Honestly, this might be the best episode of Modern Family so far. It really did have everything. The characters were pronounced, the family was forced to work together, and I cannot count how many times I busted out in laughter. From Mitchell shimmying down a rain gutter in his Spiderman costume, to Gloria trying to ditch her accent so people can understand her better, almost every character has a great line.
What a complete turnaround from last week’s episode. Not only does it almost hit on all its jokes, but if we are to take the show seriously as having mythology (and why wouldn’t we, we’re all fans) it maybe the most important episode of the show.
Cartman’s superhero identity returns this week along with Mysterion, and a cavalcade of new heroes forming their own form of justice league, “Coon and Friends”. These characters date back to last season’s episode The Coon and it is cool to see that Trey and Matt are still expanding the South Park character mythos. The real danger this week is BP and their apparent inability to ever drill for oil without causing a catastrophe. The BP jokes are well done for the most part, but the “We’re Sorry” sections, while funny at first, do go on a bit too long but not terribly so.
Am I missing something, or is this is the first time the show has made reference to Jim and Pam being Christians? This week’s episode was framed around the christening of their daughter Cece, and due to Michael’s obnoxious tendency to thrust himself way too far into his employees’ lives, he invites the whole office and for some reason they all show up. I don’t object to the Halperts being Christians, they just never seemed very religious to me, and it just seems weird that this is the first we see of that part of their lives. Also, it further calls into question the purpose of the cameras. They’re supposed to be documentarians filming the goings-on in a typical American workplace, right? So why are they brought along to weddings and baptisms and stuff like that?
Coming off what I believe to be the best episode of the series, Halloween, this week’s episode could have slumped after that high, but luckily that wasn’t the case. While Chirp is not a classic episode it is funny and great in its own right. Phil is going through some hard times at work and the constant beeping of a smoke alarm might drive him to insanity. The metaphor is obvious and for the first time that I can remember we feel sorry for Phil. The usually happy and attentive character seems off and trouble “being the man” only makes his day worse. The women in the Dunphy house are sick and their conversation is one that neither seems to understand, which is great.
Last night’s Weeds was more of the same from last week, as the Botwin clan stuck around in Dearborn and followed up on the hanging plot threads. A bit disappointing after I had come to mostly enjoy the road trip feel of the season, and the story didn’t exactly charge ahead to compensate. Nancy still needs passports for her family, so she asks the Arab she’s been selling the new drink to, Hooman, if he has any connections (why didn’t they try this in the first place?). He suggests someone in town who can help name Daoud, if they remember to tell him that Hooman sent them. Also, a man has to go, because Daoud won’t deal with a woman. Nancy asks why they treat women this way, and Hooman says it’s because they’re terrified of them.
In the early moments of The Walking Dead, AMC’s tense and atmospheric new horror series, our main character, deputy sheriff Rick Grimes (Andrew Lincoln) awakens from a coma in a hospital bed to an entirely new world. It’s one where the streets are filled with wreckage and corpses, and there isn’t a (living) soul to be found. The city is hardly deserted, though, as the dead still shuffle around, driven by an insatiable need for flesh. It’s an opening that anyone familiar with zombie-films will recognize, perhaps most famously from 28 Days Later. It struck me as strange that while this was just one of many references to known zombie-lore, none of the characters in the show seemed aware of any of this.
“Home,” the seventh episode of Boardwalk Empire’s first season, deals with the emotional scars carried around by its characters. In case that is at all unclear to the viewers, each of the three characters the episode focuses on have physical scars to go with their emotional ones, and the visibility of their wounds directly corolate with the depth of their personal issues. As narrative tricks go, it’s not exactly a subtle one, but that doesn’t make it any less effective.
Sunny gave us a mystery this week and along the way the gang attempts to piece together their fragmented memories of a rather outrageous Halloween party. The set up is good and while there are some missteps along the way the episode is an overall success and the best episode of the season so far.
This hilarious chapter ends Kenny and Stevie’s adventure in Mexico. It’s nice to see that the growth that Kenny went through last season has stuck with him. He’s finally done running and is returning to America and baseball. Pat Anderson is the unlikely hero
