Episode 5x12 "Raging Cory"

I decided to take the holiday on Monday. Please excuse my laziness.

I finally watched episodes 4 through 7 of GMW. Maya is still the best, Cory is still 90% of the good jokes, and it's still pretty good overall, even if I have to pause and cringe sometimes. Loved seeing Willie Garson and Lee Norris. No spoilers, but holy shit I can't believe they actually did what they did with Minkus. I'm becoming more comfortable with Lucas, which I didn't think would happen, so that's good. Also, "Weird-mommy is cool."

Most importantly, I realized what's missing. Riley is Cory, Maya is Shawn, Auggie is Morgan, Farkle is Minkus, Lucas is Topanga, Cory is (at least trying to be) Feeny, yada yada.

But there's no Eric.

THERE'S NO ERIC. WHAT ARE WE GONNA DO???

WHAT ARE WE GONNA DOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO

One more thing. I've posted this everywhere already (and made it, of course), but if you still haven't seen it, here it is.

It's the Matthews basketball championship game between Eric and Alan, in scenic The Driveway. Problem is, Cory's not included. He wants to be, though, and wants a game with his father after Eric, but Alan's already exhausted after goofing around with Eric all day. Things get heated, and Cory accidentally knocks his father to the ground.

There's trouble at The Apartment too, as Jack "pokes a bubble" on the ceiling of his room and a bunch of water collapses in on him. Shawn offers to let Jack stay in his room for the time being, and it is an absolute monstrosity. I can't imagine why Angela wouldn't take some steps to get him to clean this place up, it's pretty bad. Jack comments that "a pig would never live here," but that's not quite true, as it turns out.

I hope that's a callback to 3x06.

It's probably a coincidence though, since the writers have proven that they can't keep track of a damn thing. 

Cory joins us in Shawn's room, I guess he broke into the apartment, and explains what happened with his father. The "talking based relationship" isn't enough for Cory, who wants to actually do stuff, like Eric gets to. Shawn insists that Cory has a great relationship with his father, and he's also hilarious here. One after the other with the jokes, they really nailed this scene. 

It's 2 a.m and Mister Feeny knocks on the patio-to-kitchen door as Alan is preparing a sandwich. Feeny can't sleep since he knows there's a problem and yet nobody came to him for advice. It's a funny little self aware bit, and Feeny explains to Alan that Cory's upset because of their "talking based relationship". 

There really isn't much to say so far. It's been separated into very easy-to-summarize little bits. 

There's this long gag now where Jack is trying to fall asleep in Shawn's room, but Shawn needs the light on to remind him of the headlights shining through his window back in the trailer park, and he also needs to play this tape called Sounds of the Trailer Park.It's not nearly as funny as that first scene with Shawn, but we do learn that the pig's name is Little Cory, just like it was in 3x06, so maybe it is actually a callback. Anyway, things escalate and the Hunter boys are about to throw down. Jack decides he'd rather sleep though, "in the dark, like a normal person," and Shawn looks pretty hurt. And I don't blame him! That was a punch right in the insecurity. 

The next morning, Topanga breaks into the apartment to wake up Cory.

She assures him that he has a great relationship with his father, just like Shawn said, but Cory still ain't buyin it. Just then, Alan and Eric show up at the door and kidnap Cory to go skydiving. Well that's a quick resolution at 8 minutes. I was worried we'd spend the entire episode on this, and then have some moving activity together at the end, but we're knocking it out quick. 

Our Matthews boys are in the skydiving plane now, in the longest scene in the universe. It's stretched out to four minutes as Alan explains to Cory that he truly values their talking relationship, that he loves to hear his opinions on politics and philosophy and such. Cory jumps out of the plane first, and we see how the rest of the episode is going go. Eric explains that he wants that meaningful, deep relationship too, that he wants to talk to his father about politics and other important stuff.

Holy crap, that was extremely harsh. Jumping out of a plane rather than talking to your son. Poor Eric. Back at home, Cory's playing basketball with Alan now, and Eric is the one who ends up pushing Alan down this time. The scene ends pretty abruptly though, so we'll have to see how it pans out later. 

At The Apartment, Jack plays Shawn a recording of him both talking and snoring in his sleep. They argue some more about how disgusting the room is, it's basically the same scene as before, except they actually fight this time.

I don't think this was pieced together properly. Cory's obviously not staying on their couch anymore, and that was the only reason Jack was staying in Shawn's room anyway. Jack can totally just take the couch now, (or sleep in Eric's room). So I feel like this scene was supposed to happen earlier, before Cory got kidnapped, but whatever. Out in the living room, Cory arrives to smooth things over with Eric, and Eric explains that he'll be joining the witness protection program. It's hilarious, because it's Eric, but the plot doesn't actually move at all.

Back in Shawn's room, the boys are still fighting, it's really unclear if maybe time just passes more slowly in Shawn's bedroom, I don't know. Ultimately, they both realize that they're not actually fighting about the messy room, but rather about... not getting to know each other.. while they were growing up..? It's not well written at all. I get that they both might wish they got to know each other earlier, but I don't know why they would... physically fight about it... It's weird. Doesn't make a lot of sense.

Later that night, we're back in the driveway where Amy gets to do the speech of the day, which is a rare sight indeed. She's basically explaining that he's gotta give both sons both sides of him, that this "talking vs doing" split between them isn't going to work anymore. Amy hasn't been given a lot of love when it comes to speeches, but I'm pleased with how this one turned out.

Now it's Eric's turn to be kidnapped.

So they're at an art museum where, ALLEGEDLY, Cory enjoys going with Alan sometimes. This goes back to the whole "why is Cory suddenly a scholar" thing from 5x09. Anyway Eric chooses an abstract sculpture thing to try to interpret, and he sees it as a metaphor for, to paraphrase, a father monkey with two sons and only one coconut. It's a heartwarming little scene, and it turns out that Eric actually knows a decent amount about art but always thought Alan didn't want to hear about it. 

During the credits, Alan confirms with Morgan that they have a good relationship where they talk and also do fun things together. It might not seem like much to the casual viewer, but I'm really glad they decided to throw that in. 

Plot: 0.75 - The Shawn and Jack thing was stuuuuuuuuuuuupid, oh my goodness. Sooooooooooo stupid. But I do love Alan, and this father son story felt very season 1, where Alan got a lot of good stories. 

Character Development: 1.0 - This whole father son thing grew pretty dramatically, and we got to see some new sides of all the Matthews men. And I guess Shawn and Jack sort of did some shit but who cares.

Humor: 1.0 - Eric and Shawn, of course, stand out the most. 

Life Lesson: 0.5 - I'm not really sure what we can take away from this, other than that you shouldn't be afraid to improve your relationships with your parents (or your kids). 

3.25 out of 4.0. If this review was bad, I'm sorry, it's been a shitty day. This is a pretty good episode though.

Thanks for reading, see you Friday.

All images used under Fair Use.