March 15, 2014 Moff

Microeconomics and Modern Femininity

This post contains spoilers for episode 5.09 of Community, “VCR Maintenance and Educational Publishing.”

This post was going to be about something very different, and then I realized: What I was going to respond to wasn’t actually the important part of this episode. It was simply a distraction from the real point. But I’m getting ahead of myself.

This week’s episode featured the return of Brie Larson as Abed’s sometime girlfriend Rachel, as well a sort-of cameo by Breaking Bad producer Vince Gilligan. Both were part of a storyline in which Annie and Abed argued over who should move in with them: His girlfriend or Annie’s brother, Anthony.

The concurrent storyline involved Jeff, Shirley, and Professor Hickey discovering a cache of mint-condition chemistry textbooks in a storage room while organizing (another item from the Save Greendale Committee’s task list).

They decide to sell the textbooks themselves, rather than turn the books over to Dean Pelton. Britta is brought in for the use of her shady connections to find a buyer, and then Chang stumbles into the middle of the plot. Jeff, Shirley, and Hickey turn on each other, and Shirley meets with Britta’s buyer (musician and songwriter Paul Williams in a surprise cameo) in a dark hallway. But their hopes of making a quick buck are ultimately disappointed, when the mystery buyer tells Shirley the books are misprints – each volume is missing page 105 – and no one will buy the books.

As wonderfully executed as Gilligan’s cameo was – especially the tongue-in-cheek tag including a second surprise appearance, with Gina Gershon appearing as his wife – people seemed frustrated by the inclusion of Annie’s brother for two reasons: The character was grievously underserved by the writing, and there had never been a single hint Annie was anything other than an only child.

Compounded by the fact that Anthony’s character was a fantastic opportunity to shed further light on Annie’s character and backstory – whether by discovering a new facet of her personality or find a clearer reason for an existing trait – yet we ultimately learned very little that was new about her, I personally wonder why the writers believed introducing a sibling with no prior warning would make for a compelling story element.

However, if nothing else, the missed opportunity to shed light on a main character and the secret textbook sale storyline did highlight something I hadn’t noticed about Community. As much as Jeff has always essentially been the main character – largely because the show was designed as a vehicle for Joel McHale, with the established star-power of Chevy Chase – he is not the true main character.

Let’s take a quick tally of which family members we’ve met and when:

Troy’s grandmother (1.18)
Annie’s brother (5.09)
Abed’s father (1.03) and mother, sort of (2.11)
Chang’s wife (1.10) and brother (1.18)
Jeff’s father and half-brother (4.05)
Pierce’s ex-stepdaughter (1.18), father (3.2) and half-brother (3.20)
Shirley’s older sons (1.18), her husband (2.12), her baby (2.22), and a several members of her extended family (4.05)

While we’ve met none (Britta or Dean Pelton) or very few (see above) of the people close to most of our main ensemble, we’ve met all of Shirley’s immediate and some of her extended family. We knew much of her family had chosen her husband over her, and we’ve seen her gain and lose real and chosen family members (her youngest son, and her friend and business partner, respectively).

We’ve watched her journey from isolated single mother to successful businesswoman and watched her fall from grace, again, with the start of this season. We’ve watched her fall in lust (guy with dreadlocks), fall back in love with her ex-husband, and have a random one night stand (albeit with dubious consent). We knew more truth about her from day one than any of the other characters: Her husband left her for a stripper, she had two young children, and she wanted to sell her brownies and such on the Internet. We knew she was angry over the hand she’d been dealt, and her decision to attend Greendale was driven by a desire to take back control over her life.

We learned over time that she had anger management issues, that she was essentially a recovering alcoholic, and, as she herself mentioned earlier this season, that she has a problem with passive aggressiveness. Where the other characters have willfully withheld or unconsciously omitted important information about themselves, Shirley has always stuck as much to the truth as possible – even if she can and does manipulate others to advance her own cause.

If we assume, despite Community‘s creativity and rejection of traditional sitcom tropes, that one character is the audience’s point of entry and that character is our main character, the true focus of the show is Shirley Bennett, a Black single mother and small business owner with expanding interests.

It’s difficult not to want good things for Shirley, especially when she typically only works to improve herself and others. She’s had so many disappointments, and yet she is unflinchingly optimistic.

When her husband leaves her, she turns it into an opportunity to become self-sufficient. When she is kicked out of her first study group, she takes offense at their nickname for her but doesn’t lash out at them directly. When she discovers she’s pregnant, she is worried that her child’s father might be Chang, but she doesn’t keep him at arm’s length (more so than normal, at least). And when Greendale denies her the opportunity to open her own business, she refuses to accept their answer as final.

In a society and a time when women are expected to always be polite; to never raise their voice; to immediately apologize for any offense, real or imagined; to not expect their opinions to be valued unless they further those of a man; to stand down when they are told their behavior is somehow inappropriate; and to not only express shame, but to genuinely feel shame when society tells them they are not behaving like a woman, Shirley is a role model.

Shirley is not perfect. She is not always quiet. She often yells and shouts. She is occasionally violent.

She appreciates the value of revenge. She stands by her opinions, even when they are unpopular. She shows embarrassment, but she is rarely ashamed of her choices.

She appreciates a pretty face on a man, and isn’t shy about saying so. She shows a true mercenary streak, as demonstrated when she ties up her would-be partners so she can pocket the entire windfall from the chemistry textbooks.

She is polite, but she will not be cowed. She loves her children and her friends, and she fights for them. She is willing to forgive the man who betrayed her sacred trust and give him another chance.

She asserts the worth of others, even when they don’t value themselves. She is unfailingly honest, but she has the maturity to acknowledge if she’s hurt someone because they misunderstood her.

Shirley is wiser and tougher and stronger than many female characters on TV today.

She never says ‘quit,’ and she does so, mostly, with good humor and the wisdom of experience. She is the true main character of Community, and as nice as it would be for her to catch a break – Maybe Idris Elba is a deacon at her church? Or Chris Evans is an investor for Shirley’s Sandwiches? Perhaps Godfrey Gao is a different investor, who wants to open a chain of Shirley’s Sandwiches in Canada? – she never seems to ask for more than the love of her family and the loyalty of her friends.

She’s not the obvious star because she doesn’t expect to be treated with kid gloves: Shirley understands that being an adult means not only opening yourself up to criticism but learning to respond to it gracefully.

As a friend of mine said last night, it’d be nice to learn even more about Shirley’s background than we already know. But, in the meantime, I would have settled for her plan to sell the textbooks not backfiring, and Shirley making out like a~~n outlaw~~ bandit.

March 8, 2014 Moff

High School Is Forever

This post contains spoilers for episode 5.08 of Community, “App Development and Condiments.”

You remember that thing teachers make you do on the first day? When you sit in a circle, or a square all facing in, and go around the room, introducing yourself and say something about yourself? Invariably, what you say in those 30 or 40 seconds determines how whoever hears you thinks about you for the rest of the term. It’s a lot of pressure to put on anyone: ‘Hey! Say something short but funny, brief but pithy, and remember: These one or two sentences will define who you are to the people you’re about to spend a lot of time with for the next couple of months.’ When you consider that, normally, the people introducing themselves are teenagers or young adults, who may not have a fully developed sense of self – let alone know what they’ll be having for dinner – it seems extra unfair.

The unfailingly sad – and frustrating – part of life is this doesn’t stop happening when we leave school. It happens at jobs – menial, part-time and big, fancy shmancy ones – and it happens in other, unexpected circumstances. And, nearly every time, it sucks.

This week’s episode starts with another meeting of the Save Greendale Committee, wherein they’ve agreed to seek estimates on how much putting grass on the soccer field will cost.* As the meeting draws to a close, Shirley discovers Jeff has organized a dinner outing with everyone else but to which she was not invited. Jeff explains he didn’t invite her because he knew she’d be unavailable**, and before they devolve into an argument of foosball levels (and before the rest of the group fumblingly tries to reschedule), Dean Pelton arrives with an announcement: Greendale has been chosen to beta test a new mobile app.

So, this happened.

The app, created by David and Bixel (guest stars Steve Agee and Robert Patrick), is more ridiculous than its name: Meowmeowbeenz is a ‘rating’ app, where users can rate each other, and their ratings become weighted over time, with the ratings of users with higher ratings themselves given more importance.

Before Annie went all sycophant.

As you might suspect, the app, with its wide-open parameters, leads to a total breakdown of society within Greendale. Shirley and Annie, along with Buzz Hickey and Chang, advance to the top strata, while Abed hovers around the middle, and Jeff and Britta struggle to break out of the lower ranks. The rules become increasingly absurd as the levels become more and more clearly delineated.

At the episode’s climax, Jeff performs a bizarre, and offensive***, stand up act to gain the approval of and join the uppermost tier, letting Britta down after agreeing to help her overthrow the system. He and Shirley argue again, are kicked down to the lowest level of the new society, and then resolve both their current and earlier arguments. Meanwhile, Britta embraces her own absurdity and manages to overthrow the skewed social order on her own, only to impose a new, vindictive system in its place. However, when Jeff and Shirley are brought before her for judgment, Jeff manages to destroy Britta’s new world order. The episode ends with Jeff inviting Shirley to dinner. She explains she’s probably unable to attend, but Jeff has thought ahead: They can order take-out for the entire committee, which means Shirley won’t have to arrange for a different schedule to see her kids.

The first element of the episode, largely because it’s totally inescapable, is that it was designed as an homage to the 1976 scifi film Logan’s Run, with just a dash of the alternately campy and bewildering Zardoz.****

Just when I thought Starburns couldn’t get any worse

Logan’s Run is, in many ways, a predecessor to the current crop of dystopian future novels and films we’ve been swimming in for the last decade; it has nearly all the required elements. Wacky futuristic jumpsuits and/or diaphanous outfits in colors associated with your place in society? Check.

Oh, hai, Tim. Love the eye makeup. Also, a round of applause for Jeff’s cleavage, everyone!

A rigid social order that is as arbitrary as it is (mostly) understandable? Check. A dire secret that can bring the entire society crashing down? Check. A cross-social class alliance that will end in rebellion and romance? Double check.

But what’s particularly interesting is how, in the context of social satire, Community has embraced the traditional role of scifi, which is to hold up a mirror to our own lives in order to highlight the parts that are awful and ridiculous. In Logan’s Run, the social commentary focused on overpopulation and the glorification of youth culture.

Yup. You know you’ve thought it.

In “App Development and Condiments,” the commentary reflects our obsession with technology; our inability to communicate effectively with real people; and our tendency to overinvest on social media. (Full Disclosure: I fully include myself in those ‘ours.’ I’m as guilty as anyone of these same dependencies.) However, while other modern satires – The Colbert Report, Weekend Update – take a more direct approach to pointing out societal absurdities, Community used scifi conventions to show the logical (but sped up) conclusion to a new social media trend. (Klout, anyone? Twitter? Facebook? Ahem.)

The other interesting aspect of this episode was the focus on relationships. First and foremost was the tug-of-war between Jeff and Shirley. Season three’s “Foosball and Nocturnal Vigilantism” illustrated how compelling they can be when they work together, given that Jeff now is modeled on Shirley then, while season one’s “Social Psychology” showed how their similarities (both gossipy and thoughtless) make both of them genuinely unpleasant to spend time with, at times.

Oh, Annie. Et tu, Edison?

But equally interesting was how Annie followed Shirley, riding the other woman’s coattails to the popularity she presumably always wanted in high school, if last season’s “Heroic Origins” can be trusted. Yet, despite Annie toadying to Shirley’s whims, there were points where Annie seemed aware her popularity was still unstable, which speaks to Annie’s continued lack of confidence: Much like Britta, her sense of self-worth is connected to her friends, but she also lacks the confidence to build her popularity on her own merits.

Interestingly, in a subtle callback to season three’s “Horror Fiction in Seven Spooky Steps,” Abed is again shown to be the lone voice of reason in his group of friends. While the beginning of the second act sees him super pleased with everyone using Meowmeowbeenz, and the close of the same shows him tickled that he can make small talk with others in his class, he realizes in the third act that being part of the popular elite is as isolating and lonely as being considered emotionally stunted and socially inept.

I’m sorry. That is not the face of a happy Abed.

It becomes clear Abed had hoped his Meowmeowbeenz rating would help fill the void left by Troy, but what becomes clear is he’s not the same self-assured man he was in season one’s “Physical Education.” Whether his lack of confidence is a product of having had Troy as a crutch for the last four years, or if it’s a result of having lost sight of who he was because Troy was always there, Abed is both lonely and seems to have lost the spark he had back at the start.

Following on last week’s confession from Britta that she feels she has no friends, her discovery in this week’s episode that people would take her seriously only if she had mustard on her face was a sad addendum to her character having lost sight of her self worth. Now, it might be that I simply have strong Britta feelings (We do have similar names.), or it might be a matter of hating how she’s been misused and ignored for the better part of three seasons.

Shirley’s storylines have consistently been about her struggle to balance her personal and professional obligations with her desire for freedom, even if they’ve been couched in a poorly handled pregnancy arc, a poorly handled recovering alcoholic arc, and a marriage more confusing than Ross and Rachel’s on again/off again nonsense. Annie may have less backstory than any of the other characters, and the storylines she’s been a part of have disproportionately focused on her attraction to Jeff (and Vaughn and Rich and, that one time, Dean Pelton), but she’s always been represented as smart and driven. The same can’t be said for Britta.

You tell him, Britta!

Whatever the cause, I was genuinely upset by Britta’s willingness to make a mockery of herself. As much as her activism has often been played for laughs, her passion to make the world better is a huge part of what makes her believable as a person who might exist in the real world. And she’s always genuinely believed in the value of her activism, even if she’s equally aware that she’s not making a huge dent in the world’s problems.

This was simply too pretty not include.

Furthermore, her rise as a egalitarian-minded dictator isn’t as absurd when we remember this is a girl who felt her father was controlling, who was ignored by her peers as a teenager, and who made the incredibly ballsy (if ill-timed) move to tell Jeff she loved him in front of the entire student body, only to have him walk away and make out with someone she thought was a friend. (Second Full Disclosure: I am an unabashed Jeff/Annie shipper, but that was a pretty jerk move on Jeff’s part, regardless.) My point is Britta went a little mad with power, but her reign wasn’t as divisive as Shirley’s or as mindlessly violent as Chang’s; and her intentions, however clouded, were pure.

But like a lot of us, Britta is stuck. She wants to be taken seriously, but she’s unsure how to present herself in a way that won’t make others dismiss her out of hand. She’s trapped in high school and knows it, but can’t escape because everyone else is stuck there, too.

After last week, I am more convinced that Britta is on an arc where her loneliness, which is even more ingrained than Abed’s, will make her the weak link when the inevitable season-ending showdown happens. And if that showdown includes City College and Dean Spreck, well, the Save Greendale Committee will have its work cut out for them when they have to fight a foe from within as well as an outside threat.

* It’s fantastic to finally have the world of Greendale fleshed out. We’ve known for years now that their basketball team is really gay, their football team practically always loses, and the football field serves as overflow parking for the nearby mega church. But there are still little bizarre things about the campus we’ve never quite found out, as Kerry has mentioned.

** I think it speaks to the nature of Jeff and Shirley’s friendship that he knows her schedule, but also to a new commitment on Jeff’s part, after season four’s confrontation with his father, to spend more time actively engaged with his friends rather than keeping his nose glued to his phone all the time.

*** As a fellow former Seattlite, I can say that not everyone in the Pacific Northwest thinks people from New York sound the way Jeff was speaking. However, our impressions of Californians are usually more on point than when we try to mimic people from the other side of the country.

**** Unlike Logan’s Run, the social commentary of Zardoz is not really worth discussing, although if you haven’t seen it already, I recommend it if you have a couple hours to kill and you’re not huge on things like plot, story logic, or continuity.

February 28, 2014 Moff

Newton’s Third Law, In Practice

This post contains spoilers for episode 5.07 of Community, “Bondage and Beta Male Sexuality.”

Newton’s Third Law of motion, in simplified terms, is that for every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction. In a practical sense, Newton was codifying the idea that for every choice we make, or do not make, there is a consequence. There is always a consequence.

“Bondage and Beta Male Sexuality” opens with Jeff and Professor Duncan chatting in the faculty lounge, where apparently Greendale’s budget woes hasn’t meant a cut in the quality of refreshments, if Jeff’s tumbler of scotch is anything by which to judge.

Oh, Duncan. Don’t be silly: No one’s met them.

Duncan, in the least subtle way possible, opens by reminding Jeff (and the audience) that they’ve known each other for a long time, then segues into a request for help in seducing Britta. Jeff demures, but ultimately outlines a plan for Duncan: Find something Britta cares about, pretend to care about it as well, and he’ll be in like Flynn.

After prompting Jeff to give him an opening at the end of the (weekly? daily?) meeting of the Save Greendale Committee, Duncan mentions he’ll be attending a benefit for starving children with cleft palates at a local theater. Cue the ‘awwws!’ from Britta and Annie, but Duncan’s plan starts to fall apart when Britta wants to go – along with Annie, Shirley and Chang. Jeff tries to worm his way out, but bows to peer pressure from the others to attend.

Bye, ladies! See you at the end of the episode!

Later, at the theater after the show, Annie and Shirley go for a bite to eat, leaving Jeff, Duncan and Britta to have a drink at the bar. (Slightly OT: Is it normal to have a full-fledged bar in the lobby of a theater? I was reminded of the bar/gay theater in that one episode of The I.T. Crowd, but I’ve never been to a theater with a bar as fully equipped as that one or the one on Community.) Britta leaves Duncan and Jeff at the bar when she sees several old friends from her anarchist days and goes to greet them. Duncan and Jeff discuss Duncan’s plan to seduce Britta, but Jeff isn’t interested in sticking around to watch what he assumes will be a train wreck.

In all honesty, I would watch Joel McHale and John Oliver in an “Odd Couple” sitcom, even if it was only the two of them drinking scotch and arguing.

One of Britta’s old friends, Michael (pronounced ‘Mik-hael’ because why not?) thanks the people attending the benefit performance, then introduces Britta to the crowd as a ‘passionate activist.’ Abashedly, she responds that she’s only a “high school dropout bartender,” but she manages to charm the crowd with her usual mix of self-deprecation and optimism. Jeff then decides to stay, as he confesses to Duncan that he now finds Britta attractive because of her sudden popularity.

Of Nerdiness, Obsession and Social Awkwardness

In which “drink” is code for “unresolved stuff.”

However, Duncan convinces Jeff to “stand down” for an hour to give him time to make a move. Duncan’s opportunity comes soon after, when Britta’s old friends give her a hard time about not having a real, grown-up life with actual responsibilities, and she realizes it wouldn’t matter to them if she’d really ‘sold out’ or not: They’ll never take her seriously.

How can you not want to go along with whatever ridiculous plan comes out of that face?

Duncan swoops in with a handkerchief, a friendly shoulder, and an offer of to go someplace – just as Jeff’s hour runs down.

And that’s the face of a man who didn’t expect it work.

In the car, Britta explains she’s always based her own self perception on how her friends respond to and think of her, but if her old friends think she’s a joke – and as she thinks she has no other friends – she doesn’t know who she is. In a fit of conscience, Duncan tells her she’s not a joke, but decides to take her directly home, for which she thanks him.

PLOT TWIST: Jeff *is* gay. Discuss amongst yourselves.

Duncan then returns to the theater/bar, and has an awkward friend date with Jeff.

I loved the poignancy of this moment, but I wish this season wasn’t so LITERALLY dark. I’m old, OK? It hurts my eyes.

While all this has been happening, Abed spends the evening, alone, building a costume Kickpuncher costume to wear while he crashes the premiere for the Kickpuncher reboot. He’s wandering Greendale’s halls when he hears Professor Hickey grousing in an office. Abed finds Hickey at his desk, fussing with drawings that Abed then shoots with foam. In a fury, Hickey handcuffs Abed to a filing cabinet to force him to learn the consequences of acting without thinking. They spend the evening bonding and arguing and bonding some more.

Jonathan Banks was excellent, again, as Buzz Hickey, but Danny Pudi was on fire. His performance this week, along with his Nic Cage impression, make me wonder how he doesn’t have an Emmy yet.

The hashtag for this week’s episode was #AbedsLesson, which arguably gave precedence to the Abed and Hickey storyline. Hickey gave answer to a question the audience has often voiced: How does the rest of Greendale Community College view the Study Group? Previous episodes have illustrated the Dean gives them special preference; and last season’s faceoff with the German foreign exchange students, in “Alternative History of the German Invasion,” showed the other students bear resentment toward the Study Group. But in both cases, the Dean and the students who joined the German’s anti-Study Group protest were all characters who’ve had direct interaction with Jeff & Co. The only other time we’ve had a perspective similar to Hickey’s was in Season 1’s “Introduction to Statistics,” when the group interfered with Jeff’s attempts to woo Michelle Slater and she, in turn, asked Jeff if he was legally responsible for them. As Hickey rants at Abed, explaining he cannot let Abed go until the younger man learns that all actions have consequences, and that not everyone will be content to pussyfoot around, giving Abed’s feeling special consideration.

It’s particularly interesting, given Hickey’s willingness two episodes ago to play along with Abed’s campus-wide hot lava game, although his motives were admittedly mercenary. (That is, paying for his son’s wedding flowers.) At the end of the game, when Britta “killed” Hickey, he was angry, but presumably because he lost out on the $50,000 prize. However, the specifics of Hickey’s rant, coupled with not knowing precisely how much of Britta and Troy’s effort to “save” Abed, means there’s at least one person at Greendale who’s been watching the Study Group for some time and is un-enchanted with their adventures.

The Britta-Duncan-Jeff set up indicated Jeff’s cynicism in “Repilot” hasn’t stuck, as he was passed on his shot at striking while Britta was vulnerable. And Duncan’s decision not to take advantage of her, when added to his attempts in previous seasons to help the other members of the Study Group, mean he has nobler motives than his usual self-serving comments indicate.

When did Britta stop being the dark cloud the Study Group gathers under, and start being the heart of the show? No, not a rhetorical question. Was it “Contemporary Impressionists” in season 3?

At the same time, Britta’s identity crisis reveals an intrinsic weakness in the study group: Despite three years (plus the gas leak year) of comic exploits and zany, madcap adventures, she doesn’t consider the Study Group her friends. This is far more troubling than her realization that she can’t always rely on being a reflection of what others think of her, as if she doesn’t consider herself integral to the group, it makes their bonds weaker. The weaker their bonds, the easier it is for wedges to be driven between them, and for the Study Group to be divided. And, when we consider that their purpose this season is to work together to save Greendale, Britta’s Freudian slip that she has no friends doesn’t bode well for the future of our favorite community college. After all, while adding people to a situation affects group dynamics, sometimes removing someone from the same can have even more dire consequences.

What were your thoughts on the episode? Let me know in the comments, and join us next week on Twitter at @WWFTP, where I’ll be live tweeting the East coast broadcast.

February 15, 2014 Moff

A Few of My Favorite Ships

They say you never forget your first ship.

I don’t know who ‘they’ are, but I’d like to give them a piece of my mind. I didn’t realize there were things I shipped until I was about 12, and discovered Buffy the Vampire Slayer. (And its fandom.) About a year after that, I watched Reality Bites for the first time on TV, and Lelaina/Troy became the first ship I shipped so hard it hurt. But, I’m in luck because my favorite ships now, even the ones that never really existed, aren’t quite as depressing (or bad for inadvertently emulating in real life). I’d love to hear in the comments about the ships you shipped (or still do), even when they sank faster than a rowboat made of Swiss cheese.

Rumplestiltskin/Belle

Once Upon a Time

It’s not about Rumple’s self-loathing. (OK, it might be a little about that. I also root for The Hulk.) It’s not even because I have this inexplicable…thing about Robert Carlyle. (Don’t ask me to explain it: I can’t.) It’s not because I’ve always loved the story of La Belle et la bête, even though I knew it was sexist from every Women’s Studies class I ever took. And, frankly, even despite Emilie de Ravin’s turn as everyone’s favorite abused pawn on LOST, I still couldn’t quite separate her from her role as Tess on the WB drama Roswell. But there’s something about how Belle’s resiliency in the face of everyone who tells her ‘no’ – her father, Regina, that dude on the road who threw her book in the dirt – that makes her inherently appealing. She brings out the best in Rumple and believes he is capable of making amends, which is so much more important than believing he’s simply misunderstood. And, in turn, Rumple pushes her to be braver and stronger than she thinks she can be. He knows she’s capable of greatness because he sees her ability to love him as evidence of a depth of potential.

Hamish/Isobel

Hamish Macbeth

I might have mentioned I have a thing for Robert Carlyle? Right. Part of it came from this (relatively) short-lived BBC series, set in the far northern reaches of Scotland. Carlyle is police officer Hamish Macbeth, while Shirley Henderson is village reporter (and his long-suffering love interest) Isobel Sutherland. Their romance stretches all three seasons, but it’s the way the two banter and side-eye each other that makes their inability to get out of their own way worth the wait.

Mary/Marshall

In Plain Sight

Full Disclosure: I haven’t seen all of season three, any of seasons four or five, but my goal this spring is to catch up and finish. However, I think I was sold on this ship in the penultimate episode of season one, “Stan By Me,” in which Mary is abducted, and Marshall only barely hangs on to his composure. It’s a credit to the acting of both Mary McCormack and Fred Weller in this episode, as in one scene their partnership is given a depth that even previous close shaves didn’t draw forth. It’s the strength of their professional partnership, paired with their fondness for each other – even when they’re driving the other batty – that makes them so worth the investment I made as a fan years ago.

Josh/Donna

The West Wing

Does it take the better part of five seasons for anything real to happen? Yes. Does it take another two seasons for them to finally get together? Yes. Is it worth slogging through the political intrigue? YES. Trust me on this one.

Wendy Watson/The Middleman

The Middleman

I swear, it’s not a height thing or an age thing or a mentor/mentee thing. And I understand that The Middleman and Lacey’s forbidden love is true and epic, while Wendy and Tyler were the perfect proto-hipster romance. But where Lacey and MM were the ‘bells are ringing, birds are singing’ type of love, he could never tell her the truth, for a variety of reasons. Likewise, if The Middleman had made it to a second season, Tyler’s involvement with Fat Boy was always going to present a hurdle for Wendy as she would never quite be able to trust him. Consequently, it’s entirely practical for Wendy and MM to eventually turn to each other for companionship – but practical isn’t always enough for a relationship. More important than sharing a Mission (and a non-disclosure agreement), Wendy and MM had similar values, priorities, even sense of humor – and they had trust. They were friends first, and their romance? It would have been genuine and epic. (OK. Maybe it’s a little bit of a height thing.)

Anya Jenkins/Rupert Giles

Buffy the Vampire Slayer

I can’t explain the appeal of this one. Of course, it was formally introduced in season six’s “Tabula Rasa,” but I think it was their team up in season four’s “Fear Itself” that first made me tilt my head and go ‘huh.’ Or maybe even a season earlier, when Giles was the first man in a long time to stand up to Anya in “The Wish.” Granted, had they ever wound up together, one or the either would have been devastated by events of later seasons, but the good times might have made up for it.

Jeff/Annie

Community

While Rumple/Belle brought Becca and I together, it was Jeff/Annie that first introduced me to Kerry. I agree with her thoughts on this ship, but I also find I like how these two do more than bring out the best in each other: They force the other to be more inventive, to find new ways of getting things done. Or put another way, she’s just as selfish as he is, and she’s getting better at it.

Buffy/Spike

Buffy the Vampire Slayer

This was the first ship where I knew enough to call it a ship, so it holds a special place in my heart. There’s been an awful lot of ink spilt, real and virtual, about this ship by people much smarter than me. (It’s totally normal to read academic criticism about favorite TV shows, right?) But when you have a heroine who always has and always will put the good of the universe above her own wishes (Why, yes, I am ignoring the climatic arc of the season 7 comics. Thanks for noticing!), there’s something appealing about the thankless partnership between someone driven by duty and someone driven by devotion to that person.

Anne Shirley/Gilbert Blythe

Anne of Green Gables/ AoGG: The Continuing Story

If the above pairing was the first ship I called by name, then Anne and Gilbert was the first ship I ever shipped, before I even knew what shipping was. So much of this pairing comes from the chemistry Megan Follows and Jonathan Crombie shared, even as young teens, which managed to whet the appetites of a 80s audiences who wouldn’t be content with poetry recitations and tame waltzes. Still, even though I’ve read the books and seen these series countless, I still find myself hoping they’ll get together sooner than they do because they so deserve to be happy together.

Hope y’all had a non-depressing Valentine’s Day. Now, if y’all will excuse me, I’ll be hiding from Kerry for using one of her fanvids.

January 31, 2014 Moff

For want of a theme

This post contains spoilers for episode 5.06, “Analysis of Cork-Based Networking,” of Community.

Sometimes, I watch an episode of a TV show and wonder, “What version of this scene ended up on the proverbial cutting-room floor?” Or I watch an episode and think, “That was a strange cut. It totally changes the tone or pacing of the scene.” Most of the time, I know I’m overthinking these sorts of editing choices. (Full Disclosure: I have an awful habit of overthinking things, as Kerry and Becca can attest. They’ve received several early morning emails from me on the subject of my former college crush, stemming from Facebook stalking compounded by me overthinking inconsequential things. My point? Give me a topic, I’ll think way too much about it.)

Last night’s episode of Community was no exception, as I wondered how what was ostensibly the A-plot somehow became the C-plot, the B-plot slipped into the lead, and the C-plot moseyed into second place. But I’m getting ahead of myself.

This week’s episode, “Analysis of Cork-Based Networking,” was (relatively) heavily promoted, given its stable of guest stars:

Whedonverse-regular and star of ABC’s Castle, Nathan Fillion; Paget Brewster, alumna of CBS’s Criminal Minds;

ABC Family’s Katie Leclerc, best known for Switched at Birth; and action movie favorite, Robert Patrick. Plus, Jonathan Banks was back as Professor Buzz Hickey, and Brie Larson returned as Rachel the Coat Check Girl. Some of the guest spots were brief – Larson’s was tucked into the final minutes of the third act – while others, like Leclerc’s, were woven throughout the entire episode. Each appearance was a pleasant surprise, and added a new layer to the world of Greendale. (Because herpes transmitted by the water fountains? Sure. But absolutely no porn allowed through the school’s firewall? Say it ain’t so!)

The three concurrent plots were each well-realized and funny, even if their place in the plot hierarchy was a little muddled. In what essentially served as a prologue, Annie is leading a meeting of the ~~Study Group~~ Save Greendale Committee, of which Chang is now a member, and trying to assign tasks to the other characters.

Britta and Abed squabble about spoilers for Bloodlines of Conquest (the Greendale equivalent of Game of Thrones), then are tasked with updating the Greendale Community College student census. Shirley, Jeff, Ian Duncan and Chang avoid volunteering to decorate for the Mid-term Dance *until Annie says she’ll head up the group* – then they all agree to help.

Annie then puts them in charge of the dance, instead putting herself and Hickey on bulletin board posting duty.

On paper, Annie’s task is the A-plot: In the course of negotiating Greendale’s bureaucracy to have a new bulletin board put up in the cafeteria, she and Hickey encounter Fillion’s head custodian, Bob Waite; Brewster’s head of campus IT, Debra Chambers; and Patrick’s campus parking director, promising each one some weirdly specific kick-back in exchange for shuffling the bulletin board work order to the top of the queue. (Moving it ahead of “lower flag to half-staff for Reagan’s funeral,” so, really, Greendale could be further behind.) The dance committee had what appeared to be the B-plot, with Chang’s suggestion first confusing Jeff, Shirley, and Duncan, then bringing them together as a team, before finally bringing them together in shared embarrassment. And Abed and Britta’s cross-campus spoiler war, which used Leclerc’s fluency in sign language, should’ve been the C-plot: The shallowest and easiest to resolve.

This is where it gets tricky: Each of the three plots was funny and clever in its own right, letting us spend time with the characters as themselves, rather than as the extreme versions of themselves we often see in the heavily themed or homage episodes. Jeff and Duncan were their usual responsibility shirking selves. Abed exhibited a dedication to avoiding spoilers typical of his usual compulsions. Annie’s ambition was matched only by her deviousness, and both are traits that should come as no surprise to anyone who remembers season one’s “Social Psychology.”

Yet, Annie and Hickey’s plot, despite both Alison Brie and Banks bringing their A-game, lacks the charm of the other two.

It seemed unnecessarily convoluted and repetitive: For want of a looser firewall, a work order was delayed. For want of a closer parking space, a looser firewall was denied. For want of a bulletin board posting supervisor, a closer parking space was refused. For want of a toast, a bulletin board posting supervisor went unapproved. For want of a toast, a wall remained blank. And all for the want of a work order. Perhaps if the cameos had been spread out more equitably, this particular plot wouldn’t have felt as incidental, as created to provide a structure into which the guest stars could easily be inserted.

Abed and Britta’s task provides them a reason for roaming Greendale’s halls, but their plot instead focuses on Britta’s insistence on spoiling Abed for Bloodlines of Conquest. She goes to absurd lengths, matching Abed’s steps to avoid hearing or seeing anything she tries to tell him.

In the course of them avoiding each other, Abed meets Leclerc’s lip-reading and signing student, who peaks his interest. Their interactions are funny and sweet, as Abed quickly learns enough sign language to have a conversation with Leclerc.

As much as Abed’s made-up signs have all the indicators of being offensive, he almost immediately apologizes to Leclerc for not actually knowing sign language.

Meanwhile, Gillian Jacobs gives Britta’s mission to spoil Abed for BoC a gleefulness and dedication that speaks to the state of Abed and Britta’s evolving friendship: They aren’t – and may never be – besties, but her desire to annoy him isn’t done out of spite or ignorance. (Cougarton Abbey, anyone?)

Instead, Britta is poking at Abed the way she’d poke at any of the others in the study group, and, finally, without the assumption of Abed being some thing she needs to fix. I think it’s a layer that’s a result of Britta doing her best to ‘help’ Abed at the end of last week’s Lava World game, in that she finally seems to be accepting Abed needs someone to ground him, as Troy did, rather than someone who’s primary goal is ‘curing’ him. If that’s the tact the show takes, with Britta filling the same role for Abed, albeit in a different way, I think I could finally get behind her pursuing a career in psychology.

Finally, somehow the Mid-term Dance Committee plot took center stage, and in an unexpected way. The dance itself is less important than the decorating, as it’s not unexpected for Greendale to have a dance for any and every event. Chang, who has always been treated as unwelcome hanger-on by the study group and an object of derision and/or pity by his colleagues at Greendale, offers a suggestion for a theme for the dance: ‘Bear Down for Mid-terms.’ Jeff, Duncan, and Shirley are all, understandably, confused and mock Chang, as he repeats his suggestion without elaborating on what he means but grows visibly more frustrated. In an inspired choice, Ken Jeong explodes in a tantrum that is typical of Chang’s earlier behavior, but with an edge of mingled desperation and frustration as he says he knows he’s a joke and they think he’s crazy, but he genuinely wants to contribute.

It’s inspired because Jeong voices, in one brief monologue, what Community – both the show and fandom – have been saying since 2009: This show is unusual and may be best known for spurts of bizarre behavior, but it is as capable of contributing something real to the world as any other comedy, drama, network show or cable masterpiece.

Of course, there sight gags in abundance: Annie’s structurally unsound wall of success; the custodians’ enormous garage versus the IT’s department crammed into a large closet; Abed taping cans over his ears; and Neil bringing in a couple of 24-packs of soda (budget cuts?) as refreshments for the dance.

There’s added humor in clever dialogue: Dean Pelton’s insouciant “Easy peasy, lemon squeezy”; Garret screaming “IT’S A BEAR DANCE!”; Duncan’s exasperated, “You can’t just repeat it but louder”; Jeff awkwardly trying to sell the new dance theme, ‘Fat Dog for Mid-terms’; and Annie’s “EV-ERY-THING!” (It’s been a while since we heard Annie’s Loud Voice, hasn’t it?)

These all added up to a funny, strange little episode, but I’m still wondering how the plot packed with guest stars wound up the least compelling. Did it happen in editing? Was it a matter of trimming the episode down for time? Or was it intentional, some sort of meta commentary on the propensity for stunt casting? But what do I know? I overthink everything.

January 27, 2014 Moff

The Unusual Suspect

This post contains spoilers for the Lifetime TV movie, Lizzie Borden Took An Axe. It also contains some non-explicit discussion of the Borden murders. Proceed accordingly.

Sometimes I tell people what my parents let me watch when I was a wee one, and people look at me strangely. I don’t know if it’s because this new information makes some unconscious aspect of my personality make sense, or if they can’t understand how I’m not stranger because of what I grew up watching. But my parents never really saw a problem with letting me watch the nightly news, Unsolved Mysteries or Jeremy Brett’s Sherlock Holmes movies. (They did not give my older sibs permission to let me watch Heathers or Flatliners, but those also left an indelible impression.) Somewhere, in between watching 1-2-3 CONTACT and the NBC movie of the week, I also developed an affinity for melodrama. And, as I have mentioned before, I will watch nearly anything with Christina Ricci.*

Oh, Lifetime: Didn’t we almost have it all?

When I learned, late last year, Ricci had starred in a Lifetime movie about Massachusett’s infamous lady, Lizzie Borden, I was sold. I wasn’t expecting Lawrence of Arabia, but I figured Lizzie Borden Took an Axe would be good for a couple hours entertainment. I really ought to have to have remembered what network was broadcasting it.

I’m not going to get into the historical inaccuracies or the issues with characterization because there are people who will know more about this than I do, and I’d rather not flaunt my ignorance all over the place. While I’m not sure if the costumes were entirely historically accurate, I will say they were pretty without being ostentatious the way TV period pieces in the U.S. often are.

The clothes were lovely, even if they’re not quite the Victorian styles I’m used to seeing.

And while I can understand not everyone liking the choice to use contemporary music for the non-diegetic sound, I didn’t find it completely jarring. (On the other hand, I also loved Sofia Coppola’s Marie Antoinette, so maybe my taste can’t be trusted.)

What I do want to discuss is the missed opportunities in Lizzie Borden. The first article I read about this movie, back in October, included a quote from one of the producers about how the Lizzie Borden trial was the Dr. Sheppard or O.J. Simpson trial of its day. At its heart, this is a story that would still capture national attention today: A young woman is accused of brutally murdering her father and step-mother, vehemently denies it, and then all her family’s dirty laundry is aired at trial.

The start of the movie’s first act shows several potential suspects: People to whom Lizzie’s father, Andrew, owed money, and were unhappy with not being paid. The Borden family’s maid. A passing vagrant.** In keeping with the historical record, however, Lizzie is the only person arrested and tried for her father and step-mother’s murders.

In the course of the pre-trial inquest, it’s shown that Lizzie’s doctor gave her morphine to help her handle the stress of the daily questioning. Subsequently, Lizzie is shown changing her story, in the context of being stressed and confused because of her medicated state. And during both the inquest and trial, Lizzie occasionally appears either incredibly shallow or simple, commenting that the photo used by the local paper isn’t flattering.

However, aside from the producer’s decision to make Lizzie the murderer and have her confess as much to her older sister after the trial, at no point does the movie try to comment on the nature of celebrity trials or the importance of living in a post-Miranda Rights justice system.*** Furthermore, there’s no reflection on how the U.S. justice system treats women accused of violent crimes versus men; how or whether that treatment has changed over time; or even whether the Borden’s socioeconomic standing may have affected the jury’s perception of Lizzie’s guilt.

I don’t want to sound like a broken record, but the movie seemed white-washed, especially given that the entire series of events took place in the 1890s. The lack of diversity in the supporting cast of townspeople was enough to take me out of the story for a moment, even when the musical choices didn’t. And while we’re on the subject of representation, I found the indecision on whether Lizzie was a lesbian or not irksome: I realize most of the choices on the part of the production team and the actors were likely based on anecdotal evidence, but it either should’ve been an actual (minor) plot point or it should’ve been avoided completely.

Clea DuVall gave an understated performance, far more nuanced than I’ll guess the script portrayed her.

Finally, as far as the actors are concerned, I should mention Clea DuVall was excellent as elder Borden daughter, Emma. Her entire performance was understated, but the scene in which she locks her door against her sister after their parent’s deaths spoke volumes. Billy Campbell was overshadowed by his distracting facial hair in his role as the Borden family lawyer, but his performance was serviceable, if not as compelling as it might have been.

But I was disappointed in Ricci’s portrayal of Lizzie, as it felt like she had no internal life. Even at the close of the third act, when Lizzie is describing the murders in detail to Emma, the shots interspersed with Ricci splattered with gore and blank facedly swinging a hatchet, there is no indication of what Lizzie is thinking or feeling.

I really, *really* want to blame this uneven performance on the director. Christina Ricci is much more capable than this.

While portraying Lizzie as having wild mood swings might have given the character some spark, her scenes showed no identifiable shift. Instead, in one scene she’d be dour and unyielding, and in the next, unpredictable and childlike, without any rhyme to the change.

If you are trapped under your couch, unable to reach your remote to change the channel when Lizzie Borden comes on (and, inevitably, it will be replayed multiple times), watching it until rescue comes will not bore you to death. But if you are looking for a TV movie with a moral, in the grand tradition of the movies of the week that taught us college is a death trap or that we, too, might be single white female-d, you’re out of luck. Lizzie Borden Took an Axe might have been a great many things, but, in the end, it’s as unsatisfying as last weekend’s Flowers In the Attic ultimately was.

* If you would like to watch a more entertaining movie with Christina Ricci, I would strongly suggest tracking down All’s Faire in Love. It’s ridiculous and awful, but it’s still more entertaining.

** The movie indicates there may or may not have been a strange man on the property; it’s unclear whether he is a part of Lizzie’s hallucinations. I don’t know if her testimony included a mention of a stranger, but it was an element of this movie.

***The passing mention by Lizzie’s lawyer that any of her testimony during the inquest is inadmissible as she wasn’t informed of her rights is silly and a clear attempt to dumb down the material for modern audiences, who would be more familiar with contemporary police procedurals where suspects are read their rights upon arrest. However, the U.S. Supreme Court did not rule on the necessity of this until 1966, in the case of Miranda v. Arizona, more than 70 years after the Borden murder trial.

January 22, 2014 Moff

Nice Guys (and Dolls)

This post contains spoilers for episodes 1.12 and 1.13, “The Indispensable Man” and “Bad Blood” of FOX’s Sleepy Hollow.

I guess I was exceptionally lucky in college: I only came across two actual Nice Guys in the five years I was working to put myself through school and complete my degree. The first was by far the worst: After all, how exactly am I supposed to respond when a young man I’m not even dating asks if I’m a virgin when we’ve only spent a grand total of five or six hours together?

I certainly never was faced with a Nice Guy who claims he’s the only one who can save me from the coming apocalypse, then willingly turned himself into a demon when I turned him down; nor did I ever run across a guy who wouldn’t take ‘no’ for an answer, even after two centuries and his beheading. And I never met a man so incapable of empathy that he orchestrated a ridiculously elaborate revenge plot to prove his own worth and superiority. Then again, I’ve never spent much time in upstate New York. But I’m getting ahead of myself.

The first season finale picks up a couple days after the events of last week’s episode, where Capt. Irving’s daughter was possessed by a demon after George Washington’s bible, killed a priest, and was then defeated by a magic lantern. (Frankly, if the pacing wasn’t as tight or the performances as engaging, I wouldn’t believe this was a real show sometimes.) But a dead cop, let alone a dead priest, isn’t something that can be overlooked, and Irving and his daughter are both facing some pointed questions.

Meanwhile, Abbie and Ichabod are still figuring out how George Washington could have written a message in his bible in invisible ink four days after his historical death. (Although, considering how much the show has cribbed from the school of ‘wave hands, shout Freemasons’ thus far, I wondered at their focus on the ‘how’ versus the ‘why.’) However, not even our intrepid Witnesses – and, yes, there is finally a line about it being with a capital ‘w’ – can research 24/7, and so Abbie heads home to putter about in her kitchen, which is really a convenient excuse for Deputy Andy (Sadly, not the robotic one.) to creep on her in her home.

Second verse, same as the first.

They have a little tete-a-tete, wherein Andy explains his ‘in’ with Moloch, the Big Demon on Purgatory, means he gets a plus-one to the Apocalypse, and he’s inviting Abby. She’ll have none of it, or him, and Andy hares off back to his sewer hidey hole-slash-bachelor pad.

In the first of the evening’s homages to the National Treasure franchise, Ichabod and Abbie discover a letter from Zombie!George Washington to Future!Ichabod about where to find a map to Purgatory.

Zombie Washington: The hottest costume of Halloween 2014.

Our Friendly Neighborhood Sin Eater, Henry Parrish, arrives to help the Witnesses discover the map’s final resting place. Their search takes them to the grave of the priest killed in the pilot, who happens to have been an equally well-preserved relic of the colonial era, but while there, Parrish, Ichabod and Abbie are attacked by a particularly violent reject from a Cirque du Soleil production. They return to the archives, where they then realize the map is buried with George Washington, and head off to retrieve the map.

In the second homage to National Treasure, the Witnesses and Parrish discover Washington’s Mason-fied underground tomb, where they are joined by a newly demon-enhanced Deputy Andy. They manage to retrieve the Map to Purgatory, but they also destroy Washington’s tomb in an attempt to trap Andy while they escape.

How to make John Cho Even Less Attractive: 1) Remove wrinkly neck skin; 2) Add veins. Lots and lots of veins.

(Side Note: I think that destruction counts as a fake felony? Because it’s destruction of federal property? Second Side Note: I have no formal legal education.) However, as the prophecy/rumor that Ichabod will betray Abbie continues to circle, Ichabod destroys the map to both prevent Moloch from getting ahold of it, and himself from using it to rescue his wife and condemning his partner.

The tomb raiders separate for the night, with Abbie heading home, Parrish retreating to his motel, and Ichabod sitting down in the cabin to recreate the map, thanks to his eidetic memory. Meanwhile, to save his daughter from punishment, Capt. Irving confesses to the murders of the cop and the priest, then is frog-marched out through the throngs of shocked Sleepy Hollow PD staff.

Anyone else remember when Orlando Jones was best known for “MAD TV”? Cause, man, he was underused when he’s capable of this.

(And encapsulating this relatively major plot point in one sentence is not even as abrupt as the show handled it, frankly.)

The following morning, Parrish informs Abbie and Ichabod that he had a vision of the second horseman, War, being awakened sometime that day. Ichabod reveals he redrew the map, down to the special incantation needed to open the ~~Hellmouth~~ door to Purgatory. While annoyed, Abbie agrees that if the timeline has been moved up, they must use the map to go to Purgatory, find Katrina and bring her back, as she is the only one capable of stopping War from arriving. Jenny Mills appears and begs Abbie not to go messing around with these grand cosmic powers, worried Moloch will be particularly unkind to the elder Mills sister. (The entire exchange prompted me to start referring to him as Old Man Moloch, who keeps yelling at those darn witnesses to git off his lawn.)

As a sister, Jenny and Abbie’s relationship feels mostly realistic to me. Y’know, demons aside.

Abbie promises to return to Jenny, and Jenny agrees to stay close to the archives, where it is safe, which Jenny takes as orders from her big sister to comb through Sheriff Corbin’s collection of x-files, looking for further information to help their fight.

Ichabod and Abbie recite the incantation and cross into Purgatory, with a final warning from Parrish not to eat or drink anything they’re offered. (Now we can add the Persephone story to the various myths the show has used.) He also reminds them not to forget each other, as they will offered what they want the most.

Don’t try this one at home, kids.

Abbie’s deepest desire is up first, as she awakens in the cabin, calling for Ichabod but finding Corbin, Andy and fresh pie. She’s confused, but is all too willing to accept a reality in which her pseudo-father figure and good friend are both alive and whole. But when they all sit down for a slice of pie, she realizes it’s an illusion and refuses to eat her pie. The illusion shatters, and the scene shifts to Ichabod’s temptation: The love and admiration of his father, who actually renounced him when he switched sides after meeting Katrina. As they’re about to toast Ichabod receiving a full professorship, Ichabod realizes he’s trapped in an illusion, and his father does an excellent Walking Dead impression as ye olde teacher’s lounge explodes.

Meanwhile, Jenny has discovered in one of Corbin’s x-files information about an unnamed church, which, when she tracks it down and discovers the church’s name, sets her on a collision course with the Headless Horseman – literally.

Dead? Or merely unconscious?

The last shot of her is hanging unconscious and suspended from a seatbelt in an overturned truck as the Headless Horseman rides in the opposite direction.

As a dazed and disheveled Ichabod wanders among extras from Pan’s Labyrinth, he nearly stumbles over Abbie. Both are reluctant to believe the other is real, until what was a throw-away moment six episodes ago becomes integral to proving to each other they are who they say they are.

Fist bumps: They’re the new shibboleth.

From there, it’s a race to the last five minutes: Abbie and Ichabod find Katrina, who says she cannot leave without destroying the veil between the real world and Purgatory unless someone stays in her stead. Katrina and Ichabod return to the real world while Abbie is left behind, and promptly faces off against Moloch.

I’m not one to shout “FACES” about characters, but: HER FACE.

She’s unsuccessful and soon finds herself trapped inside a facsimile of the dollhouse she and Jenny had as children, unable to escape and with only teenage versions of herself and her sister for company. In the real world, Ichabod introduces Katrina to Parrish, and the three hike through the woods to Chekov’s Four White Trees, which have cropped up nearly every other episode. Unsure of how to proceed, Katrina and Ichabod dither until they are abruptly thrown against two of the trees and secured with vines as Parrish is, in fact, their own magically inclined son, all growed up and in cahoots with the forces of Evil. Jeremy ‘Henry Parrish’ Crane explains he did not die when his mother’s former coven trapped him in a grave for more than 200 years, but instead lay aware but unable to free himself until he was freed by Moloch. The Headless Horseman arrives and Jeremy/Parrish gives Katrina to the Horseman, in fulfillment of their long-broken engagement, then throws Ichabod into his own former grave and buries Ichabod alive.

Not gonna lie: This scene did remind me of Angel and Connor more than a smidge. And The Woods are as desolate as the Pacific.

Early in the season, Katrina tells Ichabod that Evil wins when good men do nothing, and his decision to disown his commission in the King’s army and join the colonists is driven, in large part, by his belief in two things: His own inherent goodness, and his desire to do something when confronted by the possibility of something worse than corruption and injustice. These two beliefs are what connect most of the main characters, to varying degrees: Abbie went into law enforcement to be a force for good, even though she came from a troubled background; Jenny risked life and limb to track and retrieve artifacts that could be useful in case of Armageddon; and Katrina aligned herself with questionable forces in an attempt to secure safety for her husband and child. While Ichabod and Irving began as skeptics, their shared belief in truth and justice were enough to carry them through events that strained the suspension of their disbelief. In the two-hour finale, the faith and trust these characters have in their cause, themselves and each other was severely tested. And as it wavered in the face of deeply held desires, they were weakened.

But here’s why I was so excited at the prospect of Abbie and Ichabod trapped, helpless and alone; by Jenny hovering on the edge of death; by Irving sacrificing his freedom; and by Katrina carried off by her former fiancé, now the embodiment of Death: They believe in their own goodness, but they aren’t arrogant about it. Where Moloch, the Headless Horseman, Parrish and Deputy Andy are certain they cannot be stopped, the show illustrates how the White Hats are plagued with self-doubt. Ichabod, Abbie, Jenny, Katrina and Irving never assume their plans will work, or that those plans will work exactly as they hope, especially as there isn’t exactly a “World Saving for Dummies” they can reference.

Yes, because telling Abbie Mills what to do is generally quite effective.

Furthermore, the agents of Evil assume the women involved in this story are less of a threat, that they are helpless without a man or backup. While the show has never shied away from killing anyone, Abbie, Jenny, and Katrina are not traditional Final Girls: They may be punished, but not for behaving in an unladylike way. They are not forced to run from the demons that chase them; most of the time, they don’t run at all, choosing instead to stand and fight. They are post-Final Girl heroines, embracing their flaws and femininity, and using their wits to defeat their enemies, rather than a well-placed pitchfork to the sternum.

In the same way Nice Guys underestimate the women they alternately fetishize and belittle, Sleepy Hollow‘s forces of Evil are focused on stripping Ichabod and Irving of their power and authority, believing it is enough to frighten, threaten and shame Abbie, Jenny and Katrina into submission.

Evil has grown arrogant, and that is its greatest weakness, as it assumes Abbie, Jenny and Katrina are no more than pawns, dolls which can be moved about arbitrarily without consequence. The finale elegantly sets up what will surely be a firecracker of a season two premiere, and I, for one, cannot wait to see the forces of Evil crumple under the weight of its own smug self-satisfaction.

January 18, 2014 Moff

Sperm, Lies and Polygraphs

I still remember where I was when I heard Dan Harmon had been fired from his own damn show following season three: At a table on the patio of a bowling alley with two friends from college, watching my college crush at the next table over while also trying to avoid eye contact with the retiring professors for whom we were all gathered at the aforementioned bowling alley. One of my friends came back from the bar with drinks, the setting sun turning her curls gold, sat down and said, “You were at work all day, so you probably didn’t hear about Dan.” Confused, I looked to where another of our former classmates, named Dan, stood, and looked back at my friend, blinking like a tiny puppy. My friend explained she meant Harmon, and the three of us spent the next 20 minutes wondering how it could even be possible.

As goes the Dean, so goes my nation.

Then we had the Oct. 19 Debacle, and, finally, season four premiered in February. And, sure, it wasn’t the same Community we’d all fallen in love with: The rhythms were different, the focus wasn’t as sharp, and not all the jokes landed properly. I didn’t love season four, but I love the cast, in character and out, and I was simply happy to have them back on my screen. I only missed one episode, last April, when Yvette Nicole Brown came to my city and was part of a panel discussion at the public library. (Yes, I got to meet her. Yes, she is as charming and lovely and gorgeous in person as she is on screen. And, yes, this is the only time I will ever consciously name-drop.)

Now, I don’t know how many of you watch the show because you love it, warts and all, and how many watch because they believe Harmon can do no wrong. I think tough love – that is, looking critically at things you value and expecting more from them – isn’t something you do only when you’re unhappy with that thing you value; it’s something you do all the time, even when you’re happy with the thing. After this week’s episode, it’s time for some tough love, so if you’re looking for rainbows and glitter, go ahead and skip this post. I won’t take it personally.

This post contains spoilers for episode 5.04 of Community, “Cooperative Polygraphy.”

The fourth episode of Community‘s fifth season picks up sometime shortly after “Basic Intergluteal Numismatics,” with the study group returning from Pierce’s funeral and shucking the sky blue robes and beehive hats of the Church of Neo Reformed Buddhism. Chang enters and asks if Pierce’s funeral was fun, but the Study Group tell him they’ll all miss Pierce. Chang calls shenanigans, recalling all the times they complained about Pierce and even tried to evict the older man from the Study Group.

Up to this point, the episode is funny, if a little slow, joke-wise. And, after rewatching earlier today, I like to think the episode could have handled the inevitable fall-out of Pierce’s death in a variety of ways: A visit from Gilbert sparks questions about Pierce’s will, or even his legitimacy as one of the Hawthorne Wipes heirs; or perhaps the remaining members of the Greendale Seven would have returned to Pierce’s home. Maybe even a group project that would have highlighted the role Pierce played in the group dynamics. Instead, we watch as Pierce posthumously throws one more wrench into the works, engaging a professional to administer a group polygraph, ostensibly to determine if anyone in the Study Group (or Chang) murdered him.

As a concept, the group polygraph is a slightly less clever premise for a bottle episode than the search for Annie’s purple pen in season two’s “Cooperative Calligraphy,” but it’s not as far-fetched as some shows. (For instance, this week’s Person of Interest took place in the course of one plane ride and was as thrilling as ever, but the story has been done in the last several years by shows as varied as Human Target to Covert Affairs. It wasn’t bad, but it felt a little flat, as far as bottle eps go.) And, unlike season four’s “Paranormal Parentage,” this bottle episode was rather elegant in the way it drew parallels with “Cooperative Calligraphy.” Jeff and Britta’s abortive romance in season two; Annie’s need drive to succeed at all costs; Abed’s inability to understand appropriate boundaries;

Using a friend’s bathroom? OK. Secretly using a friend’s shower? Not so much.

Shirley’s desire to be seen as selfless and peaceable; Chang’s peculiar relationship with the Greendale campus; and Britta’s government-related paranoia are all referenced.

Britta, I have a Libertarian friend you would *love.*

Like the previous three episodes this season, the tone of life being darker is prevalent, as the group’s revelations are harsh and uncomfortable, even though the study group’s delivery was spot on for much of the action. In particular, Shirley had a couple particularly good lines, which is nice to see as hers is a character written into a box more often than not.

*So* many reactions on Twitter. Was it the tone? The words? But people loved it.

And Danny Pudi’s delivery “Your faces are changing” was reminiscent of some of Abed’s season one and two scenes, before his defining characteristic became the isolating behaviors that always set Abed apart from his friends.

At some point, asking why Danny Pudi’s never been nominated for an Emmy becomes redundant – and painful.

Plus, while I’m not generally a fan of Ken Jeong’s broad comedic choices as Chang, his ‘confession’ was so daft but still serious I was surprised into laughter.

This whole bit was gold.

However, the Study Group’s confessions were a sliver that irritated me as the episode aired Thursday and again when I rewatched, and were part of why I wish now the episode had handled the aftermath of Pierces death differently. As I mentioned earlier, I didn’t love season four, but I felt one of its redeeming elements was the attempts, however clumsy, to give the characters legitimate growth. For instance, as much as Joel McHale acted the hell out of the scene in which Jeff confronts his absentee father “Cooperative Escapism in Familial Relations,” using Britta as a catalyst for that confrontation never sat well with me, nor did the show’s ham-handed attempt to illustrate how little Jeff really missed given that Bill Winger’s other son was shown as a total disaster. Likewise, Abed’s epiphany that Troy would always find him, in “Conventions of Space and Time,” was unnecessary given Annie had already helped him to that conclusion in “Virtual Systems Analysis” in season three; but Britta’s confirmation of Troy’s fear that another man was trying to steal his best friend was a sweet nod to her knowing Troy well enough to respect Troy and Abed’s friendship. And for all the problems involved in “Heroic Origins,” it was nice to finally see a sliver of Annie’s backstory and to discover the rehab group she mentioned back in season one’s “English as a Second Language” was not a fabrication on her part, but a reality, further reinforcing the importance of the Study Group in her life given her abandonment by both her biological family and her fellow recovering addicts.

As the confessions came during the rounds of questioning during the polygraph, learning that Shirley still blindly put her own preferences over her friend’s (the substitution of tofu for ‘meatfu’ to save money); that Britta wouldn’t automatically guess Troy and Abed putting themselves first in case of the zombpocalypse; that Abed would overstep the boundaries of privacy and bodily autonomy by implanting trackers in all his friends; Jeff was still as hell-bent on collecting proof of his own importance (the box of sexual trophies being akin to the get well cards he collected after his faked appendectomy);

Ugh. Adrian Grody

and, perhaps most troubling given her comments in “Repilot,” that Annie has had access to methamphetamines for years, but also still sees them as a legit route to success, were all troubling. The confessions felt less like seeds for future storylines and more like Harmon flipping the bird at the thought that his characters might be capable of growth and change.

As much as I appreciate Donald’s face – and I really do – I would’ve liked Troy to be more active.

Further troubling was how underused Troy was in this episode, especially given this coming week is his final episode of the season. His confessions – that he didn’t invent his and Abed’s handshake and had not been to Legoland – felt shallow and superfluous, especially as the wedge between he and Abed had already been driven into place in “Repilot.” (Frankly, the wedge has been there since the end of “Contemporary Impressionists,” and wasn’t exactly helped by the antics of “Basic Human Anatomy.”) Similarly, he wasn’t integral to the action in “Cooperative Calligraphy,” so at least it was parallel in that repsect. I hope “Geothermal Escapism” will give Troy the farewell he deserves, but my fingers aren’t quite crossed yet.

I’d be remiss if I didn’t mention Walton Goggins excellent turn as Pierce’s hired gun, Mr. Stone. I’m familiar with him from FX’s Justified as Boyd Crowder, who is arguably my favorite character on the show, despite Timothy Olyphant’s flawless- assets. Goggins’ Boyd has incredibly messy personal ethics, but that messiness is a hell of a lot more relatable than Olyphant’s U.S. marshal, who is troubled but ultimately prone to uphold the law.

“Justified” doesn’t have really long seasons. Maybe Walton Goggins can have a sitcom on cable, too?

As Mr. Stone, Goggins is delightfully straight-faced, which makes his carefree exuberance in the tag worth the slog through the ugliness the Study Group trots out during the course of the first 20 minutes.

When it was announced Dan Harmon was returning for season five, it was the icing on the cake of a renewal for a fifth season and even helped soothe the hurt of that fifth season being only for 13 episodes. Rather than a 20 minute discussion, my two college friends and I exchanged a few thoughts on what might happen. I imagine that’s the difference a couple years make: We’re a little older, a little less prone to wild speculation, and a little more focused on becoming the people we’ve tried to be. I guess it’s a shame Harmon isn’t ready to let the Study Group focus on doing the same.

January 13, 2014 Moff

At the Corner of Downton and Gosford

This post contains spoilers for episode 4.3 of Downton Abbey, and references the 2001 film Gosford Park. This post also contains discussion of sexual violence; please be advised before proceeding.

In advance, I want to apologize for the wall of text here, but this isn’t really an episode that leant itself to pretty caps and quippy captions.

It’s not unusual to see a ‘Viewer discrestion is advised’ placard at the beginning of a PBS program, but usually, it’ll show up at the start of a program like Frontline, where images of warfare or the aftermarth of natural disasters isn’t softened with artful editing. But I was surprised Sunday evening when the placard appeared before the start of the third episode of British import, Downton Abbey. Like nearly any young adult raised in the U.S. in the 90s, I took the placard as short-hand for ‘something violent and/or sexy is going to happen.’ (And, considering this is the U.S. and I was watching PBS, my bar for ‘violent and/or sexy’ was considerably lower than it might be were I watching a DVD, or if Downton aired on basic or pay cable.)

I was correct, but, oh, how I wish I hadn’t been.

But, first, let’s talk about Julian Fellowes. My first knowledge of him came from watching the mostly charming, if occasionally disjointed, British TV series Monarch of the Glen. Fellowes, a published author and actor, played ‘Lord Kilwillie,’ a bumbling aristocrat who lived across the loch from the main characters and was somehow successful in turning his grand Scottish estate into a tourist attraction that could sustain itself. I’ve also read his 2004 novel, Snobs, although I didn’t find it particularly memorable.

However, it wasn’t until after I’d seen Monarch that I realized one of my favorite movies was ostensibly written by Fellowes. Gosford Park, which was released in 2001, is arguably a dry run for Downton:It has the same bored society toffs; the same grand country house in slow but steady decline; the same intrigue and gossip tying the people above stairs to those below; and, in Maggie Smith, even the same acerbic delivery of complisults. In fact, different casts aside, the only obvious difference between the movie and the TV series was that Gosford was structured more as a whodunit, though more Pink Panther than Poirot.

Oh, and there was one other difference: Gosford Park included a tertiary storyline where one valet saves a ladies maid from an attempted rape by another valet.

It makes sense in the context of the movie, as the valet who interrupts the assault, played by Clive Owen, is in fact the illegitimate son of a young woman who was harassed by her employer and later coerced into a sexual relationship with him. There are parallels and intersections, and both the events of the past and the current incident are handled with a deft touch for a plot point that isn’t part of the primary story.

But after the third episode of Downton‘s fourth season, this distinction no longer exists.

This episode focused on a house party, presumably intended to provide a context for a visit from Dame Nellie Melba (portrayed charmingly by Kiwi opera singer Kiri Te Kanawa) and to introduce widowed Lady Mary Crawley to some new eligible young men. But, in the last 15 minutes or so, the real purpose of the house party is revealed: To provide a plausible reason for a snake to have slithered into the grass of the grand estate.

One of the eligible young men invited for Lady Mary is Anthony Gillingham, a childhood friend who’s all grown up and inherited his family’s estate, which is in poorer shape than Downton itself. Lord Gillingham brings with him his valet, Mr. Green, who immediately appears to set his sights on head house maid Anna Bates, whose romance with John, Lord Grantham’s valet, has been the longest and most successful romance in the course of the series’ three seasons.

(They’re both still alive, neither of them cheated on each other, and they managed to thwart a death sentence.) Over the course of several days, Green flirts with Anna, while her husband grows increasingly annoyed with both Green’s behavior and Anna’s failure to put him in his place.

The last evening of the party concludes with a performance by Dame Melba, during which Anna excuses herself to take something for a headache. While in the kitchen, she’s joined by Green who offers her a drink from a flask, which she refuses, and who then asks whether her ‘cripple’ husband can really keep her happy. He kisses her, she shoves him away, and he backhands her. Anna runs from the kitchen, screaming for help, but Green catches her in the laundry room.

Sometime later, Green reappears in the foyer to catch the last of the performance. He then heads upstairs to prepare Lord Gillingham’s room for the night, while housekeeper Mrs. Hughes heads downstairs with Bates, joking about Anna pretending a headache to skip out on the performance.

Mrs. Hughes enters her room to find a shaken and disheveled Anna crouched in a corner. She quickly realizes what has happened, then agrees to find a fresh dress for Anna, although she urges the younger woman to tell someone what happened to her. Anna refuses to tell anyone and later shies away from her husband when he goes to help her put on her coat so they can walk across the lawns to their house. Bates is confused and concerned, especially when Anna essentially runs out of the house ahead of him.

Of course, there are other things that happen in this episode, but the above-stairs plots pale in comparison to Anna’s story. I’m undecided on how to react to this episode, and here’s why.

Anna is essentially the heart of Downton Abbey: She’s been in every episode, and has been privy to both the triumphs and the tragedies of Lady Mary, whose inability to inherit the estate is the real catalyst that sets the events of season one (and every season following) in motion. Her quiet romance with Bates illustrates the idea of ‘friendship set on fire,’ and her devotion to proving his innocence made the ‘Free Bates’ arc of seasons two and three bearable, despite that storyline long outstaying its welcome. And it’s Anna who comforts scheming footman Thomas when Lady Sybil dies, despite his history of belittling Bates and actively trying to get the other man fired.

On one hand, I am really not a fan of using sexual violence (abuse, assault, etc.) or its threat simply as a plot device because it cheapens and normalizes the crime in a way that I think can be dangerous. I also hate when rape (or its threat) is used to make a female character seem stronger. I find it sloppy and lazy, and I think it’s unnecessary practically every time: There is always a better way of showing a character’s strength, up to and including actually making her or him physically strong. And, please understand, I’ve used this device in short stories I wrote when I was younger, and I also have read and watched plenty of stories that used sexual violence as a means of showing a woman’s strength. But, if age hasn’t given me wisdom, it’s at least given me some perspective, and I’ve arrived at the opinion that if you can replace a woman being raped or threatened with rape with, say, holding her at gunpoint; strapping her to something where she’ll burn to death; threatening to kill her lover, pet or family; or any one of the other multitude of ways of destroying someone’s spirit (and/or killing them), then maybe you should reconsider whether you’re holding a character’s bodily autonomy hostage because it’s the only logical route – or because you’re going for titillation over quality.

On the other hand, as poorly handled as Matthew Crawley’s death was at the end of season three, Fellowes has done a fair job of juggling a multitude of characters, each with their own motivations and levels of investment in the survival of Downton. His writing and characterization aren’t perfect, but looking at other large cast shows (Lost, Heroes, Once Upon a Time), there are plot holes Fellowes has managed to either avoid or stumble out of before becoming bogged down in them.

Furthermore, by making Anna the subject of this plot twist, Fellowes picked one of the few characters historically mature enough to make her initial reaction and the consequences that will follow both believable and resonant. I’m not saying another character wouldn’t have been as worthy of sympathy or justice, but Anna’s storylines so far have been largely reactive, whether it’s been her relationship with Bates or her service for Lady Mary. This is a meaty storyline where Joanne Froggatt will have the chance to show who Anna is when she must make her own choices and not simply react to other’s decisions.

Additionally, because this is happening to the Anna of season four, she is less likely to be defined by her assault. When fans describe the show to non-watchers, she won’t automatically be ‘the maid who was raped by another servant’; she’ll be ‘Anna, the house maid who freed her husband from prison and kept a raping d-bag from assaulting other women in service.’ At least, I hope that will be the case.

Finally, as divided as I am over the events of this episode, I was struck by Phyllis Logan’s performance when Mrs. Hughes found Anna in her room. What I know of the rules of service, there was as much a hierarchy below stairs as there was above, and authentic friendships weren’t common. But Mrs. Hughes’ reaction, compounded by her automatic correct conclusion as to what happened, was stripped of all rules of propriety, instead showing compassion from one person to another. (It also made me curious about Mrs. Hughes’ background, that she was able to jump straight to the truth.) And I’m definitely a sucker for ladies being friends – almost as much as I am of ladies doing science.

December 25, 2013 Moff

It’s really been grand

You made it! The wrapping papers been cleared away, the roast beast leftovers have been packed away, and the fire may be burning low in the grate. (Or you have finally turned off the yule log and poured yourself a drink.)

However, if you’ve sat through a day of being asked about your future, you may want to curl up with your favorite screen and a movie where things are bound to work out well because, well, they’re written that way. So refresh your drink, maybe grab a nosh and settle in for a long winter’s veg.

Movies are presented in no particular order, and trailers may include spoilers.

The Shop Around the Corner (1940)

If you like You’ve Got Mail, then you really ought to watch the original. The story’s slightly different, and instead of email, Jimmy Stewart and Margaret Sullivan do this crazy thing where they hand write letters to each other. Madness, I tell you.

Watch: Amazon | YouTube

Christmas in Connecticut (1945)

Mistaken identities, roaming cows, a joyride in a stolen sleigh: The hijinks of the 1940s, amirite? But Barbara Stanwyck is a force to be reckoned with as she tries to save her job and not fall for the fella she just met – who’s a guest of her fiancé.

Watch: Amazon | YouTube

Never Say Goodbye (1947)

I hope you have some crackers left over from tonight’s appetizers because this movie’s bringing the cheese. But if you can bear to overlook the excessive optimism, there are worse ways to spend an hour and a half than watching Errol Flynn make an ass of himself.

When Harry Met Sally (1989)

While not technically a holiday movie, the major scenes do take place between Christmas and New Year’s Eve. Also, I’m loathe to admit it, but I think finding a Billy Crystal is a lot easier than finding an Errol Flynn or Jimmy Stewart – or even a Meg Ryan, if that’s your preference.

Watch: Amazon

The Sure Thing (1985)

If you like: 10 Things I Hate About You, John Cusack, classic 90210, or Edie from Desperate Housewives, this movie is for you. Conversely, if you’ve ever wondered what Harry and Sally were like while they were in college, this is the movie for you. My point is, you should watch this movie. (Full disclosure: I love it so much I even managed to reference it in a short story I wrote.)

Die Hard (1988)

Bear with: First, this movie takes place during Christmas. Second, everything John does is in the pursuit of saving his wife. Third, they reconcile at the end. It’s the perfect blend of romance and senseless violence. After all, Pat Benatar was not wrong: Love is a battlefield.

Watch: YouTube | Amazon

If all else fails, Love Actually should be on cable at least twice between Christmas and New Year’s Day.

We Watch for the Plot

No really, we do.

Moff’s Posts

Microeconomics and Modern Femininity

High School Is Forever

Newton’s Third Law, In Practice

A Few of My Favorite Ships

Rumplestiltskin/Belle

Once Upon a Time

Hamish/Isobel

Hamish Macbeth

Mary/Marshall

In Plain Sight

Josh/Donna

The West Wing

Wendy Watson/The Middleman

The Middleman

Anya Jenkins/Rupert Giles

Buffy the Vampire Slayer

Jeff/Annie

Community

Buffy/Spike

Buffy the Vampire Slayer

Anne Shirley/Gilbert Blythe

Anne of Green Gables/ AoGG: The Continuing Story

For want of a theme

The Unusual Suspect

Nice Guys (and Dolls)

Sperm, Lies and Polygraphs

At the Corner of Downton and Gosford

It’s really been grand