Quick spoilers for last night's "My Boys" coming up just as soon as I order a pizza...And here we get confirmation, once again, that resolving a will-they-or-won't-they? scenario in no way signals creative death for a comedy. Bobby and PJ are together, and two episodes in, this season has been much stronger than last year's Unresolved Sexual Tension-laden episodes.
"Private Eyes" paid off a lot of the potential I saw in the idea of PJ dating within the group. Though the guys were ultimately fine with it -- preferred it, actually, to seeing her go off with somebody new they don't like -- but the episode had a lot of fun with PJ and Bobby's fear of what would happen when the truth came out, as well as Bobby briefly letting himself be swayed by everybody's theories about PJ. (I love how much this show seems to despise Jeremy Piven. Brendan name-checking Piven was the last straw in the Douchebag Intervention (and if you haven't watched that in a while, enjoy), and here the name was enough to give Bobby genuine second thoughts about PJ.
Just a funny episode all around, with other highlights including:
• The entire subplot about Andy trying to enjoy his brief escapes from baby-ville, particularly his complaint that he doesn't want to spend that time talking about his sister's love life, so "Let's make the switch to sports and reality TV."
• Mike letting his mustache slowly transform him into a 1970s cop.
• Kenny, upon discovering that Bobby's dating PJ, asking, "Are her feet soft?"
What did everybody else think?
I totally forgot about it last night, whoops.
ReplyDelete"His parents will want a picture, right?"
ReplyDeleteI basically starting laughing out loud at that and never really stopped.
I really liked this episode and am very happy with the tone they've set for the season. I think it's going to be a big improvement over Season 2.
ReplyDeleteBut...
Stephanie is really irritating the hell out of me! (Gotta love Mike's "Is this heaven?" line!) Why is she acting so obnoxious about PJ not telling her about Bobby when Stephanie still hasn't owned up to sleeping with Kenny? Which begs the question, are they ever going to make mention of that again? And do I even want them to? Not so sure.
I loved this exchange between Kenny and Mike:
ReplyDelete"She has been smelling even better. She's changed her scent just the slightest bit."
"What are you, planning to track her?"
Or the fact that Mike asks to no one in particular whether Steph's house is Heaven. That had me in stitches.
Or when Bobby has to firmly explain that Mike is not a cop and that there was only one cop on the whole street! Funny episode...
Such a good episode. I really hope they can keep up the great work this season (or half season, or whatever it is).
ReplyDeleteIt seems like they have finally nailed what works for them...just focusing on the group, let each actor play to their strengths but let none of them become characteratures of themselves (everyone sort of did last year).
I can't believe I even like Brenden again!
I'm hoping ignoring the bad Andy and his co-worker story line means it is over. Jim Gaffigan is perfect in his just outside the loop but always around it role they have him playing now.
I liked the "covers" Mike and Kenny came up with. Mike had nothing, Kenny says "I was just walking by the building and I thought I smelled gas."
ReplyDeleteNot a good cover, but at least it was something.
lol
It's almost like the bad stuff from last season never happened when the episodes are this funny.
ReplyDeleteI also loved Bobby's line about how the van smelled like feet.
I started watching this show for Jim Gaffigan, and I stuck with it for Jim Gaffigan, and I found most of the characters annoying because basically they weren’t Jim Gaffigan, but last night it all clicked for me.
ReplyDeleteOf course I laughed out load at the already mentioned line from Mike about being in heaven, but I also loved it when Andy was directing the pizza place where to have the pizza delivered and he mentions they are 4 grown men in a van across from a grade school. He seemed genuinely unaware of what he was saying. I always enjoy it when a show lets the humor come from a character’s lack of self-awareness and last night I think the entire cast got a chance to do that and they were all able to pull it off.
I liked how Kenny subtly hinted that he was aware of Steph's no shoes policy. They will definitely bring this out at one point. I could live with Steph being hypocritical, and she was probably overdoing her anger to cover for her guilt about not saying anything to PJ about Kenny.
ReplyDeleteI thought this episode really worked for me and was pretty much straight through funny. PJ and Bobby are acting like a normal couple, or as normal as possible in that group, without the grandiose romantic gestures, and it's the kind of thing that works on this show. They definitely have taken the Jim/Pam approach.
Kenny thinking he was a cop was also funny too, although he looked less like a 70s cop than the Village People "cop".
^ oops I meant Mike looks like the Village People cop.
ReplyDeleteWow: Although my wife and I are fans and probably saw every episode of the first 2 seasons, I was unaware that My Boys had even returned for Season 3 until today -- clearly I have to come to Alan's site more frequently. Was it just us that missed the return or did TBS do less promotion for the return this time around?
ReplyDeleteVery funny episode. I laughed all the way through. Mike keeping his 70's porn/cop stache is sheer genius. They've had two episodes worth of great lines over it.
ReplyDeleteI'm glad this show found its footing again. Last season kind of blew, but I'm back to loving it.
I watched this episode a second time today. Loved that Kenny knew Andy's license plate number off the top of his head, Andy's Disney knock-off movies (A Handful of Dalmations), and, of course, Mike's 70s porn moustache (why was he drinking his beer through a straw? Trying to avoid getting the 'stache wet?).
ReplyDeleteI finally watched it this afternoon. I know everyone's said it already, but still...thank goodness it's back to being funny and awesome and we can all forget that 90% of last season ever happened. Not only that, but I like them all at the same time. Even in the early, wonderful episodes *somebody* was the bland or annoying one of the ep, but I like them all. I know people still seem to have problems with Steph (even though most agree that she's leaps and bounds better than season one) but I'm glad they've struck the balance with her they have. I would hope they'll deal with the Steph/Kenny issue at some point, but if they don't...whatever. And I didn't really think it was that weird that she was annoyed with PJ, partly because that's just the way she is, partly because they'd just had the talk about Bobby and partly because she was semi-undercover. I mean, even though she probably wasn't going to give the guys anything, she was still working PJ for specific information and that was funny.
ReplyDeleteAnd more Piven jokes. That never fails to amuse me.
I liked the episode a lot. Like the season premiere it was genuinely funny, and they all work exceptionally well together as a group.
ReplyDeleteHowever, I am not okay with the fact that ever since their brief hook-up, Brendan has seemed completely okay with PJ dating other guys. And that he doesn't even suffer a bit of heartache now that she's with Bobby and he's single. I realize this is a sitcom, but I hate it when events like that have no impact. I really hope the Brendo/PJ thing will be revisited somewhere down the road. Bobby/PJ is fun and I'm sure the writers will make it enjoyable for us to follow their relationship for a while, but he's really not the one I want PJ to ultimately end up with.
I laughed out loud when they flashed to Stephanie's apartment and you see all the boys sitting in a row on the couch with their shoes on their laps. GREAT stuff! And when Brendan starts talking and goes to set his shoes on the table and Stephanie immediately chastises him. And then of course Mike's line to no one: "Is this heaven?"
ReplyDelete