Part of me wanted to skip watching this and I should have gone with my first instinct. Every part of this episode is really terrible.
I will admit part of my problem is that I really never liked Artie Johnson like at all. But I like the rest of the guest cast - and I especially wanted to see Cassandra Peterson pre-Elvira! She looked amazing of course playing a woman in a harem, but I was left wondering if she was embarrassed to be there (I don't blame her due to the horrible script this week). I figure she was just there for the paycheck. In her biggest scene (her part is tiny), she kept her face often turned away from the camera. Even at one point when she was closest to the camera, she pulled her veil over to cover the small part of her face that was showing. She had Groundlings training, but maybe she was so new to tv, she didn't know where face.
Anyway, this is part of the lamer story, which is super problematic by today's standards, where Artie plays a proto-incel surrounded in daily life by women he thinks reject him, so his fantasy is to completely control a group of women, including sexually (just like today). Of course, typical of the day, it's a white man's version of a harem where all parts are played by white people and Arab culture is extremely stereotypical, exoticized, romanticized. It's made even grosser when Georgia Engel turns up (who I always really liked, and she looks amazing here too btw). She announces she's been in love with Johnson's character for years and her only fantasy was of getting him, even though he's a disgusting pig who never noticed her until she was dressed like a belly dancer. His character is so disgusting!
Anyway, there's also a side story where Tattoo is down because of his size. Now, in hindsight, we know Hervé struggled with depression about his size for years and eventually killed himself. Mostly, Mr Roarke is very sweet to him and Hervé gets a chance to act a bit. But also Roarke does tell him to stop feeling sorry for himself and get over it. Not the best approach, looking back.
The last story was 2/3 pretty good, as far fetched tv situations go. There was a red flag when Roarke hinted David Burney's character should keep his identity a secret from his family. But the schmaltzy plot went along as expected for a while and I even teared up at one time. When the son ran away & all, I thought "I get it. I know how this will go. Now he understands how much the stepfather loves the son. He respects his wife's choices. I bet it'll even turn out the wife had figured out who he was by then. There'll will be a kiss and then hugs. And loaded Alan will pay for the kid's school. Hell, maybe the kid can live with him while at school." Happy ending!
Now remember, at this time in 1978, it was new that so many families were getting divorced. Many were freaking out and it was always in the media. Parental rights was a big thing. Also custody of kids was confusing. There were lots of bad choices and decisions. So I figured maybe the writer of the show was going to be making some statement about how divorce and co-parenting works.
Boy was I wrong! Are you kidding? The show's stance is "it's best to go on thinking dad is dead!?!" Just wow. And this is presented as the moral thing to do. Alan needs to just suck it up and let go?!?
What the heck was going on in the writers' room that week? I'm just giving this 2 stars instead of one for Cassandra Peterson, who is an icon.
0 out of 0 found this helpful.
Was this review helpful? Sign in to vote.
Permalink
