7.18 The Mommy Observation

[devilbk]

I saw ratings were down from last week. 750,000 less people watched.

---

They still dominated the time period and prime demos though.

[Trust No One]

I saw ratings were down from last week. 750,000 less people watched.

---

They still dominated the time period and prime demos though.

I knew ses started a movement. Just kidding. Plenty of Shenny fans stopped watching before me.

[Idle Miscreant]

Listen you (fellow) miserable sods, I know at some stage in the past few years they turned our antique vase into a pisspot, but does NO-ONE else have anything vaguely positive (sorry for using the P-Word) to say about this one? We’re not going to BAN you for godsake if you don’t, (it’d look rather silly considering the Mods here are some of the least positive members on the forum) but those few of you who have actually seen the episode, is there not even a thread of silver amidst the big dirty cloud?

This episode is about the best we’re going to get this season, along with the Hofstadter Deficiency, Scavenger, POSSIBLY the James Earl Jones one, and this upcoming Proton thing. It was QUITE close in style to the early seasons, and THERE WAS NO SHAMY. We should be thankful for small mercies. It’s a brief respite from the hell to come.

So if we don’t like THIS one, and most of us aren’t watching anyway, then the point of having separate threads in the Season 7 forum eludes me. I enjoyed filling up the Locomotive thread with train gifs, but we had good reason to dislike that rampant pillage of our principles. If we’re not going to mention specific things (like Devilbk did with the Harlan Ellison business), then shouldn’t we just conglomerate all these threads into one big carp? (And how do you like your phraseology sir, mixed?) It would make sense.

The other thing…Given that less than half the people here actually WATCH the episodes (and we’re cheering them on, no fret! I’ll probably be joining TeamSes shortly) and some don’t even read the Taping Reports, then future episode threads are probably going to end up along the lines of;

Watcher - “I thought that orange thing was a bit predictable”
Non-Watcher 1 - “She drugged his orange juice didn’t she! The prize WHOREMONGER!”
Non-Watcher 2 - “What! She used Rohypnol? Christ almighty!”

When the joke was about Raj and Howard squeezing each others’ oranges or something.

Amy was not wantonly plotting to steal the Nobel Prize off Sheldon (although I wouldn’t put it past Leonard, one dark night in Stockholm….) then buy Stuart’s shop in order to further rob him of happiness, and then finally acquire the attention she “deserves” (although I wouldn’t put it past her either). The context of the “joke” was that Raj was having another dig at Amy’s relationship, and instead of being insulted, ie “like we would expect”, she actually agreed. Bam! Expectation subverted! Ie, a normal joke. Nothing further. Just another “sad Amy” schtick.

As some of you braved the other forums (for masochistic reasons of your own), you will know that what SOME fans (Queen’s 4%ers) took from that whole scenario was “OMG, Amy and Sheldon will still be together in 20 years!!!!!” “Babies!” etc
Thus spectacularly missing the point in another fashion altogether. Because no, that was not implied, and neither was it the joke. That is personal extrapolation based on a private mythology.
Point is, at least HERE, let’s get our facts straight, because bad as they are straight, they’re worse crooked.

Or is it a case of, as Witchdoctor pointed out…somewhere else…that these characters have been bollocked around with so much that the later seasons don’t warrant serious or even attentive discussion? Because that’s fair enough. I’d agree. There’s not much point in psychoanalysing Sheldon when his reset button’s been hit so many times the label’s worn off.

Also, why celebrate one episode when you know you’re going to get a bucket of swill to the face next time? Indeed.

So I know all this business. I’m just trying to prompt some “intelligent discourse”…Isn’t that what mods are supposed to do? It’s not all fancy hats you know!



EDIT - As esteemed fellow FlyingMonkey has astutely pointed out in the Grumblebox, it's hard to be positive about a prerecorded sports game when it's a foregone conclusion that your Team will lose. (to paraphrase)
I suppose the only thing one can do is potentially enjoy the small moments, a particularly clever pass for example, or a [insert suitable sports metaphor because I don't know a damn thing about them]. But overall I do agree it sucks the big hairy meatball. To quote another esteemed fellow.

[devilbk]

Listen you (fellow) miserable sods, I know at some stage in the past few years they turned our antique vase into a pisspot, but does NO-ONE else have anything vaguely positive (sorry for using the P-Word) to say about this one? We’re not going to BAN you for godsake if you don’t, (it’d look rather silly considering the Mods here are some of the least positive members on the forum) but those few of you who have actually seen the episode, is there not even a thread of silver amidst the big dirty cloud?

This episode is about the best we’re going to get this season, along with the Hofstadter Deficiency, Scavenger, POSSIBLY the James Earl Jones one, and this upcoming Proton thing. It was QUITE close in style to the early seasons, and THERE WAS NO SHAMY. We should be thankful for small mercies. It’s a brief respite from the hell to come.

So if we don’t like THIS one, and most of us aren’t watching anyway, then the point of having separate threads in the Season 7 forum eludes me. I enjoyed filling up the Locomotive thread with train gifs, but we had good reason to dislike that rampant pillage of our principles. If we’re not going to mention specific things (like Devilbk did with the Harlan Ellison business), then shouldn’t we just conglomerate all these threads into one big carp? (And how do you like your phraseology sir, mixed?) It would make sense.

The other thing…Given that less than half the people here actually WATCH the episodes (and we’re cheering them on, no fret! I’ll probably be joining TeamSes shortly) and some don’t even read the Taping Reports, then future episode threads are probably going to end up along the lines of;

Watcher - “I thought that orange thing was a bit predictable”
Non-Watcher 1 - “She drugged his orange juice didn’t she! The prize WHOREMONGER!”
Non-Watcher 2 - “What! She used Rohypnol? Christ almighty!”

When the joke was about Raj and Howard squeezing each others’ oranges or something.

Amy was not wantonly plotting to steal the Nobel Prize off Sheldon (although I wouldn’t put it past Leonard, one dark night in Stockholm….) then buy Stuart’s shop in order to further rob him of happiness, and then finally acquire the attention she “deserves” (although I wouldn’t put it past her either). The context of the “joke” was that Raj was having another dig at Amy’s relationship, and instead of being insulted, ie “like we would expect”, she actually agreed. Bam! Expectation subverted! Ie, a normal joke. Nothing further. Just another “sad Amy” schtick.

As some of you braved the other forums (for masochistic reasons of your own), you will know that what SOME fans (Queen’s 4%ers) took from that whole scenario was “OMG, Amy and Sheldon will still be together in 20 years!!!!!” “Babies!” etc
Thus spectacularly missing the point in another fashion altogether. Because no, that was not implied, and neither was it the joke. That is personal extrapolation based on a private mythology.
Point is, at least HERE, let’s get our facts straight, because bad as they are straight, they’re worse crooked.

Or is it a case of, as Witchdoctor pointed out…somewhere else…that these characters have been bollocked around with so much that the later seasons don’t warrant serious or even attentive discussion? Because that’s fair enough. I’d agree. There’s not much point in psychoanalysing Sheldon when his reset button’s been hit so many times the label’s worn off.

Also, why celebrate one episode when you know you’re going to get a bucket of swill to the face next time? Indeed.

So I know all this business. I’m just trying to prompt some “intelligent discourse”…Isn’t that what mods are supposed to do? It’s not all fancy hats you know!

I agree that there were positives and we should accept them with appropriate grace. There was actual mention of science fiction that had never been mentioned before and had naught to do with the Star Trek/Wars. More land mines in the Lenny were exposed despite what Stuart said. Disagreement on children and when. Odd evidence that Amy and Bernadette do not think all is well in Lennyland. There is some kind of shakeup coming. Or maybe I'm just a hopeful pessimist.

[Jislane35]

I agree that there were positives and we should accept them with appropriate grace. There was actual mention of science fiction that had never been mentioned before and had naught to do with the Star Trek/Wars. More land mines in the Lenny were exposed despite what Stuart said. Disagreement on children and when. Odd evidence that Amy and Bernadette do not think all is well in Lennyland. There is some kind of shakeup coming. Or maybe I'm just a hopeful pessimist.

I'm guessing Penny doesn't want kids any time soon because of her now getting back on track with her (farfetched and poor) acting career and/or they just don't appeal to her while Leonard would definitely want to have as many as possible and the sooner the better right? Probably even before marriage that way there'd be a better chance of her being a stay-at-home wife/mom. And of course they were arguing over who gets to follow and support whom once their careers take off. Those two can't agree on anything and in the end one of them is forced to do what the other wants out of surrender instead of agreeing to disagree (usually it's Penny).

It's no wonder Raj believed that they would eventually drift apart from each other because of their goals in life and I too was surprised that the girls didn't agree with them being a solid couple especially when all three of them rhetorically asked one another what Penny sees in Leonard during the Thanksgiving episode. Since Raj was pushing Penny to tell Leonard ILY in season 6 while the girls were encouraging Penny to learn more about his job by visiting him at the university thinking it would bring them closer together but instead Penny was more interested in mediocre sex than his brains, it's obvious that she's not interested in what he does for a living. I remember the days when Sheldon would brag about how their relationship would never last or even end on a good note. They don't fix their issues they just leave them in the back burner never to be brought up again since it'll only lead to more fighting. In the end it always leads to crappy sex anyways just to end it.

It's gonna be a bit tough to have a third Lenny break up after having Leonard five her a 'new' car and encouraging her to take up the audition instead of going back to waitressing even though he'd be totally fine with her going through her savings and sieving from there. Which I doubt would be enough for her to last on for god knows how long, either way she should STILL look for a side job because those auditions won't be there for her for very long given the fact that Molaro mentioned Penny still not having much luck as an actress. Amazing how he mentioned sex as 'comfort' while she was upset over her not making it to the audition and then being bothered with her only giving him a hug as a thank you. Such an asshole. I wonder if the next break up would be as short as the first two or longer for the sake of 'suspense' and keeping the fans interested. Leonard will just constantly beg her to not leave him like he did just recently and if Penny does get the balls to call it quits officially then she'll obviously just end up regretting it and Leonard will be with another chick a day after they split. I doubt Leonard ever leave her since he always begs her not to go so Penny would need to do something real horrible in order for him to do so which I'm sure the writers wouldn't be against, the Lenny's already hate her as it is.

[FlyingMonkey]

There was a bit of Vintage Sheldon when he agreed with Howard that it probably was indeed Howard's fault that his mother was alone. Honesty with no harm intended, but better left unsaid.

[Nutz]

I agree that there were positives and we should accept them with appropriate grace. There was actual mention of science fiction that had never been mentioned before and had naught to do with the Star Trek/Wars. More land mines in the Lenny were exposed despite what Stuart said. Disagreement on children and when. Odd evidence that Amy and Bernadette do not think all is well in Lennyland. There is some kind of shakeup coming. Or maybe I'm just a hopeful pessimist.

I got the feeling that Bernie & Amy don't necessarily think any thing is wrong with Lenny's relationship, They just think what they have with their significant other is even more beautiful and special. Stuart knows all three of these couples (supposedly really well now....snicker) and him saying he thinks Lenny is the shining example of couple hood (snicker) was a slap to the other two couples. It's ego not really what they think about Lenny as a whole. (Did anyone else find it ironic that Stuart is telling us what a great couple Lenny is when they've just spent 5 minutes proving they haven't TALKED about the most basic things when it comes to their relationship)

I really enjoyed Sheldon for the most part this episode, very vintage which just makes it sadder since we probably won't see THIS Sheldon again for a while. Howard was also pretty good as a friend this episode.

BTW, Saw a post on Facebook that they wish the tag had Penny and Sheldon walking up just as Stuart is walking away with Sheldon complaining that they wouldn't have been late if Penny had fixed the check engine light. That would have been hysterical, but of course we can't have Penny and Sheldon together in twenty years, that way is chaos and anarchy.

[Gamma]

I got the feeling that Bernie & Amy don't necessarily think any thing is wrong with Lenny's relationship, They just think what they have with their significant other is even more beautiful and special. Stuart knows all three of these couples (supposedly really well now....snicker) and him saying he thinks Lenny is the shining example of couple hood (snicker) was a slap to the other two couples. It's ego not really what they think about Lenny as a whole. (Did anyone else find it ironic that Stuart is telling us what a great couple Lenny is when they've just spent 5 minutes proving they haven't TALKED about the most basic things when it comes to their relationship)

I really enjoyed Sheldon for the most part this episode, very vintage which just makes it sadder since we probably won't see THIS Sheldon again for a while. Howard was also pretty good as a friend this episode.

BTW, Saw a post on Facebook that they wish the tag had Penny and Sheldon walking up just as Stuart is walking away with Sheldon complaining that they wouldn't have been late if Penny had fixed the check engine light. That would have been hysterical, but of course we can't have Penny and Sheldon together in twenty years, that way is chaos and anarchy.

That as a tag would have been hilarious. Tptb would never do anything like that, way to far out of their comfort zone. They are more stuck in their ways than Sheldon is.

I rewatched the Sheldon/Howard/Mary storyline. I did enjoy that part of the episode. Aside from a couple lapses Sheldon was pretty in character. I have to say though that while Howard was being a good friend I miss snarky Howard. He still gets some good lines off sometimes but he has had too many of his rougher edges smoothed. It may make him more mature, but it also makes him less funny and since this is a comedy..

Lenny, well Lenny is a total BS relationship. They never talk about anything. They spend whole episodes avoiding any talk of their relationship. When things do come to a head and they end up having to talk about something, that last only as long as it takes one or the other to be distracted by shiny objects or sex. Then under the rug it goes again unresolved and ignored til next time. I get so tired of the writer showing us what a miserable couple Lenny make only to have someone from the chorus opine how great they are together. And to use Stuart of all people. Considering Leonard once did his best to sabotage Stuarts date with Penny that just seems wrong.

[Tuesday Pajamas]

Just put the poll up on this and I'm going to go with neutral.

Points for not having Shamy. Points for having Stuart and Mary Cooper. The murder mystery idea was a fun idea but what a bunch of miserable bastards his friends are. There's were a few mildly amusing jokes.

Penny - "You going to lie on the floor and pretend to be dead all night?"
Stuart - "What do you think I was going to do at home?"

Howard - "I was going to say we pick up a cake or a pie but an insult to her faith is always thoughtful"

Mary and Sheldon are really good onscreen, it's just a shame all the dumb as soup actors are doing with this plot is removing Mary's potential disapproval to Sheldon having premarital sex with AFF.

And still more of the Leonard and Penny are a great couple crap. PLEASE! I wish they would stop telling us what they're not showing us.

One thing that struck a chord, Stuart alone outside the apartment, 20 years into the future for their meet-up - proof NONE of those couples are going to work out.

[Berliner]

Based on reading spoilers (and your insightful rants ) , I'll give this one a "Neutral Zone".
And if I hear one more time how great the Lenny are, I'm going to overtake the Botchelennism thread lol!