Episode 6x20 "The Truth About Honesty"

Our four heroes are all in the bathroom at the same time because friends love to shower and shave as a team. As usual, Angela seems completely superfluous. She has lines, which is better than usual, but she doesn't actually contribute anything. But hey, she signed a contract, might as well write her into the show. Cory is grossed out by Topanga having used his razor to shave her legs, and honestly I'm surprised Topanga even shaves her legs at all. Actually, back in "Cory's Alternative Friends" in season 1, Cory says "You're going to be one of those girls who doesn't shave her legs, aren't you," and she answers that she hasn't decided yet. I know you've all been on the edge of your seats since then, this plot thread taunting you with its dangling threadiness, so here you go. We finally have the answer. 

BOY MEETS WORLD REVIEWED. FIVE STARS. Critics are raving, "Yeah it's okay but I'd rather just watch the show."

Anyway Cory lies about being grossed out, but Angela tells Topanga the truth (they're all still in the bathroom), so Topanga decides to make a giant mountain out of the smallest molehill I've ever seen. Like those molehills in Banjo Kazooie? Smaller than that. Topgangrene declares that they have to be 100% completely honest with each other from now on. Cory thinks it's a good deal, but Shawn can see danger from a mile away. Well, from the other side of the bathroom. I don't know how far that is.

We've transitioned to the coffee shop side of The Union, and I'm seeing on the side of a mug that this place is called Brew Lagoon. I probably should have caught that a long time ago. Topaljs;dj comments that "My Petite Chou" is playing at the university theatre, and I swear they used that earlier the series. It's not a real movie, and it sounds so familiar, so it must have been on this show... 

Cory, inspired by his new honesty powers, declares that he doesn't want to see My Petite Chou. Or the Icecapades! Because he can't get in trouble for honesty now, and darn it, he doesn't like the Icecapades! Eric strolls in with, allegedly, Joshua in a baby carriage, but it's pretty obviously empty. Jack and Rachel show up next, exhibiting what I've decided to call "The Chubbie's Phenomenon", or Chubnomenon. The Chubnomenon is characterized by people independently showing up in quick succession. Apparently Jachel are having their "first dinner party". Everyone agrees to go, except Eric who doesn't want to deal with the emotional turmoil of being there.

Eric: "Will you be making tater tots?"

Rachel: "Oh I'll make tater tots."

Eric: "Well then I'll be there."

Eric takes "Joshua" outside and pulls a Shawn, that is, woos a woman with lies by pretending to be the baby's father when she takes interest. And it's about time too. Eric hasn't had a girl since Jennifer Love Fefferman in 5x17. Amy and Alan continue the Chubnomenon, and actually pretend to be Joshua's grandparents to help Eric. They're probably just sick of Eric crying over Rachel, and will say pretty much anything at this point to get him to move on.

It's time for the dinner party, and we join our heroes in the elevator up to Jachel's apartment. Topanga has styled her hair in a way that I can only describe as "crinkle fries", and Cory is... well, see for yourself.

See? He wants to eat it. Cuz it looks like french fries.

He plays the "you want me to be honest" card again, describing in vivid detail how much he hates the crinkle fries hair. Funny stuff. Angela doesn't have any lines. 

Inside the apartment, Rachel is inspired by Corpanga's honesty deal to play a version of Truth or Dare for people that are afraid of dares. I mean, for God's sake, what if they dared you to say a bad word?  Anyway it's called The Honesty Game, and you draw a name out of a hat and ask that person a question, which they have to answer truthfully. 

Everyone is laughing at Jack's erection, and he's embarrassed. (It makes sense with the picture, sorry mobile users)

That was just too perfect, I'm sorry. But seriously, pants are so frustrating, that shit happens all the time.

 The running gag of the night is that Jack is too passive and doesn't voice his opinions, which certainly wasn't the case when he was constantly calling Eric a moron in every episode prior to this one. It's still pretty funny though, Matthew Lawrence does a great job with it. Eric arrives at the party with the girl he met earlier, Dana. As Shawn eloquently points out with a posh accent, this should be interesting since Eric has told Dana nothing but lies. Refer back to the logo to see Eric's opinion of Toplorable's hair. 

Eric: "Ahh, honesty, excellent, excellent, that's what they teach us at law school."

Crinkle Fries draws Shawn's name from the hat, and asks him who he wants to spend a no-strings-attached night with, out of everyone on earth. That is a seriously saucy question for Topanga, like, I would expect Cory or pretty much anyone else to ask that before Topanga. Regardless, he says Angela because the writers aren't quite finished boring us to death with that. At least she has an interesting response.

Shawn: "Whaddya say to that?"

Angela: "Let's do it."

Topanga and Cory have some... interesting faces there.

Angela makes it clear that this has to be no-strings, no commitment, no emotional attachment, and then they head into... someone's bedroom. Now see that's the most interesting thing Angela's ever done. But I guess that's not saying much. Rachel asks Cory what he would change about Topanga if he could change any one thing, literally the third time this question has been asked tonight, demonstrating just HOW MUCH FUN this game can be. Props to Topanga for asking something else.

Everyone including Topanga expects Cory to make some comment about sex, but he actually says he doesn't want Topanga to need to be perfect all the time. This is confusing, since a few episodes ago he demanded that she act like the old Topanga, who, in addition to being "weird", needed to be perfect at everything. Regardless, she doesn't agree that she always needs to be perfect, and proves it with the harshest thing she's ever said.

Topanga: "Then why didn't I go to Yale, Cory? Why am I here at Pennbrook with you?"

Rachel is either as shocked as I am, or she, like Cory, wants to eat Topanga's crinkle fries. She did make tater tots, but it's just not the same.

Even though Topanga blatantly crossed the line, she decides that she is the victim and leaves the party, with Cory chasing after her. Rachel blames herself since she started The Honesty Game, but Jack explains that the party would have been bad no matter what. That's a touching sentiment, and Rachel appreciates it because she's not Topanga.

We take a trip over to the love shack, which is actually Rachel's room. Huh. My money was on Eric's old room. Poor Rachel. Shawn and Angela are going at it pretty hard while some cruiseliner saxophone music is playing in the background. Shawn's having trouble following the statute of "no emotional attachment", which is slightly backward from how things ended between them with Shawn unable to make a commitment, but I'm sure this will develop more as we go on. 

Well I'm... pretty sure it's Rachel's room, but... I guess you never know...

OKAY HERE WE GO NOW, Cory and Topanga are in the elevator to leave and they deal with the whole Yale shit pretty quick, BUT THAT'S NOT IMPORTANT HERE. Topanga comments, as they embrace, that she just wants to be able to use his razor, that she doesn't want a relationship that's just two individuals living under the same roof. Cory is still grossed out by the idea, even more by the idea of her using his toothbrush.  Oh, crap, we have to go back to the love shack real quick, but remember this, I love where this goes.

Shawn decides that it's a good time to confess his love to Angela, who really doesn't want to hear it, and then pushes him off the bed. 

Shawn: "I Cory'd this up, didn't I..."

Shawn realizes that he's starting to adopt some of the relationship values that Cory and Topanga have, and he's not exactly happy about it.

OKAY HERE IT IS, back in the elevator, Topanga's exploding about how ridiculous it is that Cory won't share his toothbrush if they're going to spend the rest of their lives together. Cory asks her if she can handle real honesty, and that is exactly what he brings to the table. "The truth is, I could never share any of my personal items with someone who won't even show me her tushie!"

Cory: "No tushie? No brushie!"

OHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH

OHHHHOHOHHHH SHIT SON.

What really seals the deal is that Crinkle Fries almost immediately agrees that that's fair. She's been demanding total emotional connection while holding back the physical connection, and because she's a rational human being she is able to admit that that was a bit one sided. Awesome. That is the kind of relationship development you want to see. A+. 

Corpanga re enter the party, with Cory declaring that he has "seen the promised land", and I mean, as far as I'm concerned, boobs are the promised land, but Cory is allowed to have his opinion. Angela and Shawn leave the party for some reason now. Sure the moment was ruined in the bedroom, but they might as well eat, I dunno. 

Cory: "If you'll notice, only the honest couples are still here."

Eric, to Dana: "Yeah the bullet hurt."

Eric goes on to claim that he is also Batman. As we all know, Will Friedle was the voice of the new Batman in Batman Beyond, which was an awesome cartoon, and it started airing a few months before this episode aired, so yeah, nice work, writers. Eric has been hilarious.

During the credits, Cory uses Topanga's deodorant in The Bathroom, which she thinks is gross, so I can't actually tell if we made any progress at all. Shawn follows Angela into the bathroom, another instance of the Chubnomenon, but he claims that he's not following her and doesn't care about her at all. She gives him a big smooch, but he stands his ground. Angela leaves the bathroom, raising the question of why she came in here to begin with, and as soon as she's gone Shawn hops over for a cold shower. The Hunter Boys' erections are out of control in this episode. 

Eric never got his tater tots :(

Plot: 1.0 - I don't have any real problems with this. I don't know anyone who hosts dinner parties at 19, but it was a fine excuse to have an ensemble episode. We haven't had a good one of these in a long time.

Character Development: 1.0 - Shawn's feelings for Angela re-emerge, Jack and Rachel actually seem like a genuine, functioning couple, and Cory and Topanga make some progress in their relationship as well. Great stuff, although Eric is still stuck in his lie-tacular situation. He doesn't seem to mind though.

Humor: 1.0 - Everybody was great. No complaints.

Life Lesson: 1.0 - Physical intimacy matters. And keeping it no-strings-attached might be harder than you think.

4.0 out of 4.0. Going into it, I didn't expect to give it a full score, but I really have nothing bad to say about it, and a lot of good things. Some real relationship developments happened here, and it was a lot of fun getting there. Anything negative in the writeup was just for comedic effect. I hope by now it's clear when I'm being negative for humor and when I'm being negative to be critical.

Thanks for reading, see you Wednesday.

All images used under Fair Use.

Episode 6x19 "Bee True"

This might be my favorite logo ever.

Eric is intent on progressing the relationship between Dean Bolander and Mister Feeny, which at present is nothing more than professional, and perhaps friendly. We learned in My Baby Valentine that Feeny had the hots for the Dean, and we've seen the two interact several times in the past. By the Light, they've actually laid (lain? fuck "lay" and all of its conjugations, that shit is TOO confusing) the groundwork for this pairing. It's so simple, and it makes such a difference. The point is, Eric is working to motivate Mister Feeny, while Topanga and Angela put the moves on Bolander. As the three women enter The Union, the Dean explains that she's fond of Feeny, but he needs to "pick up the pace."

I was hoping for Topanga to drop in about "destructive gender biased thinking" (re: Turnaround in Season 2), but she doesn't, and so it falls on Mister Feeny to make the first move. Fortunately, Eric is doing a commendable job of coaching his mentor.

Just as the Feenster is about to spill his heart to the Dean, some chump in a multi-pocketed vest named Lester barges into The Union and the Dean rushes over to hug him. "Lester" is probably the most old-man-ish name I can think of. Well that sure throws a wrench into things.

Lester tries to woo Bolander, clearly an old flame, but she introduces him to Feeny, perhaps oblivious to Lester's advances. Also, his name isn't actually Lester. It's Curtis. I checked, and she has called him Curtis the whole time. I am apparently an idiot. Anyway, Curtis is in town to give some presentation about his top secret archaeological find in Africa. He is also, as we now learn, Bolander's ex husband. I think this picture alone would have been a sufficient replacement for everything I just wrote.

Oh wow, he even says right here in front of everybody that he intends to win her back. What a bozo.

This next scene... is special. I want to do it justice. Every line deserves a gif or a quote or a mention. Shawn and Cory are working a table for a bake sale, and Eric has come to them to ask for a favor, in the style of that daughter's-wedding-favor stuff from The Godfather, and they're all doing the  Italian mobster accents. Eric needs them to run a "scheme" on Feeny and Bolander, the type of scheme they used to run all the time in high school. It may very well be the best scene this season. As you can see from the background and the logo, I'm quite pleased with this. Further, Cory reminds Eric (and the viewer) that he's on probation after he punched Stuart earlier this season, so it's riskier than usual to pull any hijinx.

Shawn: "We're legitimate now."
Cory: "We're in the bake sale business."

ERIC AND FEENY.
SHAWN AND CORY.
A SCHEME.
HILARITY.
CONTINUITY.

IT'S EVERYTHING. IT'S PERFECT.
And the best part is that, in my ignorance, I've only seen this episode a couple times. I don't remember anything except how it ends, it's like seeing it for the first time. I'm so excited.

Anyway, by the end of the scene, Shawn and Cory look like they've decided to go for one last caper. And the audience cheers at the end of that scene, one of the, like, three times in the series that I approve of that.

Meanwhile, Jack and Rachel arrrrrrrre making out. That's pretty much all we've seen of them since Chet died. But hey, it's fine with me since it frees up Eric to do interesting shit. Which is exactly what he's been up to the last few episodes. Oh, wow, Rachel's first line is "Have you noticed that this is all we do?" See I could totally write this show. So the tall one explains that she wants to go on dates and stuff, and decides for both of them that they're going to go dancing the next night. She asks if Jack knows how to dance, so I guess she's never heard the story of Last Tango In Philly. Jack doesn't seem too happy about going out though, which is supposed to make us interested in this plot thread. It does not succeed.

In what must be Mister Feeny's... archaeology class... containing the four youngsters as well as Eric, that Curtis guy is giving an Indiana Jones type story of his own adventures, to the raucous applause of the students. His arrogance finally tips our heroes over the edge. It's go time, you sack of bitches.

Cory: "But let's not get caught like all the other times, okay?"
Shawn: "Okay!"

The next scene is... interesting. Shawn and Cory sneak into the science lab where all of Curtis's archaeological findings are being kept, intent on making a big mess. It devolves into breaking stuff, in particular while trying to open a jar containing a preserved human brain. It's sort of frustrating to watch, because they're just wantonly breaking priceless artifacts, like some kind of Urkel or Kenan & Kel type thing, but it's still funny. I rather enjoy how Shawn somehow knows the names and details of various artifacts, like "Hand me that ancient Phoenician mallet." So yeah, it's fun because it's Shawn and Cory, but breaking stuff has never been my cup of tea.

Now we're in Feeny's... quantum mechanics class... which must be a meta joke at this point, but the audience doesn't laugh, so I dunno. There's no way he's qualified to teach this class, especially since he misspelled BOSON on the chalkboard as "bozon". More like BOZO, AM I RIGHTTTTTTTTT?? THAT'S HUMOR, FOLKS.

THAT IS HUMOR.

More specifically the board says "Higgs Bozon", and as we all know the Higgs was fairly recently confirmed to exist, over at CERN.

 Eric isn't actually enrolled in this class, but he's here anyway just to annoy Feeny about the Dean, which is accomplished fairly quickly. Feeny dismisses the class, probably because he realized that he's not a physicist, and explains to Eric that he thinks it's proper to allow the Dean to sort things out with her ex husband before he makes a move. Eric disagrees, citing his loss of Rachel to Jack as evidence of the need to act, rather than wait. He never really had a chance with Rachel, but I mean, his advice is still solid.

Aaaaaaand we're breakin' stuff again. Cory accidentally drops the brain's jar onto a jar containing some sort of bee, which is let loose to wreak its stingy havoc as a result. The boys open a window to intentionally set off an alarm, calling in the only man capable of hearing it in this universe, Mister Feeny. But that was their plan, so it's a fun piece of self-aware humor. Time to initiate phase 2 of the great comeback scheme: blame everything on Mister Feeny.

Shawn: "We didn't break this stuff."
Feeny: "Well who did?!"
Cory: "You did!"
Shawn: "And we're telling!"

The Jack/Rachel sidestory is so unimportant stacked up against the Shawn and Cory adventure going on, but the abridged version of this next scene is that Jack feels like a shrimpy pity-case going out in public with Rachel. As such, he's wearing "Manly Step-Ups" for added height as they're about to leave The Apartment. Interesting to note is the fact that the Hunter men are only capable of wearing black leather jackets on dates. She convinces her shorter boyfriend to stop worrying about it, and whaddya know, the problem is resolved and they head out.

The scheme has reached critical mass. Dean Bolander arrives back in the science lab with Cory and Shawn, as well as Topanga, Angela, and Eric.

Everyone is supporting the "Feeny did it" story, and it goes like you can imagine, like it was a crime of passion, or whatever, and the Dean seems to think that justifies it. Curtis shows up, and doesn't give a shit about anything in the room, including the Dean herself, except for that bee. For weird and unimportant reasons, the bee is going to save thousands of lives, but Feeny kills it as it's about to sting the Dean. (Angela actually has a line in this scene, but of course it's about Shawn.) So yeah, Curtis is still a jerk, and Feeny gets the girl. Everyone's happy.

Except Shawn and Cory, who have to wash windows as punishment.

During the credits is some crap with Jack and Rachel, IT'S NOT IMPORTANT AND I ALREADY FORGOT IT.

This episode is absolutely wonderful. I had so much fun, start to finish. I'm not even gonna bother breaking it down, it's a 4.0, no question. Destroying valuable artifacts for the sake of romance isn't a great life lesson, but whatever, it's not about the points, it's about the spirit of the points. Or something. Best episode of the season. I know you guys get the point after six seasons, but SHAWN AND CORY. ERIC AND FEENY. Respectfully, there are people who enjoy Cory/Topanga the most in this series, and I would never say that they're wrong, but what Corpanga story this season can even come close to being this entertaining? I'm honestly asking.

This is one of those episodes that's perfect for people who've never seen the show before. I'm really happy right now, it feels like the show is alive again. As far as I'm concerned, this should have been the episode named "resurrection".

But you don't have to take my word for it. Watch this one. Absolutely watch this one.

Thanks a lot for reading, see you next week to close out this season.

All images used under Fair Use.

Episode 6x18 "Can I Help To Cheer You?"

In The Union, Cory and Topanga are arguing about wedding stuff, but it's lighthearted and fun, making us feel right back at home after the previous episode. Over in the coffee shop half, Eric and Tommy are having some treats. But things get heavy real quick, as Tommy asks his Big Brother if adoption is ever going to happen. I feel like Tommy was either misled, or never had the situation properly explained to him, but either way you gotta feel bad for him.

I said in the last review that Tommy isn't the worst child actor, but that was clearly not true. Or isn't true anymore. Every line is a test of your will and your patience. And I barely passed.

Cory, Topanga, and their respective best friends are, I don't know, sitting-in? on a wedding ceremony to see what sorts of things they want to include in their own wedding. If this sort of activity does actually exist, it seems reserved to a time before the internet, yet here we are. Topanga claims this sort of things happens all the time, and that they just need to keep a low profile.

We meet two new fellows off to the side, the groom and the father of the bride, but they aren't getting along very well. The F of the B is named Stan, and disapproves of this man marrying his daughter because he's a kindergarten teacher and doesn't make much money. He wants this guy to join his plumbing company to have a higher salary and provide nice things for his daughter. Yeah I know, lots of exposition, and the worst thing is that most of it doesn't matter, which we'll see in a few minutes.

Stan and Cory take an immediate like to each other.

For the sake of creating a narrative, Stan asks Cory to marry his daughter, going so far as offering him a million dollars to do it. He claims that it's because Cory is nice and polite to him, and therefore deserves his daughter's and in marriage. It's completely insane. And if he's got a million dollars to throw at the first guy he meets, why does he care how much money the other guy makes as a teacher? (Also worth pointing out is Michael Jacobs's continued theme of the underpayment of teachers.) And Cory doesn't even have a job! He has zero income and is probably in debt, but somehow he's a better fit. I guess it's supposed to be nonsense? And we should derive some sort of humor from how nonsense it is? It really doesn't feel that way, but it's the only thing that makes sense.

At home, Eric's discussing the Tommy sitcheeashun with his parents, who both agree that it's impossible and irresponsible for Eric to adopt him. This point is driven home by Eric's inability to zip up his pants without catching his shirt.

Eric complains that everyone he knows has someone they want to dedicate their life to: Cory to Topanga, Jack and Rachel to each other, his parents to the new baby. He says Tommy needs him, but it's clear to the viewer that Eric needs Tommy just as much. So our boy with twenty rings on his fingers and a still-unzipped fly goes to call the adoption agency to.

Amy: "You're saying you're going along with this? The kid just pulled his shirt out of his fly."
Alan: "No one else could do that."

That's actually really funny. It's a shame they don't give more jokes to Amy, she's got great delivery and voice, but I guess there's only so much to go around. And it's usually serious stuff whenever she gets involved.

Anyway Eric returns from his phone call with the news that a family wants to adopt Tommy, so he heads down to the orphanage to see what's up. Eric has a cute little dialogue with his Little Brother, insisting that they can still be Big and Little brothers, but that won't work. This family lives in California. To quote Eric, "I don't want them to live in California." In the heat of the moment, Eric declares that he's going to adopt Tommy.

The orphanage matron or whatever there is Mrs. Gallagher, played by Nia Vardalos. Nia went on to take the lead in My Big Fat Greek Wedding, but before Boy Meets World she voiced one of the main characters on "Team Knight Rider", a spinoff of Knight Rider. As we all know, our own Mister Feeny was the voice of KITT on Knight Rider, but it doesn't look like KITT was in the spinoff, likely a big reason why the spinoff failed so quickly.

Back at the wedding, Shawn thinks Cory should.... take the money. Cory doesn't want to, because he loves Topanga, so Shawn decides to cast his lot in with Stan.

Shawn: "You're a winner. And I'm a winner. And we winners need to stick together and marry each other's daughters. I'll go first!"

This wedding story is cripplingly boring, and not funny enough to beat out the boredom. You would think that Eric's story is the main story today, and usually the main story gets the majority of the screen time right? But I just time it, and it's almost an exact split with Cory and Eric both getting about 10 minutes of the episode.  We're bouncing between "oh my god my heart is breaking" and "I don't care about this, why are we at a wedding".

Back in Emotionville City, Eric's filling out the paperwork to adopt Tomothy. Mrs. Gallagher explains that the other family is pretty great, and successfully adopted a girl from the orphanage when they used to live here in Philly, expertly closing that plot hole of "why are they adopting here if they live in Cali".

Gallagher is doing a magnificent job as a character (in addition to being extremely well cast), guiding Eric through this incredibly difficult and painful decision, since she knows that Eric can't possibly go through with this. She's helping him as much as she helps Tommy. She knows as well as we do that Eric is still a child at heart, still so innocent, just like Tommy. And it's definitely deliberate, having Eric say things like "I don't want them to live in California," to show us that he's still got that kid in him. It's not nearly as well developed as Eric/Feeny, but it's still wonderful to watch because Tommy brings out the best in Eric, just like Feeny did. Full disclosure, this episode makes me ache for poor Eric, and brings him back into the spotlight to remind us why he's the most loved character in the show.

So Eric finally understands that he has to let Tommy go, and braces himself for the showdown.

Eric: "I'm not gonna adopt you."
Tommy: "I don't like you anymore."

I'm not gonna lie to ya, it's rough. This is one of those scenes that really messes me up every time I see it. And if it was anyone in the world other than Will Friedle... I don't think it could have worked half as well.

If you're on mobile, you are missing out right now. That's A+ television right there. Granted, a lot of its power comes from the fact that we've seen the whole series up to now and we love Eric, so it's hard to say how a casual viewer would feel here. Hopefully it wouldn't be lost on them.

Maybe it's supposed to act as a cushion after that last bit, but we have to go back to the stupid wedding now.

There isn't even anything to review, really. The procession starts and Shawn makes me laugh, which is cool, I guess.

The bride is pretty, which is supposed to make us think that Cory's actually having a difficult time with this decision. And look at Angela, tryin not to laugh.

Cory begins to imagine himself being fed grapes by the bride on some beach, and thus instinctively raises his hand when the minister asks for objections to the marriage. He can't control himself at this point, and he ends up doing the most bull shit thing I've ever seen in my life. I mean this is some Full House shit right now. Cory gets up and makes a fucking speech to a crowd of people he doesn't know about how important love is and THEREFORE HE'S NOT GOING TO STEAL THE BRIDE. He doesn't explicitly say that last part, but jeez, it's so insanely ridiculous.

Cory: "I don't know any of you... But um... I guess I should say something very important now."

Wasn't the one rule to keep a low profile? But here's Cory god damn Matthews, making a speech about how important love is in front of a bunch of strangers on some random folks' wedding day. Un. Believable. UNBELIEVABLE. Who could have POSSIBLY written this! It's laughable, which might be fine if it were tongue-in-cheek, but it's not, because the audience isn't laughing. This is disgraceful after such an amazing scene with Eric. And then they all trot out of the wedding hall on their self righteous high horses as if Cory's opinion is actually worth a god damn thing to these people.

IT'S NOT.

At home, Amy and Alan try to console their poor son. Alan has a line that sounds like "Kids are a zillion", which doesn't make any sense at all, I honestly cannot figure out what he's supposed to be saying. Tommy shows up at the door for a goodbye hug from Eric, which is sweet, but I'm still sour over that absurd speech at the wedding.

During the credits, Shawn has taken over the beachside fantasy, but for some reason he's wearing blue jeans and his shoes. Someone didn't think this through.

Let's separate this episode into halves. The Cory wedding half gets a 0 for plot, 0 for character development, 0.5 for humor, and 0 for life lesson. The Eric half, on the other hand...

Plot: 1.0 - Tears your heart apart. Why are we tearing all the characters apart? Shawn, Eric, The Matthews family had some trouble with Joshua, what the heck is going on here? For Eric, at least, it hit all the right notes. I would have liked it better if Tommy hadn't shown up at the end, but I can't blame them for going for the happier ending.

Character Development: 1.0 - Eric wrestles with his inner child and comes out on top. With the help of Mrs. Gallagher, of course.

Humor: 0.5 - Obviously they couldn't make it too funny, with the nature of the story, but that's okay.

Life Lesson: 1.0 - Sometimes you have to make those hard decisions for the greater good.

Either 0.5 or 3.5 out of 4.0. Seriously what the fuck was that speech at the wedding, I can't let it go. It's just so out of place and unbelievable.

Thanks for reading, see you Friday.

All images used under Fair Use.

Episode 6x17 "Resurrection"

Hey kids, time to gather 'round the campfire. Take a seat, get comfortable, and plop your marshmallows onto the ends of your sticks for roasting. Fill your lungs with a refreshing breath of that mountain air, and take a quick glance at the stars, unhindered by the city lights we're so used to. Are you nice and settled? Lovely. Now pay attention and listen up while ol' Grandpa KBM tells you a story. Once upon a time, fuck this episode.

You can't center an episode around whether or not a newborn is going to die. By default there are only two paths we can take. Either he lives and the whole episode is just one big emotion-bait, or he dies and what the fuck you just killed a baby and now the parents are going to spiral into depression. Looking at our options, it's about 99.9% chance the baby lives, so any suspense in the plot is automatically wasted. It's not like Chet, who we already had an attachment to, and actually could have gone either way. Added to the fact that we've all seen this already and know how it ends... like... what am I holding on to here? Is the life lesson the power of medicine? Yeah science and medicine kick ass, but that's not why I'm watching this show.

Let's get this over with. Right away the redhead doctor who used to be a journalist informs the parents that they're getting a new doctor, a specialist with newborns, and even he isn't sure if their baby is going to live. But we're sure, so *snore*.

Out in the waiting room, Cory is once again making this all about himself. It's difficult to even explain what he's talking about because it doesn't make any sense. He wants Topanga to be there for him, which she is, but it.. doesn't count..? because she's not acting like she used to when they were kids..?

Topanga: "I don't like it when you use "us" to hide from the rest of life, Cory."
Cory: "I don't like it that you're not Topanga anymore."

That was an expert deduction by Topanga, I'm glad SOMEONE understands what he's doing. But of course he responded with insanity that makes you want to punch him in the face. It immediately fades out of that scene, over to Eric hanging out with Tommy at The Apartment. This is one of those remote cases of continuity, as we first met Tommy all the way back in the Christmas episode, number 11. The writers have shown us a certain amount of respect by not blatantly reminding us who Tommy is, and I appreciate that.

Ever since Jack and Rachel "got together", Eric's been acting less like himself, which Tommy picks up on as the two of them pack Eric's suitcase.

That's actually kind of adorable. As child actors go, Tommy's certainly not the worst.

Jachel come home, pleading with Eric not to move out. Okay so that's what the suitcase is for. All one of the suitcases. The topic of conversation shifts over to the baby dying, and Tommy decides he wants to go visit Eric's new brother in the hospital. The audience thinks it's cute, but it seems obnoxious to me.

Topanga comes home to her dorm and holy shit it's Angela. All we've had to say about her the last few episodes is that she wasn't there. Topanga explains what happened with her dumb boyfriend, and Angela comments that Topanga is handling the baby situation "very maturely", but clarifies that that's not a compliment. Oh god this can't be happening. Angela's insane too.

Topanga begins to reminisce about her time as "the weird kid" in season 1, and tells Angela the story of helping Cory with "a poem for school" when she danced around his kitchen and  put lipstick on her face. She's referring to 1x04, "Cory's Alternative Friends", and is giving a false account of what happened. It's nitpicky, but they might as well have just said what actually happened.

Angela tries to convince Topanga to indulge in Cory's lunacy. "Dance around him. Help him through what's going on." I get the sentiment here, like do whatever you have to to comfort him while his little brother is dying, I get that. But Topanga had the right of it when she told him not to hide from the rest of his life. He needs comfort, that's fine, but he still needs to face the situation.

Maybe Feeny will help. Cory finds the old man having coffee at The Union and explains his frustration with Topanga.

Feeny: "She's growing up, Cory! So are you!"
Cory: "But why does she have to grow now?"

I'M LEAVIN YA CORY. THAT'S IT. TIME TO REVIEW FRESH PRINCE.

I mean come on. MAYBE we could have a real conversation about this if he wasn't completely bullshitting right now. Topanga grew up at the beginning of season 2! She stopped being weird when she started seventh grade. You are in college now, Cory. Have you paid literally no attention to your girlfriend for the last five years?!

Instead of responding to that question, Feeny offers to take Cory to see his baby brother.

We're in the ICU now with Amy, Alan, and some other concerned parents. Amy has decided to name her new son "Joshua Gabriel Matthews". Biblical-Figure Archangel Matthews. See the problem with that name is that it's not cheesy enough. Was "God Christ Matthews" already taken? I just gave a moment to thinking about naming, and it occurs to me that if, on Girl Meets World, Auggie's middle name isn't "Shawn", then the entire show is a waste of time. I feel like that would have come up in the Christmas episode, so it's almost certainly not the case, and that's pretty disappointing.

So Mista and Misses are hanging out with their baby, and Alan tells God to "come on", whatever that means. Eric and Tommy watch from a window and then head home. We see that Topanga still hasn't strayed from her path, as she and Cory have another completely insane fight.

Topanga: "We can't have that relationship anymore."
Cory: "Why?!"
Topanga: "I'm not like that anymore."
Cory: "Why not?!"

Are you seeing this shit? Is Cory ten years old right now? He never cared a moment in the last five years that Topanga wasn't "weird" anymore, but now that he needs something from her, he thinks she's a villain!

Just then, Shawn arrives at the hospital, back from his road trip that lasted, what, a week? Cory's first reaction is to say "Shawny", which he neglected to ever say in the Christmas episode of Girl Meets World, something that a large number of fans have taken issue with. Shawn says all the hopeful things Cory needs to hear, that everything's going to be okay, all the fun they're going to have with Joshua in the future... And this all turns Cory's attitude right around. And that's fine. It's heartwarming to see Shawn bring Cory back to life. I don't have a problem with Cory wanting some hope to hold on to. It's just bull shit the way he's taking out his anger on Topanga, who has done absolutely nothing wrong.

The doctor suggests that Cory go in and talk to Joshua, and Shawn and Topanga tag along.

Doctor, to Shawn: "Oh I'm sorry, family only."
Alan: "Um, he is family."

That's really sweet, but I can't ignore the fact that she didn't try to stop Topanga. And how does she even know he's not family? What a jerk.

So the trio are in the ICU with Joshy Josh now, and it's pretty uncomfortable to watch. The slow, evocative music is playing while they talk to Josh. It's the definition of emotion-bait, and all I can do is roll my eyes. Let's make a note, though, of what Shawn says in his ridiculous monologue directed at this day old infant. "Don't go out of town. Don't go anywhere. Life is right here with these people, with your family. And my family. We got the greatest family there is, Josh." IS THAT RIGHT, SHAWN. IS THAT A FACT. BECAUSE I'M PRETTY SURE YOU DO THE EXACT OPPOSITE OF THAT SHIT WHEN RILEY IS BORN A FEW YEARS FROM NOW. Spoilers, if you haven't watched that Christmas GMW, Shawn left town when Riley was born because, and here's the kicker, he didn't have a family. This is the worst.

That right there is the smug face of a man who never takes his own advice.

At The Apartment, Tommy and Eric goof around some more, and then Eric takes the last of his things out the door for good. It fades back to the hospital where the showrunners did their damnedest to make us think that Joshua had passed away, but he is in fact ready to go home with his family. And then the audience fucking applauds and cheers as Amy and Alan walk off camera. Are you serious with this?

The parents proceed out to the waiting room where everyone else is, well, waiting. Shawn makes some comments, and Angela's right next to him, but she's had zero lines since that one scene in the dorm with Topanga.

Topanga draws on her face with lipstick to remind Cory of who she used to be, and Shawn's response is the same as it was in 1x04, which you might not know if you weren't me.

Shawn: "Use a mirror babe."

You can see Cory's head peeking into the shot at the end of that gif, and he's got the lipstick heart on  his face too, but that hasn't happened yet, as you can see in the first part of the gif. So that shot of Topanga's smiling face is... not where it's supposed to be.

So yeah, Topanga draws on Cory's face too, and they agree to be each other's Valentine, even though that was several days ago. The very last shot of the episode shows us the ICU again, and how all the other parents are still there.

Credit where credit is due, that may be the best artistic choice of the whole series, showing us that last shot of the ICU. They could have left us feeling good and optimistic, but Jacobs said "No, make it real." It's powerful.

(The credits are just the logo and music.)

Plot: 0.25 - It's dumb! We're already almost certain that Joshua isn't going to die from the beginning, and at the end there's no real exposition about it. He just... got better. My opinion on this probably doesn't sit well with some of you, and I'm sorry, but this one just doesn't do anything for me. Especially with Cory being an asshole the entire time.

Character Development: 0.75 - For Eric moving out, and Topanga bringing back some weirdness. I do like the idea of Topanga bringing back some weirdness (which I don't think comes up again after this episode), I just hate that Cory demanded it from her after five years just so she could make him feel better.

Humor: 0.25 - Almost none.

Life Lesson: 0.5 - Hope is important, but if a newborn is teetering on the edge between life and death, you really ought to come to terms with the reality of the situation.

1.75 out of 4.0. And that's the end of Grandpa KBM's story. I don't like this episode and I never watch it. I don't think Topanga's weirdness comes up again after this episode, and everyone seemed to validate Cory's assholeness the entire time. I just don't enjoy anything that happened, except for that very last shot of the ICU.

Thanks for reading, see you Wednesday.

All images used under Fair Use.

Episode 6x16 "My Baby Valentine"

Well.... At least it's Friday...

Cory's having a phone conversation with his best buddy because Snapchat wasn't invented yet. God, can you imagine Cory on Snapchat? What a nightmare. Anyway Cory's talking about his Valentine's Day plans, including the fact that he's got his "red turtleneck for the romantic carriage ride". Why not just wear the rainbow suspenders and a bowtie too? I guess he's not getting laid no matter what, so it hardly matters.

Shawn's at some truck stop on the road, and he's afraid to wish Cory a happy Valentine's Day since this crowd of cowboys is behind him. Now that's confusing to me. It sounds like we're supposed to think these are some tough customers who won't take kindly to any of that man love, but even in the 90's I would have thought cowboy outfits were sort of a "gay" thing. Either way, they're cool with it, and the audience laughs, reaffirming the idea that we should have assumed they weren't. Weird.

Cowboy: "Ain't nuttin wrong wishin another man happy Valentine's Day, ain't that right boys?"

Good for you, progressive cowboys.

As the phone call ends, Topanga arrives in Cory's living room. They dredge up the past concerning last year's catastrophe of a V-Day, I'm not sure why, maybe they're just reminding the audience what happened. Apparently Topers had to pick up Morgan from school since Amy forgot, again. Morgan's having some "left out" issues with the new baby on the way, which is just about the most cliche pregnancy storyline you could ever write. Because of said issues, Topanga invites Morgan to... spend Valentine's with her and Cory... What...? WHY WOULD YOU DO THAT?! Seriously, Cory getting cockblocked at every opportunity isn't funny after the 20th time.

The parents and Eric come home and it's... pregnancy-palooza. Amy is difficult to deal with, lots of lazy jokes from pretty much everybody, and finally Topanga decides to throw a "Valentine's Day Baby Shower" for Mrs. Matthews. I can't really explain why, except that it advances the plot.

Topanga: "It'll just be us girls."
Cory: "That's discriminatory, and I won't stand for it."

I don't really remember this episode, so I'm going in blind here, but I'll be thoroughly surprised if it doesn't involve the words "my water just broke" at some point.

Topanga insists that this baby shower won't interfere with her and Cory's plans, but he's not satisfied with just words, and I can't blame him at all. This is some bull crap Topanga's pulling right now. So Cory decides to take command of the baby shower, but of course, he doesn't actually know anything about baby showers.

Well at least some people are getting intimate this Valentine's Day. Jack and Rachel are going pretty hard in the same spot they made out both times in the past: the couch. They agree that they should tell Eric about this blooming romance, and then start kissing again. A well-crafted scene, all things considered. Haven't seen teenagers acting like teenagers since, like, season 4. I'm assuming they're 19, but maybe they're 20, whatever. You know what I mean.

It's baby shower time, and "the joke" is that Cory is doing literally everything wrong. And that horse is dead and beaten very quickly. He even hired a male stripper for the party, who shows up doing the pizza delivery man routine. And let's remember that Morgan is at this party, but oh, okay, Amy covers Morgan's eyes as soon as the stripping starts. So yeah he starts his routine, and manages to get his shirt off before Amy sends him packing. The funniest things about this are actually really subtle, and you'd almost certainly miss them if you weren't trying to write a blog about it. I only noticed because I paused at the right time. So yeah, two things, the first is Angela's reaction to the guy taking his shirt off...

And the second is Morgan's reaction.

Amy was using her hand to cover Morgan's eyes, so Morgan lifts her mom's hand to peek at this guy. That is easily the funniest Morgan moment in the series, and honestly it was probably improvised. Very funny, very easy to miss.

Amy declares the party over after she gets rid of the stripper, and sullenly walks offcamera. Topanga is angry with Cory and so she cancels their plans for the evening, and storms off upstairs! Honestly, what did she expect here! Both Amy and Topanga know perfectly well that Cory is a moron most of the time, and now they're upset that he did moron stuff.

The men have organized a poker game at The Apartment to take place during the baby shower, so that's where we are now. Jack's just about to break the Rachel-news to Eric when Feeny and Alan barge in. The sweater-vested old man has a real spring in his step today, and goes so far as to hug Eric and tell him he loves him "like a son". That's pretty fuckin significant to just idly slip in here! Well I'm glad it got said, especially since he's so resistant to tell the other heroes he loves them at the end of the series. But today Feeny's clearly got a different kind of love on his mind, directed at Dean Bolander.

Eric: "Ey Feeny, you got that love thang?"

Cory shows up now too, and the joke is once again that he messed everything up at the baby shower.

Meanwhile, Amy opens the gifts she received for the shower. It comes up again that Morgan's sad about not being "the youngest" or whatever anymore, so Amy promises to spend as much time as possible with her until the baby comes, which is practically a guarantee that that baby is about to drop. Sure enough, she gets some sort of rumble in her stomach and we cut over to The Apartment, where they receive a call from Topanga informing them that Amy's water broke. Six weeks early, as a matter of fact.

This does not interest me. Am I alone here? I'm genuinely interested to know. There have been zero times in my life where I was interested in a pregnancy on television. I just cannot get invested at all. The "six weeks early" thing is their attempt at separating it from normal tv pregnancies, but it's still not enough to pull me in.

At the hospital, Topanga's taken care of pretty much everything and guides Alan right where he needs to go. It's... nice. Topanga has taken charge and directed her attention to what really matters here, instead of stewing over what happened earlier. These moments of level-headedness are always the times that I like Topanga the most. And Cory feels the same way, as he realizes that this stuff takes precedence over his earlier plans. It's a great little scene for sure, thumbs up.

So Cory and Topanga have managed to set aside their own shit for this important event, but Jack and Rachel are still pretty focused on themselves.

Rachel: "Maybe it would be better if I told him."

Jack: "Yeah that... That's good, that would be easier on me."

She tries, but is unsuccessful once again. Doesn't matter though, as Eric reveals that he knows they're falling for each other. Poor Eric.

Alan makes his way into the delivery room, where things are already under way for Amy's C Section. The doctor performing the procedure is played by McNally Sagal, who played a hospital administrator on Sons of Anarchy, so I'm concluding that the two shows exist in the same universe. Even more, she was already on Boy Meets World! She played that newscaster at the end of Danger Boy when Feeny and Cory got on the roller coaster. So her character has apparently spent the last four seasons at medical school. Good for her.

Morgan has been awesome this episode, it might be her best episode ever. Which is a shame, since I've only seen this one like twice in my life. And one of Angela's best episodes was Starry Night, which I never watch. It's a shame that some characters shine in episodes that I hardly ever watch because it leaves me thinking that they're just weak characters in general.

So the new baby boy gets born, but he's having trouble breathing and has to get rushed off to the ICU. Crazy times.

In the waiting room, Cory's stuck worrying about his own stupid problems again, which makes him look like a real bozo when Alan comes in with the bad news about the ICU. The baby isn't breathing on his own and has to be on a respirator. William Russ gives a pretty powerful performance here.

You can see Angela there on the side, she's had literally one line in this episode. Less than Rachel. So much for being Topanga's best friend. Without the Shawn drama they've got nothing to write for her! It's a little sad, honestly.

Alan makes his way to Amy's hospital room, as she's trying to decide between "Joshua" and "Daniel" for the baby's name. The veterans among us know that she eventually chooses Joshua, so it might have been a cool touch if, say, Auggie had been named Daniel instead. Either way, the episode fades to black as Alan is about to give her the bad news. It's just the music playing over the logo during the credits. They've done that a lot this season.

Plot: 0.25 - I mean... what really happened here? There was a baby shower that wasn't really much of a baby shower, and then Amy gave birth. Pretty straightforward.

Character Development: 1.0 - I always give this one away too easily, but Eric is handling the Jachel situation with surprising maturity, and Morgan was at least some sort of character trait.

Humor: 1.0 - Just because it's so rare for Morgan to make me laugh.

Life Lesson: 0.5 - Don't be a self centered piece of crap like Cory.

2.75 out of 4.0. I doubt I'll ever watch this episode just for fun. It's not very fun. Shawn is almost entirely absent and Eric's actions are all in response to the Jachel thing. If it weren't for Morgan peeking out at that stripper, I'd have said this whole episode was a wash. I was about to say that at least we don't have to watch Jack and Eric compete for Rachel anymore, and that's true, but there's still more drama to come from that as Eric tries to figure out what to do about it. Blah.

Thanks for reading, see you Monday.

All images used under Fair Use.

Episode 6x15 "Road Trip"

This episode is so boring. I've been putting this review off all day. There's just nothing interesting to talk about at all.

A few hours have passed since I wrote that. I just ate some Taco Bell and I still have no interest in writing this review. We will have to try again tomorrow.

-THE NEXT DAY-

And we're back, tryin this one more time. As an anonymous commenter so aply put it, " I remember this episode as being 'the one where Shawn takes Cory out to some diner and they meet a band or something' and this band was like an actual real life band of the 90s but even back when this aired I was always like, who are these people." That's the abridged version of this episode, and hey, if that's enough for you, great, see you Friday.

I'm not sure why I haven't said this before now, but during the stupid theme song one of the lines is "Wanderin' down this road that we call liiiiiiiiife". And for the decade or so that I've been watching this show, every time it sounds like "Wanderin' down this road of E. Coliiiiiiiii". Seriously. Listen to it. That's what it sounds like.

Shawn and Cory set off on their road trip (oh my god that's the name of the episode!) off camera, so now we're joining them out on the open road. Shawn's wearing a bandana for the only time in the entire series, and it's almost universally accepted that he looks like an absolute tool. 

I don't know, you guys know I love Shawn, and yeah I know his dad just died, but this angst is just too much. He's like how an angsty 14 year old imagines himself at 18. Except in real life they grow out of it by then. Shawn did not do that part. 

This is the worst. I'm gonna play WoW for like TEN MINUTES. Just TEN MINUTES, and then I'll come back to this, I promise. Just TEN MINUTES, like FIFTEEN MINUTES.

He refuses to tell Cory why they're even taking this trip, at least for now, and eventually we find ourselves at some backwater truckstop diner. There's four girls about 19 or 20 working here, and we meet them all over the course of a minute or so. The fourth one literally just stares at Shawn for a good 20 seconds, it's really weird. Finally the owner of the diner comes out, who is also the father of two of the girls, and makes sure our heroes don't get any hormonal ideas. 

This guy is drying his hands the entire time he says these lines, and they really don't look wet enough to warrant this much drying. 

He's played by Art LaFleur, who seems familiar but nothing's jumping out at me on IMDB. He's been doing one-off characters since the late 70's and is still going strong, including an episode of Baywatch, like everyone on this show, and an episode of House, which is fun for me.

The four girls are the members of the former girlband "Nobody's Angel". They never got anywhere, and disbanded before their second album came out. What they did do, though, was collaborate with a boyband that also never got anywhere called Youngstown, to make the song Pokemon World for Pokemon The Movie 2000, which you can listen to right here https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U0FjlxQJU88. Don't be embarrassed, I listened to it too. It's safe to say that that was their best gig ever.

There's also a guy in the credits credited as "Milkshake Guy", so I'm excited to see what he contributes to the Boy Meets World mythos.

Back to the show, Dad Guy comments that Shawn looks familiar, and heads back to the kitchen still drying his hands. Shawn tells Cory he should "go home", which is weird since they just started this trip, I'm not sure why Shawn brought him in the first place, but we're stuck with it since Shawn refuses to explain any further. It fades over to the apartment where Rachel and Jack try to sort out the fact that they shared a passionate kiss in the previous episode. They agree not to tell Eric about the kiss.

At the diner, we jump into a performance by the four girls which lasts for two and a half minutes. On normal TV, this would be very frustrating. However, in this situation, it's fantastic! Because it's two and a half minutes that I can just skip and not have to write about, other than by saying that it's not very good and they're blatantly lip syncing. Like, the guys dancing to Hot Stuff in 5x10 was significantly more entertaining. 

Shawn and Cory lie and tell the girls that they're pretty good and would have a real shot at success, a shot that they would take if it weren't for Intimidating Dad Guy insisting that they stay. In what might be the weirdest bull shit on this show of all time, the girls ask Cory to talk to Scary Dad Guy for them, to convince him to let them go. WWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWHAT? 

Cory doesn't want to play ball, and tells Shawn it's time to go home, even though they just left. Unless there was an unspoken timeskip between the first scene in the truck and their arrival at the diner. I guess that's possible. Regardless, Shawn says he isn't going home, and that the purpose of this trip was so that he could say goodbye to Cory. 

Cory: "What are you, breaking up with me in a restaurant? In a public place so I won't make a scene?"

Cory is rightfully outraged at his best friend's nonsense, but Shawn isn't even listening. Instead he spots a picture on the corkboard behind the register of Controlling Dad Guy with Shawn's own father, Chet. Even Cory has to admit that that makes things interesting. 

Lumberjack Dad Guy, the girls, and some of the regulars reminisce about Chet with Shawn, and he has to give them the bad news about his father's death. They take the news in good spirits though, and joke about Chet and remember the good times. It's actually sort of moving. Shawn gets on board with the good spirits, and asks Cory to give a toast to Chet, since Shawn claims to be bad at that sort of things, which... is kinda bull shit to ask someone else to do that, but whatever.

Shawn: "Cory! Would you say something?"

Cory: "No, I'm mad at you, Shawn."

Ben Savage gets the Perfect Delivery of the Day award for that one, that line is amazing. 

Shawn convinces him to do the toast anyway, and yeah, it's pretty nice. In death, we tend to cut people a lot more slack than usual, so Cory's toast is very forgiving. Chet was always an interesting character though, so it's good that we got to say something nice about him. 

In Apartment Land, everyone agrees that they're all just friends and the kiss thing went too far. Eric is satisfied with this outcome and goes to get his laundry from the dryer. Soon as he's gone, things go too far once again.

Jack: "I wanna kiss you."
Rachel: "I want to kiss you too Jack."

KBM DATING TIP:

That shit works. I've done a lot of dating in my days, and "I think we should kiss" or "We should probably kiss" at the end of the first date has a near 100% success rate. Or even just asking "Do you want to kiss?" It is INFINITELY better than the awkward lean-in-and-hope-for-the-best that most people get stuck in. That's just terrifying and unnecessary. 

Shawn and Cory are in the trailer now, presumably still near the diner, and they start to fight. I think the last time they had a physical fight was 3x17, in The Hallway. Correct me if I'm wrong. The argument is about what you'd expect, Cory's saying all the reasonable things that the viewer is thinking about the whole situation, while Shawn just wants Cory's blessing for this stupid getting-away-from-everything-indefinitely road trip.

The girlband girls just sort of barge into the trailer, which is pretty uncool. Regardless of whether they should have made it in the singing business, I can see pretty clearly why none of these girls made it in the acting business. If uh, if you catch my drift. Because... you know. 'Cause they're bad at acting.

I cannot begin to understand why they value Cory's opinion so highly, but they really really want to know what he thinks they should do. Cory has an appropriately "What the fuck?" reaction to their request, but one of the girls gives him what I assume are supposed to be puppy dog eyes, but I don't think she really understands what they are.

She just kinda looks like a pissed off Colin Mochrie.

Cory's a pushover, so he tells them they should go for it. Overprotective Dad Guy probably assumes there's a wild orgy going on here, so he makes his way into the trailer as well, just in time to hear Cory's advice. Cory explains further that sometimes you have to let go of your loved ones and let them find their own way, which is WOO SO CLEVER because he's simultaneously giving himself advice about the Shawn situation. What an unpredictable turn of events. I can't believe it. That girl is still making that same weird face in the background, she needs to stop.

Hulk Dad Guy decides to fire the four girls so they can go end up as waitresses in LA. But hey, they do deserve credit for chasing their dream, I can't deny that. 

More important than what Cory's saying there is the fact that everyone else is just sitting on the couch in silence, staring at the wall. Look at em back there, there's even more to the dialogue between Shawn and Cory and they're just awkwardly sitting back there the whole time. It's really strange. 

Cory gives Shawn his "blessing" to go soulsearching, and then it fades over to Shawn getting into the driver's seat of the truck. Cory has mysteriously vanished, maybe he took a cab back to Philly, there's no explanation for where he went. Chet's ghost appears and tells Shawn he'll always be with him. He points at Shawn's head, which is considerably less puke-worthy than pointing at his heart, but it's still deserves a big eye-roll. 

Plot: who cares

Character Development: not me

Humor: Cory was funny like twice

Life Lesson: wear a bandana to be cool

shut up out of 4.0. Still not sure who Milkshake Guy was.

See you Friday.

All images used under Fair Use.

Episode 6x14 "Getting Hitched"

I watched episode 14 of Girl Meets World, and I couldn't even finish it. I got near the end, but as soon as Riley and Maya turned on that video of Lucas's friends? I had to turn that shit right off. The feel-good-ness is so oppressively heavy handed, I couldn't stand it. 

Episode 15 was marginally better, but still oppressively mushy toward the end. I lost count of how many times the audience went "awwww" by the end of it.

Only a few more days until the episode with Shawn, hopefully that doesn't disappoint.

The first minute and a half shows us what happened in the previous episode, but thankfully the episode itself kicks off with a much more lighthearted tone. Topanga surprises her boyfriend at The Union with her recent purchase of "The Fiancee Game". They need a couple to play against, and Eric and Rachel conveniently arrive just in time. As I'm sure you all know, you can't play The Fiancee Game without an official moderator, so Eric recruits a nearby Mister Feeny, who is surprisingly eager to participate.

 Before the hot, steamy action of The Fiancee Game can begin, it cuts over to The Dorm, where Shawn Hunter is sullenly stacking soda cans into a lovely pyramid, which is obviously a metaphor for stacking sadness into a pyramid of having a dead dad. Something like that, anyway.

Jack shows up and wants his little brother to head down to the old trailer with him and sort through the old man's stuff. The whole dead-dad/broken-heart thing has multiplied Shawn's normal angst levels by a factor of about 17.3, so he wants Jack to just throw all that old shit away, cuz he ain't goin back. 

Back at The Union, Cory and Topanga are having a very bad time in the Fiancee Game. Cory's answered every question wrong, and presumably so has Topanga. Eric and Rachel are rocking out though, including Rachel knowing that Eric's favorite fish is "penguin". Feeny can see that Topanga's getting upset so he ends the game and Rachel heads home, but Eric's getting relationshippy thoughts as a result of his success in the game. So that will surely come up later, which I'm not excited about. This scene, though, has been one of the very few where Racheric were actually fun to watch.

Topanga decides that the only reasonable solution to this problem is for her and Cory to move in together. 

It's amazing to me that she can be ready to live with him, and still not ready to have sex with him. I feel like the natural order is sex -> live together -> get engaged, yet they're proceeding in the reverse order. 

Chet's old trailer is pretty messy, leaving Jack without any idea where to start. It takes about five seconds for Shawn to show up. He hugs it out with his brother and starts to have a look around. I really don't understand where this total change of heart came from, but it moves the plot along. Shawn seems unusually excited to find his dad's lighter, and stashes it in his pocket without saying anything, so that should be significant later. Most important, though, is when he finds a letter from Jack's stepfather, telling Chet not to worry about paying him back. Turns out, Shawn's tuition money was coming from Jack's stepdad! Dun dun dunnnn. That's actually a fantastic bit of detail that I never saw coming when I first watched the series. I fully expected them to just sweep it under the rug. On the other hand, Jack said he was paying for college with student loans, so I'm not sure why his stepdad would pay for Shawn but not Jack. Probably just an oversight.

Jack: "Your dad wanted you to go to college so bad, that he came to my step father for help. Can you imagine how hard that was for him?" 

I wonder if it's deliberate when Jack says "your father" instead of "our father". 

Eric arrives at The Dorm, where Cory is eagerly waiting for Topanga in his expensive new silk pajamas. Eric's looking for advice about what to do with Rachel. He mentions the "unspoken competition" between him and Jack, which, pfff, come on, unspoken? But Cory doesn't give a shit since he thinks he's gonna get laid tonight. And frankly, that's a reasonable assumption. Cory finally gets him out the door, but not before Topanga arrives with a bag full of her stuff, since she's moving in or whatever. Eric asks her "Oooh what'd you bring, toys?", and see this is an interesting line. If you're young, and you think Eric is merely displaying his innocence as he thinks Topanga would come over to play with toys, then sure, that's chuckle worthy. But if you're an adult, and you think that Eric has picked up on the presumed sexual nature of this encounter, due to Cory's pajamas and sheets and behavior, then that line takes on a very different, and awkward, meaning. I don't know how they got away with that. Surely they were going for the first option, but it's way too close to the line.

Doesn't matter anyway cuz Topanga ain't here to sin. She just wants to have a normal, sex-free living-together situation.

Topanga: "Sex is the last thing we should be doing."
Cory: "You are wrong."

Back at the trailer, Shawn's raving about how he doesn't want to be a charity case for Jack's family. Let's travel back in time to my review of Season 1 Episode 10, and I quote, "Indeed, it's not that Shawn hates charity, he hates pity. He hates self righteous people thinking that he needs help. But in this case Cory didn't help Shawn because Shawn needs help, he helped Shawn because they're friends." How fucking spot on was that shit? That has been consistent through the whole series, and we're seeing it now in this episode. This time, replace "Cory" with "Jack", and "friends" with "family", and Shawn is once again willing to accept it. 

The trouble isn't over though. Shawn still isn't really willing to help Jack learn about their father, since he thinks it's all shitty stuff that's just gonna make the situation worse. Some sad music plays as we head back to CoTopangary. 

Shawn: "There's no reason for you to go through this kind of pain."

There's a handful of jokes in this scene that are completely based on the fact that Topanga's wearing a green face-cream mask and it looks weird. Okay, serious question, are we ten years old right now? That is some terrible, lazy ass writing. Booooo. Booooooooo.

Eric Kramer's his way into the room again, and nothing worth mentioning happens. When he leaves, he plays with Topanga's face for some reason... It seems like a reference? I have no idea.

He sucks one of his fingers clean as he walks out, which gets the standard "eewww" from the audience, but just as they finish their group expression, some guy yells out "sick!", it's clearly audible in the footage, and he sounds truly disgusted. Honestly the funniest thing to happen today. You should go listen for that, it's hilarious.

Topanga goes to wash off her mask before bed, and Cory... starts praying. He spends like a whole minute asking God to bless various people, which I guess is nice of him? But it's really not very engaging television. Topanga joins the praying and asks God to bless Cory, just before a fade over to The Apartment. 

What in the gosh darn heck was that? Their entire living-together experience has been a disaster so far, and they're continuing to see how much they don't know about each other, but we're supposed to throw all that aside because they prayed for each other? I don't get it at all. What on earth are we supposed to take away from that? It's weird.

Anyway, Jack tries to explain how he's feeling to Rachel, but starts to break down as his emotions overwhelm him. In particular, he's having trouble dealing with the fact that he'll never get to know his real dad, but he has to keep it locked away for Shawn's sake. In the heat of the moment, somebody on the show finally gets to kiss Rachel. And it ain't Eric, much to his disappointment, as he walks in just as things start to heat up.

I'm... actually pretty okay with that. That sort of thing definitely happens in real life, and I like how they made it a curveball by making us think Eric was gonna make something happen.

In the final scene, Cory shows up at the trailer and informs Shawn that he is in fact still a virgin, much to his disappointment. Shawn thinks it's a good time to "get outta here", and wants to hit the road with the trailer. He invites Cory along, which Cory accepts, and that's about it. I can't claim to fully understand how trailers work, but there has always been a hallway on the back wall leading to the bedrooms, and now that's just not there anymore.

Plot: 0.75 - Yeah it's fine. The Cory story was fun comic relief except for when he started praying... Jack and Shawn were sort of connected but also independent, and Rachel was interesting for probably the first time ever.

Character Development: 1.0 - Eric finds that he has feelings for Rachel beyond the superficial, but she's currently got her tongue in Jack's mouth. Cory and Topanga realize that they don't know each other as well as they thought, and maybe they're not ready to live together. Shawn wants to head out on his own. That's some good shit all around.

Humor: 1.0 - Honestly I'm just giving it for the guy who yelled "Sick!". Seriously, you should go listen to that.

Life Lesson: 0.5 - Living with your SO is harder than you might think.

3.25 out of 4.0. It's actually a pretty good episode. I expected much worse. And the title is pretty clever, like hitched for Cory and Topanga and their living together, and also Shawn hitching up his trailer for the road. I think I've covered everything I want to say.

Thanks for reading, see you Wednesday!

All images used under Fair Use.