As much as Community this week was about how the holidays can be a lonely time,"Christmas Attack Zone" is about the other end of the spectrum, and how miserable Christmas with your family can be, but how its a time for family anyway. Liz tries her best to stay away from hers to avoid drama, but drama comes to Liz Lemon like a fat suit to Tracy Jordan, and so she becomes embroiled in the Donaghy family drama surrounding the revelation of Avery's pregnancy and Jack's knowledge of Milton to Colleen.
For a show that really tries its best to eschew any real character development or arc, we certainly know a lot about Jack Donaghy and the family problems that have made him the man he is today. For a recurring guest star, Elaine Stritch has really made a lot of Colleen Donaghy, a very well realized maternal monster and master manipulator who falls into her son's Christmas Attack Zone, but has her own prepared to draw him in just a short while later. The interplay between the whole Donaghy clan is excellent (even that heinous beast who calls itself Elizabeth Banks does a nice job with her character, though again, Avery Jessup is so shockingly well written that not even Banks can really screw her up), and Liz aquits herself well among the madness.
Meanwhile, Tracy is trying to be taken seriously by dropping his comedic persona, and wearing the black beret and "Poverty" necklace he wore to the screening of his Oscar Contender of a movie, and doing charity on Christmas Eve by showing his movie about abuse at a battered women's shelter. I love the "Tracy wants an Oscar" plotline, and this was an excellent entry in it. As always, Kenneth is Tracy's moral compass and guides him back toward his lunacy and a screening of Chunks 2: A Chunky Christmas that will bring joy to those who need it most.
Finally, Jenna and her man are reunited over their mutual desire to go to Tom Ford and Elton John's New Year's Eve Party dressed as two black swans. Basically, there was a sweeter core to this week's 30 Rock than usual, and it all boiled down to Liz's conclusion at the episode's end, "You know what I learned tonight? As hard as you try, no one can escape the horror of Christmas, so you may as well be with your own family." This was not the best Christmas episode the show has ever done, but it was a good one that earned all of its sentimentality and had a refreshing honesty about how hard the holidays can be, but how wonderful they are nevertheless.
Grade: B+
Notes:
-"And her ex-husband will also be there with his date, alcoholism."
-"Happy Holidays is what terrorists say. Merry Christmas from Avery and Jack."
-"Obesity is killing the African American community...with laughter." This show has always used comedic pauses well, but it seems on a roll this year with just killer pause lines. Another excellent one tonight, "Most people thought I was a hero...for killing Lydia's parrot."
-"She needs to read my new book, There's No Wrong Way To Make A Family."
-"By the way, we have a tradition in my family where we let the child name himself."
-"In the Darfur region, the dead may be the lucky ones. Next slide." Nice Ludachristmas callback!
-"I want to eat shrimp off an old gay dressed as Baby New Year."
-"Ladies of the battered women's shelter, please be quiet. A man is talking."
-"Can I get you a cup of coffee or an absynth enema?"
Thursday, December 9, 2010
Jordan's Review: Community, Season 2, Episode 11: Abed's Uncontrollable Christmas
Here's the thing about Christmas: every person has their very own traditions that make it unique and completely different than any other Christmas. Every person has pretty much exactly the same Halloween experience (costumes, trick or treating, or maybe horror movies) and pretty much the same Thanksgiving traditions (eating a ridiculous amount of food while trying to avoid family contact as much as possible) but Christmas is a deeply personal Holiday, and messing with Christmas traditions is a dangerous game. Last week Community gave us a little peek into Abed's daily existence and the constant loneliness that he feels, and we all know that Christmas can be a very lonely holiday. Most of the best Christmas stories have small tragedies at their center, because at heart, Christmas is a time when we all band together to fight off the darkness and sadness that comes with the winter and with the end of the year, a time when people hope to surround themselves with friends and look forward, often mostly so they can avoid loneliness and looking backward at the mistakes they've made over the last year. Its this inherent sadness that allows people to transcend their darker impulses and come together to bring joy to those around them.
All of this is preface to my main point, which is that Abed is the perfect character for the show to center its Christmas episode around. The episode has an uphill battle from the start, though, in convincing us that its incredibly high concept (that Abed views everyone in stop-motion claymation animated format and needs them all to go on an adventure with him to the North Pole) is even remotely plausible, and it does this basically by telling us that Abed is insane. This is honestly a bit far to go for the sake of a Christmas episode, and the show seems to know this from the start. When the gang gathers for an intervention and some serious therapy with Professor Duncan, they seem to be taking Abed's sudden descent into madness fairly seriously (though Britta's "you'll get kicked out of school" worries seem like a bit too pat a way to raise the stakes for curing Abed), and they all seem very committed to Duncan's ridiculous plan to humor Abed into shedding his delusions. I was completely willing to look past all of this scrambling to make the concept work, especially since the show was making it abundantly clear that it was trying its hardest to pull it off plausibly. The show was flying close to the sun, and it did enough in my mind to keep its wings from melting.
Another problem I have to mention before praising the show for several paragraphs is the over-the-topness of the letter from Abed's mom. I think the idea that Abed's mom isn't coming for Christmas is kind of a classic Christmas special tragedy, but the letter she writes is so blunt and brutal and on the nose, it kind of takes away from the moment. I understand that this episode exists almost entirely in Abed's mind, and is characterized by heart-on-its-sleeve sentimentality, but this felt like a bridge too far, and was a slight blemish on an otherwise excellent episode.
Community manages to pull off its gimmick episodes as well as it does and as often as it does because while it is always dedicated to making an episode that fits well within the genre its aiming for, it also never forgets to tell a story about its characters at the same time. I liked the show commenting on the "costumes" Abed creates for them (saved me the paragraph analyzing the meaning of each of them), which all tell a little something about the characters, and the way the episode narrowed down the characters and took them each out of play in a way that slyly commented on their flaws made the moment when they all returned to help Abed even more moving. We know that Jeff is sarcastic, Britta is a party pooper, Shirley is self-righteous, and Pierce often checks out emotionally.And honestly, I've seen enough Christmas specials to know Pierce was still on the train when Abed thought he was all alone, but that didn't mean it didn't warm my heart when Pierce confessed that he decided to stick around because it gets a little lonely at home sometimes.
The truly amazing thing about "Abed's Uncontrollable Christmas" isn't that it pulled off the "animated Christmas special" while also pulling off the Community episode. I knew all along it would do that. What was especially awesome about it was just how sad it was willing to be. Abed's central emotional breakdown was realistic enough to understand his tragic quest to find the meaning of Christmas, yet moments of despair seeped in around the edges of the episode fairly frequently, from Duncan's flashback to his 10th Christmas at the Cave of Frozen Memories to Abed's cold, analytical and completely valid rejection of Britta's attempts to save him from himself. Britta really wanted to help Abed, but at a certain point she just couldn't let him go through what he needed to. She was just to grounded and stubborn to allow Abed's much needed flight of fancy (and brief insanity). And that was a really affecting, realistic, tragic moment between these two characters that just happened to occur in the middle of a Christmas Wonderland.
Basically, "Abed's Uncontrollable Christmas" was just another reminder about how deeply invested I have become in these characters, their failings, and their attempts to come together and create an environment in which they can all grow and improve. These are all flawed people, but I understand each of their flaws, and more importantly, I understand the greatness, the beauty, and the inherent kindness buried deeply within each of them. And this is a show that makes me care about their struggles to be better people. When they all gather together at the end of the episode to watch Rudolph with Abed, it further cements them as a family. Each of these characters has been burned by the world, and each of them has failed in some real, significant way. If they spent their holiday alone, it would certainly be filled with self-loathing and a good long chance to look back on their mistakes and their regrets, and to let the cold seep in as the year comes to its close. But together, they can keep out the darkness, and can form their own, unique holiday tradition. And that is really what Christmas is all about.
Grade: A-
Notes:
-"Fake murdering people is going to be my new holiday tradition."
-"You really expect me to tarnish the high five for that?"
-"I thought I made you." "Yeah, you made me need a cry in the shower tonight."
-"We're in Outer-Christmas-Space!"
-"Its atmosphere is 7% cinnamon." "Aww!"
-"Somewhere out there, Tim Burton just got a boner."
-"Damn. It got real in that memory cave!"
All of this is preface to my main point, which is that Abed is the perfect character for the show to center its Christmas episode around. The episode has an uphill battle from the start, though, in convincing us that its incredibly high concept (that Abed views everyone in stop-motion claymation animated format and needs them all to go on an adventure with him to the North Pole) is even remotely plausible, and it does this basically by telling us that Abed is insane. This is honestly a bit far to go for the sake of a Christmas episode, and the show seems to know this from the start. When the gang gathers for an intervention and some serious therapy with Professor Duncan, they seem to be taking Abed's sudden descent into madness fairly seriously (though Britta's "you'll get kicked out of school" worries seem like a bit too pat a way to raise the stakes for curing Abed), and they all seem very committed to Duncan's ridiculous plan to humor Abed into shedding his delusions. I was completely willing to look past all of this scrambling to make the concept work, especially since the show was making it abundantly clear that it was trying its hardest to pull it off plausibly. The show was flying close to the sun, and it did enough in my mind to keep its wings from melting.
Another problem I have to mention before praising the show for several paragraphs is the over-the-topness of the letter from Abed's mom. I think the idea that Abed's mom isn't coming for Christmas is kind of a classic Christmas special tragedy, but the letter she writes is so blunt and brutal and on the nose, it kind of takes away from the moment. I understand that this episode exists almost entirely in Abed's mind, and is characterized by heart-on-its-sleeve sentimentality, but this felt like a bridge too far, and was a slight blemish on an otherwise excellent episode.
Community manages to pull off its gimmick episodes as well as it does and as often as it does because while it is always dedicated to making an episode that fits well within the genre its aiming for, it also never forgets to tell a story about its characters at the same time. I liked the show commenting on the "costumes" Abed creates for them (saved me the paragraph analyzing the meaning of each of them), which all tell a little something about the characters, and the way the episode narrowed down the characters and took them each out of play in a way that slyly commented on their flaws made the moment when they all returned to help Abed even more moving. We know that Jeff is sarcastic, Britta is a party pooper, Shirley is self-righteous, and Pierce often checks out emotionally.And honestly, I've seen enough Christmas specials to know Pierce was still on the train when Abed thought he was all alone, but that didn't mean it didn't warm my heart when Pierce confessed that he decided to stick around because it gets a little lonely at home sometimes.
The truly amazing thing about "Abed's Uncontrollable Christmas" isn't that it pulled off the "animated Christmas special" while also pulling off the Community episode. I knew all along it would do that. What was especially awesome about it was just how sad it was willing to be. Abed's central emotional breakdown was realistic enough to understand his tragic quest to find the meaning of Christmas, yet moments of despair seeped in around the edges of the episode fairly frequently, from Duncan's flashback to his 10th Christmas at the Cave of Frozen Memories to Abed's cold, analytical and completely valid rejection of Britta's attempts to save him from himself. Britta really wanted to help Abed, but at a certain point she just couldn't let him go through what he needed to. She was just to grounded and stubborn to allow Abed's much needed flight of fancy (and brief insanity). And that was a really affecting, realistic, tragic moment between these two characters that just happened to occur in the middle of a Christmas Wonderland.
Basically, "Abed's Uncontrollable Christmas" was just another reminder about how deeply invested I have become in these characters, their failings, and their attempts to come together and create an environment in which they can all grow and improve. These are all flawed people, but I understand each of their flaws, and more importantly, I understand the greatness, the beauty, and the inherent kindness buried deeply within each of them. And this is a show that makes me care about their struggles to be better people. When they all gather together at the end of the episode to watch Rudolph with Abed, it further cements them as a family. Each of these characters has been burned by the world, and each of them has failed in some real, significant way. If they spent their holiday alone, it would certainly be filled with self-loathing and a good long chance to look back on their mistakes and their regrets, and to let the cold seep in as the year comes to its close. But together, they can keep out the darkness, and can form their own, unique holiday tradition. And that is really what Christmas is all about.
Grade: A-
Notes:
-"Fake murdering people is going to be my new holiday tradition."
-"You really expect me to tarnish the high five for that?"
-"I thought I made you." "Yeah, you made me need a cry in the shower tonight."
-"We're in Outer-Christmas-Space!"
-"Its atmosphere is 7% cinnamon." "Aww!"
-"Somewhere out there, Tim Burton just got a boner."
-"Damn. It got real in that memory cave!"
Monday, December 6, 2010
Jordan's Review: How I Met Your Mother, Season 6, Episode 11: The Mermaid Theory
Much of tonight's episode was dedicated to a running gag that involved Ted being incapable of remembering part of the story he was telling his kids tonight, which ended up leading to a flash forward (one of the aspects of the show that most excites me when, rarely, it is employed), yet which also felt for most of its run time like lazy writing that serived to both pad the run time and to give the illusion of a Barney and Lily story without ever having to write it. The show has occasionally employed the "Ted can't remember everything" idea for laughs, yet this time it felt like basic laziness. Tonight, the writers had plotlines for Ted, Marshall, and Robin, but it had nothing for Barney and Lily, and giving us a vague idea about when Lily will be pregnant (next year) does not excuse the fact that most of the plotline was just a giant stall to disguise the fact that there was no plot there.
As much of a problem as I had with that subplot, "The Mermaid Theory" did something I've been waiting for since the introduction of Zoey: it gave me a reason to care about her, and effectively introduced her into the master plot of the series. It has always been clear that Ted and Zoey would have romantic tension, yet the way they played off of each other tonight, and the way the show used Kyle Maclachlan's over-the-top awesomeness finally made me accept the fact that this plotline is here to stay, and gave me a few things to be excited about as it continues (mostly the idea of more Kyle Maclachlan). Ted joined The Captain on his boat this week, feared for his life, and came to accept the man and his creepiness, even as both he and Zoey clearly denied the feelings they already have for each other.
Meanwhile, Marshall and Lily step up in this week's standard sitcom plot as they realize they never hang out alone and decide to do that for once. Not only is it a cliche, but Marshall and Lily have hung out alone many times before (their relationship was probably at its best during the show's last classic episode "Three Days of Snow") and each time has been funnier and more effective than they were tonight.
The theory at the center of tonight's episode, which basically proposed that given long enough, a man will find any woman attractive, was funny enough, and the show's latter day tendency to act out Barney's historical narratives is generally very effective. As a whole, "The Mermaid Theory" was a decent episode of the show that made me care about at least one aspect of this season's arc more than I have to this point. Yet a full two thirds of the episode was comprised of plots that were lazily constructed,which keeps this episode from achieving greatness. It was, however, still satisfying enough to continue the positive trend that How I Met Your Mother has been on of late, which is good enough for me, for the moment at least.
Grade: B
Notes:
-"And I'll be home trying to get over the fact that no one invited me to the big hairwashing party."
-Lily's rules for married people hanging out with single friends of the opposite sex: Don't go anywhere with candles, no sharing food, and dont' lie about anything you do.
-I really disliked the moment where Lily and Barney stared at the camera, waiting for Future Ted to remember the story he's telling. This show is a flashback, narrated by Ted, not a reenactment, and acknowleding the story is just awkward.
-"Looks like its just you, me, and six hours in frigid international waters."
-"Do you know how the myth f mermaids came to be?" "I'm sorry, myth?"
-"Did we bet on this?" "Let's say yes."
-"How now? Oh bother..."
-"Oh, I'm just jesting for sport."
As much of a problem as I had with that subplot, "The Mermaid Theory" did something I've been waiting for since the introduction of Zoey: it gave me a reason to care about her, and effectively introduced her into the master plot of the series. It has always been clear that Ted and Zoey would have romantic tension, yet the way they played off of each other tonight, and the way the show used Kyle Maclachlan's over-the-top awesomeness finally made me accept the fact that this plotline is here to stay, and gave me a few things to be excited about as it continues (mostly the idea of more Kyle Maclachlan). Ted joined The Captain on his boat this week, feared for his life, and came to accept the man and his creepiness, even as both he and Zoey clearly denied the feelings they already have for each other.
Meanwhile, Marshall and Lily step up in this week's standard sitcom plot as they realize they never hang out alone and decide to do that for once. Not only is it a cliche, but Marshall and Lily have hung out alone many times before (their relationship was probably at its best during the show's last classic episode "Three Days of Snow") and each time has been funnier and more effective than they were tonight.
The theory at the center of tonight's episode, which basically proposed that given long enough, a man will find any woman attractive, was funny enough, and the show's latter day tendency to act out Barney's historical narratives is generally very effective. As a whole, "The Mermaid Theory" was a decent episode of the show that made me care about at least one aspect of this season's arc more than I have to this point. Yet a full two thirds of the episode was comprised of plots that were lazily constructed,which keeps this episode from achieving greatness. It was, however, still satisfying enough to continue the positive trend that How I Met Your Mother has been on of late, which is good enough for me, for the moment at least.
Grade: B
Notes:
-"And I'll be home trying to get over the fact that no one invited me to the big hairwashing party."
-Lily's rules for married people hanging out with single friends of the opposite sex: Don't go anywhere with candles, no sharing food, and dont' lie about anything you do.
-I really disliked the moment where Lily and Barney stared at the camera, waiting for Future Ted to remember the story he's telling. This show is a flashback, narrated by Ted, not a reenactment, and acknowleding the story is just awkward.
-"Looks like its just you, me, and six hours in frigid international waters."
-"Do you know how the myth f mermaids came to be?" "I'm sorry, myth?"
-"Did we bet on this?" "Let's say yes."
-"How now? Oh bother..."
-"Oh, I'm just jesting for sport."
Sunday, December 5, 2010
Jordan's Review: The Walking Dead: Season 1, Episode 6: TS-19
Last week, Frank Darabont, the man behind bringing The Walking Dead to television, announced that he had fired the entire show's writing staff, and was going to rely more on himself and on Robert Kirkman, the writer of the comic series on which the show is based, to write Season Two. Considering many of the show's flaws this year have been in flat out terrible dialogue (a problem that mostly disappeared in tonight's Darabont penned finale), this shake up could really bring the series to the next level and help it reach its considerable potential. I've said before that I hope the show moves more towards its emotional, insightful side and doesn't give in to fans who just want 45 minutes of zombie-killin' every Sunday night, and I think Darabont (the man behind The Shawshank Redemtpion) could very well take the show in that direction, trying to make it on par with Mad Men and Breaking Bad instead of just on par with any other zombie story out there. All that being said, I must confess that "TS-19" did not deliver, nor did it instill in me the great confidence I hoped it would.
Granted, Darabont fired the entire staff after the season had wrapped, and perhaps only realized the problems with the season as a whole in retrospect, but this still seems like a poorly thought out season finale. Any showrunner worth his salt knows that you end a season with a bang, not a whimper, especially in a show like this that thrives on thrills as much as it does on meditation. The actual end of this episode went off very well, as I'll discuss in a moment, but so much before it didn't work that its impossible to call the episode as a whole a success. The episode opens well, with a flashback that finds Shane rushing through the hospital to find Rick, dodging waves of the undead and a military force that is seemingly slaughtering everyone, infected or not. This scene provides necessary shading to Shane's character, showing him trying to save Rick, and honestly believing him dead before leaving him there, blocking the door with a gurney to at least keep his body intact. Its a fairly noble moment for the character, and a necessary one considering the terible things he will do later in the episode.
Back in the present, the survivors are welcomed into CDC by Dr. Edwin Jenner, who requires a blood test from everyone and clearly knows more than he's letting on. The group is so happy to be inside, however, that the barely notice his secrecy before indulging in booze and food and hot showers. Everyone gets a chance to relax, but the liquor brings out some true colors as well. Rick confesses to Jenner that he's losing hope, and that he thinks everyone he knows will soon be dead. Its a brazenly honest, communicative moment from our taciturn protagonist, who admits his biggest problem is refusing to talk about how he feels to his family. Meanwhile, Shane corners Lori and tries to explain his justifications for leaving Rick. He did the best he could at the time, honestly, and its hard to argue that he wasn't in the moral right at any point before Rick's return, that we know of. Sure, he started banging his best friend's wife pretty quickly after Rick "died (last week we learned the breakout happened around 63 days ago), but he really thought his friend was dead, and he seems to really love Lori. Unfortunately he quickly cedes his moral high ground, giving into his tendency to use violence to force cooperation, and attempting to rape Lori. She quickly fights him off, yet Shane has officially burnt through whatever little goodwill he had left for saving her life.
The next morning, Jenner treats thr group to a lecture on the disease that causes the dead to rise. We learn that the time before they reanimate varies, and that only the motor functions return. We also discover that Jenner does not know what causes the disease, or how to cure it, and that only a few hours remain before the entire center goes up in a firebomb that Jenner wants to incinerate everyone. He is not made out as an evil man; he isn't trying to murder the group in cold blood, he just thinks the situation outside is hopeless, and believes quick, painless death is better than the short, brutal life that awaits them outside. The group immediately starts panicking, with Darly and Shane doing the most damage, but of course Rick wins the day with a plea to the human side of the situation, explaining to Jenner that the situation may seem hopeless, but there is always a chance as long as they are still alive. He persuades most to escape, but Jacqui and Andrea elect to stay behind, that is until Dale threatens to stay with Andrea because he doesn't want to face the world alone. So Dale and Andrea also flee, and Jacqui and Jenner stay behind to be incinerated painlessly while the others forge on.
Rick's speech, and the scene of the group driving away at the end send the themes of the show home nicely, and reminded me of the vast potential this series has to be an excellent examination of the human will to survive and the desire of one man to retain his essential humanity when all else is falling apart around him. It would be easier to stop, to just allow yourself to be painlessly incinerated and to ensure you wouldn't be torn to shreds, but that is surrender. Rick, and the rest of the survivors have kept hope alive, and their struggle to survive is a story that I tihnk can easily be the groundwork for an excellent television series. Unfortunately, most of tonight was taken up with silly plot contrivances, some exceedingly dumb behavior from the characters, and very little plot advancement. All we learned could have been just as easily assumed, and while Shane and Rick both had great moments of emotional honest that shade in their characters a little more fully, these moments pretty much confirmed things we already knew about them. Jacqui's death could not have meant less to me, while the prospect of losing Dale showed me just how much I'd come to care about him over the last few weeks (and just how sad I'll be when this show inevitably kills him. Come on, wise old man who loves everybody? He HAS to die at some point, but I'm glad it isn't yet). I still think its hard to judge The Walking Dead until we see its second season, and I remain excited for the show's potential there, but this finale didn't do much to increase that excitement. Until next season, folks.
Grade: B-
Notes:
-Jenner whispered something in Rick's ear before he left. That certainly leaves me curious...
-Some really stupid moments: "Is that a brain?" i know Carl is a kid, but is he like four? That was insanely stupid. Also, "Is that what happened to Jim?" OF COURSE IT IS. Plus, Daryl going at the metal door with an axe was remarkably cliche and a clear waste of his time and energy.
-"No pain, an end to sorrow, greif, regret, everything."
-Loved the choice of the ending song, Bob Dylan's "Tomorrow is a Long Time." See you guys next season!
Granted, Darabont fired the entire staff after the season had wrapped, and perhaps only realized the problems with the season as a whole in retrospect, but this still seems like a poorly thought out season finale. Any showrunner worth his salt knows that you end a season with a bang, not a whimper, especially in a show like this that thrives on thrills as much as it does on meditation. The actual end of this episode went off very well, as I'll discuss in a moment, but so much before it didn't work that its impossible to call the episode as a whole a success. The episode opens well, with a flashback that finds Shane rushing through the hospital to find Rick, dodging waves of the undead and a military force that is seemingly slaughtering everyone, infected or not. This scene provides necessary shading to Shane's character, showing him trying to save Rick, and honestly believing him dead before leaving him there, blocking the door with a gurney to at least keep his body intact. Its a fairly noble moment for the character, and a necessary one considering the terible things he will do later in the episode.
Back in the present, the survivors are welcomed into CDC by Dr. Edwin Jenner, who requires a blood test from everyone and clearly knows more than he's letting on. The group is so happy to be inside, however, that the barely notice his secrecy before indulging in booze and food and hot showers. Everyone gets a chance to relax, but the liquor brings out some true colors as well. Rick confesses to Jenner that he's losing hope, and that he thinks everyone he knows will soon be dead. Its a brazenly honest, communicative moment from our taciturn protagonist, who admits his biggest problem is refusing to talk about how he feels to his family. Meanwhile, Shane corners Lori and tries to explain his justifications for leaving Rick. He did the best he could at the time, honestly, and its hard to argue that he wasn't in the moral right at any point before Rick's return, that we know of. Sure, he started banging his best friend's wife pretty quickly after Rick "died (last week we learned the breakout happened around 63 days ago), but he really thought his friend was dead, and he seems to really love Lori. Unfortunately he quickly cedes his moral high ground, giving into his tendency to use violence to force cooperation, and attempting to rape Lori. She quickly fights him off, yet Shane has officially burnt through whatever little goodwill he had left for saving her life.
The next morning, Jenner treats thr group to a lecture on the disease that causes the dead to rise. We learn that the time before they reanimate varies, and that only the motor functions return. We also discover that Jenner does not know what causes the disease, or how to cure it, and that only a few hours remain before the entire center goes up in a firebomb that Jenner wants to incinerate everyone. He is not made out as an evil man; he isn't trying to murder the group in cold blood, he just thinks the situation outside is hopeless, and believes quick, painless death is better than the short, brutal life that awaits them outside. The group immediately starts panicking, with Darly and Shane doing the most damage, but of course Rick wins the day with a plea to the human side of the situation, explaining to Jenner that the situation may seem hopeless, but there is always a chance as long as they are still alive. He persuades most to escape, but Jacqui and Andrea elect to stay behind, that is until Dale threatens to stay with Andrea because he doesn't want to face the world alone. So Dale and Andrea also flee, and Jacqui and Jenner stay behind to be incinerated painlessly while the others forge on.
Rick's speech, and the scene of the group driving away at the end send the themes of the show home nicely, and reminded me of the vast potential this series has to be an excellent examination of the human will to survive and the desire of one man to retain his essential humanity when all else is falling apart around him. It would be easier to stop, to just allow yourself to be painlessly incinerated and to ensure you wouldn't be torn to shreds, but that is surrender. Rick, and the rest of the survivors have kept hope alive, and their struggle to survive is a story that I tihnk can easily be the groundwork for an excellent television series. Unfortunately, most of tonight was taken up with silly plot contrivances, some exceedingly dumb behavior from the characters, and very little plot advancement. All we learned could have been just as easily assumed, and while Shane and Rick both had great moments of emotional honest that shade in their characters a little more fully, these moments pretty much confirmed things we already knew about them. Jacqui's death could not have meant less to me, while the prospect of losing Dale showed me just how much I'd come to care about him over the last few weeks (and just how sad I'll be when this show inevitably kills him. Come on, wise old man who loves everybody? He HAS to die at some point, but I'm glad it isn't yet). I still think its hard to judge The Walking Dead until we see its second season, and I remain excited for the show's potential there, but this finale didn't do much to increase that excitement. Until next season, folks.
Grade: B-
Notes:
-Jenner whispered something in Rick's ear before he left. That certainly leaves me curious...
-Some really stupid moments: "Is that a brain?" i know Carl is a kid, but is he like four? That was insanely stupid. Also, "Is that what happened to Jim?" OF COURSE IT IS. Plus, Daryl going at the metal door with an axe was remarkably cliche and a clear waste of his time and energy.
-"No pain, an end to sorrow, greif, regret, everything."
-Loved the choice of the ending song, Bob Dylan's "Tomorrow is a Long Time." See you guys next season!
Whose Film Is It Anyway?: Darren Aronofsky
by Jordan
Note: The purpose of Whose Film Is It Anyway? is to examine the validity of the auteur theory through the lens of individual film-makers, taking a look at their bodies of work and highlighting the technical elements, personal style, and thematic consistency of their films. Ultimately, the goal of this column will be to generate a discussion of the merits of auteur theory through examinations of directors widely considered auteurs, analyses of directors whose status as auteurs is more tenuous, and occasional looks at non-directors who may drive the quality and content of their films with more assuredness than the directors they work with.
“Aronofsky probably couldn’t videotape a nephew’s sixth birthday party without transforming it into a visually stunning, viscerally intense exploration of obsession and madness.” –Nathan Rabin, My Year of Flops
Often times here at Whose Film Is It Anyway? the goal of any given column is to point the way to a possible thematic consideration running through the work of a director that might otherwise have gone unnoticed. While this column does attempt to pick at the particulars of the auteur theory from time to time, it more often exists as a guide to a new way at viewing movies—through the lens of the auteur theory. Some directors leave subtle traces of their own pet themes and considerations in each of their films. Others drive their themes throughout their careers like a freight train towards a populated area (apologies to Denzel). There’s little argument that Darren Aronofsky is the latter type of director, one who works with a theme with so many ins and outs that he has examined it in five films over the last twelve years, and each time come up with something new to say about it. Of yet, the films of Darren Aronofsky are all, to one extent or another, about obsession and the way it drives people past the point of success and to potential ruin.
Aronofsky began his examination of obsession in his debut feature, 1998’s Pi: Faith in Chaos, which follows number theorist Max Cohen (Sean Gullette) on a harrowing journey into the depths of obsession and madness. Max’s obsession is numbers, which he believes hold the key to every question in the universe. When the computer Max has programmed to predict the stock market crashes, spitting out a seemingly random 216 digit number and a correct prediction about a single stock. Max is quickly drawn into a world of paranoid obsession as Wall Street Executives, Hasidic Jews, and Max’s own increasingly fragile mind attempt to understand the meaning of the number and its potential power to influence and alter society. As the film progresses, Max’s obsession with the number, and with mathematics in general drives him ever closer to inanity until in the film’s cathartic climax he makes a shocking decision to rid himself of his obsession and finally find peace.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4YnpYWI4XNE
Max’s obsession with numbers is shocking in its own right, but it has nothing on Aronofsky’s harrowing, heart-wrenching follow up Requiem for a Dream. The film follows four characters, each obsessed with the realization of their own dreams, and each eventually felled by a different obsession—drug addiction. Harry Goldfarb (Jared Leto) dreams of making enough money to treat his mother and his girlfriend properly. His girlfriend Marion (Jennifer Connolly) hopes to open her own fashion store with the financial backing of Harry. Harry’s best friend Tyrone (Marlon Wayans) wants to make enough money to get out of his terrible neighborhood and make his mother proud. And Harry’s mother Sarah (Ellen Burstyn in an Oscar nominated performance that is guaranteed to break your heart) wants to lose enough weight to fit into the red dress she wore on her proudest day, at Harry’s graduation, for her upcoming appearance on a game show. The characters each try to achieve their dreams through drug use as Harry, Tyrone and Marion, all heroin addicts plan to make a big score to finance their dreams and Sarah goes on diet pills to lose the weight, and their obsessions eventually lead to their downfall.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uuzNohk5cYw&playnext=1&list=PL9E138116EC416F7A&index=11
Throughout his work, but especially in Pi and Requiem, Aronofsky uses extremely short shots and quick cuts to depict the torturous routine that accompanies obsession. Throughout the film, Aronofsky repeatedly cuts back to the same quick montage of the routine of preparing and using heroin, showing that these characters are not just addicted to the drug itself, but obsessed with the behaviors and routines that surround drug use. Requiem for a Dream is almost doubtlessly the most harrowing, soul-crushingly depressing film ever made, but more than that, it is a tireless examination of the nightmare that results when lives are overtaken by obsession.
Never one to refuse an ambitious undertaking or to brush off a seemingly impossible challenge, Aronofsky next decided to make a movie that spanned millennia and dealt with one of the fundamental concerns of the human condition: mortality. The Fountain follows Tomas (Hugh Jackman) on a quest to conquer death in three intertwining stories: first as a conquistador attempting to save Spain and Queen Isabella (Rachel Weisz) by travelling to New Spain and finding the Tree of Life; second as a modern day scientist trying to cure cancer, reverse aging and ultimately end death all as a means of saving his beloved wife Izzy; and finally as an astronaut in the future, traveling the vast reaches of space with the Tree of Life, attempting to reach a dying star to resurrect both the tree and his long-dead wife. Tomas is driven by an endless obsession with death, willing to go to any lengths to avoid it and to conquer it in order to save the woman he loves. Through the seemingly endless and arguably futile quest of his protagonist, Aronofsky argues that mortality makes life precious and that obsession threatens to keep us from appreciating the little time we have, instead squandering it in a pointless grab at more time to waste.
Likely feeling defeated by the financial failure of The Fountain (which is what allowed it to be featured in Nathan Rabin’s excellent, hilarious and insightful ongoing column My Year of Flops), Aronofsky took his exploration of the dark, destructive side of obsession to a more commercial venue in 2008’s The Wrestler. The film depicts Randy “The Ram” Robinson (an Oscar nominated Mickey Rourke), a former celebrity wrestler twenty years past his prime who refuses to give up chasing his glory days. Randy spends his weeks working at a grocery store, saving up enough to spend his weekends wrestling on the independent circuit. Wrestling has always been his reason for living, so much so that he abandoned his daughter Stephanie (Evan Rachel Wood) in her childhood. As he prepares to reenter the ring for a rematch, he attempts to reconcile with his daughter and strikes up a friendship and possible romance with an aging stripper (Marisa Tomei, who was nominated for Best Supporting Actress for her performance) who also insists on staying in a career she is slowly aging out of. As the film continues, Randy suffers a heart attack and is told he can no longer wrestle without risking death, yet he allows his obsession to be his potential ruination as he reenters the ring for his final rematch and prepares to sacrifice himself to the obsession that has shaped his life.
A similar narrative forms the center of Aronofsky’s newest film Black Swan (due to the fact that the film was only released two days ago, I will avoid spoilers in my discussion of it), which Aronofsky has referred to as a companion piece to The Wrestler. The film follows Nina Sayers (an Oscar worthy Natalie Portman) through her arduous training as she prepares to star in a modern retelling of Swan Lake. Sayers puts herself through physical and mental anguish in preparation for the role, forcing herself to vomit, scratching at her skin, damaging her feet and even pushing her mind into near insanity, all for the sake of her art. Though hers is the central story of the dangers of obsession in the film, she is also surrounded by others who are endangered by their obsessions—her mother Erica (a tremendous Barbara Hershey), a former ballerina who remains consumed by her love of ballet, her director Thomas (Vincent Cassel) who is passionately, sometimes creepily committed to helping Nina find her dark side to portray the titular Swan, he understudy Lily (Mila Kunis) who may or may not be trying to keep Nina from taking the stage, and her predecessor (Winona Ryder) a famed ballerina forced into retirement because of her age. Each of these characters goes to absurd lengths for the art that grips them, sacrificing their bodies, their minds, their relationships, and even their lives for their obsessions.
Each of Darren Aronofsky’s films examines the nature of obsession and the myriad consequences of letting your life become consumed with something that keeps you from really enjoying it. Whether the obsession is with numbers, dreams, drugs, death, or art, Aronofsky’s characters let their lives pass them by and sacrifice their relationships with others, their sanity, and in some cases even their lives in pursuit of what consumes them. Few directors manage to make a succession of films so thematically similar and yet individually satisfying. Aronofsky has worked throughout his career with the same cinematographer, Matthew Libatique, and the same composer, Clint Mansell, to create a similar feeling of claustrophobic dread whether his movies are set in the seedy side of New Jersey or the high-art society that surrounds the ballet. The nature of his character’s obsession may differ each time, yet in every case, their unaltered focus seals their (usually very dark and depressing) fate. Aronofsky recently announced that his next project will be to direct The Wolverine (after the very exciting rumor that he was being tapped to direct the next Superman movie turned out to be just that), and there is little doubt in my mind that when next we see the X-Man at that movie’s center, he will be driven to the brink of his exceptional abilities in a struggle to overcome, or succumb, to the obsessions that drive him.
Read more Whose Film Is It Anyway? here
Coming up on Who's Film Is It Anyway?:
12/19: Frank Capra
1/2: Mike Myers
1/16: Kevin Smith
1/30: Akira Kurosawa
Note: The purpose of Whose Film Is It Anyway? is to examine the validity of the auteur theory through the lens of individual film-makers, taking a look at their bodies of work and highlighting the technical elements, personal style, and thematic consistency of their films. Ultimately, the goal of this column will be to generate a discussion of the merits of auteur theory through examinations of directors widely considered auteurs, analyses of directors whose status as auteurs is more tenuous, and occasional looks at non-directors who may drive the quality and content of their films with more assuredness than the directors they work with.
“Aronofsky probably couldn’t videotape a nephew’s sixth birthday party without transforming it into a visually stunning, viscerally intense exploration of obsession and madness.” –Nathan Rabin, My Year of Flops
Often times here at Whose Film Is It Anyway? the goal of any given column is to point the way to a possible thematic consideration running through the work of a director that might otherwise have gone unnoticed. While this column does attempt to pick at the particulars of the auteur theory from time to time, it more often exists as a guide to a new way at viewing movies—through the lens of the auteur theory. Some directors leave subtle traces of their own pet themes and considerations in each of their films. Others drive their themes throughout their careers like a freight train towards a populated area (apologies to Denzel). There’s little argument that Darren Aronofsky is the latter type of director, one who works with a theme with so many ins and outs that he has examined it in five films over the last twelve years, and each time come up with something new to say about it. Of yet, the films of Darren Aronofsky are all, to one extent or another, about obsession and the way it drives people past the point of success and to potential ruin.
Aronofsky began his examination of obsession in his debut feature, 1998’s Pi: Faith in Chaos, which follows number theorist Max Cohen (Sean Gullette) on a harrowing journey into the depths of obsession and madness. Max’s obsession is numbers, which he believes hold the key to every question in the universe. When the computer Max has programmed to predict the stock market crashes, spitting out a seemingly random 216 digit number and a correct prediction about a single stock. Max is quickly drawn into a world of paranoid obsession as Wall Street Executives, Hasidic Jews, and Max’s own increasingly fragile mind attempt to understand the meaning of the number and its potential power to influence and alter society. As the film progresses, Max’s obsession with the number, and with mathematics in general drives him ever closer to inanity until in the film’s cathartic climax he makes a shocking decision to rid himself of his obsession and finally find peace.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4YnpYWI4XNE
Max’s obsession with numbers is shocking in its own right, but it has nothing on Aronofsky’s harrowing, heart-wrenching follow up Requiem for a Dream. The film follows four characters, each obsessed with the realization of their own dreams, and each eventually felled by a different obsession—drug addiction. Harry Goldfarb (Jared Leto) dreams of making enough money to treat his mother and his girlfriend properly. His girlfriend Marion (Jennifer Connolly) hopes to open her own fashion store with the financial backing of Harry. Harry’s best friend Tyrone (Marlon Wayans) wants to make enough money to get out of his terrible neighborhood and make his mother proud. And Harry’s mother Sarah (Ellen Burstyn in an Oscar nominated performance that is guaranteed to break your heart) wants to lose enough weight to fit into the red dress she wore on her proudest day, at Harry’s graduation, for her upcoming appearance on a game show. The characters each try to achieve their dreams through drug use as Harry, Tyrone and Marion, all heroin addicts plan to make a big score to finance their dreams and Sarah goes on diet pills to lose the weight, and their obsessions eventually lead to their downfall.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uuzNohk5cYw&playnext=1&list=PL9E138116EC416F7A&index=11
Throughout his work, but especially in Pi and Requiem, Aronofsky uses extremely short shots and quick cuts to depict the torturous routine that accompanies obsession. Throughout the film, Aronofsky repeatedly cuts back to the same quick montage of the routine of preparing and using heroin, showing that these characters are not just addicted to the drug itself, but obsessed with the behaviors and routines that surround drug use. Requiem for a Dream is almost doubtlessly the most harrowing, soul-crushingly depressing film ever made, but more than that, it is a tireless examination of the nightmare that results when lives are overtaken by obsession.
Never one to refuse an ambitious undertaking or to brush off a seemingly impossible challenge, Aronofsky next decided to make a movie that spanned millennia and dealt with one of the fundamental concerns of the human condition: mortality. The Fountain follows Tomas (Hugh Jackman) on a quest to conquer death in three intertwining stories: first as a conquistador attempting to save Spain and Queen Isabella (Rachel Weisz) by travelling to New Spain and finding the Tree of Life; second as a modern day scientist trying to cure cancer, reverse aging and ultimately end death all as a means of saving his beloved wife Izzy; and finally as an astronaut in the future, traveling the vast reaches of space with the Tree of Life, attempting to reach a dying star to resurrect both the tree and his long-dead wife. Tomas is driven by an endless obsession with death, willing to go to any lengths to avoid it and to conquer it in order to save the woman he loves. Through the seemingly endless and arguably futile quest of his protagonist, Aronofsky argues that mortality makes life precious and that obsession threatens to keep us from appreciating the little time we have, instead squandering it in a pointless grab at more time to waste.
Likely feeling defeated by the financial failure of The Fountain (which is what allowed it to be featured in Nathan Rabin’s excellent, hilarious and insightful ongoing column My Year of Flops), Aronofsky took his exploration of the dark, destructive side of obsession to a more commercial venue in 2008’s The Wrestler. The film depicts Randy “The Ram” Robinson (an Oscar nominated Mickey Rourke), a former celebrity wrestler twenty years past his prime who refuses to give up chasing his glory days. Randy spends his weeks working at a grocery store, saving up enough to spend his weekends wrestling on the independent circuit. Wrestling has always been his reason for living, so much so that he abandoned his daughter Stephanie (Evan Rachel Wood) in her childhood. As he prepares to reenter the ring for a rematch, he attempts to reconcile with his daughter and strikes up a friendship and possible romance with an aging stripper (Marisa Tomei, who was nominated for Best Supporting Actress for her performance) who also insists on staying in a career she is slowly aging out of. As the film continues, Randy suffers a heart attack and is told he can no longer wrestle without risking death, yet he allows his obsession to be his potential ruination as he reenters the ring for his final rematch and prepares to sacrifice himself to the obsession that has shaped his life.
A similar narrative forms the center of Aronofsky’s newest film Black Swan (due to the fact that the film was only released two days ago, I will avoid spoilers in my discussion of it), which Aronofsky has referred to as a companion piece to The Wrestler. The film follows Nina Sayers (an Oscar worthy Natalie Portman) through her arduous training as she prepares to star in a modern retelling of Swan Lake. Sayers puts herself through physical and mental anguish in preparation for the role, forcing herself to vomit, scratching at her skin, damaging her feet and even pushing her mind into near insanity, all for the sake of her art. Though hers is the central story of the dangers of obsession in the film, she is also surrounded by others who are endangered by their obsessions—her mother Erica (a tremendous Barbara Hershey), a former ballerina who remains consumed by her love of ballet, her director Thomas (Vincent Cassel) who is passionately, sometimes creepily committed to helping Nina find her dark side to portray the titular Swan, he understudy Lily (Mila Kunis) who may or may not be trying to keep Nina from taking the stage, and her predecessor (Winona Ryder) a famed ballerina forced into retirement because of her age. Each of these characters goes to absurd lengths for the art that grips them, sacrificing their bodies, their minds, their relationships, and even their lives for their obsessions.
Each of Darren Aronofsky’s films examines the nature of obsession and the myriad consequences of letting your life become consumed with something that keeps you from really enjoying it. Whether the obsession is with numbers, dreams, drugs, death, or art, Aronofsky’s characters let their lives pass them by and sacrifice their relationships with others, their sanity, and in some cases even their lives in pursuit of what consumes them. Few directors manage to make a succession of films so thematically similar and yet individually satisfying. Aronofsky has worked throughout his career with the same cinematographer, Matthew Libatique, and the same composer, Clint Mansell, to create a similar feeling of claustrophobic dread whether his movies are set in the seedy side of New Jersey or the high-art society that surrounds the ballet. The nature of his character’s obsession may differ each time, yet in every case, their unaltered focus seals their (usually very dark and depressing) fate. Aronofsky recently announced that his next project will be to direct The Wolverine (after the very exciting rumor that he was being tapped to direct the next Superman movie turned out to be just that), and there is little doubt in my mind that when next we see the X-Man at that movie’s center, he will be driven to the brink of his exceptional abilities in a struggle to overcome, or succumb, to the obsessions that drive him.
Read more Whose Film Is It Anyway? here
Coming up on Who's Film Is It Anyway?:
12/19: Frank Capra
1/2: Mike Myers
1/16: Kevin Smith
1/30: Akira Kurosawa
Thursday, December 2, 2010
Jordan's Review: 30 Rock, Season 5, Episode 8: Chain Reaction of Mental Anguish
You'll forgive me, 30 Rock fans, if this review is a little brief, but after the novel I just posted on tonight's Community episode my fingers, and my soul, are tired. This week's episode finds Liz seeking counsel from ears that are not attached to the head of Jack Donaghy, as he sends her out to get professional help. In a strangely elliptical episode (or perhaps not, considering its title), Liz seeks help from Kenneth, who seeks help from Jack, who claims to be able to destroy all of hsi issues in a mental vice, but ends up receiving the help he really needs when he tried to help Tracy help his "son."
Let's start at the beginning. Liz Lemon has to be among the upper echelons of the most psychologically messed up characters in the history of television (she might even give Tony Soprano a run for his money if she got the chance to sit in Dr. Melfi's chair for a few months, and most of the patients on In Treatment are a psychological cake walk by comparison), and tonight is no different. Liz worries that Carol is growing distant, which stems from her fear that all men are betrayors, which in turn stems from a ridiculous amount of horrible experiences (she tried to seek revenge on Santa who blew up at her, her divorced aunt used to make her wear her uncle's cologne and give her a massage in the bathtub, all of her boyfriends in high school were either gay of girls dressed up as boys to win journalism scholarships) that have occurred throughout her life. She unburdens all of this on Kenneth, who seems able to handle it, especially considering the regular stream of demeaning, menial tasks he bears with a smile. Yet the deep, deep issues that plague Liz get to Kenneth and he goes completely insane...
...Until Jack steps in and takes a look at Kenneth's head. Kenneth's problems mostly stem from a terrible Oedipal situation in which he was forced by financial straits to devour the pig that had served as his surrogate father figure in order to afford his ticket to New York to become a low level employee at a last place network. I was surprised and a little disappointed that the "Kenneth's been alive forever" joke didn't crop up tonight, but on the whole, this was a dark, hysterical Kenneth story.
Jack is so disturbed by Kenneth's patricide that his own father issues crop up. It seems that Jack always wanted to be a scientist (which makes his cleaning of the Princeton monkey cages slightly sadder) but his dad convinced him he couldn't cut it because he mispronounced the word protein while rehearsing for an elementary school play. This ties in with his efforts to help Tracy, who is trying to cut his "son" off after another business idea tanks. Jack decides he was wrong, and that Tracy should continue supporting his son because parents are meant to have a ludicrous amount of faith in their children no matter what. The moment near episode's end when Jack recites the speech from his elementary school play was, like the monkey cage scene I mentioned above, a near perfect moment from Baldwin, who combined comedy and subtle tragedy together so well I was laughing while I was moved. In short, give this man another Emmy. He deserves it.
The subplot that ties into the main plot in every way except actually being brought into the chain involves Jenna's relationship with her own impersonator (a brilliant storyline I wish the show would do more with now that Forte has a little more time on his hands) goes sour because she refuses to actually become serious with him and wants to tastelessly leak a sex tape instead.
This was a pretty solid episode of 30 Rock that allowed for some great moments from all involved, but was absolutely stolen by Alec Baldwin, who continues to be near-perfect as Jack Donaghy, master of the world. As I say pretty much weeky, I'm just happy to have 30 Rock back to its pre-season four quality and glad that it seems primed to stay there for a while yet.
Grade: B+
Notes:
-"What is Senior Mexico saying? Stop keeping me out of the loop!"
-"Jenna and I are mirroring until we achieve touchless orgasm. I'm finished."
-"you're a bigger disappointment than our current President Jimmy Carter!"
-"Get a room! Whatever that is..." I like that on 30 Rock, homeless people don't know what rooms are...
-"I ate him sir. I ate my father-pig!"
-"Why can't we paint each other's toenails, watch vintage pornography, and go to sleep in our swing like a normal couple?"
-"I should have moved to Cleveland with that guy when I had the chance!" "No! Godzeera!"
Let's start at the beginning. Liz Lemon has to be among the upper echelons of the most psychologically messed up characters in the history of television (she might even give Tony Soprano a run for his money if she got the chance to sit in Dr. Melfi's chair for a few months, and most of the patients on In Treatment are a psychological cake walk by comparison), and tonight is no different. Liz worries that Carol is growing distant, which stems from her fear that all men are betrayors, which in turn stems from a ridiculous amount of horrible experiences (she tried to seek revenge on Santa who blew up at her, her divorced aunt used to make her wear her uncle's cologne and give her a massage in the bathtub, all of her boyfriends in high school were either gay of girls dressed up as boys to win journalism scholarships) that have occurred throughout her life. She unburdens all of this on Kenneth, who seems able to handle it, especially considering the regular stream of demeaning, menial tasks he bears with a smile. Yet the deep, deep issues that plague Liz get to Kenneth and he goes completely insane...
...Until Jack steps in and takes a look at Kenneth's head. Kenneth's problems mostly stem from a terrible Oedipal situation in which he was forced by financial straits to devour the pig that had served as his surrogate father figure in order to afford his ticket to New York to become a low level employee at a last place network. I was surprised and a little disappointed that the "Kenneth's been alive forever" joke didn't crop up tonight, but on the whole, this was a dark, hysterical Kenneth story.
Jack is so disturbed by Kenneth's patricide that his own father issues crop up. It seems that Jack always wanted to be a scientist (which makes his cleaning of the Princeton monkey cages slightly sadder) but his dad convinced him he couldn't cut it because he mispronounced the word protein while rehearsing for an elementary school play. This ties in with his efforts to help Tracy, who is trying to cut his "son" off after another business idea tanks. Jack decides he was wrong, and that Tracy should continue supporting his son because parents are meant to have a ludicrous amount of faith in their children no matter what. The moment near episode's end when Jack recites the speech from his elementary school play was, like the monkey cage scene I mentioned above, a near perfect moment from Baldwin, who combined comedy and subtle tragedy together so well I was laughing while I was moved. In short, give this man another Emmy. He deserves it.
The subplot that ties into the main plot in every way except actually being brought into the chain involves Jenna's relationship with her own impersonator (a brilliant storyline I wish the show would do more with now that Forte has a little more time on his hands) goes sour because she refuses to actually become serious with him and wants to tastelessly leak a sex tape instead.
This was a pretty solid episode of 30 Rock that allowed for some great moments from all involved, but was absolutely stolen by Alec Baldwin, who continues to be near-perfect as Jack Donaghy, master of the world. As I say pretty much weeky, I'm just happy to have 30 Rock back to its pre-season four quality and glad that it seems primed to stay there for a while yet.
Grade: B+
Notes:
-"What is Senior Mexico saying? Stop keeping me out of the loop!"
-"Jenna and I are mirroring until we achieve touchless orgasm. I'm finished."
-"you're a bigger disappointment than our current President Jimmy Carter!"
-"Get a room! Whatever that is..." I like that on 30 Rock, homeless people don't know what rooms are...
-"I ate him sir. I ate my father-pig!"
-"Why can't we paint each other's toenails, watch vintage pornography, and go to sleep in our swing like a normal couple?"
-"I should have moved to Cleveland with that guy when I had the chance!" "No! Godzeera!"
Jordan's Review: Community, Season 2, Episode 10: Mixology Certification
Its getting to the point where my praise of season two of Community is becoming overkill. I recognize the heaps of credit I throw at the show every week, and yet, it just keeps showing me why it deserves all of the wonderful things I can say about it. A lot of the negative criticism I read about Community (it exists, oddly enough) derides the show for its over reliance on parody and pop culture references, and while I think the show continuously avoids doing too much of that, its a potentially valid criticism. As I've said before, if the show was to go off the wheels right now, I think that would present itself as a long string of parody episodes with no character development or heart in between. "Mixology Certification" drops a lot of the things the show is known for, from its pop culture references, to its subplots, and even its setting. This week, the gang leaves pretty much everything we think when we think about Community behind, and in so doing, turns in one of the best episodes in the show's history.
This week, its Troy's birthday (which Abed's Robocop vision foreshadowed in "Aerodynamics of Gender"), yet since Troy is a Jehovah's witness (in a nice bit of the show recalling its continuity) his celebration is wondrously vague, full of almost birthday rituals so that Troy can celebrate without violating his faith. Troy very quickly realizes that he is in fact celebrating his 21st birthday, not his twentieth ("Everyone is ten for two years because fifth grade is really hard...Mom how many lies have I been living?") and so Jeff and Britta, being that they are Jeff and Britta require Troy to go out celebrating. After fighting about whether to go to Jeff's "cool" bar L Street or Britta's "hipster" bar The Red Door, they compromise and take Troy to The Ballroom, one of those bars that has an ironically fancy name or is a double entendre. Seeing as Annie is 19 (yeah, ok Allison Brie) and doesn't want to get left behind, Britta grabs her a fake ID and she becomes Caroline Decker from Corpus Christi, Texas for the remainder of the evening.
Annie seems as good a place as any to start, since her storyline takes off right from there. Being that she is as insanely anal as usual, she begins to research Corpus Christi immediately and starts working on her southern accent to make sure she's authentic. Because she's a hot girl, her ID isn't even checked (and there's a nice moment there when Britta's is) this is immediately shown to be just Annie being a ridiculous worry wort, which is totally in character, but she doesn't stop there. She invents an entire persona for herself as the exact opposite of Annie. Caroline is a drifting adventurer who doesn't plan her life out meticulously, follows Phish around not because she likes the music but because she wants to see if she can live in parking lots, and, actually, will have a Screwdriver thank you very much. Its all pretty much a standard "uptight girl pretends to walk on the wild side" plotline until it finally reaches its apex in probably the best moment of the episode when Troy walks Annie to her door and she breaks down, admitting that she pretended to be Caroline because she has no idea who she is besides a ball of anxiety and a drive to overachieve that plagues her mostly because she doesn't know what else to do with herself. Troy's monologue about what Annie means to him, and who she is in his eyes, is exactly the type of moment Community at its best can pull off, and the fact that it stayed platonic instead of playing into the long dead Troy-Annie tension (which I was never a huge fan of. We all know where I hope Annie ends up) made it even better. Troy wasn't saying those things to win Annie's heart. He was just speaking from his own about the individuality of a girl who has come to mean a lot to him in the last year.
Moving down the bar a bit to Abed, whose story is maybe the saddest in a surprisingly depressing episode of the show. Abed moves away from the group to play Asteroids and is approached by Paul F. Tompkins, who picks him up by quoting Last Starfighter and Farscape and offers to buy Abed a drink. Abed picks up on the fact that the guy is hitting on him, but ignores all of the hints anyway because he just likes talking about Farscape. Its a very minor part of the episode, and yet it speaks volumes about just how lonely Abed's life can be. Danny Pudi played the plotline wonderfully, subtly hinting at just how long its been since Abed has been able to have a good talk about Farscape with anyone, and acknowledging that he is willing to let a man hit on him if only someone will talk with him about pop culture for a little while. Abed returns to the group by the end of the story, and its the place he has found the most acceptance at this point in his life. Yet even there, where he is happiest, he is often ignored, as he is near the episode's end by Jeff and Britta.
One of the best things about season two so far has been the show's efforts to deepen Shirley as a character. For much of season one, she was pretty much a quiet, nice Christian lady who had fallen in with this wild study group and only seemed to hint occasionally at the sadness in her life, which she had seemingly overcome with the power of Jesus Christ, her lord and savior. But second chances aren't that easy on Community and we have learned a lot this season about the deep seated anger Shirley carries around with her. We have seen her go to bat for the thing the thing that saved her from the darkness with vehemence earlier this season in "Messianic Myths and Ancient Peoples" and we have watched her be shaken by a pregnancy scare (which we may not have heard the last of), but tonight we get a larger hint about the type of person Shirley was before she began seeking that second chance: a lonely, depressed divorcee who just needed to drown her sorrows at The Ballroom, and who found herself in a drunken stupor there so many times the place is littered with pictures of her, including a few cautionary posters in the restrooms and on the back of the door. She begins the episode trying to remove all of them, trying to wipe away her past entirely, and when the gang finds one (of course they do), they all find this aspect of Shirley humorous and are ready to joke about it. They don't even seem to be denigrating Shirley here. No one is trying to take her righteous, holier than thou attitude down a notch in the scene. Instead, they just seem prepared to laugh about it with her, because who hasn't been there? But Shirley isn't ready to laugh about it, and instead storms out of the bar, hurt that this part of her old life is invading her attempts at constructing a new one.
On her way out of the door she runs into Pierce, who has easily the slightest story this week, but one that delivers plenty of laughs and a whole lot of sadness at the same time. Pierce is a stubborn jackass of a man who refuses to ask for help regardless of what happens to him. He refuses to ask for anyone's help getting to The Ballroom, and when he finally makes it there, he refuses to let the doorman help him inside, even when he hysterically cannot maneuver inside, and even when the battery on his wheelchair dies. And so Pierce is left alone, much like he has been by his family and most of the people in his life. His pigheaded independence leaves him stranded again, until he caves and asks Shirley for help. Once again, the group provides the support these characters need to grow beyond the flaws that have trapped them at Greendale, all trying to build new lives for themselves and atone for their past mistakes.
Speaking of mistakes, Jeff and Britta make one tonight, ending up in each others arms in the back of Jeff's car and pretty much on top of Abed. Hooking these two up is played mostly for laughs, and anyone on board the Jeff and Britta ship probably jumped for joy, but I think there was something deeper and much, much more wonderful going on tonight. In its first season, Community treated Britta as Jeff's main love interest, and in the early portion of the series, she was set up to be his redeemer. Basically, it seemed at first, Britta was the character who would make Jeff "want to be a better man" in order to earn her love (that was an As Good As It Gets reference, yes, but this can also be seen all over film and television, most recently on the failed show Running Wilde). Fortunately, the show has decided to take a much more daring path with these two, documenting them as they circle each other in an endless game of mutual loathing that doesn't quite cover their basic attraction and grudging affection for each other as well as they think.
This actually makes Jeff and Britta a better potential couple than the other storyline ever would have (setting Britta up as the saint Jeff had to improve to win over would have been much more boring and conventional), but I don't think the show is aiming in that direction. A few weeks ago, a friend of mine pointed out that while she agreed with my Jeff-Annie ardor, she also thought that Troy and Britta would make a cute couple. I responded at the time that I thought the pairing was interesting, but I wasn't exactly sure if it would work. I was dead wrong. There are two moments tonight, buried under layers of storyline, that show the obvious potential of the Britta and Troy pairing, though they both come from Troy (whose journey we will address in a moment). First, when Britta leaves her sparring match with Jeff to use the restroom, he sighs and wearily says "that woman is a hurricane," a nice moment for him, which acknowledges the world-weary wonder with which he greets Britta daily, but Troy's response is really the key. His eyes light up as he quietly says, "I know." Troy agrees with Jeff's assessment on the surface, but where Jeff sees Britta as a storm he has to weather constantly, Troy sees her as a potential adventure. Later, when Abed reveals Jeff and Britta have been making out, Troy looks clearly hurt. Its a small moment, but I doubt its the last of the Troy and Britta storyline.
And now, last but not least, I will turn this absurdly long review towards Troy, the man unquestionably at the center of the episode, both thematically and actually. Troy spends this episode preparing to become "a man" as he takes advice from Britta and Jeff about how to be a cool drinker and waits diligently until midnight to order his first drink. I need to step away from hi actual journey this episode for a moment to point out how Troy, like Shirley, has been shockingly deepened this season. He has always been the goofy, nerdy, kind of dumb guy in the group, but this season has seen him grow into something of a hero for these people, the glue that holds the gang together when everyone else's burdens have become too much. When zombies attacked the school, Troy was the man who sacrificed himself to save everyone. When the loss of Annie's pen threatened to tear the gang apart, it was Troy's ghost story that kept them all together. And tonight, when the dangers of over-intoxication felled everyone else, Troy stepped up to the plate and took care of everyone, even driving Jeff's car in the process. Tonight, Troy abandons the traditional idea of a 21st birthday to rescue his friends from themselves. He is the first one to see that Shirley is truly upset by the jokes. He is the one who talks Annie out of her spiral, and drags Jeff, Abed, and Britta out of the bar when things have gone too far. He is the one who gets to drive Jeff's car tonight (and make no mistake that Jeff is seen as the show's traditional patriarch), and when he finally gets to order his first drink (though he doesn't get to taste it), he ignores all of the advice of Jeff and Britta and just gets what he wants.
I have never seen a show capture the melancholy of a drunken night with friends turned sour as well as Community does tonight. Honestly, I'm not sure I've ever even seen a show try. I often tell those who ask that I have no idea how much I like an episode of a show, or what grade I'll give it, until I've written the whole review. I knew I liked "Mixology Certification" from the moment it ended, but I didn't realize how much I really loved it until I wrote perhaps the longest review ever about it. This is truly one of the best episodes of Community ever. Maybe even its very best so far. Its an episode that cuts away all that is recognizable about an episode of this show, and yet comes out with a microcosm of everything this show is about. This is an episode, like this is a show, about a bunch of sad, sort of ruined people who have dead ended in their lives and come to Greendale Community College for a second chance to rebuild themselves, and have found in each other the love and support they need to do it. I love this show. I love this episode. I can't wait for next week.
Grade: A
Notes:
-"To you!" "Why did we only sing the last two words?"
-Nice KickPuncher callback.
-"They serve virgin mudslides." "Those are milkshakes, Shirley!" Good joke, that becomes something much more by the episode's end.
-"Annie, don;t accept any drinks." "Or invitations to the bathroom." I love when Jeff and Britta function as parents for the group.
-"I'm Caroline. Grew up on a trout farm, doodlee doo..."
-"You'd like that. A little turning of the tables." "What tables?" "I don't know. Leave me alone!"
-"I can't wait to understand these arguments!"
-"Plans just fall off me like chicken crap off an armadillo."
-"Alcohol makes people sad. Its like the Lifetime movies of beverages."
This week, its Troy's birthday (which Abed's Robocop vision foreshadowed in "Aerodynamics of Gender"), yet since Troy is a Jehovah's witness (in a nice bit of the show recalling its continuity) his celebration is wondrously vague, full of almost birthday rituals so that Troy can celebrate without violating his faith. Troy very quickly realizes that he is in fact celebrating his 21st birthday, not his twentieth ("Everyone is ten for two years because fifth grade is really hard...Mom how many lies have I been living?") and so Jeff and Britta, being that they are Jeff and Britta require Troy to go out celebrating. After fighting about whether to go to Jeff's "cool" bar L Street or Britta's "hipster" bar The Red Door, they compromise and take Troy to The Ballroom, one of those bars that has an ironically fancy name or is a double entendre. Seeing as Annie is 19 (yeah, ok Allison Brie) and doesn't want to get left behind, Britta grabs her a fake ID and she becomes Caroline Decker from Corpus Christi, Texas for the remainder of the evening.
Annie seems as good a place as any to start, since her storyline takes off right from there. Being that she is as insanely anal as usual, she begins to research Corpus Christi immediately and starts working on her southern accent to make sure she's authentic. Because she's a hot girl, her ID isn't even checked (and there's a nice moment there when Britta's is) this is immediately shown to be just Annie being a ridiculous worry wort, which is totally in character, but she doesn't stop there. She invents an entire persona for herself as the exact opposite of Annie. Caroline is a drifting adventurer who doesn't plan her life out meticulously, follows Phish around not because she likes the music but because she wants to see if she can live in parking lots, and, actually, will have a Screwdriver thank you very much. Its all pretty much a standard "uptight girl pretends to walk on the wild side" plotline until it finally reaches its apex in probably the best moment of the episode when Troy walks Annie to her door and she breaks down, admitting that she pretended to be Caroline because she has no idea who she is besides a ball of anxiety and a drive to overachieve that plagues her mostly because she doesn't know what else to do with herself. Troy's monologue about what Annie means to him, and who she is in his eyes, is exactly the type of moment Community at its best can pull off, and the fact that it stayed platonic instead of playing into the long dead Troy-Annie tension (which I was never a huge fan of. We all know where I hope Annie ends up) made it even better. Troy wasn't saying those things to win Annie's heart. He was just speaking from his own about the individuality of a girl who has come to mean a lot to him in the last year.
Moving down the bar a bit to Abed, whose story is maybe the saddest in a surprisingly depressing episode of the show. Abed moves away from the group to play Asteroids and is approached by Paul F. Tompkins, who picks him up by quoting Last Starfighter and Farscape and offers to buy Abed a drink. Abed picks up on the fact that the guy is hitting on him, but ignores all of the hints anyway because he just likes talking about Farscape. Its a very minor part of the episode, and yet it speaks volumes about just how lonely Abed's life can be. Danny Pudi played the plotline wonderfully, subtly hinting at just how long its been since Abed has been able to have a good talk about Farscape with anyone, and acknowledging that he is willing to let a man hit on him if only someone will talk with him about pop culture for a little while. Abed returns to the group by the end of the story, and its the place he has found the most acceptance at this point in his life. Yet even there, where he is happiest, he is often ignored, as he is near the episode's end by Jeff and Britta.
One of the best things about season two so far has been the show's efforts to deepen Shirley as a character. For much of season one, she was pretty much a quiet, nice Christian lady who had fallen in with this wild study group and only seemed to hint occasionally at the sadness in her life, which she had seemingly overcome with the power of Jesus Christ, her lord and savior. But second chances aren't that easy on Community and we have learned a lot this season about the deep seated anger Shirley carries around with her. We have seen her go to bat for the thing the thing that saved her from the darkness with vehemence earlier this season in "Messianic Myths and Ancient Peoples" and we have watched her be shaken by a pregnancy scare (which we may not have heard the last of), but tonight we get a larger hint about the type of person Shirley was before she began seeking that second chance: a lonely, depressed divorcee who just needed to drown her sorrows at The Ballroom, and who found herself in a drunken stupor there so many times the place is littered with pictures of her, including a few cautionary posters in the restrooms and on the back of the door. She begins the episode trying to remove all of them, trying to wipe away her past entirely, and when the gang finds one (of course they do), they all find this aspect of Shirley humorous and are ready to joke about it. They don't even seem to be denigrating Shirley here. No one is trying to take her righteous, holier than thou attitude down a notch in the scene. Instead, they just seem prepared to laugh about it with her, because who hasn't been there? But Shirley isn't ready to laugh about it, and instead storms out of the bar, hurt that this part of her old life is invading her attempts at constructing a new one.
On her way out of the door she runs into Pierce, who has easily the slightest story this week, but one that delivers plenty of laughs and a whole lot of sadness at the same time. Pierce is a stubborn jackass of a man who refuses to ask for help regardless of what happens to him. He refuses to ask for anyone's help getting to The Ballroom, and when he finally makes it there, he refuses to let the doorman help him inside, even when he hysterically cannot maneuver inside, and even when the battery on his wheelchair dies. And so Pierce is left alone, much like he has been by his family and most of the people in his life. His pigheaded independence leaves him stranded again, until he caves and asks Shirley for help. Once again, the group provides the support these characters need to grow beyond the flaws that have trapped them at Greendale, all trying to build new lives for themselves and atone for their past mistakes.
Speaking of mistakes, Jeff and Britta make one tonight, ending up in each others arms in the back of Jeff's car and pretty much on top of Abed. Hooking these two up is played mostly for laughs, and anyone on board the Jeff and Britta ship probably jumped for joy, but I think there was something deeper and much, much more wonderful going on tonight. In its first season, Community treated Britta as Jeff's main love interest, and in the early portion of the series, she was set up to be his redeemer. Basically, it seemed at first, Britta was the character who would make Jeff "want to be a better man" in order to earn her love (that was an As Good As It Gets reference, yes, but this can also be seen all over film and television, most recently on the failed show Running Wilde). Fortunately, the show has decided to take a much more daring path with these two, documenting them as they circle each other in an endless game of mutual loathing that doesn't quite cover their basic attraction and grudging affection for each other as well as they think.
This actually makes Jeff and Britta a better potential couple than the other storyline ever would have (setting Britta up as the saint Jeff had to improve to win over would have been much more boring and conventional), but I don't think the show is aiming in that direction. A few weeks ago, a friend of mine pointed out that while she agreed with my Jeff-Annie ardor, she also thought that Troy and Britta would make a cute couple. I responded at the time that I thought the pairing was interesting, but I wasn't exactly sure if it would work. I was dead wrong. There are two moments tonight, buried under layers of storyline, that show the obvious potential of the Britta and Troy pairing, though they both come from Troy (whose journey we will address in a moment). First, when Britta leaves her sparring match with Jeff to use the restroom, he sighs and wearily says "that woman is a hurricane," a nice moment for him, which acknowledges the world-weary wonder with which he greets Britta daily, but Troy's response is really the key. His eyes light up as he quietly says, "I know." Troy agrees with Jeff's assessment on the surface, but where Jeff sees Britta as a storm he has to weather constantly, Troy sees her as a potential adventure. Later, when Abed reveals Jeff and Britta have been making out, Troy looks clearly hurt. Its a small moment, but I doubt its the last of the Troy and Britta storyline.
And now, last but not least, I will turn this absurdly long review towards Troy, the man unquestionably at the center of the episode, both thematically and actually. Troy spends this episode preparing to become "a man" as he takes advice from Britta and Jeff about how to be a cool drinker and waits diligently until midnight to order his first drink. I need to step away from hi actual journey this episode for a moment to point out how Troy, like Shirley, has been shockingly deepened this season. He has always been the goofy, nerdy, kind of dumb guy in the group, but this season has seen him grow into something of a hero for these people, the glue that holds the gang together when everyone else's burdens have become too much. When zombies attacked the school, Troy was the man who sacrificed himself to save everyone. When the loss of Annie's pen threatened to tear the gang apart, it was Troy's ghost story that kept them all together. And tonight, when the dangers of over-intoxication felled everyone else, Troy stepped up to the plate and took care of everyone, even driving Jeff's car in the process. Tonight, Troy abandons the traditional idea of a 21st birthday to rescue his friends from themselves. He is the first one to see that Shirley is truly upset by the jokes. He is the one who talks Annie out of her spiral, and drags Jeff, Abed, and Britta out of the bar when things have gone too far. He is the one who gets to drive Jeff's car tonight (and make no mistake that Jeff is seen as the show's traditional patriarch), and when he finally gets to order his first drink (though he doesn't get to taste it), he ignores all of the advice of Jeff and Britta and just gets what he wants.
I have never seen a show capture the melancholy of a drunken night with friends turned sour as well as Community does tonight. Honestly, I'm not sure I've ever even seen a show try. I often tell those who ask that I have no idea how much I like an episode of a show, or what grade I'll give it, until I've written the whole review. I knew I liked "Mixology Certification" from the moment it ended, but I didn't realize how much I really loved it until I wrote perhaps the longest review ever about it. This is truly one of the best episodes of Community ever. Maybe even its very best so far. Its an episode that cuts away all that is recognizable about an episode of this show, and yet comes out with a microcosm of everything this show is about. This is an episode, like this is a show, about a bunch of sad, sort of ruined people who have dead ended in their lives and come to Greendale Community College for a second chance to rebuild themselves, and have found in each other the love and support they need to do it. I love this show. I love this episode. I can't wait for next week.
Grade: A
Notes:
-"To you!" "Why did we only sing the last two words?"
-Nice KickPuncher callback.
-"They serve virgin mudslides." "Those are milkshakes, Shirley!" Good joke, that becomes something much more by the episode's end.
-"Annie, don;t accept any drinks." "Or invitations to the bathroom." I love when Jeff and Britta function as parents for the group.
-"I'm Caroline. Grew up on a trout farm, doodlee doo..."
-"You'd like that. A little turning of the tables." "What tables?" "I don't know. Leave me alone!"
-"I can't wait to understand these arguments!"
-"Plans just fall off me like chicken crap off an armadillo."
-"Alcohol makes people sad. Its like the Lifetime movies of beverages."
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