Goddamnit. This MIGHT ACTUALLY be a short one. You know how sometimes I say “lets make this fast” and it never is? It’s always endless and unbearable? Well, I might try a LITTLE harder and actually deliver on that promise. Some old faggot once said, “I’d write a shorter letter, but I didn’t have a time.” Unfortunately I don’t have much time either. I swallowed an entire bottle of sleeping pills before I sat down at this type-writer. I’m a fucking goner.
So this episode Brendon turns 6. Brendon isn’t completely terrible at this point in the series. He sure beats the shit out of Lilly, as far as shit kids go. For birthday six Frank decides they are going to go for the old tried and true PIZZA AND BOWLING. But after Frank leaves, Brendon confesses to Carol he doesn’t really like bowling that much. Why the fuck not? Seriously, the moment Frank said pizza and bowling I was instantly envious, and wished I picked a project synopsizing every pizza joint and bowling alley in town. Step by Step, you shouldn’t mention things that are preferable activities to watching your show. But I guess that would leave VERY few things for them to talk about. Oh well. No, the only thing Brendon likes about Bowling is wearing other people’s shoes. He’d rather have a party with a real party clown! Specifically YoYo, who can make “music come out of his arm-pit!” Ugh, I bet he can also make barf come out of my mouth. Think about a sweaty clown, intentionally not putting on deodorant to go hang out with children. He’s obviously trying to get them to trust and grow accustomed to his scent, so it’ll be easier to get them in his van. You may like wearing other people’s shoes, Brendon, but I think YoYo likes wearing other people’s faces. I’ve written a joke about a clown that ends with him molesting and murdering children. Jesus, I’m better than that, right?
BAD EDIT ALERT: While Carol is on the phone booking YoYo, you can see Al in the background of the shot at the dinner table. Then it cuts to the dinner table, and she’s gone! Cody pontificates weather American cheese has holes in Switzerland. Please Cody, just sell that joke to Steven Wright. It’s not a bad joke, but I don’t want to put up with your shit in order to hear it. I just can’t. Al then enters wearing FM radio headphones. She updates the meatheads of the family that the Packers are winning: “The Pack is back!” I’d be on board if you were talking about the Quack Pack, Al! Wait, no I wouldn’t. I am thinking of Quack Attack, not Quack Pack. Quack Pack was the one where Huey, Dewey, and Louie are teenagers, right? I just want the one where they showed old Donald Duck cartoons and used a thermometer to show you how Quacky each cartoon was. The only Quack Pack episode I like is the one where Unca Donna eats anti-age formula and is suddenly drawn like he was in the 1930s. That’s an actual episode of Quack Pack I just referenced. Give me a medal.
Here’s the rest of the scene: Mark is a wuss about football, Karen is a ditz, Dana gets hit on by Cody, Frank finds out Brendon doesn’t want to go bowling and pouts, and finally the mail comes containing magazines that are relevant to each member of the family’s personality type (except JT who gets nothing because there is no magazine dedicated to being a piece of shit... unless you count Vice, but that’s a different kind of shit). Oh, and there’s a letter in there saying that the place Frank and Carol got married wasn’t licensed, so they’ve been sucking each others dicks in sin and aren’t actually married. The children cheer while Frank and Carol look distraught.  Fat Lady Watch: It’s decided that Frank and Carol will simply get married at City Hall, so Carol comes in looking like a pile of barf in a blue nightmare dress. The Fat ladies are there. Mom insults her redheaded daughter about how she won’t ever get married and they do some other stuff in the episode but goddamnit how can I be expected to put up with these two long enough to tell you about it? They are ridiculous and that is the final word on them in this write-up.
Carol goes to City Hall to meet Frank. Frank arrives after some cartoonishly unromantic bureaucratic nonsense, including Carol being told to get in line when she’s the only one there, and being told to go to the next window for “form 37B” and having the same person who told her that simply walk over to the next window to hand it to her. I will bet you 37B dollars that “form 37B” has been used in at least 10 other sitcoms. I don’t mean that as a figurative number, I mean I bet if you watched TV Land long enough you could come up with 10 solid examples of “form 37B.” 37 is already an easy comedy number to come up with, and B stands for bureaucracy, so you gotta tack that on there. Why, I bet Judge Harry T. Stone had to fill out form 37B to get permission to adopt that African he was always crying about on Night Court. Oh bureaucracy! You drive me bureaucrazy! (Note to self: ask hound if I can use his “beureucrazy” joke in this write up)
Frank shows up just covered in dust and termites. He brought burritos in a bag for their lunch afterwards. He has to make this quick so he can get back to work. Carol, shocked and appalled at her boorish not-husband’s idea of what it means to get MARRIED, runs out on Frank. The judge points to Frank’s paper sack and asks him “is that a burrito?” Yeah right there’s not even a LOGO on the bag or ANYTHING that would tell him about what was in there. I guess all he really had to go on was that Frank was NOT happy to see him. Okay. So here’s the whole thing of the episode! It happens in this scene! Frank and Carol decide to get married for reasies, with music and cake and friends and family played by extras we’ve never seen before or will ever see again. But most important, Carol wants it performed by Reverend Wallace. BUT HE’S LEAVING TOWN FOR SIX MONTHS! The only day he could do it is on Saturday, right before he leaves. Saturday is the day of Brendon’s party! We can’t have a wedding AND a party AND an over-used sitcom conflict at the same time, can we?? Turns out they can time it just so that they have the party, THEN they have the wedding. But they never go into WHY IT’S SO IMPORTANT THAT THIS PARTICULAR DUMB REVEREND PERFORM THE CEREMONY! Give us something, you lazy fucks. Maybe he’s the only reverend in town? With him gone and YoYo behind bars, who’s gonna fuck all the towns children? Come on. You’re better than this. Please, stop.
Oh yeah, about that! They find out YoYo can’t make it to the party. Give ONE kid a private lesson on how to pee and poop properly and everyone labels you a criminal. Brendon is way bummed, but Frank promises him YoYo WILL show up. Cody’s excited: “He did my party last year!” Cody was born on a leap year and is actually only about 5 or 6 years old, so it makes sense. That’s not actually a joke at all. Well it is, but not from me. Cody actually says this somewhere in the series. Not this episode. I just happened to remember it, and I actually considered pretending like it was my own joke. See how dire things are getting with this write-up? Ugh, let’s get this over with. I’m running out of steam faster than an Adam Sandler movie.
The wedding is starting, and the Reverend is getting restless as Frank is nowhere to be found. Turns out he’s dressed as YoYo. Carol is disappointed in Frank, and assumes that he did it to SPIT in the face of marriage once again (there’s an allegory for Prop 8 protestors in here somewhere). “You’re dressed in a clown suit and talking to a sock!” This basically describes Mark’s typical Friday night, except him and the sock don’t do much talking. But once Carol realizes that Frank did it all for Brendon she realizes that Frank truly does understand what it means to love and to cherish.  Then they get married. Sorry this wasn’t a short one.
|
