Never Alone, But Forever Crazy

Cougar Town, S0314-15

Jules was forced to deal with some issues she was having with Grayson's privacy and deceiving Laurie about her position as co-maid of honor when everyone re-enacted the premise of Groundhog Day for her.  Travis had to rekindle Bobby and Andy's passion for penny can.  Grayson proposed that he and Jules elope in Napa by themselves, but she brought the whole gang with her.

Sometimes I think that Grayson is the most reasonable person on the show and found his explosion of fury when Jules and company would not give him the tiniest bit of space in his new home to be overdue.  There's only so much one person can take before you just push them over the line and having people lotioning up and raiding your drawers and closet while you want to read is beyond what a normal person could tolerate.  That's why it was not just appropriate to see Grayson yell at the gang and punch the wall, but it was also funny.  Finally he stops just complaining in the background while everyone ignores him and puts a little force behind his rejections of their ways!  Truly, I identify with Grayson the most of all (especially because I would have been a neighbor like him was who intended to interact as little as possible with his fellow neighbors).

I wasn't too surprised that Grayson's request for the two of them to be eloped was denied.  But it frustrated me to see Jules not understand that just the two of us didn't mean the rest of the people who never leave her house (gathering at 6:30 in the morning?? I would shoot those people!).  In fact, I think my head would explode if Jules had taken Grayson to Napa with just the two of them.  But at least Grayson accepted his fate that he was marrying everyone (his proposal to them all was lame) and didn't drown himself in a full wine barrel.  There's not much he can do short of murdering Jules' entourage.

Besides Grayson's outburst, I liked that they recreated Groundhog Day to teach Jules a lesson.  It's one of my favorite movies, and I would love it if I could do that with a group of friends.  The fact that Jules didn't understand the concept of the movie and was annoyed that they kept saying the same thing for a few days was really funny.  I only wished that she had taken longer to figure out how to make things right with Laurie and Grayson.  I like when they sort of team up against her.  She deserves it.

Concerning penny can... I was so hopeful that Travis had done something great for once in his miserable life and brought an end to that game.  It has a certain charm for weirdo adults, but when you think about it, it's a really stupid game that loses its charm the more they play the game.  It was only slightly cute when Little Stan was asking to play and finally did play it at the end.  Other than that, I didn't pay too much attention to that story.

I also didn't pay too much attention to Travis trying to get Laurie again.  I was happy, however, to see Wade.  He is quite cuter in person than on an iPad!  But I know one day, especially now that Travis has drunkenly exposed himself to Laurie, Travis will get Laurie.  Am I sitting on the edge of my seat waiting for that day?  Hell no.  But I hope to enjoy more of cute Wade for a little while longer until that happens.

I was disappointed that they had their wedding on the beach while trying to avoid the cops because it happened without much mishap.  I wanted to see disaster after disaster before they said "I do."  It was sweet, but it didn't pull at any heart strings for me.  What was better than their wedding was Ellie flirting shamelessly with the guy at the hotel.  I mean, if Andy had dropped dead right in front of her, I think she would have hopped over his body and jumped Daniel's bones in a second.  I loved it. She just wouldn't stop, even when Daniel was arrested.  She kept texting him things that were certainly crossing over to cheating on Andy.  Somehow I really envy how she can do that with no guilt.  It's cruel in a hilarious way, and I sort of wish I could do that if I were married.  I gained a little more respect for Ellie.

This wasn't a bad season finale, and I could be happy if this were the series finale, frankly.  This show was a little too often off the mark for me in terms of jokes, so I'm not that eager to continue watching it on TBS, unless I hear some pretty good rumors about it.  I kept with this show hoping that it would grow on me and it has a tiny bit, but not so much that I think that I will be definitely watching it again in its fourth season. 

Travis, The Dancing iPad

Cougar Town, S03E11

A hurricane blew into town, and Jules set up a party to ride it out with her friends.  Besides the wine running out, the biggest issue was that Travis looked like he finally had a chance to be with Laurie since she was having problems with Wade.  Jules was against her son getting together with Laurie until Bobby made her realize that Travis' happiness was more important than their personal feelings.  Travis ended up helping Wade patch up things with Laurie via a video call on an iPad and convinced Laurie to give Wade another chance even though it would ruin his own chance.

I usually don't pay attention to the few seconds for the title, but I noticed this time there was a quote from Abed:

"I didn't know it was back on either."

I started to wonder if they always do that sort of thing.  I keep forgetting that Abed loves Cougar Town.  It's just so random when you think about the kind of shows he usually enjoys (crime and sci-fi).  Then again, Abed is a jack-of-all-trades, really.  It's funny to think that he wouldn't have noticed that one of his favorite shows was back on the air.  Guess he has really been distracted by that Dr. Who knock-off he and Troy enjoy so much.

Anyway, back to this show.  I wasn't rooting for Travis to get with Laurie.  I'm sure it will happen one day, but thankfully it wasn't last night.  I mean, sure they would make a good and possibly entertaining couple, but I just can't care that much when Travis is involved.  It's like his nonchalant attitude has affected my feelings about him.  He always sounds like he's about to take a nap (or just woke up from one), so I tend to ignore what's going on with him.

That being said, I was laughing when he was acting as Wade's "body" by taping the iPad to his face and taking direction from Wade.  It was crazy ridiculous, but a little bit sweet in a weird way.  It sort of made me think of them making some kind of weird iRobot in the future where someone from a remote location could control a body and have their face show up in a screen as if they were there.  Watching Laurie dancing with Wade's screen face on Travis' body was oddly cute and scary.  It was funny that Travis let himself do that for Laurie's sake, but he drew the line when he had to touch her butt for him.  It was already a strange situation, so I don't know why that was too much.  Taping an iPad to your face for your rival in love should be too much.

Besides that moment, I didn't think anything was too funny except when Jules kept pouring herself a glass of wine, forgetting that the bottles were empty.  They were having a pretty good party (despite Jules fretting about a future grandson bore by Laurie and Travis) until the wine started to go.  I liked how the guys were smart enough to know that they needed to hurry up and get some more before things turned ugly.  And Ellie immediately turned to them and asked in a scary voice what were they whispering about.  I wish that they were unable to leave, just so I could see a wine-less Ellie tear them apart.

 Not one of the best episodes, but at least we didn't see the start of Travis and Laurie skipping around town together.  That can be put off for another season (if there will be one), I hope.  I guess with Wade enlisting in for another year, we won't be able to physically see him for a while.  It's just as well because it is a little funny that Laurie is walking around with him on a video call as if he's a real person.  I could stand to see her doing that more.  This show is often a little boring to me compared to some other shows (I laugh more watching Mad Men), so I'll ask for anything that might make me think watching the rest of this season is worthwhile.

Bobby Sees His Racist Side

Cougar Town, S03E10

Jules wanted Andy to run for Mayor so that he could get her a permit to have her wedding on the beach, which wasn't allowed.  Ellie despised the idea of her husband being in public officer since it would force her to interact with people more.  After making a comment to an Asian man, Bobby worried that he was racist, and Laurie put together a panel to help him.  Travis made out with Holly, and he and Grayson tried to teach Jules a lesson about cutting Holly a bit of slack.

Even though Jules suggested Andy run for Mayor for her own selfish reasons, I think she was right that he would be a good candidate (as least out of the people she knows).  I would be interested in seeing him win that position, although I doubt it will be very easy for him.  I'd condemn Jules further for making Ellie unhappy with her plan to get Andy to be mayor, but Ellie's reasons against it were too funny.  She really is a woman after my own heart.  I would be annoyed too by the idea of having to deal with more people than the few I can tolerate.  The best thing about her opposition of Andy running for mayor was when she told Andy in the car about her opinion on the matter.  Andy said he wouldn't be mad, but he purposely ran over a speed bump quickly so that her coffee would splash in her face.  It's great seeing Ellie on the receiving end of a joke at her expense.  I almost wish that she hadn't come to her senses and realized how selfish she was being to her husband.  I would have preferred to see how she could have gotten him back, though.

Bobby's realization of his racist nature was probably the funniest thing in this episode.  I just can't believe how stupid he was to tell that guy he would probably love a giant camera around his neck.  But you knew that he had no malice behind his words--only ignorance.  So when the guy got upset and Laurie looked at him with horror, it was really funny.  He also thought that all black guys could dunk and asked a man if he could in a later scene.  Bobby's too much of a bonehead for anyone to take his racist remarks seriously.  Plus, like Andy said, the fact that he was so bothered by the racial implications of his words and thoughts, made Bobby a decent guy with the potential to one day to realize when he was using stereotypes to make judgments about people.

It was also nice to see that in Laurie's panel she had included her boyfriend, Wade.  I wasn't sure if he would ever be mentioned again.  According to their routine of getting naked for each other on Skype calls, I would say that their relationship is still going on strong.  That means it's still possible he would visit Laurie once he's done with his service in Iraq.  I'm sure that would make for some really entertaining scenes, knowing how hyper Laurie is.

I never pictured Holly getting together with Travis, but when he later explained that he was just taking advantage of a woman, that made a lot of sense.  The only way Travis could go from small talk at a coffee shop to heavy making out had to be due to him being with a vulnerable woman.  Travis is a bit of a loser with no swagger to speak of, so a girl like Holly is probably his best bet.  I'll admit it's a little weird since she has had a baby with his future stepdad, though.  More than the baby, I would think that he would be a little disturbed by locking lips with someone that Grayson had once done the same.  I wouldn't even eat a piece of bread that he had eaten from.  Eww.  But I'm not sure if Travis really has any feelings for Holly or if he was just messing with Jules to make a point.  Someone as self-centered as Jules needed such an extreme measure to teach her to stop judging people.

I liked the Bobby story enough that I think this was a good episode overall.  I definitely laughed more times than I have compared to other episodes.  I hope that next time we get to see some of Andy's campaign ideas.  I could see the possibility of that being funny, especially if Bobby was his manager.  Almost anything that will take away the focus from Jules' wedding is welcome to me.  I already know that it's not going to be the dream wedding she wants, even if she does get to have it on the beach.