S05.E10: Negotiations

[Aulty]

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Jonah and Sandra represent the Cloud 9 employees at union contract negotiations with corporate. Worried about the union’s fate, Amy, Dina and Cheyenne distract themselves by looking for the perfect Christmas tree. Mateo, Garrett and Glenn compete to see who can sell an unsellable item.

Original air date: 12/12/2019

[jmonique]

Are the writers aiming to make this show extremely depressing?

Because that's what they're doing.

[Irlandesa]

3 minutes ago, jmonique said:

Are the writers aiming to make this show extremely depressing?

Because that's what they're doing.

That is exactly what I was thinking.  The past few years the series has had some pretty gloomy/scary/sad cliffhangers. 

There was the tornado, everyone walking off the job, Mateo being arrested, the news about Cloud 9 and even Jonah and Amy having sex was not great because they were filmed. 

[chocolatine]

Oof. If a "tech company" (i.e. a fictionalized version of Amazon) bought out Cloud9, things are about to get much worse for everyone.

[Aulty]

It was an OK episode and before the big twist at the end I thought Jonah was maybe heading for positiona as a union leader or something like that.

I need more Sayid and less Justine.

The B plot with Jared, Mateo and Glenn was lame. Glenn's cow shoe was the least worst.

[AnimeMania]

6 hours ago, Aulty said:

It was an OK episode and before the big twist at the end I thought Jonah was maybe heading for positiona as a union leader or something like that.

Or even funnier if they gave all the credit to Sandra and made her the union leader.

[tennisgurl]

Ouch, I knew that corporate gave up WAY too easily, nothing around here ever goes so well so easily. This show really has ended a lot of its seasons/mid-seasons on depressing and/or dramatic notes. 

The tree cutting was decently funny at least, but all I can hang onto now is how screwed everyone is, even more than before probably, and now Amy will have to tell everyone not to be excited about this "win" anymore. 

Actually, I plan on just thinking about the robot wearing a Santa hat. Oh yeah, thats my Christmas take-away. 

[Lovecat]

1 hour ago, tennisgurl said:

Actually, I plan on just thinking about the robot wearing a Santa hat. Oh yeah, thats my Christmas take-away. 

That was my favorite part, too!  Listen, I hate "Marty" the robot at my local Giant store, but now I kind of want to take him a Santa hat...if that's not the Christmas spirit, then I don't know what is!

[Harvey]

I liked the "Jonah sounds the way he looks" joke. I thought it was clever and kinda shady as well.

[Trillium]

I really liked this one. No one was a dick, Amy and Jonah were cute. I always love when Dina, Amy and Cheyenne are together ( 3 owl bitch still makes me laugh years later) and I thought the random things they were try to sell was hysterical because I see things and wonder “who thought of this and was able to convince someone to mass produce it??”

The ending was a major buzzkill though. Jonah (and Sandra) actually did a really good job negotiating. A victory would have been nice   

[rhys]

I thought there would be some health insurance snafu at the ER with the other woman who bageled her hand. She was so ready to acquiese when they got to the table with the suits. She caved easily to about everything the "union" was asking for. The writers missed a golden opportunity to show how much an ER visit might cost even with health insurance. Of course this would have made the show an hour long.

[Kiddvideo]

Depressing. Why not go all in, add an active shooter and make it as truly awful as real life can be. Ho Ho Ho.

[foxfreakinmulder]

Didn't find this episode funny at all.

I don't think they would have negotiations if the sale of the Cloud 9 was in place.

The new company take over would probably mean every employee would be let go or have to reapply/interview for a position. And they would close the store for remodel so it meets their companies vision.  

The writers don't know what to do with this show anymore.

[jmonique]

If the new company taking over is anything like the new showrunners who took over this season, everyone other than Amy is doomed.

[Harvey]

1 hour ago, foxfreakinmulder said:

Didn't find this episode funny at all.

I don't think they would have negotiations if the sale of the Cloud 9 was in place.

The new company take over would probably mean every employee would be let go or have to reapply/interview for a position. And they would close the store for remodel so it meets their companies vision.  

The writers don't know what to do with this show anymore.

I don't think it was meant to be funny to be honest. The show takes itself too seriously sometimes, it wants to be everything at once. A vehicle for immigration rights and now this.

[iMonrey]

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The show takes itself too seriously sometimes, it wants to be everything at once. A vehicle for immigration rights and now this.

I'm willing to bet America Ferrara has a hand in what goes into the show.

Not to get into a thing, but I found the negotiator unfortunately realistic based on my own experience with unions. They promise the moon to get you to sign a card then they throw you under the bus when it comes to negotiating your actual contract.

I got a big kick out of the Tony Danza popcorn maker, which works only with Tony Danza popcorn cartridges. Cartridges not included.

[geauxaway]

2 minutes ago, iMonrey said:

I got a big kick out of the Tony Danza popcorn maker, which works only with Tony Danza popcorn cartridges. Cartridges not included.

Me too!  So random, yet so funny!  I mean, why Tony Danza of all people?  

[chocolatine]

1 hour ago, foxfreakinmulder said:

I don't think they would have negotiations if the sale of the Cloud 9 was in place.

The sale may have still been pending at that time. It takes several months to finalize such a big (i.e. multi-billion dollar) merger.

1 hour ago, foxfreakinmulder said:

The new company take over would probably mean every employee would be let go or have to reapply/interview for a position.

Not necessarily. If the new ownership wants to keep the stores running with minimum friction, they'll give all or most of the existing employees offer letters to continue working at the stores. Of course, the terms of those offer letters could be worse than their terms with Cloud9, and as Maya said, the new ownership doesn't have to honor any of the concessions that the Cloud9 lawyers agreed to in the negotiation. The workers can try to negotiate with the new ownership, but those terms are usually "take it or leave it". The new ownership is not firing anyone who doesn't accept the terms, those people just choose of their own accord not to accept the offers, so there's no risk or liability for the company.

2 hours ago, foxfreakinmulder said:

And they would close the store for remodel so it meets their companies vision. 

Again, not necessarily. Amazon changed almost nothing about the Whole Foods branding after the acquisition, they just put a bunch of Prime signs in the stores and added the Prime app scanning at the checkouts. 

[foxfreakinmulder]

11 minutes ago, chocolatine said:

Again, not necessarily. Amazon changed almost nothing about the Whole Foods branding after the acquisition, they just put a bunch of Prime signs in the stores and added the Prime app scanning at the checkouts. 

Okay. I was going by what I've seen happen in my town :-)

[theatremouse]

2 hours ago, foxfreakinmulder said:

I don't think they would have negotiations if the sale of the Cloud 9 was in place.

I think that was basically the point: they were negotiating in bad faith the whole time. They set the meeting so soon, probably knowing that they might not need to keep whatever agreement they might verbally come to. The corporate folks didn't necessarily expect the sale to go through literally during the meeting, but if they were expecting it within a few days - the whole "legal will send the paperwork in the next few days" thing was probably always the buffer they needed anyway. They would get to say Cloud 9 were the good guys, but oops, buyout and your agreement isn't finalized yet and would have needed to be finalized with them not us, sorry we actually have no authority now k bye.

[foxfreakinmulder]

21 minutes ago, chocolatine said:

The sale may have still been pending at that time. It takes several months to finalize such a big (i.e. multi-billion dollar) merger.

Didn't the phone conversation say Cloud 9 was sold to a tech company?

Also, if it is a tech company, which makes me think of Google, and Microsoft I would think they would be looking for employees a lot smarter than our Cloud 9 group.

Again, I don't think these writers know what they're doing. If it ain't broke don't fix it, why try to change the format?

[chocolatine]

3 minutes ago, foxfreakinmulder said:

Didn't the phone conversation say Cloud 9 was sold to a tech company?

Also, if it is a tech company, which makes me think of Google, and Microsoft I would think they would be looking for employees a lot smarter than our Cloud 9 group.

Again, I don't think these writers know what they're doing. If it ain't broke don't fix it, why try to change the format?

It's much more likely to be a tech company that operates in the retail market, like Amazon. And why would they need "smarter" - i.e. more expensive - floor workers? Every company, for every function, wants the cheapest employees that are qualified to do those jobs. That's why "overqualified" people have such a hard time getting hired.

[foxfreakinmulder]

20 minutes ago, chocolatine said:

It's much more likely to be a tech company that operates in the retail market, like Amazon.

If it's a retail store than no they wouldn't need "smarter" employees. But if it's a tech company without a store front, I would think so. Amazon doesn't have any retail stores anywhere around where I live, they have warehouses and I know people that work there and it's hard work. But when I hear "company" to me that doesn't sound like retail. I guess we'll have to wait until after the mid-season break to find out.  

[theatremouse]

Tech company buys retail store is very analogous to Amazon buys Whole Foods. The new fictional tech company may not have been one having store fronts in the show universe, but it just bought a whole bunch of them. This episode didn't suggest the point was buying them all to shut them all - not saying that never happens but to me nothing in the phone call from Maya suggested that's where this is going. 

[Leilani]

When Amazon bought Whole Foods alot of things changed in the background for the employees. They cut down on lots of 'redundant' postions like the sign maker and all signs came directly from corporate. Many long time employees saw their hours cut so they no longer qualified for health insurance etc.

The items got reduced so less options for the consumers.  I know this from friends employed during the merger and also from keeping up with the move on Glass Door.

I think the producers are probably going towards the trend of companies like Walmart moving toward self checkouts and delivery, cutting down even more on employees and pretty much warehouse based.