Episode 3x17 "The Pink Flamingo Kid"

I've been putting this one off because I remember it specifically as being terrible. Like, one of the lowest lows of the series. But I guess it's time. Time for a test of my willpower. 

So Cory's got a camera and he shows up at Turner's place, and Shawn's on the phone with his dad since it's his dad's birthday. No sign of ol Chet Hunter's return yet, and Shawn's a little broken up about it. They resolve to go to Shawn's old trailer park and film him and his relatives as a birthday gift/general update for Chet.

I don't think that's particularly funny, but if you do, congratulations: that's every punchline for the first half of this episode.

Maybe 30 seconds later, we're at school and Shawn's already made another joke about his family being criminals. Eli comes along and informs Cory of some contest at a news station, but the deadline for submissions is two days. Could this conflict with his commitment to Shawn? Gollypops. What a compelling story. The Ericlogue begins. Eric's hauling some junk to Feeny's office for no reason, apparently Feeny's going to be auctioning off some stuff from his attic. Why the hell does he need to bring it to school? Because it's convenient for the production crew, that's why.

We're at the trailer park now, and we first meet Shawn's uncle Mike, who is shockingly both a character we've met before, and is played by the same actor. Don't get used to that. They make a few jokes about how he's a criminal. Uncle Mike calls out the rest of the Hunters, and they make a joke about how they're criminals.

After like 8 more jokes about how literally everyone in the Hunter family is a criminal, Cory ends up filming this.

Special Boy Meets World Fan Challenge: Why are they all hidden? I suggest you watch the episode because there's no way anything I've said so far will direct you to the answer.

Uncle Mike steals Cory's wallet, and then we meed Eddie, some sort of gang leader, but he's certainly lacking the class and relative charm of Harley Keiner. He gives the boys a hard time about not including him in their video, and tells them to get the fuck out before he starts to do gang leader things to them.

At home, Eric has cleaned out his own attic in hopes of finding something of value, like Mr. Feeny did. I think this would be funny under different circumstances, but I'm pretty numb to the idea of humor after all the criminal jokes. Anyway his parents trick him into thinking he'll find valuable stuff if he cleans out the attic and the garage.

Oh bless you William Russ and Betsy Randle. Bless your experienced acting. Will Friedle is doing well too, I'm just sour about everything before this. But this is good. Great, maybe. Something to keep me going, a reason to keep fighting.

At Turner's apartment, Cory and Shawn are reviewing the footage and see that they accidentally filmed that Eddie guy hauling around some presumably stolen computers. How the fuck was Eddie dumb enough to let that happen? How does this guy get dressed in the morning? Cory and Shawn were practically right next to him, it's ridiculous. Regardless, Cory wants to use this hardware thievery ring as the source material for his news-station contest project thing. Shawn doesn't like the idea.

Gee that was mature and rational. What the fuck. It's not like the tape had any sort of conclusive evidence. Shawn would rather protect this trailer park gangster piece of shit than send the tape to his dad as a birthday gift. I can't even begin to understand how this makes sense. "It's my family, I can do whatever I want" is his justification. Cory's pissed, by the way. He's also as confused as I am. The next day at school, Cory demands an explanation.

Shawn refuses to provide one, so they tackle each other and grapple a little bit, it's honestly not the worst act-fighting I've ever seen, and the extras react by crowding around and shouting "fight!" which is about as realistic as it could be. Turner and Eli break up the fight and Cory says he thinks that Shawn is just jealous of his skills with a camera, which is just completely fucking retarded.

And because I know we all want it,

Cory is going to go down to the trailer park to get more footage of Eddie stealing shit. Shawn warns him one last time, but Cory doesn't listen. So now Feeny is left to give advice to the frustrated Mr. Hunter. Shawn is playing the whole "who needs friends when you have family, family is always there for you" EVEN THOUGH HIS PARENTS ARE BLATANTLY NOT THERE FOR HIM so I just don't even know how the writers could have POSSIBLY thought this made sense. Mr. Feeny points out that you "don't have to be blood to be family", which is pretty great advice that Shawn really shouldn't need to hear after all these years.

We can always count on Eric. His parents try to convince him that he's getting scammed by both them and the appraisal place, but he's too far gone.

At the trailer park, Cory is a complete fucking idiot. He's already got the thugs on tape hauling their stolen stuff, about a thousand times more footage than he had before, but "I gotta get closer". No you don't Cory. You're already withing not-moron seeing distance. Jesus this is ridiculous. Eddie and the gang catch him, break his camera, and are about to beat the shit out of him.

PFFFFFFFFFFFFHAHAHAHAHAHA

aaaaaaaaahahahahahaha

Shawn threatens to call the cops on Eddie, who responds with "Come on man, I'm your brother." Shawn sticks to his guns and the trailer park gang crew squad decide not to kill Shawn and Cory. Shawn clarifies that Eddie is merely his half-brother, and that his existence "just didn't seem worth talking about." Shawn and Cory reconcile, Shawn points out that Cory is his "family" and that Eddie is only "blood". I feel like he should have known that already.

During the credits, Eric's fuckin loaded, apparently he sold some mask he found while he was cleaning for $4,000. Feeny shows up and inquires about the mask, apparently it was his, Eric gives him the money. Poor Eric.

Plot: 0.25 - Eric's wasn't terrible.

Humor: 0.25 - Eric, Amy, and Alan were good.

Character Development: 0.25 - Development occurred but it was LONG overdue. How fuckin long have these guys been friends? And Shawn only now realizes that Cory is his real family? It's just not even remotely believable.

Life Lesson: 0.50 - "You don't have to be blood to be family."

1.25 out of 4.0 - Just not a good episode at all. Obviously they're never going to MENTION Eddie again. I mean shit, there are several very important Hunter related events in the future and this guy isn't even whispered about. The only remotely reasonable thing is that he's Shawn's mother's kid from a previous husband, but even then there are a lot of places where he should come around. This was a complete fucking mistake by the writers. Just make him a cousin or something for crying out loud, what were they thinking? In the past, Shawn's mentioned a sister, as has Topanga, but they were never actually on screen. This half-brother was on screen and had lines and directly impacted the story, and is immediately erased from existence. What a complete waste of time.

At least it's over. Thanks for reading, see you Monday.

All images used under Fair Use.