Weeds: Little Boats
By fred | August 12, 2008
(S04E09) This season of Weeds has been quite disappointing overall, really, because much like last year after a start where you could see promise of a better land and hope for may new possibilities, a return of the funny twisted stories and characters you used to love back when it premiered, it soon fell flat into boredom, at best. This week, this week was very much a mixed bag.
On the one hand, it was a pure continuity of what we’ve had the previous weeks, the same crap that, really, makes you wonder why you’re still watching this show. On the other hand, it had a few good moments, and (I felt) a much welcome comeback of humor. It wasn’t much, but it felt pretty good. Didn’t restore my faith in the show or anything, not even close, but it felt like for a moment they took a break for this now usual boring mess to get back to the roots of the show.
To say it differently : Thank you El Doug, you may just be a sidekick no one even talks to, but you were the best thing in this week’s episode!
I’ll start with the goods, and while the resolution over Andy’s fate was pretty weak, it was also your typical Weeds move so I didn’t really expect anything different. And if I never liked this whole “coyote” plot for many reasons, this week wasn’t really about that, it was about Andy being Andy, and it was about Doug being that sad tall angry baby man he is.
And that made for the best and, more importantly, the funniest scenes of the episode (also, pretty much the only one to be funny). That was a very nice relief, and as I said earlier, it felt like we were literally taking a break from the rest of this silly mess to return to what the show used to be : funny.
Other than that, it was nothing worth our time, I’m afraid. The whole mess with Celia is nothing but pathetic, really. She used to be an interesting character because she was a bitch and she had a personality, there was a point to her character. But now, she’s just a mess, a sad and pathetic mess. I feel sorry for Elizabeth Perkins because really, she wasn’t given anything interesting this season.
Then we have Shane, who keeps pleasuring himself to pictures of his naked mother. That sentence alone perfectly illustrate, for me, the way they are destroying the interesting character that Shane used to be. Sure, he was a “weird” kid, I guess, but he was also smart and had some fun adventures. Actually, the whole prison school plot we have now seems rather good on that matter, but what the fuck was this mess, and what was the point of it in the first place ? I have no idea.
I just hope it wasn’t that lecture Nancy did to her kids, because that was quite pathetic as well. A boring speech, the same one basically given to both kids, without once seeming to really mean it, or care, only trying to get over it so she could feel better about herself. You know what ? I wish Andy talked to Shane, because I’m not sure what he would have said or how he would have said it, but I’m pretty sure that, at least, it would have been funny !
As for Nancy, she’s still a careless idiot. Of course she’s a threat to the whole operation : she is a moron ! She may have tried to appear in charge and aware of what she was doing and how to do stuff when she went to Lisa & Silas (doesn’t that sound like a poor name for an awful sitcom??), but that was actually funny when you know who she is and how she really does “handle” things on her own.
But of course, it always work out for her. Because her responsibility at the present time is the store, she has to manager and take care of that store, and that’s a very important thing, and the most important thing of all is to make sure they don’t get noticed, they don’t draw any attention to that store, because you don’t want people to look around when you have a drug operation running in the back.
So to have Celia running around all drugged up, selling anything for some cash, doesn’t matter how much, spitting blood on everyone’s faces (because that’s so funny I guess) and running places she’s not supposed to go, ever, is about the worst thing that could happen. And it’s all Nancy’s responsibility, she’s the one in charge, she’s the one getting a fat paycheck every month to take care of that, and yet there will be no consequences at all whatsoever for her.
As a good friend she’ll drop Celia at her place and leave her there alone (with a kid to take care of) and walk away without looking back, and that’s it. The only thing she cares about is when is the next time she’ll get to spend a night with her new lover, other than that it doesn’t matter.
This show is only a shadow of what it once was, a sad, depressing, and often pathetic shadow…
