Home Again AM - 422
Well, what can I say???...
"Let's start out in nice civil tones and *build* towards the anger..."
It wasn't THAT bad... Of COURSE it was bad, but I imagined it being MUCH WORSE...
It sounds weird, because I'm, well, *emotionless*. Yes, you read that right. Emotions are always triggered by *real* sentiments, and this episode was so profoundly LACKING them I found myself *laughing* at the point I thought I was gonna *cry*... (Seriously, that ice cream scene was damn funny because it was just so DUMB!)
There are two types of characters on TV: (a) those that write themselves - that are *natural*, *free*, and that are percieved as being natural & free; and (b) those that are *written* - what you see aren't the characters, but rather the actors saying words written in the script... Now, no matter how great of an actor you are, if you have to play a character (especially if you've been playing him/her for a long time) that's doing something that just *clashes* with the already built image of him/her, it's gonna look WRITTEN. So, it gets even worse if a recurring character in your performance spectrum suddenly turns from NATURAL to WRITTEN... And that's EXACTLY what we got with darling Ally here. In this episode I saw only ONE truly sane person - Coretta. Now, if the Larry (who was also partially "written", I guess) we got here had had half a brain, he'd listen to the woman, 'cause she's SMART. And while half of the ep looks relatively okay, the other is just... gross. It's not them!!!!!!!
Most of the scenes *SCREAM* of fakeness. Yes, yes, I get the whole "situation" Mr. Robert "snuffed up" [sorry] for Mr. Kelley here, and fully understand the pressure *was* tough. But I, as I'm sure could most of you, could have lived just FINE for TWO EPS with Larry away in... wherever, BERMUDA, for all I care, instead of THIS - a potentially UNDOABLE mistake which will take a LOT of work to erase... STUPID. STUPID. And I must repeat once again for it to fully sink in - STUPID. Was this a career suicide attempt? Doesn't Kelley understand he's playing with fire (we fans are one hot bunch, are we not?)??? His work of four years is risking to go up in flames, because HE extinguished with one "pschhhikkkk" of whipped cream the flame that kept US - the fans - lit. Say it with me - STUPID.
Let's rewind a tad bit, shall we? "Even if it's now over between me and her, trust me, you don't wanna be following her, because she's... she's *it*." Uh-huh, EXACTLY. Now, PARTIAL amnesty is granted to Mr. Kelley for TWO (and ONLY TWO) lines here - 1) the "Strike 3" line - we all know what happens after the third strike, which only PROVES my aforementioned point that she's IT, and his life as WE knew it/saw it ends with the end of their relationship (it's true, don't argue with me, because you *know* it's true)... 2) "How's life so far without her?" - and in response he gazes out into space like a Bergen-Belsen prisoner... Yes. Life *is* concentration camp without her. Go on, admit it. Yeah, yeah, you.
I still don't get the "failing" line. But it probably requires a straight mindset, which I'm unable to cling on to at, let's see here, 1:39 a.m., so I won't even be digging too deep into it. Whatever.
Now, despite the many, many, MANY flaws of this episode, I was able to find *something* worth mentioning in the "plus" part: 'Music Man' reference - especially in *his* performance - fabulous; 'Cyrano the Burger King' - priceless; his EYES in response to 'how's life without her'; 'practising law without adult supervision' & the transcontinental court scenes - hilarious; 'she's nice' - 'sweetheart' - great.
BUT THAT DOESN'T MAKE UP FOR ALL THE STUPIDITY THIS EPISODE WAS INFLATED WITH!!!
"He didn't seem like himself..." - why not give him a day or two to clear his mind & go back to the way he was, and THEN deal with all the crap???
"I love you. Goodbye." - WHAT THE HELL WAS THAT????? <-- vivid example of bad character writing -- THE Larry, OUR Larry, *Ally's* Larry wouldn't leave with a STUPID note... In fact, he would've long since dropped the note thing altogether... Ya know what, babe, it's time to grow out of infancy and take some FREAKING responsibility for your actions - you don't just do whatever you want and tell your girl off with a SCRAP OF PAPER, you need time - you TALK TO HER, FACE TO FACE!!! In "HOTL" it was sweet, here it's disgusting. Here Larry was *written* as a TOTAL coward, a tactic I also strongly disagree with because it's not Larry!!!... If all were to be written as needed, NEITHER would've walked away. It was all too good for them to give up on in a split second... They love each other WAY, *WAY* too much to just walk away... Crisis management, I get it, yeah, yeah, whatever, but as I said - he could've sent him off to wherever, instead he decides to kill the ratings. Bravissimo, splendid choice. Break out the champagne. How come I don't hear any applause?!
Richard's awesome, by the way. :o)
Oh, and before I forget - one ex is bad, two's a war crime. Drop the theme.
Classic my ass.
Next week looks highly delightful. I'm tripping over myself to see it. Ugh.
God bless fanfic.
--May 19th
Yay! The joyous cry of dawning realization... Just a hypothesis here, but I think everything was supposed to go *something* like this (had he not... ya know...):
Bad dinner date because the waiter is a turdface --> Larry's upset --> Ally's even more upset
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Larry talks to Coretta who tells him to go for it, screw the omens --> Helena appears --> they go to lunch
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Ally & John walk in --> blah blah blah, ice cream on Larry, yadda yadda yadda
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Another morality lesson from Coretta --> Yet another one from Helena --> All the while Ally's majorly depressed
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Larry stops by with the "failing" speech, tappa tappa tappa, leaves --> Ally's still depressed
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THEN they make up in some unearthly adorable way (which isn't totally out of character for either, you have to agree) --> not sure here whether Larry tells Ally about the initial restaurant screw up, but he does make up for it with... [drumroll] --> a proposal, which Ally OF COURSE accepts :o)
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Which brings us to next week - titled "The Wedding", it was supposed to be just that (Lord knows what it'll end up as... ugh...); PLUS -- the "some episodes are destined to become classics" line fits perfectly with the given approximate scenario... They probably kept the preview clip for this ep, together with the "classics" line, because remontaging it would end up quite a round sum... They *did* have to cut corners wherever they could as is, because they had to reshoot the finale & part of "Home Again".
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So, let's see here -- instead of a promisingly incredible ep, we got bad character writing, previews that don't fit with the real deal, a screwed up finale and a foggy future.
Spamtastic.
--May 21st