Bro Parents Activate!

It’s been kind of a slow week for TV, but here’s what was on.

Spoilers...

How I Met Your Mother – “The Rebound Girl” (B+)

I can’t help but notice this show’s trend towards loaded endings of late. Before I thought maybe they were just poor attempts to save weak episodes, much like last week’s lackluster affair, but “The Rebound Girl” actually had a decent amount going for it. I’m starting to think now that this is a purposeful effort by the writers to keep the audience feeling like there’s some forward momentum in the major series arc, even if it’s just these little snippets at the end of episodes. Maybe it’ll be enough to help people forget we still have a season to go before Ted finds the mother.

But so long as they’re giving us a decent episode to begin with I don’t mind these big endings. The “I’m pregnant” bombshell during this episode definitely got me excited for next week. Slowly we’re starting to see how exactly Barney winds up at the altar at season’s end and certainly I think Robin has become the number 1 candidate for the bride... that is if she wasn’t already.

 Of course I can’t spend all of my time talking about what essentially amounted to 6 seconds of the episode. I also didn’t mind the storylines that led up to that point. At first glance both of the main threads in this episode were a little out of the ordinary. Just two episodes ago Marshall and Lily had the discussion about moving to Long Island and decided against it, so it wasn’t exactly a natural progression that they would revisit that storyline this soon (story wise anyway... life wise that decision would probably take more than a half hour). Still, there was something quite charming about the storyline, whether it be Robin knocking over lamps or Marshall contemplating becoming a Ghostbuster (it took me a second to see where they were going with that). By the end I didn’t much care that it was a somewhat recycled plotline.

The same went for Barney – yes, Barney – deciding that he wanted to have a kid. Initially it put me off so much I didn’t want to like the storyline, but eventually the writers won me over. There were just too many good one liners and hilarious hypotheticals for me not to laugh. It really did look like Josh Radnor and NPH were having a great time playing off each other on this one. It must have been a fun day on set. I particularly loved how Ted had to keep stressing that the two of them were going through a really hard time. Was it a shameless attempt to justify the premise... probably, but it made me laugh anyway.

To the quotes:

MARSHALL: And then we destroy it with sledgehammers... as a family.

TED: Don’t worry, he’s going to do something crazy.

LILY: If there’s cockroaches they respect us enough to sneak around.

TED: Kids I cannot stress this enough; Barney and I were going through a tough time.

ROBIN: And did Marshall become a Ghostbuster?
MARSHALL: That firehouse is still for sale.

BARNEY: Ted please do not dig in on this whole no banging the nanny policy.
TED: Okay, we’ll get two nannies. One for banging, one for child care.
BARNEY: Slash banging. Dibs on both nannies!

BARNEY: A kid needs a pet cobra Ted, don’t be a pill about this.

And line of the night:

ROBIN: Have you never heard of overhead lighting!

Modern Family – “Punkin Chunkin” (B)

I’ve definitely heard of few of those “Punkin Chunkin” stories before (and unfortunately I’ve likely told a few myself), which is probably what made Mitchell’s reaction to the story so funny. Not the wah wah so much as his little interview to the camera where he told Cam’s drawn out story in three seconds. I know I’ve felt like that before.

“Punkin Chunkin” was a fairly average outing for Modern Family however. Usually this show does a pretty good job of the holidays but Thanksgiving really just served as the backdrop to the larger dreamers vs. realist theme. I found the episode kind of lulled in the middle, and didn’t come up with the ending needed to save it. Other than that I don’t have a ton of pointed complaints, I just wasn’t laughing as much as I normally do.

There were a few amusing bits though. I mentioned Mitchell’s interview, but I also loved Phil and Luke’s Head Scratcher (TM) infomercial, if only for the aspirin shooter call back. And my personal highlight – Claire’s long speech about how she cooked for 8 hours and would be damned if everybody left before the meal only to reverse that sentiment the second she was taunted by Phil.

I want to say I liked Manny and Jay’s centerpiece storyline too but really I just liked listening to Gloria chime in every now and then. Once again, and it does seem like I say this a lot lately, Sofia Vergara stole the show. Assuming the entire cast gets nominated for Emmys again (and that’s not too far of a stretch) maybe she should win it this time.

My favourite lines:

PHIL: Record scratch!

PHIL: He’s me, and he’s spectacular.

MANNY: Remember that collage I made that helped us get through Katrina?

LUKE: Shoot me an aspirin friend.
PHIL: Maybe someday...

CLAIRE: I did not just cook for 8 hours so you people could run off to prove some asinine point that’s only going to make half of us feel bad! Come on, show a little respect.
JAY: Turkey smells great sweetheart.
PHIL: Is that turkey, because something smells like chicken...
CLAIRE: Okay, let’s settle this.

And line of the night:

GLORIA: My mother used to criticise everything I did, and look at me now... I am a jumble of insecurities.
JAY: I’m not getting that.

House – “Dead and Buried” (B+)

You know what, I’ve got to hand it to the House writers this week. I’ve been giving them a bit of a hard time lately, but credit where credit is due; I actually quite enjoyed this episode. For the first time in a while I actually cared about the patient stories... both of them!

And no, I’m not talking about the multiple personality diagnosis – that’s been done to death – I’m talking about the heartfelt reason behind the multiple personality diagnosis, the poor little girl who watched her father die and blamed herself for it. That was a legitimately emotional moment that I really didn’t see coming. Whoever the young girl was playing the patient did a heck of job selling that storyline.

But even better was House’s quest to find closure for one of his anger management classmates. The storyline combined the ingenuity I love to see from House (the character) with much of the same emotional impact of the previous storyline. That final scene, where the wife finally admitted to her ex-husband that she missed their dead son was really the highlight of the episode. Even after all these years it’s still fun to watch House get vindicated for coming up with the right answer.

 Well somewhat vindicated anyway – he still had to face Foreman after going behind his back and for the most part I think the writers handled that well. I liked Wilson’s description of how Cuddy handled House and I also liked that Foreman laid down his own personal punishment despite taking the advice. It was good for both characters really, and I mean come on – we all knew he wasn’t going back to jail.

The only thing I thought hurt this episode was the filler storyline. Chase’s new TV gig seemed like just a ploy to fill time... and give the rest of the team something to do this week. And honestly, the pay off really wasn’t worth all of the mystery leading up to it. Unless this ends up with Chase leaving the show or undergoing some sort of epiphany (the writers have been hinting there’s something going on with him lately) than his brief foray into television was just an unneeded distraction from what was otherwise a fairly strong episode.