Franny's Life Is Her Own Business

American Dad, S08E07

Francine found out that the fireman who had saved her from a well 35 years ago wasn't dead as everyone had thought.  She attempted to adapt him back into society.  Stan and Roger also tried to start up a male stripper shoe business, but their investment money was dependent on killing someone.

I was sort of annoyed that Terry and Greg were such assholes about trying to get Francine on their show.  They were pissed that she avoided them, and yet they clearly wanted to embarass her on TV.  I mean, they have an idea of what Francine has been doing with her life, so I have little faith that they were trying to do good.  I really hated them in this episode.  Sure, you could blame Steve and the others, but they seriously thought they were trying to help Francine.

Then I was annoyed at the rest of the people with such high expectations for Francine.  Henry was a firefighter--it's pretty much a given that he's going to save lives.  Why should any person he save, even if he dies, be responsible for living an incredible life?   It was such bullshit.  I just kept hoping Francine would come to the conclusion that she didn't have to feel guilty and didn't have to impress anyone with her life's accomplishments except herself.

I was sort of glad to see that Henry wanted to go back into the well (even if he ironically died after diving back in) because seeing him bite off a woman's nose, punch and kill a bird in midair, and nearly rape Klaus made me think that Francine would have been infinitely better off never having found him in the first place.   I mean, maybe it would have been nice if she could have returned the favor by getting his life back on track, but when you think about it, Henry living in a well for thirty-plus years would have never realistically gotten back into society (not without some intense therapy or something).  I didn't want to see what other disgusting things he was going to do next.  He just needed to go (not die, though).

The side story with Stan and Roger was pretty uneventful.  They only tried once to kill Hideki's wife and then found out their idea had already been stolen.  It all happened pretty much in what seemed one breath.  I was expecting something much more different.  There were, however, two interesting things from that story.  The first was seeing Roger hosting that Japanese game show:

I kept wondering what Roger was saying, but after listening a few times, I figured that he was just saying gibberish (or super fast and badly pronounced Japanese or something).  When seeing this, I was sort of reminded of the ridiculous shows I would happen upon while flipping through TV in Japan. 

The second thing I thought was interesting was that Stan and Roger were having coffee later at a place called "Coughy's Coffee."  I don't know why but that made me chuckle.  I think that's a pretty good name for a coffee shop.

In general, I don't think I liked this episode that much.  I would have much rather Roger and Stan's story had been extended and the "Baby Franny" story had been the side story.  I feel like lots of times I would switch the main and side story.  However, I'm just glad they didn't do another Christmas story.  Almost every one they've shown has been really violent and crazy.  I'd much rather be angry about a story like this than see another insane holiday episode.

I'm Worried For Marvin

How I Met Your Mother, S08E04

Lily and Marshall finally got some time to themselves, but decided not to spend much of it with their friends.  The two began getting fearful of their deaths and thought they should pick a guardian for Marvin just in case.  Robin, Ted, and Barney began vying for the title of Marvin's guardian.

I would have never guessed that this episode would have led to Lily and Marshall thinking about how they would die (except I did see a commercial for this episode last week).  Nor did I think that their friends would attempt such stupid tactics to win the responsibility of taking care of Marvin in the worst-case scenario.  I mean, all Robin and Ted did was bring big ol' bears.  They didn't put much effort into their bribery.  Barney, on the other hand, put some effort into making children's songs into bro-themed lyrics, but I couldn't see how that was supposed to impress anyone.  I know it's Barney, but still--what was that?  He has to think somewhere in his head that doing that wouldn't make Lily and Marshall snap their fingers and tell him he's the one.  Out of all of them, he could have used his money to actually buy less stupid gifts than teddy bears to bribe them.  It's puzzling.  And it wasn't too funny.

Later, I was a little excited to see Marshall pull out a huge game wheel because Marshall always has the funniest games.  Plus, it's just ridiculous that anyone would make one of those in the first place.  The time he used to make that could have been spent just talking and hanging out with his friends in the first place, but, hey.  Anyway, the categories weren't especially clever, nor were the "contestants' " answers.  We all knew that Barney wouldn't provide a decent answer for most things, but I do think his approach to helping Marvin heal a broken heart was kind of funny:

I know this hurts little buddy. But you will love again someday because time heals a broken heart. But not that bitches window.

But when you think about it, Barney felt like the better choice when you had Robin, being a little too frank about death, threatening to send Marvin to military school, and shamelessly buttering up Marshall by saying he was a stud when it came to sex and Ted, mostly using a damn puppet to explain things to Marvin and caving into his every whim the moment Marvin looked a little sad.  Although, I would still never choose him.  In short, they all seemed like they would be horrible parents.  At least, if we were thinking about each of them raising Marvin by themselves, I would be really concerned about what would happen to the kid.

So I thought maybe Marshall and Lily would see that they all weren't good guardians, but they surprisingly chose them all.  I didn't know you could do that.  And also, even if they raised Marvin together, he would be a complete mess.  They're good friends, but I don't think they would necessarily teach Marvin good life lessons so he wouldn't grow up to be all the bad parts of Ted, Robin, and Barney (that mishmash would be a monster).  But I guess since Marshall and Lily had no family they could agree upon, that was the best they could do.

I also want to say that I was a little shocked that Marshall told his friends that Marvin wasn't one of the most important things in their life, but was the most important thing.  Perhaps one's child is to many parents, but to say that straight up to your friends would still feel like a slap in the face.  I had to share Ted and company's feelings when they walked out after that.  I don't ever think I've seen Marshall and Lily act like such jerks.  They made up for it, but damn.  It just bothers me when people seem to toss friendships away once they have kids.  Your kids are special, but you're not going to be able to bitch to them about your problems or go drinking with them (not while they're underage anyway) or probably hang out with them much (because they'll think you're too old and uncool).  So it doesn't make sense to me.  Good thing they patched things up some.

I guess this was an okay episode.  It distracted me from wanting to see those other two dumb relationships fall already.  I truly didn't even think about it because I was too focused on how Marshall and Lily were acting.  But next time I would like to see them get back to that and put an end to one or both of them.