heads off, promising to go to a beauty parlor. Shawn emerges from that left stall there and he and Cory hang out on the couch. At home, Eric continues to steal the show. He's been lounging around the house in a bathrobe all day, eating breakfast cereal and watching cop shows. As such, he's invented a concept for his own cop show, "Eric Matthews, Good Looking Detective", and a theme song to go with it. This scene is hysterical. will never stop loving this scene. It's everything that Eric is. Will Friedle has perfectly mastered this character. His mother insists that he get out of the house, and suggests he find a date, since he used to go on dates all the time. Now we're at a beauty parlor where Topanga's getting her hair all sorted out, and our heroes are worried. If Topanga was a looker with her natural hair, what sort of dark magic will she be capable of with the help of a professional stylist? She does indeed come out looking pretty stellar, stellar enough for Shawn to try asking her out. Topanga decides to go to the mall with her recently upgraded hotness, leaving Cory to interrogate Topanga's stylist. It's like a two minute bit whose entire basis for humor is the fact that the stylist switches from a fake Italian accent to his actual Boston accent, and I ain't laughin. The dialogue between Cory and Shawn leading up to this was fantastic, A+ stuff, but this crap with the stylist is just a total misfire. It doesn't even contribute to the story. Yeah I ran that through Google Translate and it didn't come up with anything, so I'm not too sure what she's tryin to say there. Over at Chubbie's, Eric has heeded the advice of his mother and is currently on a date. His date looks like a... doll...? I don't know. It's something, there's something unsettling about it. Maybe her hair just doesn't match her face? Either her hair or face on its own would be fine, but together they're not working out. Anyway, they talk about how Eric thinks he's seen it all, what with his internship and cross-country traveling, and being eighteen years old. But this girl is estranged from her parents and works double shifts at the Dairy Queen to support her two year old son. You aren't in Pottstown anymore, Eric. And so our boy realizes that he's extremely fortunate to still have the support of his parents and to not have any real responsibilities. So once again we're building more of Eric's character as he learns where he really stands in society. It's one thing to hear Mr. Feeny tell you over and over that you have potential, but it's much more impactful to sit here at Chubbie's and be like "oh shit, I don't have any kids, and my parents are letting me live at home for free, I have so many options open to me right now." In Turner's class, the man himself is passing out copies of The Elephant Man to the class, and explaining what it's about. This is one of those fabled literature tie-ins, even if it's half-jokingly tied in: Cory obviously isn't horribly disfigured, but he's feeling pretty insecure. So that's fun. Feeny interrupts class to remind everyone that picture day is on Friday. Cory pays a visit to that same stylist who worked on Topanga and the audience laughs at his accent again. Cory drops 75 fucking dollars to become beautiful or whatever. At home, Eric's mumbling his cop show theme song into a bowl of cocoa puffs. He's feeling even worse than before due to that new layer of "I'm relying completely on my parents". But good old Alan Matthews kicks him into high gear. Topanga is checking her hair and makeup in that same girls' bathroom at school, and Shawn emerges from a stall once again. Topanga defends her actions, claiming that everyone in high school is obsessed with how they look, but Shawn points out that she never cared before a few days ago. It's kinda bull shitty, but Topanga realizes that this isn't who she wants to be and dunks her hair under the faucet. It doesn't really address Cory's concerns from the beginning of the episode. It's real easy for Topanga to decide not to worry about her appearance when she's good looking regardless. Shawn obviously isn't going to stop worrying about his hair, so what are they trying to tell us? I think the point is that obsessing over your appearance is normal, and it's okay and you shouldn't feel bad about it, but maybe still aspire to rise above it? It's not completely clear to me what we're supposed to take away. It's a shame because I praised them earlier in the review for being so real, but this is pretty standard stuff. Topanga rushes to the beauty parlor where Cory's just finished receiving his makeover, and the joke is that he looks exactly the same. During the credits, we see Eric's fully produced crime show theme song. This entire Good Looking Detective gag is honestly one of my favorites in the whole series, probably top 5. It's so campy and tongue-in-cheek, I absolutely love it. You can find this entire clip here, and I suggest that you do. www.youtube.com/watch?v=zcKXFwOpD7QPlot: 0.5 - It wasn't bad, but honestly what even happened? An impromptu haircut in the hallway, and then two haircuts at a salon. Character Development: 1.0 - Topanga sort of changed, but then changed back? And I guess Cory isn't going to be insecure about his appearance anymore, so that's good. Humor: 1.0 - 'CAUSE HE'S THE GOOD LOOKIN GUY. GOOD LOOKIN GUY. Life Lesson: 0.5 - Like I said, it's too conflicting. Everything Cory said at the beginning is still true, and they didn't even touch on the fact that everyone is too busy worrying about themselves to notice other people's imperfections, and that's some really good advice that I would have expected from Boy Meets World. This one kinda dropped the ball. 3.0 out of 4.0. It's a really funny episode. REALLY funny. Except for the stupid accent stylist guy. Fuck that guy. Who wrote that crap.
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Post by sbtbfanatic on Jun 25, 2015 12:03:37 GMT
Episode 4x03 "I Ain't Gonna Spray Lettuce No More"
Our boy Eric's down in the dumps after getting passed over for a job at The Gap. He says a few odd things about how "I'm Gap", which must be a reference to some ad campaign they ran in the 90s. I don't get it. Apparently Eric was underqualified, and he claims that a monkey could do that job.
I'm glad that people don't try to wear T shirts with sweater vests anymore. It's like, the mullet of shirt combinations. Put a polo under there, fine, but a t shirt?
Alan is also down in the dumps. He doesn't like his job or his salary, and is determined to ask his boss for a raise. We jump ahead to that evening when Alan returns home. His boss did indeed offer him a raise of $5000 a year. Alan's response was to quit. Wuh oh.
Cory starts freaking out about being poor, Eric is a little shellshocked, Morgan isn't important enough to have lines, and Amy is pissed that her husband would make such a huge decision without talking to her first. Alan's big plan is to go into business for himself, and hire Eric, killing two birds with one nepotistic stone.
This is the second episode in a row we've had Cory wearing a polo with his pants up to his belly button, I'm not sure why they're intentionally making him look ridiculous, but it's happening.
Amy's final solution is to keep a family-changing, huge decision in her back pocket, and use it whenever she wants, in the spirit of the equal-partnership of marriage. At school, Cory recruits Shawn to teach him how to be poor. Eric arrives on campus to talk to Mr. Feeny, and the writers have not missed a BEAT. We haven't seen this pair yet this season, but it's as wonderful as ever. Perfect chemistry, hilarious dialogue.
Eric had originally scheduled to talk to Feeny about getting a tutoring gig, but has instead informed his old mentor that he'll be forsaking that pursuit in favor of working for his father. Indeed, Eric and Alan are set to attend a thing with a long name that I don't wanna type that's some sort of workshop for starting your own business.
That's where we are in the next scene, and all the tables set up at this workshop are dumb. We get a long pitch from the guy behind Poo-pourri, it's pretty funny, but our heroes aren't interested. At home, we learn that Eric's got his heart set on opening an Agner's House of Strudel, as he pitches the idea to his mother.
I've been saying for a while that Cory shines brightest in a supporting-comedy role, and that definitely holds true here. Regardless of whether the plot is centered on Shawn or Eric, Cory is always at his funniest giving commentary on the goings-on of that main character, like we've been seeing in this episode.
Alan, in contrast with his oldest son, wants to open his own Rapid Mart. Amy recognizes that this is the easy way out, and that her husband won't actually be happy doing something he hates, even though he defends himself by saying that he will enjoy being his own boss. What intrigue! Maybe he is going to Spray Lettuce No More.... Some More... More..? This is why double negatives are frowned upon, they're hard to work with. Ultimately, Amy doesn't support his decision to start a Rapid Mart. The two talk outside later, and it's pretty good stuff. Amy knows that this Rapid Mart won't actually make him happy, and she can only support what makes him happy. But our favorite dad is stuck, torn between his responsibility to his family and his desire to make something out of himself.
This is easily the most realistic and thorough mid-life crisis I've seen on television, and they even set the groundwork for it back in the season opener. And this is one of Amy's better showings. She's usually kinda boring, but it's awesome to see her really push her husband to not take the easy way out. In that way, she's sort of Alan's Feeny. Also I'm assuming Amy is still working her... art gallery job? Real estate job? She's had both in the past, I don't remember which is more recent. They just completely neglect to even mention whether she's employed or not, which is weird.
In the next scene, Cory has followed Shawn's plan to be experimented on to make money. The location? I think that should be fairly obvious.
I mean where the fuck else is it gonna be? Chubbie's?
Well yeah, actually, that would be my next guess.
Topanga doesn't approve, but the boys go through with it anyway. They're going to be testing some new shampoo, which is ultimately brought in by a guy in a hazmat suit. He drops the beaker, alarms go off, the scientists bail the fuck outta there, it's pretty funny.
Apparently Eric and Alan went on a camping trip to clear their heads of all this job stuff, and have come back fully refreshed. Evidently they had an excellent time. The pair are regaling Mr. Feeny with the tale in their shared backyard, and Amy joins the gang as well. Mr. Matthews comments that he'd like to bring her along next time he goes camping, and Feeny suggests they pick up a two-person sleeping bag from a specific camping store, I think the name he says is Kimball's.
I love this show. There's at least one instance per season of Feeny implying that he's swimming in ass. Next time he's at Kimball's he needs to buy a god damn snorkel. Anyway, Alan mentions that Kimball's is one of his favorite stores, and he'll definitely stop by.
Now we're at Chubbie's where a broken Cory has purchased a hamburger. Shawn arrives, because that's what people do at Chubbie's, they arrive, and is appalled by Cory's lack of frugality. Cory starts crying and saying it's his parents' fault, that sort of thing, it's pretty funny and you can see Rider Strong trying not to laugh. In the end, Cory earns his best friend's forgiveness by offering half of his hamburger. I guess that's the end of that arc, and it was awesome.
The Matthews family is at Kimball's now, and Eric and Alan incidentally demonstrate to the owner that they know their shit when it comes to camping. Amy talks with the owner, Kimball himself, and learns that the store is up for sale (Kimball is getting on in years). In fact, he was just telling that to his buddy, George Feeny. Oh Feens. Feenerson. Always lookin out for those Matthews boys, all three of em.
Amy decides to play her "crazy decision without consulting anyone" card, and buys the store for her husband. He's apprehensive at first, but realizes what a great opportunity this is.
Your first instinct is probably to write this off as Hollywood-Magic, but Alan did put out a good deal of effort looking for the right job, and they only found this one because of Feeny, so I'm totally fine with it.
During the credits, Feeny enters the shop as Alan, Eric, and Kimball are sorting out some logistics. Eric pulls Feeny aside for a private tête-à-tête. He's worried that he'll ruin everything since he knows nothing about business and pleads for help from his mentor.
Feeny suggests a more general, complete education than simply addressing today's particular problem of dealing with some accounting books, and he ultimately agrees to help Eric learn the basics. What a swell guy.
Plot: 1.0 - A lovely mid-life crisis that we were totally prepared for after episode 4x01, Eric's still searching for his place, and Cory's Adventure In Poverty with his best buddy was a ton of fun.
Character Development: 1.0 - Amy and Alan both had some splendid characterization in this episode, and again, Eric's taking a few more steps toward his future.
Humor: 1.0 - Hilarious from start to finish. Everyone had great jokes, except Morgan, but she wasn't anti-funny either, and that's about all you can hope for.
Life Lesson: 1.0 - First of all, it's never too late to find happiness. Alan put in the work and ended up in a job he's really excited about. It wasn't free, he had to struggle before he found it, and I appreciate that. In the end, I guess he did get kind of lucky, but whatever. He didn't want to settle, and that's the main takeaway. Also, the Feeny quote in that last gif up there.
4.0 out of 4.0. This episode kicks ass for a hundred different reasons. That should be apparent by now. I love this episode, and I love that they thought Alan deserved this attention. This is a classic, I will never get tired of this one.
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Post by sbtbfanatic on Jun 25, 2015 12:04:04 GMT
Episode 4x04 "Fishing For Virna"
The first minute of this episode consists of the members of the Matthews family running out the door in the morning for various reasons, completely neglecting the breakfast that Amy has prepared. Hopefully it's relevant later, because otherwise it's just kinda pointless and not funny.
Now we're at lunch and Cory's dick is getting rock hard over the lunch lady's preparation of his mashed potatoes. Topanga is lookin' like a Dixie Sweetheart today, which sort of nullifies her decision to stop worrying about her appearance. And that's fine, there's nothing wrong with wanting to look nice, I would just appreciate a modicum of consistency on this show.
This woman's name is Brenda, and the lovely couple here have used her name like twenty times so she's obviously going to be important today. Not only is she a master potatosmith, she's also saved the last piece of cherry pie for Topanga. WHAT THE FUCK IS THIS LUNCH ROOM? THE SIZZLER?
Shawn bursts into the lunch room and runs up to Cory, and takes much more time than necessary to say that his mom (named Virna) is finally back in town. Recall that she ran away back in season 2, which Shawn refers to as "a year ago", so my timeline theories are completely trash now. It officially doesn't make sense. Case closed, there's nothing we can do.
Later, at Shawn's trailer, the crew try to figure out what to do about the Virna situation.
I fuckin love Chet. And it looks like, once again, the episode is centered on not-Cory, and so he gets to play into these types of silly dialogue.
Shawn and his father want to figure out what Virna's doing in town but they don't want to scare her off, so they send Cory to parley. So Cory goes over to the hotel she's staying at across the highway, and he makes a comment about how he's lucky to be alive after crossing the highway. There's nothing really revolutionary in this scene. Virna wants to be a good mother, but she needs to know that Chet wants to be a good father too. And she won't take his word for it, either. Virna plans to hang around until she actually sees Chet consistently being a good father.
Virna is a cool name.
Cory relays what he's learned back to the trailer, and makes another joke about the highway, saying that he'd have to be Moses to get across. It's a pretty funny running joke.
At the school's lunch the next day, Feeny comes into the cafeteria and informs the students that Brenda has passed away. He asks the students for a moment of silence, and it happens, but Cory thinks Brenda deserves a lot more. And the new guy doesn't do Cory's mashed potatoes as well as Brenda did, so this tragedy has clearly earned the sad clarinet music that transitions us to the next scene.
Or maybe it's a flute, I don't fuckin know. Regardless, that's an ass ton of mashed potatoes Cory just got, he needs to pull himself together.
Back at the Hunters' trailer, Shawn and Chet finally have the reckoning we've been waiting for. Chet's tired of waiting for Virna and wants to go get her now, but Shawn points out what a disaster it was the last time he tried chasing her. Chet denies that it was such a disaster, but Shawn explains that Virna sent him a letter every day she was gone, while he barely heard from Chet the entire time. Chet's speechless, but the reckoning is interrupted by a knock at the door. It's Frankie the Enforcer, who apparently lives in the same trailer park as Shawn. Frankie needs to go get some milk from a store on the other side of the interstate and requests that the Hunters watch his little brother, Herman.
I had to speed that gif up to 30 frames per second because these guys talk so fuckin slow. Herman is supposed to be a young copy of Frankie. They have the same speech patterns, but the difference is that Herman is fucking terrible at saying his lines and I want to punch my screen every time he talks.
The reckoning resumes as Chet looks over the letters Shawn got from Virna, and apologizes for not being in more frequent contact. Shawn seriously calls out Chet here, big time, saying that the two of them could have been a family without Virna, "but you didn't want that dad. Why didn't you want that?" The clarinet fades us out of a speechless Chet.
The next morning, everybody neglects Amy's breakfast again. Compared to the highway, this is a lackluster running joke. Cory is still super sad about Brenda. I guess I was wrong before, this isn't the sidekick-Cory we're used to, it's underwhelming sidestory Cory.
I get what they're trying to do, they're exploring the underappreciation of cafeteria workers, but I'm just not sold. And maybe there's supposed to be a parallel between Brenda being unappreciated and Amy's food preparation being unappreciated.
At the trailer, the boys are havin a real fun time looking over family photos from when Shawn was a lot younger. It's not nearly as cheesey as it sounds, it's actually enjoyable, but I'm not sure how they managed to go from "Why didn't you want to be my father" to "let's look at pictures".
The next scene is baffling. Cory goes to a funeral home in the middle of the day and finds Mr. Feeny there. Mr. Feeny even comments that Cory is supposed to be at school. How did Cory get there and what are they both doing there anyway? They have a conversation about what a nice person Brenda was and how she considered all of the students to be her children. Then Cory asks what to do about the Virna situation, and his genius fuckin advice is to tell Virna how Chet and Shawn feel, which is exactly what Virna said was insufficient earlier in the episode. Then Cory runs off to go do it. So again, why the hell was he at the funeral home? He didn't do anything except talk to Mr. Feeny.
It's never said explicitly if Brenda is in that casket. Is that even how funeral homes work? I don't know what's going on. I guess that's the only thing that makes sense, and it would have been a little morbid to say outright that her dead body was in there.
So now Cory's talking to Virna and the conversation really isn't a lot different than last time. For the life of me I can't figure out what's changed. She seems moved by the thought that Shawn and Chet want her back, but of course they fucking do, Chet chased her across the country, and we're not even slightly addressing her desire to see Chet being a good father. That was some reasonable shit before, now it's like she totally forgot. Ultimately she asks Cory straight out if they want her back, and he says she'll never know until she crosses that highway and finds out for herself.
Virna is played by Shareen Mitchell, and she hasn't done anything since 2004, but I think she's a pretty good actress. She does this whole unstable-but-caring thing really well.
Back at the trailer, Chet gets a call from an inside-man at Virna's hotel, saying she's checked out, and the boys believe she's gone on the run again. Shawn asks his father if he's going to chase after her again, but he says no. Frankie and his stupid little brother have a habit of interrupting emotional moments at the Hunter trailer, and here they are again. Apparently Herman stole their shampoo the other day. What a dumb little bastard. Hey says his lines poorly again, it's just hard to watch.
So that was worthless, but funny. Shawn and Chet have a moment, Chet promises to be the best father he can be from now on, and then Virna appears at the door. Assuming she overheard, I guess we've fulfilled her "he has to be a good father" requirement, but again, she said that words weren't enough, so I dunno.
Then we're at the Matthews kitchen again, and everybody leaves, again, except Cory, who sits down and thanks his mother for making breakfast, causing the clarinet to play. So yeah, I guess there's the parallel about appreciating people who make you food. But it's not just about food, obviously, it's about appreciating otherwise-thankless jobs. Usually the emphasis of this show is on teachers, but today it's lunchladies and moms. Which is fine.
During the credits, we see that Cory has planned a wake for students to show their appreciation of Brenda. Feeny and Turner are there, and they both think it's a good idea.
And then a bunch of students file in and lay roses on the casket. This is ridiculous, right? Or am I crazy?
Plot: 0.5 - I mean what happened, really? Cory had the same conversation with Virna twice, Brenda died, and the Matthews family didn't eat breakfast. It seems like they stretched very tiny ideas into 22 minutes.
Character Development: 1.0 - I thoroughly enjoy the dynamic between Shawn and his father, and we got to build on that a lot in this episode.
Humor: 0.75 - The highway joke was consistently funny, and everything Chet says makes me laugh.
Life Lesson: 0.5 - Appreciate people while you can. But Cory did appreciate Brenda while she was alive. Him and Topanga both were super grateful to her in the lunchline. The impact of "holy shit she's dead" doesn't hit very hard when she clearly loved her job and had students who appreciated her.
3.0 out of 4.0 - Not bad, not great, skipping this one is no great loss, except for the plot point that Shawn's mother is back in the picture.
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Post by sbtbfanatic on Jun 25, 2015 12:04:30 GMT
Episode 4x05 "Shallow Boy" So there's a girl playing cutesy lovey music outside Alan's store for tips. It's pissing everybody off. In fact, Alan would prefer the old sweaty smelly guy who spits on people. He sends Eric out to deal with her, but she flashes him a big old smile and ends up giving her his money. Good old Eric. Alan has a stroke of genius as he suggests that Eric take her on a date, and then ask her to stop singing at their store while on the date. In Mr. Feeny's class, they're talking about politics for some reason. Shawn and Cory fail to spark any interesting conversation, but Topanga posits that the most pressing issue of the time is the decline of the American family. Shawn takes this a little personally since his family situation is in the crapper. It's a fairly lackluster scene that's probably just setting some groundwork for future conflict. Topanga is wearing a shirt that's tied up in front for the third time in two episodes. In 4x04, she had one at the beginning, and then a different one at the damn funeral scene, and now this. So I think it's fair to say that nobody in the production crew cares about Hair Today Goon Tomorrow. Again, this is not a comment on how women dress, just on consistency. She was supposed to be above superficiality, but now she clearly cares very much about her appearance. In the hallway, Cory and his best bud make plans for a guys' night since Topanga's busy. But wait, she's actually babysitting, which Shawn points out is a great opportunity for some unsupervised late night intimacy. What it really means is that we're almost certainly going to have to endure a painful child actor giving Cory and Topanga a hard time. Now we're at Chubbie's for Eric's date with the singing girl, whose name is Corinna. She's played by Leisha Hailey, who has worked sporadically since Boy Meets World, including 70 episodes of some piece of crap called The L Word, and a smattering of voice acting on American Dad. She can't stop singing during this date. She sings her answers to Eric's questions, sings about whatever she sees and whatever she's feeling, it's a nightmare and everyone at Chubbie's is appropriately annoyed. It's kinda like an episode of The Office, ya know? It's funny, but you're constantly trying to look away. Cory arrives at the place where Topie is babysitting and promptly receives a Wet Willy from the kid who's supposed to be asleep. The red flags are raising, but it actually takes a fun turn. The kid, Billy, asks Cory if he wants to play his N64, which Billy calls his "Nintendo 64-bit". I mean, that's where the name comes from, but nobody in the history of space and time has ever said that, so I dunno. Anyway it's fun, because Cory is really excited to play video games, and really wants to do all the childish things that Billy wants to do, while Topanga insists that he go back to bed. Naturally, this kid is terrible at saying his lines, his emphasis is all over the place, and his hair looks absolutely fucking stupid. How could someone let their kid go on cable TV looking like that? Whatever. Cory continues to undermine his girlfriend's authority and she gets pretty angry. The scene ends with the two boys running off to watch TV against Topanga's orders. Back at Chubbie's, Eric is dying. Corinna keeps going on about innocuous nonsense, clearly unable to pick up on social cues. She starts singing another new song, and customers start running away. This scene is some of Eric's finest work. You can see him boiling up as he tries to sneakily ask for a waiter to bring the check, several times. Corinna says she's excited to spend the rest of her life with Eric, and then the cap comes off. Every single line coming out of Eric is hysterical, and the delivery is perfect. If you have two and a half minutes, I cannot recommend this scene enough. I will laugh at this scene until the end of time. You can find it here. www.youtube.com/watch?v=xCDdKR_NmK8It's about a thousand times better with sound. Corinna gets angry and starts playing some minor chords and singing an edgy song about how Eric's a dick. It's called Shallow Boy, which holy shit, is the name of the episode. And this time, the people at Chubbie's are enjoying her music. At school, Cory requests the company of his girlfriend at the cafeteria for Taco Bar Tuesday. But she's off her rocker about somethin or other, starting with "YOU WOULD FEED TACOS TO OUR CHILD?" Apparently she's worried about the well being of their potential post-marriage child, but Cory is as confused as I am. Oh okay, "You'd rather be pals with our kids than a strong responsible role model," inspired by his behavior with Billy the previous night. Well this is just ridiculous. Cory shouldn't have undermined her authority, but she is blowing this way out of proportion. I mean this is the exact reason why you're not supposed to have kids at 15, because you're still immature and shit. Give him 10 or 20 years Topanga, jesus christ, then worry about his ability to be a father. Later, we're at the Camping Store. I need to come up with a consistent term for this place. Eric's listening to "Sounds of the Sleeping Sled Dogs" over the store's loudspeaker, and it sounds really damn weird. I can't justify it at all. Watch this scene, it sounds so weird. Shawn and Cory have arrived with Corinna's new CD for Eric to listen to. The first track is Shallow Boy, the one she was singing at Chubbie's, but that doesn't prove anything! This album could be about anybody. Oh. It's even being played on the radio. What a pickle. At home, Cory's reading a book about how to be a dad, and Eric comes home with the new title of "maladjusted woman hating loser freak." Yes, Corinna's got a new song on the airwaves, and Morgan comes downstairs singing along with that new tune on her pocket radio or walkman or somethin, Iunno. The last part we hear Morgan sing goes "I think he likes boys, if you know what I'm saaaayiiiiin." There's not much to say about all this except that Eric is hilarious and Topanga is losing her mind. Alan comes home with a note from Corinna, she visited him at his store, requesting to meet Eric at, you guessed it, Chubbie's. Corinna arrives in a Steve Jobs turtleneck, and is basically trying to milk anger out of Eric so that she can write more songs. In a moment of convenient plot driven intelligence, Eric sees what's going on and starts to sing The Sun Will Come Out Tomorrow to get Corinna back to her old self. In the end, she can't resist, and it looks like Eric's in the clear. Again, not much to say, it's just funny. At home, Cory sends Morgan to bed on time, and Topanga is watching off to the side for some reason. Morgan's wearing her totally awesome cow slippers again, and she actually said her lines like a legitimate actor today, so everything except the convenience is decent. Topanga explains to Cory that by the time he is old enough to have a kid, she suspects he'll be a pretty good dad. What the fuck changed from when she was losing her shit earlier? Just implied off-screen insight? That's slightly unsatisfying. I guess we'll finally get to find out how good of a father Cory is later this year. This is actually the most pertinent background episode for Girl Meets World, which is interesting. We'll see if any of this stuff comes up again. During the credits, the radio plays Corinna's latest single called "Fuzzy Wuzzy Wuv", and it's shit. I mean, all of her songs were shit, but now the radio guy thinks so too. Plot: 1.0 - I love the Corinna story. It's unique, creative, and not entirely predictable. It might seem like it's going to end up like the Wendy story, where Cory ends up missing her, but indeed we have a completely fresh story here. Character Development: 0.25 - Eric doesn't really change at all, and Cory, I don't know, he's planning on being more responsible or something? Humor: 2.0 - I'm giving bonus points to humor to boos the score since Development and Life Lesson are lacking, and this episode deserves a good score. Life Lesson: 0.25 - Some people are just crazy. 3.5 out of 4.0. This episode is thoroughly laugh-out-loud funny. Eric is amazing. What's interesting is that the main character for the first five episodes has been, in order, Eric - Topanga - Alan - Shawn - Eric. No Cory-centric stuff yet, and they've all been really strong episodes. Very interesting.
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Post by sbtbfanatic on Jun 25, 2015 12:05:00 GMT
Episode 4x06 "Janitor Dad"
the task at hand. Amy is sabotaging Alan's store by convincing all the customers that they don't actually need the equipment they're looking at. That seems uncharacteristically stupid of her. Oh, I see, it's an outpouring of her protective-mother-ness. Alan originally asked for her help since the store is so busy, but it's time to look elsewhere.
I gotta say, they're getting a whole lot of mileage out of this new store. That was a great idea by the writers.
The next scene is Eric and Alan interviewing the candidates. They're all sort of dorky balding guys who do not, in fact, have technical knowledge of outdoor gear, but they're also not mothers, so 1 for 2 there. One of the applicants is named Mervyn, and is played by Willie Garson, who previously played Alan's assistant at the store, Leonard Spinelli. Like every other time they recycle an actor, it could have just as easily been the same character, but whatever. Next scene, some Grizzly Adams lookin guy shows up looking for a job. The impeccable convenience of this event is not lost on Eric and Alan.
At the Hunter trailer the next morning, Virna serves her son a sticky bun and a Flintstones vitamin for breakfast, which I think is pretty funny. She wants to heat up Shawn's breakfast, but finds bills in the microwave.
Much as I like him, I gotta call out Chet on this one. If you're going to hide months and months of overdue bills, the microwave is not a clever place for it. Apparently Virna's been working at the movie theatre every day, but Chet's sitting around unemployed. Shawn recalls his mother's desire for things to be different, and convinces his dad to pick up a job. At school, Shawn pranks some kids to spill milk on themselves, and Topanga comments about Shawn picking on people weaker than him. That sounds like a moral point we're going to circle back to later. And so it begins, as the janitor who shows up to clean the milk mess is none other than Chet Hunter.
Boy, episode titles don't get much more straightforward than "Janitor Dad". This show is weird with titles. Sometimes we get some shit like "Grandma Was a Rolling Stone", which, like, what the fuck are you talking about, and sometimes we get "Janitor Dad".
Back at Alan's store, the mountain man from before, named Ezekiel is doing the opposite of Amy. He's selling everyone way more than they need, albeit with good intentions, giving the Matthews men a kick to the moral groin.
At school, class begins and some asshole named, I dunno, it's probably Dirk or some shit like that, is giving Shawn a hard time about his dad being the new janitor. I mean just look at this guy, he's like half porcupine.
Cosplaying Sonic the Hedgehog or some shit, whatever. And look, there's a poster for the BooOOoOogie Down Halloween dance coming up. You gotta love those small details.
Turner intervenes before the fists start flying, and then begins the lesson. He talks about The Time Machine by H.G. Wells, and its portrayal of drastic class differences in the future. BOOM BAM BIBBITY BOP BOW. Literature inspired themes, we're back home boys and girls, back in the arms of the, you know, your loved ones, or whatever. Turner wants to show them some of the film so they get a better idea of what's going on, and Chet comes in to set up the AV equipment. Jesus christ, I just said "AV", that's depressing. The porcupine makes fun of Shawn some more, and Cory tells him to shut the fuck up. Apparently his name is Crandall, which I think excuses his bad behavior. I would probably be a serial killer by that age if I had to go around answering to "Crandall" all the time.
In the end, Shawn attacks Crandcupine and ends up in Feeny's office. Shawn explains the situation, and ultimately Feeny passes the decision of whether to keep Chet employed at the school to Shawn, citing the possibility that his father's presence could be disruptive to his education. It's a great little scene. Like I always say, the dynamic between Feeny and Shawn is really powerful (see City Slackers review).
Shawn and Cory eat lunch in the hallway and Cory is taking special care not to make a mess, for the convenience of Shawn's father.
Crandall comes up with some loser friend of his and talks shit about Chet again, and the crowd goes oooooooooooo even though it really wasn't that much of a burn. Just then, Feeny passes by and Shawn suggests terminating his father's employment, in the heat of the moment. Mr. Feeny agrees to fire him in a couple days after finding a replacement janitor.
At the store, it seems that Ezekiel has sold out the entire stock of rock climbing shoes, but to people who Alan thinks have no business climbing rocks.
You can see his mouth keeps moving after he says "successful", but I can't quite hear it because THE WORST EXTRA IN THE ENTIRE HISTORY OF HOLLYWOOD walked in front of the camera/microphone right as he says it. I think he says "right Dad?", but we'll never know for sure.
Ezekiel shows up with "terrible news from the Hill Country". His "momma's took sick". I'm quoting him directly because he's funny. So Ezekiel's gotta take off, but he's leaving his niece Lonnie to help with the store. She's listed in this episode's credits as "Lonnie", but IMDB has her as Loni, I'm not sure what's up with that.
She's played by Jennifer Campbell, who hasn't had any acting work since 1999, but she was on a few episodes of Baywatch, which is strangely common for women on this show.
At home, Shawn details his humiliation to his mother, who holds a very different opinion. She's genuinely proud of Chet for finally not-being-full-of-shit, and Shawn looks real introspective with his pouty lips practically bursting out of the screen. The old man comes home, beaming with self satisfaction, waving his first paycheck in the air. It's honestly pretty heart warming, the actor behind Chet is so fucking good at this stuff, and Virna does a great job too.
I've never touched on this before, but the interior of Shawn's home is WAY too big to be a trailer. Yeah, I know, "bigger on the inside", shut up.
Shawn shows up at school early the next morning to convince Mr. Feeny not to fire Chet. He really spills his heart out, and as usual Rider Strong nails the heck out of it. Feeny agrees, and admits that he was never going to fire him in the first place, that "this was never about your father, Shawn, this was always about you".
Clearly, Topanga is continuing not to care about her appearance.
Shawn makes a mess and cleans it up in front of that Crandall guy to prove that he's not embarrassed by his dad's job anymore. During the credits, Lonnie sells a massive crossbow to Willie Garson as Eric looks on with love in his eyes. But she proves to be much tougher than he is and sort of beats the crap out of him on accident.
Plot: 0.75 - What's not to like? The store-story wasn't the best we've seen, but it was a fun intermittent break from the seriousness of the main story.
Character Development: 1.0 - The entire Hunter family grew three sizes that day. Chet got a job, Shawn respects his father, Feeny provided the path for Shawn to find his way. *see edit below for more*
Humor: 1.0 - Certainly not as standout as the last episode, but still consistently funny.
Life Lesson: 0.75 - Topanga's line about picking on weaker people did sort of lead up to Shawn getting harassed by Crandall, but the characters never mentioned it. That line from Topanga was really quick and subtle, it would deserve the full point if it hadn't been so easy to miss, or at least if they'd explored it a little more.
3.5 out of 4.0. - This season is rocking out so far. Six episodes in a row without being focused on Cory, and if memory serves, we won't be seeing a Cory episode next week either. I love Chet, I love his relationship with Shawn, and this episode was a showcase of that. Great stuff.
*EDIT* After a small reminder from a valued colleague, I have some more I want to say. Recall episode 2x22, "Career Day", where Chet lies to Turner's class about doing cool jobs and stuff, and makes Alan feel inferior. By the end of that episode, Virna's run off with their trailer and Chet goes to find her. This is in DIRECT CONTRAST to Janitor Dad. Now that Chet actually has a job, he comes into Turner's class once again, but this time to his son's embarrassment. Further, Virna does the opposite of what she did in Career Day as she explodes with pride and love for her husband. EVEN FURTHER, Alan is now in a job that he loves! We've done a total 180 from how things were in Career Day. And that's damn good story telling. I love this show.
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