Parenthood: Trouble in Candyland(S4E10)

And suddenly, things get interesting…

Sarah and Mark are finally going on their trips, Mark to the wedding, and Sarah to the job thing with Hank in LA.  They are completely awkward while packing, and Mark is clearly harboring resentment, though he does a terrible job of hiding it.  When Sarah finally makes it to LA, she calls and leaves a whiney message for Mark, saying how much she misses him and blah blah blah.

After the day of job stuff, Sarah and Hank are drinking at the bar, and Hank is fully depressed over his daughter moving to Minnesota, so they get to drinking.  As they are getting back to their rooms, drunkenly stumbling down the hall and leaning on each other for support, who should be at Sarah’s door, but MARK!  They get into a huge argument, and Mark stalks away, feeling stupid for wanting to apologize for arguing with her earlier.

The next morning, Sarah is very short with Hank, telling him it’s not her job to fix him, and it gets very awkward from then on out.   The next we see of this threesome, Mark is on a treadmill, and Sarah and he agree to dinner and a discussion.  Clearly there are still issues though, as Sarah says “I love you,” and Mark says “me, too.”

When Mark is headed to the dinner, he runs into Hank in the elevator.  Hank tries to smooth things over, telling Mark that Sarah knew the LA job thing was a sham, but obviously THAT didn’t go over too well with Mark.  When he gets to dinner, they stare at each other awkwardly(I think I’m sensing a pattern…) until Mark blows up, and breaks up with Sarah over her inability to be happy for once.

And in the end, Hank says good bye to his daughter while Sarah says goodbye to the life she had been living with Mark.  It went not good.

 In other news, Amber tries to get Ryan a job at Joel’s construction site.  Joel acquiesces after a bit of coffee bribery, and Ryan starts the next day.  Except Ryan is kind of a fail construction guy.  He measures once, cuts twice, and can’t even break a piece of sheetrock correctly.  But the piece de resistance is his complete and utter failure to recognize that long poles plus short corners equals a broken $800 window. 

Ryan quits on the spot, and stomps off the yard even though Joel tries to stop him.  Joel stops by his house later, but Ryan doesn’t answer the door, clearly going into a depression spiral, and most likely his and Amber’s arc for the next part of the season.

Parenthood:Everything is not okay(S4E3)

Tearjerker tonight, so let’s get right into it.

Adam and Christina are at their first oncologist appointment, where they meet Gypsy from Gilmore Girls(okay, not really, but same actress), who also has cancer, and a very open attitude.  They go in and discuss with their doctor, but the doctor is rather cold and clinical, for lack of a better term.  He even takes two phone calls during her appointment.  Adam and Christina later discuss the coldness of the doctor, and Adam convinces Chrstina to go get a second opinion.  They do, and the woman doctor is much more friendly, and focused purely on them.  Adam really seems to like her, but Christina is still feeling all depressed and whatnot, for obvious reasons.  She goes and visits with Gypsy, who has an open and frank discussion with her, talking about spousal support, and what she needs.  And from this, Christina realizes it’s okay to be scared, and that Adam can’t fix everything, nor should he try.  She tells him this later in the evening, and it honestly really hit home, and was a misty moment for me.   We don’t need the husbands to fix everything, we just need them to say it’s okay to feel. 

Max on the other hand, did not have nearly the heavy story line.  The vending machine in his school was taken away, and he nearly had a breakdown over it.  He was fixating over the course of the whole episode on it, to the detriment of nearly everyone, and it even lead to some actual nearly good Asperger’s parenting.  Max was only focusing on the vending machine when his friend was over, and so his friend wanted to leave.  Adam went and talked to Max about expectations in friendships, and how he should behave in those kind of situations, which I thought was really good.   He did kind of foul it up in the end, but seeing as that’s the first time I’ve even heard him attempt this form of behavior modification, it was a pleasant surprise.  Anyway, Max decided that instead of talking about how unfair it is that the vending machine is gone 24/7, he is going to run for student council, and get the vending machine back.

Zeek, the patriarch of the whole family, is pulled over for doing an illegal u-turn, and manages to get himself arrested with a backseat full of grandchildren.  Turns out he had an expired license as well, and when the kids were discussing if they felt comfortable with him driving their kids around, it came out that Zeek is on heart medication.  Drama drama drama, angst angst angst, and the kids have a family meeting to discuss with Zeek his driving, and everyone manages to get PO’d at one another.  It does seem like they may be working toward a driving issue, when Zeek and Camille were practicing for the driving test, she was reminding him of a couple of things to remember while driving, but it didn’t lead anywhere tonight: he passed with a 98%.

Sarah is still working with Hank, and I think we saw the side Max’s Asperger’s came from.  Sarah was fixating hardcore on Hank’s unpersonableness, to the discomfort of Mark, who she bitched to for at least two scenes.  Hank didn’t want to do a wedding, and she practically forced him to do it.  After they finished, and were watching the dance, Sarah and Hank had a little conversation about past relationships, and it was a bit strange.  Sarah was talking about how her next wedding to Mark was going to last forever, and you could practically see the story arc forming:  Sarah and Mark plan their wedding, Sarah and Hank subconsciously flirt, Sarah and Mark plan, Sarah and Hank flirt, plan, flirt, plan, until it all blows up, and Sarah and Hank are together.  The only thing I’m not sure of is if it’ll happen before or after Sarah and Mark get married.

Amber had the last story of the evening, and the other one with a misty moment.  So, Amber is working, and Adam comes in all tense.  Amber had burned some coffee, and Adam flips out, not wanting burnt coffee smell, or disorganized magazines, or any mess whatsoever.  Amber freak out a bit, and starts manically cleaning the entire building, and manages to stay until 10 in the evening, when Crosby shows up.  He calms her down, and asks if she wants to start her apprenticeship, and she of course agrees.  However, the next day, Adam is in again, and when she talks to him, he still wants her to be the gofer.  Amber is not impressed, and they have a chat.  Amber NEEDS more responsibility, and she is being underutilized, according to her.  Adam breaks it down for her:  my wife has cancer, so suck it up.  He may have said it a bit more eloquently.  That was my second misty moment, Mae Whitman’s reaction killed me dead.

Grade: B+

There were some nice character building moments, and the emotional stuff was well played, I think.

Parenthood: Left Field(S4E2)

Another week, another day with the Braverman clan.

So, we jump right in with Crosby and Jasmine having grown-up fun on the kitchen floor.  Apparently, when the kid is away, Mom and Dad will play…which makes me not thrilled about playing on the kitchen floor when I was young, eww.  They are shown to be all young and spontaneous, not just because of the kitchen thing, but also because Crosby’s a jerk.  Jasmine spent a decent chink of time making salmon and rice and veggies, and Crosby’s like, screw that mess, let’s get pizza!  Incredibly rude.  Then he makes fun of his brother for having to schedule ‘funkytown.’  I do find it fun to watch how the characters seem to take on traits for a single episode to create the conflict for that episode.  There’s more arguing because Jasmine and Crosby clearly are not on the same page, and then:  Jabar gets left at school. 

Jasmine throws a conniption fit, and thus makes Crosby realize he needs to grow up…again.  He does, and just as suddenly as his spontaneity came on, it’s gone again.

Adam and Kristina are sad.  Their daughter went away to college, and now that they only have two kids, they need to fill the hole.  And why not a dog?  Kristina manages to fubar it up really quickly though, by telling Max they might get a dog.  And Lord knows, you don’t tell an Aspie something might happen, or they will freak the eff out.  Which is what Max does:  he begins obsessing, and when they visit a clearly crazy dog breeder, Max finds the dog for him.  Too bad it costs $1200, with a $200 hold deposit.  Adam was clearly not into getting a dog, so they don’t put any money down, and the dog gets sold from under them.  Max has a breakdown, and chaos ensues.  I get that they are trying to write the Aspberger’s correctly, but the writers are really laying it on thick.  With the high-functioning level Max is at, and his age, he should not really be acting like that anymore.  Or if he does, it should be seldom, not every three days.  It’s starting to verge on ridiculous.  But then, Adam and Kristina agree to get a dog, and the family goes to find one.  But first, Kristina has a doctor’s appointment.  And what do they find there?  Cancer, of course!  I haven’t been an avid watcher of this show in seasons past, but if they are hitting the cancer card already…wow.

In slightly less depressing news, Sarah is letting Drew drive his girlfriend to the first day of school…where she promptly breaks up with him.  Sarah is a helicopter parent through the whole thing, advising him what to do, trying to cheer him up, and generally being obnoxious.  She even goes as far as to vent to Hank, her boss.  He gives her the ‘good’ advice of having Drew sleep with his ex’s best friend, since that is what the ex is clearly going to do.  But in the end, Hank pulls through with some actual good advice, and tells Drew it is okay to be sad.  So of course, as Drew is lounging in his room, Sarah comes in, and he jokes about suicide, because clearly.

And finally, we have Julia and Joel, the adoptive parents who fail at parenting, like, all the time.  Viktor doesn’t want to go to school because his tummy hurts.  So what do they do?  Let him stay at home, of course!  Ridiculous.  All this kow-towing is only going to lead to a huge brat that they are going to have no control over.  They even seem to discuss it, saying how he needs discipline, and boundaries, so what does Julia do?  She brings him to school the next day, and when he refuses to get out of the car, she tells him she’ll stay in the parking lot ALL FREAKING DAY.  Julia is the most ridiculous person on the show, which is kind of saying a lot, in this show filled with ridiculousness.  So, they bond or whatever, and hopefully we’ll see one of two things from this arc.   1)  Viktor becomes a complete and utter brat, and Julia and Joel cannot control him at all(This is what SHOULD happen, if this were the real world) or 2)the subplot goes away, and Viktor is seamlessly integrated into the family(this is what MIGHT happen.)  Unfortunately, we’ll probably see six or seven episodes of Julia and Joel failing at parenting, and then we’ll have a big blowout, and then things’ll go back to status quo.  Lame.

Grade: B

So, after two episodes, here are my thoughts on this show as a whole:  While there are some ridiculously lame b and c arcs, this show is pretty solid.  I enjoy how conversation is portrayed, it seems more realistic to have the occasional talk-over than to have everyone say exactly what they mean to say one at a time with perfect eloquence.  Even with a slight liberal bent, it isn’t obnoxiously so, and I can handle it.  All in all, this is a pretty decent show, and I am enjoying it.

Parenthood: Family Portrait(S4E1)

So here’s a show that I hadn’t fully invested in in previous seasons.  With the number of shows I watch, some just naturally fall by the wayside, and this was one of them.  However, with all the critical acclaim it has been getting, along with the sporadic episodes I watched in the last two seasons, I decided I wanted to watch Parenthood a bit more closely.

So, with this huge ensemble, there are approximately 5,000 plotlines, and there is no way I can hit all the beats, or tell them in remotely the correct order, so keep that in mind as this recap goes on.

We start with the all-American family, with Adam and Christina, with their kids Hattie, Max, and the baby.  Hattie is about to head off to Cornell, and her parents have scheduled her last week in town full to the brim, which Hattie is less than pleased about.  There’s lots of arguing, and the cross-talk that this show is famous for.  There was a really sweet scene, where Hattie gave Max a weighted blanket, though their portrayal of Max’s Aspberger’s is feeling a bit…off.  The scene where he was looking for his missing lizard was just weird.  Though, what we see with one of the other groups may explain the family reaction a bit.  Anyway, fight fight fight, “Fine, maybe I won’t go to the family portrait!” “Fine!”, and then reconciliation at the portrait/farwell party.  The parents and Hattie make it to the airport, there are tears, and Hattie is off to college.