Episode 2x16 "Danger Boy"

You guys gotta understand that Eric wants to get laid.

Like...

Home boy is thirsty.

So our boy Ewic Maffyoos is tryin to put the moves on some girl who's like, I dunno, a six, under the pretense of studying. Eric wants to bang over the weekend, after the exam they're studying for has passed, but Six's younger, female cousin is going to be in town and she wants to spend time with her. Eric suggests a double date and tries to advertise his little brother as a date for Six's cousin. Cory betrays himself by coming into the living room and pretending to be a fountain.

In an unusual display of loyalty, Eric still tries to sell her on Cory, but Shawn comes downstairs to grab a soda and is much more mature and charming. Six suggests that Shawn be the date for her cousin. Eric is still hesitant, and it's completely blowing my mind right now what a good brother he's being, but Six uses her female wiles to persuade him in favor of Shawn.

#wiles

At school the next day, Mr. Feeny reminds Mr. Turner that the faculty meeting is today. Turner's reaction is beautifully spot on for anyone who works at a job with too many meetings. Like me.

Solidarity, my brotha.

Eric successfully recruits Shawn for the double date. Awesome. No wishy-washin around, we're diving right in. The two young men walk offset and we jump forward to the faculty meeting. Mimi from The Drew Carey Show is leading the staff meeting, which is odd since Feeny is the principal. She is overtly sexually harassing Turner, so she might as well actually be Mimi,  and Turner agrees to supervise the "class ski trip". Believe it or not, that is actually a real thing in this series that does come up again later. You can also see Scuba Club there on the board, a fun throwback to season one.

Why are all the "A"s capitalized? 

Feeny was Dive Master at the scuba club in season 1, so there was probably a serious bloodbath between him and this RF guy, but either way Feeny lost out. So Mimi automatically assumes Mr. Feeny is going to want to be in charge of the Chess Club, and he's not too happy about people making assumptions about him. There are only like five people at this meeting because whatever, and the meeting is being held in the cafeteria, also because whatever.

At the Matthews house, Amy comes home with a new haircut but Alan doesn't really notice. If you haven't realized by now, I love talking about hairstyles. Every person I meet I thoroughly examine their hair. I pay attention to that shit. But the last time a girl I was seeing got a haircut, I didn't notice. If anyone on earth should notice, it's me, but I didn't. It's a curse that all men have, and to all the women out there, we're sorry. Regardless, Amy paid way too much for this haircut.

Oh William Russ. I love his voice. I watched that clip three times in the process of making it, and three times I laughed at "Well tell him to stop!" Perfect delivery. 

The next scene is centered on Cory, and he's not at home or at school, so tell me, Mr. Holmes, where is he? For that matter, since Eric and Shawn are on that double date, where are they? And finally, where is the King of Rock 'n Roll?

Elvis leaves with his food and nobody says another word about it. It's completely out of nowhere and I can't decide if it's funny or not. I don't think I've given a Bonus Badge this season and this bit caught me completely off guard, so let's throw down an Elvis Presley Bonus Badge. 

Shawn thinks that Eric already asked Cory to go on the double date, and that Cory declined, so Shawn has no problem leading Cory over to Eric. The younger Matthews brother quickly grasps the situation and is like "what the fuck, why didn't you ask me?" and Shawn is like "what the fuck, why didn't you ask him?" Cory is rightfully pissed so he goes home. 

Later that night, something amazing happens. Something unheard of. Two characters on a television show address the hostility between them by communicating with each other. Someone call the Pope, it's time for Ragnarok. Eric recounts what happened in the first scene. Already knowing the answer, Cory asks "the fountain hurt me?" with a sigh. Eric explains that Six was looking for someone more "dangerous" for her cousin, and that Cory is slightly less dangerous than "lime jello". 

I think that was Friday, so now it's Monday and Mr. Feeny's class has just ended. Feeny can see that something's bothering Cory and offers to help. Student explains to teacher, and the latter tries to pass off some of that "you shouldn't worry what people think of you" crap, but just then Turner shows up in the doorway and taunts Feeny a little about that whole club situation. Feeny shoos him away, and then amends his earlier statement to include that one must leave oneself open to new experiences in order to grow and subsequently rub the haters' noses in it. To do just that, Cory and Mr. Feeny resolve to do something dangerous and spontaneous.

At the Matthews house, we discover that Alan lost 300 dollars in his recent poker game. Instead of being immature children, they both acknowledge that sometimes they do silly things with money and essentially just laugh it off. This episode has had like 90 opportunities for stupid boring drama, but the writers had the fortitude to ignore those easy stories. Way to go.

In the boys' bedroom, Eric finds a note from Cory saying that he's gone to "the amusement park" with Mr. Feeny. Eric is unreasonably alarmed by this note, and dashes off. At the park, a woman from a local news station is reporting on the grand opening of "the most terrifying amusement park attraction ever created". Guess who's at the front of the line?

The reporter is played by McNally Sagal, who has actually had a legitimate acting career since being on Boy Meets World, but I only know her from Sons of Anarchy. Those guys behind her look like they should be in the Sons of Anarchy. The writers have taken a lot of liberties here: I have never seen a roller coaster with only two seats. Why is the grand opening of this ride at night? How could they possibly have been first in line when they were at school all day? I was going to ask if Philly even has amusement parks, but apparently Hershey Park isn't that far so whatever. IT DOESN'T MATTER ANYWAY, the point I wanted to make is that we don't care or even really notice those bigger details because the show distract us with small details: The super tough guys in line for the ride, Feeny's hilarious cotton candy, the puke-bibs... Our attention is grabbed by the fun, unnecessary things they add to the scene to draw away from the necessary things that they glossed over or ignored. And that's just fine with me, because you can tell that they actually tried to draw us into this scene. 

So anyway they board the coaster and then Eric and Turner run up from the side to try to talk them out of it. 

Apparently Turner got the same sort of note as Eric, but from Feeny. This is.. ugh, okay, look Boy Meets World, I just defended you on taking liberties with the plot, I don't know if I can rationalize this one. Maybe they ran up the handicap line or something, but where would Feeny have even left that note for Turner? Regardless, Eric and Turner concede that Cory and Feeny are "dangerous", and then the ride starts. And I want you to see it.

My favorite thing is how the second piece of stock footage is blatantly a hanging coaster. My non-sarcastic favorite thing is how Cory and Feeny switched seats. Another small but hilarious detail. Cory and Feeny trick Eric and Turner into getting in the car by telling them that Cory lost his shoe.

Definitely the dumbest part of an already quite-dumb scene. No one would ever let this happen, and Eric could have blatantly seen that Cory is still wearing both of his shoes. I don't want to be that guy, but this scene in particular is full of nonsense. During the credits, Alan is hosting a poker game and Elvis shows up again. 

One thing about this show is that you can never tell which stories are going to be important. The Alan/Amy story was just filler, completely unrelated to everything else. In 2x15, Feeny hustled Turner in racquetball, and that was filler as well. Sometimes all the story threads come together, and other times it's hard to really know what to pay attention to. But I suppose for the casual viewer, it doesn't make a whole lot of difference.

Plot: .75 - Pretty much every episode this season has been founded on Cory's insecurities or his lack of some quality that Shawn has, so nothing new there. What is new is his relating to Feeny on that insecurity. Cory and Feeny team up very very rarely, and it's always a lot of fun.

Character Development: 1.0 - We're well aware that Cory is an insecure teenager, but seeing Mr. Feeny in a state of vulnerability is unique and refreshing. Watching him overcome that vulnerability is a real treat.

Humor: .5 - In the early seasons, a lot of the best humor comes from the chemistry between Shawn and Cory, but Shawn had maybe 30 seconds of screen time in this episode. On the other hand, William Russ is always funny as Alan, and Cory did have a few good bits with Eric.

Life Lesson: 1.0 - This was one of those switcheroo life lessons. It looked like we were going to get lectured on not caring what people think of us, but we ended up with something much more meaningful. It's the same sort of lesson we learned back in 2x12 when Mr. Turner was discussing Pygmalion. In the real world, how people perceive you has a very real effect on your life. That's not to say that you should only worry what people think, but just like Cory and Feeny in this episode, it's good to try to improve yourself if you want to be perceived differently. We are all special little snowflakes, but that doesn't mean we shouldn't try to better ourselves when we can. 

3.25 out of 4. 

Thanks for reading, see you Friday.