Season 2, Episode 13
Picking up where we left off emotionally last week, this week's episode of Happy Endings triples down on all the sweet, sweet James Wolk action, and gives us another crackerjack of an episode.
As we say last fall in “Secrets and Limos”, Happy Endings, in the tradition of the best of the “groups of friends” genre, is very interested in presenting the audience with a group that is fundamentally co-dependent and emotionally stunted, with those two characteristics playing into, feeding off of, and increasingly exacerbating each other at time wears on. “Secrets” showed us the group's particular hatred to anyone outside of the group dynamic; the group's rejection of Dave's new girlfriend wasn't just a symbol of the gang's general misanthropy, but also a sign of their emotional damage.
It's interesting then how “Everybody Loves Grant” turns that perception on it's head, and does so by specifically acknowledging the group's history of rejecting outsiders. If this episode hadn't been so aware of its continuity, then this episode would have come across and awkward and illogical. However, by acknowledging how this episode clashes with the past, the show instead presents us with a picture that is far more interesting and disturbing for just how far the group's unhealthy dynamic reaches.
The main joke of the episode – that instead of the group rejecting Grant, they instead embrace just a little too fully – is of course an obvious one for them to make, but the show makes it worked by couching it in its particular comedic style and delivering the quick-paced conversations and punchlines that we expect of it. But what really makes this work is that the entire episode is essentially one multi-faceted story, the first for the show (I believe) since the pilot. While it's nice from narrative perspective to see the show stick with one story and avoid over-complicating the half-hour, the real power here was that the singular story helped with the thematic angle as well. Seeing that how the entire group suddenly revolves around the new person in their midst only helps to reinforced the idea of just how co-dependent the group really is to another. Love him or hate it, it cannot be ignored that every single person suddenly changes their actions based solely on the fact that a new person enters the group.
That so many of these changes in behavior play off of group dynamics only confirms this even further. Dave worries that Grant will steal his position as the group's cool guy, but when it's revealed to him that he is in fact not the group's “cool guy” but instead “their Dave”, he spirals, as his loss of associated identity sends him into a spiral of shame and self-delusion. Likewise, Brad and Jane's attempts to couple date with Max and Grant reveal their hubris as the top couple of the group, while Penny's attempts to steal that title away from them speaks to her own insecurities as to how the rest of the group sees her love life, and by extension her.
It's telling that Alex's role in this episode is fairly limited, as the loner who runs the shop that nobody visits can't make much of an impression on Grant on her own, and thus assists Max in saving the relationship, if only to make sure that Grant stays around for her own enjoyment. That Max needs the push not to break up Grant, and that his relationship crisis is based on an inferiority complex of a man who usually acts so superior to everyone else in the gang, reveal something crippling about the group. Max obviously is friends with these people in part because they make him feel better about himself, but by comparison as opposed to anything his friends actively do. Instead they end up serving as enablers to his unwillingness to improve himself.
That all of this was “fixed” by Grant's own breakdown caused by his inherent neediness seems to indicate that nothing about this group is going to change. But that's okay, because comedy is, in part, about laughing at the flaws in the characters, and if these people were to change, then we wouldn't laugh nearly as much. (It would also change the show's tone as a “hangout sitcom”, and who wants that?)
Quotes and Other Thoughts:
“I don't know, at one point I called appetizers 'mapetizers'...”
“We'll be the nicest people he's ever...Met. Dammit!”
“Once Penny brought home an astronaut, and they were all 'Space isn't even the finale frontier any more.'”
“Can't help it. I love the sound of bones crunching. It make me feel like a god, the ability to destroy life.”
“Grantastic Voyage, I thought I heard your voice man.”
“She has some great stories.” “My husband's dead...” “That was her best story.”
“Did I or did I not call for an across-the-board chillaxin'?”
“Yeah, well I drive a fod truck, which is essentially a car full of ovens.”
“And he'll probably explain the art to them. Now we'll never know what it means.”
“I think I would know if I was being redemptive. We're not in Europe.”
“Thank you, you are smarter than you are tall. Good day, tiny madam!”
“Yeah Grant, it's awesome, whatever. It fits like a glove and it's slimming in all the right places.”
“You know what guy, you keep your facts and I'll keep mines.”
“IMPENETRABLE!”
It's interesting then how “Everybody Loves Grant” turns that perception on it's head, and does so by specifically acknowledging the group's history of rejecting outsiders. If this episode hadn't been so aware of its continuity, then this episode would have come across and awkward and illogical. However, by acknowledging how this episode clashes with the past, the show instead presents us with a picture that is far more interesting and disturbing for just how far the group's unhealthy dynamic reaches.
The main joke of the episode – that instead of the group rejecting Grant, they instead embrace just a little too fully – is of course an obvious one for them to make, but the show makes it worked by couching it in its particular comedic style and delivering the quick-paced conversations and punchlines that we expect of it. But what really makes this work is that the entire episode is essentially one multi-faceted story, the first for the show (I believe) since the pilot. While it's nice from narrative perspective to see the show stick with one story and avoid over-complicating the half-hour, the real power here was that the singular story helped with the thematic angle as well. Seeing that how the entire group suddenly revolves around the new person in their midst only helps to reinforced the idea of just how co-dependent the group really is to another. Love him or hate it, it cannot be ignored that every single person suddenly changes their actions based solely on the fact that a new person enters the group.
That so many of these changes in behavior play off of group dynamics only confirms this even further. Dave worries that Grant will steal his position as the group's cool guy, but when it's revealed to him that he is in fact not the group's “cool guy” but instead “their Dave”, he spirals, as his loss of associated identity sends him into a spiral of shame and self-delusion. Likewise, Brad and Jane's attempts to couple date with Max and Grant reveal their hubris as the top couple of the group, while Penny's attempts to steal that title away from them speaks to her own insecurities as to how the rest of the group sees her love life, and by extension her.
It's telling that Alex's role in this episode is fairly limited, as the loner who runs the shop that nobody visits can't make much of an impression on Grant on her own, and thus assists Max in saving the relationship, if only to make sure that Grant stays around for her own enjoyment. That Max needs the push not to break up Grant, and that his relationship crisis is based on an inferiority complex of a man who usually acts so superior to everyone else in the gang, reveal something crippling about the group. Max obviously is friends with these people in part because they make him feel better about himself, but by comparison as opposed to anything his friends actively do. Instead they end up serving as enablers to his unwillingness to improve himself.
That all of this was “fixed” by Grant's own breakdown caused by his inherent neediness seems to indicate that nothing about this group is going to change. But that's okay, because comedy is, in part, about laughing at the flaws in the characters, and if these people were to change, then we wouldn't laugh nearly as much. (It would also change the show's tone as a “hangout sitcom”, and who wants that?)
Quotes and Other Thoughts:
“I don't know, at one point I called appetizers 'mapetizers'...”
“We'll be the nicest people he's ever...Met. Dammit!”
“Once Penny brought home an astronaut, and they were all 'Space isn't even the finale frontier any more.'”
“Can't help it. I love the sound of bones crunching. It make me feel like a god, the ability to destroy life.”
“Grantastic Voyage, I thought I heard your voice man.”
“She has some great stories.” “My husband's dead...” “That was her best story.”
“Did I or did I not call for an across-the-board chillaxin'?”
“Yeah, well I drive a fod truck, which is essentially a car full of ovens.”
“And he'll probably explain the art to them. Now we'll never know what it means.”
“I think I would know if I was being redemptive. We're not in Europe.”
“Thank you, you are smarter than you are tall. Good day, tiny madam!”
“Yeah Grant, it's awesome, whatever. It fits like a glove and it's slimming in all the right places.”
“You know what guy, you keep your facts and I'll keep mines.”
“IMPENETRABLE!”
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