S07.E12: A Depressed Garden Gnome and a Mud Flap

[jewel21]

Quote

Christy and Bonnie support Marjorie when she attempts to reconnect with her estranged son. Also, Tammy sees another side of Jill while working as her employee.

Airdate: 01/16/2020

[Harvey]

I remember people have long been asking for a Marjorie-related storyline at the start of the season. And finally here it is 😄

Edited January 15, 2020 by Harvey

[chitowngirl]

And with her son to boot!

[SmithW6079]

On 1/15/2020 at 2:34 PM, Harvey said:

I remember people have long been asking for a Marjorie-related storyline at the start of the season. And finally here it is 😄

A Marjorie episode in which she barely appears. I would have preferred to see Marjorie and her son work it out rather than yet another performance of The Bonnie & Christy Snipe at Each Other Ad Nauseum Road Show. 

[jewel21]

Tammy does some beautiful work. Those shelves/cabinets were lovely. 

I liked Wendy being excited she was the person people are ranting to now, heh. 

I'm glad Marjorie and her son were able to work things out and that he wantes her to be involved in his daughter's life. 

[Amazee-Dayzee]

I would say that I have hope that it means that Christy will work things out with her children but Chuck Lorre wants us to forget they exist until he brings them up.

[Harvey]

4 hours ago, SmithW6079 said:

A Marjorie episode in which she barely appears. I would have preferred to see Marjorie and her son work it out rather than yet another performance of The Bonnie & Christy Snipe at Each Other Ad Nauseum Road Show. 

Well that is one of the funniest aspects of the show so I'm fine with it. 

[Amazee-Dayzee]

Am I the only one who thought that her son Jerry was a tool? All Marjorie said was that Sophia looked like she needed a blanket because she was could and that was enough for him to start straight up SCREAMING at her? Alcoholic mother or not, that is a way too big overreaction. I thought we were gonna go down the route that Jerry had something wrong with him and that is why he got so furious. Nope. He's just too oversensitive. I would hate to be his wife. She seemed like she was weak-willed but that might have been because she was tired. But he seemed like he had anger issues.

Edited January 17, 2020 by Amazee-Dayzee

[nodorothyparker]

I would guess that it's probably pretty difficult to watch a woman who by her own admission chose to move out and abandon her child so she could keep drinking offer anything resembling parenting advice.  We've seen Christy go off on Bonnie in the past for similar kinds of stuff, but for all their sniping, Christy and Bonnie were right in that the only reason they're able to be around each other now is because they kept working at it and fighting it out.  Jerry's got good reason to have anger issues, but it doesn't sound like he's made much effort to work through them at all.  The poor daughter-in-law was cast in the position of lots of people who marry into dysfunctional families and think they can fix it if they can just get everybody in the same room to talk to each other and never mind that there's years and years of history and hurt feelings that probably aren't going to be so quick to get over.

I like the idea of an episode about Marjorie and her estrangement from her son, but it would have been nice had they at least shared a scene together and the entire thing not been completely filtered through the Bonnie and Christy relationship.  I get that they're the stars of the show and that's the main draw, but Marjorie was barely in an episode that was supposed to be about her.

The Jill-Tammy story was a nice bit of continuity on the idea that Jill is spoiled and self-absorbed to the point that she doesn't think about other people unless basic stuff is pointed out to her.  She also clearly has too much time on her hands to micromanage everyone on things that don't even need doing.  Tammy was pretty diplomatic in pointing all of that out.

[Agent 817]

Just wondering, but did they change actors for Marjorie's son? I could have sworn that her son was played by someone else back in season 1 (At least I think that was when that episode aired) but now, he was played by Hodges from CSI. I guess Matt Roth was busy or couldn't be reached.

Either way, it was a good episode and we finally got a Marjorie storyline after quite a while.

[iMonrey]

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Am I the only one who thought that her son Jerry was a tool? All Marjorie said was that Sophia looked like she needed a blanket because she was cold and that was enough for him to start straight up SCREAMING at her?

We didn't see what happened, we only heard Marjorie's version of it. I can imagine how triggering she must be for her son. 

Didn't Jill get all her money from her divorce? She acts like she's been a spoiled rich girl all her life. Did she come from money? Have they ever explained that? She came off really badly in this episode the way she was with her servants.

[eel21788]

Jill came from money. She has talked about all her life, including high school, not knowing if people liked her for herself or for her money. She also talked about while her mother was committing suicide, she sent Jill on a spending spree with her mother's credit card.

[BabyVegas]

Man, this episode really got me. I grew up with a parent who was extremely depressed and, as a result, was mentally abusive towards me. That person has since gotten treatment and is a completely different person, but the struggle of having been a kid dealing with all of that is 20 years later I'm working on dealing with how to be mad at someone who doesn't exist and how to trust this new version. On that front, I could really understand where Jerry was coming from. Those could have been feelings that he didn't even know were there until Marjorie said the baby looked cold. 

I also liked the Jill/Tammy storyline. When they're used in the right amount, I find that they're two of my favorite characters. And I loved that Tammy didn't let the issue fester or sit until it became a grudge two episodes later. Plus Jill actually listened. I think that's what saves Jill from being just an asshole with money is that she will listen if somebody says something to her. She might not take it the first time, but she does listen.

Edited January 17, 2020 by BabyVegas

[bobby2018]

30 minutes ago, BabyVegas said:

they're two of my favorite characters.

Mine too!!

[Blakeston]

While we didn't see what happened between Marjorie and her son, I really can't imagine her escalating the situation. She seemed determined to be as pleasant as possible.

So I think he really did throw a hissy-fit just because she said the baby looked cold, and then either asked her to leave, or made her feel like she had to leave.

And if that's the case, then I'd say he handled the situation very badly. If he's still so bitter about his childhood that he can't stand having her around, then he should have just stayed out of her life. Once he made the choice to invite her over, he had an obligation to treat her halfway decently.

And he should understand that letting his daughter have a grandmother (and reducing the family's childcare burden, which seems to be falling entirely on his wife) is a priority.

I also thought that Christy was being an abysmal friend to Marjorie when they confronted the son, and she was basically made the argument for continued estrangement. They were very, very lucky that he wasn't fully persuaded.

If she was better at dealing with people, she would have empathized with him while still recommending forgiveness. But she got too caught up in her own anger to remember the big picture.

[Bastet]

2 hours ago, iMonrey said:

Didn't Jill get all her money from her divorce? She acts like she's been a spoiled rich girl all her life. Did she come from money? Have they ever explained that?

Several times.  She's been over-indulged, out-of-touch rich all her life.

[Amazee-Dayzee]

As for people asking if the actor who played Jerry changed, yeah he did. He was originally played by Matt Roth who played Jackie's abusive boyfriend on "Roseanne" (which makes it weird that he and Laurie Metcalfe got married). He was now played by Wallace Langham who was Hodges on "CSI".

It is weird because when I remember seeing him in season 1 I thought he was a bit older and wouldn't think of him as a first time parent. I honestly thought that Marjorie would have teenaged grandchildren since Jerry seemed to look like he was in his 50s (Matt Roth and Wallace Langham are actually in their 50s) and I put Marjorie in her 70s. Meaning she had Jerry around her 20s and he would have kids around his 20s-30s making them teenagers or young adults.

[Sarah 103]

17 hours ago, Amazee-Dayzee said:

I would say that I have hope that it means that Christy will work things out with her children but Chuck Lorre wants us to forget they exist until he brings them up.

Christy and Violet agreed to give each other some space. Violet is not ready to forgive Christy. It took years for Christy to let Bonnie back in her life, and even longer for Christy to actually let go of the anger. I really liked the way they resolved the Christy/Violet storyline.

Roscoe is a totally different. We have no idea what the situation is because they act like the character doesn't exist. Again, if the actor wanted to leave the show, just have a line or two a few times during the season that indicates Christy is still involved in his life (Hold on, I have to answer a text from Roscoe).

10 hours ago, nodorothyparker said:

I would guess that it's probably pretty difficult to watch a woman who by her own admission chose to move out and abandon her child so she could keep drinking offer anything resembling parenting advice.  

Exactly. He thought he would be okay seeing her and having her be a part of his life. However all it took was one innocent comment and all the anger, hurt, and resement came pouring out and he couldn't control how he felt. 

[iMonrey]

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While we didn't see what happened between Marjorie and her son, I really can't imagine her escalating the situation. She seemed determined to be as pleasant as possible.

So I think he really did throw a hissy-fit just because she said the baby looked cold, and then either asked her to leave, or made her feel like she had to leave.

Hmm, maybe you have to be a child of an alcoholic to understand where Jerry is coming from. I can see where on the surface it would seem like he over-reacted. But the dynamic between him and his mother is so fraught with pitfalls and so fragile it's not surprising that he could very easily be set off. That's such a volatile relationship, even if he was trying his best, he's like a lit fuse just ready to go off. 

Again, we didn't really see what happened. Knowing Marjorie as we do, I'm sure she was being her nicest, but any little thing she might say or any inflection she might use could be triggering for her son. And that's not his fault. He probably needs counseling to deal with this and get past his anger, but it was his wife that pushed this reunion. He may have tried his best but he simply wasn't ready.

[Blakeston]

i completely understand why it would be triggering for an absentee parent to offer you parenting advice. But a screaming tirade that drives your mother out of the house, leaving her a sobbing mess in the front yard, just because she said the baby looks cold, is a pretty extreme reaction. 

Marjorie doesn't get a free pass on being a shitty mother because of her alcoholism. But he doesn't get a free pass on being a shitty father and husband because of his childhood.

[Deskisamess]

Marjorie has spent years in recovery, dealing with her issues. Her son has never dealt with his issues caused by her behavior. He's ignored her for years, but that doesn't mean he is ready to have her back in his life. If Marjorie expected to walk in and have normal family time, she was mistaken.

It was weird to not see the scene between Marjorie and her son though.

I love Tammy, she's been a great addition to the show, and her and Jill work some comic timing gold together.

I missed the dog, and Adam too.

[nodorothyparker]

Marjorie has given us enough snippets of stories over the years about her time in prison, her time as a bank robbing "revolutionary," being a drunk, etc.,  to suggest that she wasn't always the mild-mannered nice old lady we mostly see her as now.  She actually sounds pretty hard in some of those stories.  That's the mom Jerry remembers, the one that's frozen in his mind as the person he'd be dealing with by inviting her back into his life  and exposing to his child when it really wasn't even his idea in the first place.  It sounds like he's been dealing with his anger and his feelings all these years by simply not dealing with them or with her.  That's naturally going to get messy when she's right there and has the audacity to tell him anything about his own kid when she apparently had no problem passing out on the sidewalk or simply abandoning him when she was supposed to be parenting him.

I do think a lot of this would be clearer had we actually gotten to see the scene between them, or any interaction between the characters at all instead of being told about it and extrapolating from there.

 

[Irlandesa]

1 hour ago, Blakeston said:

But a screaming tirade that drives your mother out of the house, leaving her a sobbing mess in the front yard, just because she said the baby looks cold, is a pretty extreme reaction. 

I think it's anything but cold. It was clearly an emotional outburst.  But it's tough because we didn't see the scene.  Marjorie is pretty tough but I could see a quick frustrated outburst as being enough to get her to leave the house and cry in the front lawn. She was on edge simply calling him back.

I do wish we would have seen a scene between them--one where they establish ground rules of her reentering his life. It might mean she spends more time with his wife and daughter while taking it much slower with her son.

[MissLucas]

I think one of the main issues that led to Marjorie's son's outburst was that he was not really ready to deal with his mother. It was his wife who had suggested it and he probably thought he could handle the situation. Turns out he couldn't and flew off the handle at what from the outside looks like a trivial matter. And as much as I would have liked to see him and Marjorie work through that, I think it was a good idea to let their conflict be played out by Christie and Bonnie.

We as the audience know Marjorie only as lovely cat lady who can dish out great advice and who has some fantastic stories to tell about her colorful past. So we tend to sympathize with her. Christie was there to remind us of the wreckage such a colorful past leaves behind.  And that mending such a fraught relationship takes lots of time and effort.

Tammy and Jill were a great B-plot. I'm glad Andy is still in the picture and I loved Tammy talking about the kitchen of 'Downton Abbey'. Speaking of - did the housekeeper who had to do all the neurotic vacuum cleaning have a British accent?

I loved Jill's snakeprint blouse - such a great color for her. 

Edited January 19, 2020 by MissLucas

[SoMuchTV]

1 hour ago, MissLucas said:

Tammy and Jill were a great B-plot. I'm glad Andy is still in the picture and I loved Tammy talking about the kitchen of 'Downton Abbey'. Speaking of - did the housekeeper who had to do all the neurotic vacuum cleaning have a British accent?

Yes, she definitely did.  I kept thinking Jill's staff could do much better seeking other employment, but I guess it worked this way.  Hope they got good raises!  Thankyouthankyou.

[Deskisamess]

I noticed something funny while watching a rerun of another show. There is a picture by the steps in Christy's apartment made with a kid's palm prints in 3 different colors.

While watching a rerun of Mike & Molly, there is a scene in the basement of church where they are playing Bingo, and that picture was on the wall at the back of the scene. I couldn't remember at first what show it was in, then it came to me.

I like looking at the props used on the sets...

 

[msrachelj]

On 1/17/2020 at 3:57 PM, Amazee-Dayzee said:

As for people asking if the actor who played Jerry changed, yeah he did. He was originally played by Matt Roth who played Jackie's abusive boyfriend on "Roseanne" (which makes it weird that he and Laurie Metcalfe got married). He was now played by Wallace Langham who was Hodges on "CSI".

It is weird because when I remember seeing him in season 1 I thought he was a bit older and wouldn't think of him as a first time parent. I honestly thought that Marjorie would have teenaged grandchildren since Jerry seemed to look like he was in his 50s (Matt Roth and Wallace Langham are actually in their 50s) and I put Marjorie in her 70s. Meaning she had Jerry around her 20s and he would have kids around his 20s-30s making them teenagers or young adults.

I also thought it weird that Marjorie was only now becoming a grandmother. Her son looks to be in his 40's but then again, this late in life parents thing happens a lot more often than it did decades ago.

[kwnyc]

On 1/25/2020 at 3:32 PM, msrachelj said:

this late in life parents thing happens a lot more often than it did decades ago.

...he also had a lot of issues to sort through about marriage and parents!

[proserpina65]

On ‎01‎/‎15‎/‎2020 at 2:34 PM, Harvey said:

I remember people have long been asking for a Marjorie-related storyline at the start of the season. And finally here it is 😄

And yet, I didn't particularly like it.  I kind of wished her son had decided that he couldn't forgive her enough to let her back into his life.  It would've been more realistic.  I mean, I like Marjorie and don't want to see her get hurt, but she really screwed him up bad when he was a kid and sometimes people just can't forgive that.

On ‎01‎/‎17‎/‎2020 at 6:48 AM, Amazee-Dayzee said:

Am I the only one who thought that her son Jerry was a tool? All Marjorie said was that Sophia looked like she needed a blanket because she was could and that was enough for him to start straight up SCREAMING at her? Alcoholic mother or not, that is a way too big overreaction. I thought we were gonna go down the route that Jerry had something wrong with him and that is why he got so furious. Nope. He's just too oversensitive. I would hate to be his wife. She seemed like she was weak-willed but that might have been because she was tired. But he seemed like he had anger issues.

Actually I was on his side.  Yes, it was an overreaction, but a completely understandable one to me.

[proserpina65]

On ‎01‎/‎17‎/‎2020 at 3:23 PM, Blakeston said:

And he should understand that letting his daughter have a grandmother (and reducing the family's childcare burden, which seems to be falling entirely on his wife) is a priority.

It's not a priority if the grandmother is someone you can't trust, and he's had plenty of reason not to trust Marjorie.  Yes, we know she's changed a lot, but she was a horrible mother to him for years.  That kind of neglect can be extremely difficult to get over, even with lots of therapy.  I agree that he shouldn't have reached out to Marjorie at all since he's clearly still dealing with the issues created by her neglect, but I don't think his behavior (which we only heard from Marjorie, and didn't see ourselves) was so out of line given their past.  And it wasn't his idea to contact her in the first place.

On ‎01‎/‎17‎/‎2020 at 8:47 PM, Blakeston said:

i completely understand why it would be triggering for an absentee parent to offer you parenting advice. But a screaming tirade that drives your mother out of the house, leaving her a sobbing mess in the front yard, just because she said the baby looks cold, is a pretty extreme reaction. 

Marjorie doesn't get a free pass on being a shitty mother because of her alcoholism. But he doesn't get a free pass on being a shitty father and husband because of his childhood.

We have no evidence of him being a shitty father and husband, not based on what we saw.  We only have Marjorie's word on what happened, and people do tend to shade stories to make themselves look better a lot of the time.

I'm not the child of an alcoholic, but I do know a few, and it took years for them to come to grips with their childhood trauma enough to have even the slightest relationship with their parents.  So I'm not blaming Jerry for not actually being ready to let Marjorie back into his life.

Edited January 31, 2020 by proserpina65