S05.E03: Changes

[JudyObscure]

1 hour ago, Neurochick said:

So I guess, if a young woman wants to get married, why bother dating?  Just get pregnant and the guy will want to move in with you (if there's a pandemic) and ask to marry you...in less than six months.

Sorry, no, I didn't mean to imply that, at all.  It rarely works out that way today because the guy usually does not want to marry the girl he gets pregnant, and to be fair, the women are different today too.  In the past they  probably had only ever been with the man they eventually married. 

I'm just saying that because Kevin actually  is the type of man to want to marry the mother of his child, I think he and Madison have a good chance together.   I think (sometimes at least)   being married, living together and having a child together can make a couple fall in love with each other and end up having a happy marriage. 

 I'm definitely not saying I think it's a good idea for a woman to get pregnant hoping the father will marry her.  

[BC4ME]

On 11/11/2020 at 7:13 PM, slasherboy said:

It's long been a major source of irritation with me on TV shows when there is a perfectly good meal on the table and kids, usually, are dismissive and leave all that food just sitting there, wasted. That wouldn't happen but a couple of times if I was to cook.

OMG, me too! All the food wasting and people not closing doors behind when they come in them just drives me crazy.

[BC4ME]

On 11/12/2020 at 1:18 PM, ams1001 said:

I think she even mentioned when she originally told Kevin (at the end of last season) that she never thought she'd be able to have kids. (I guess she didn't mention why, but an eating disorder/being underweight can certainly affect your fertility.)

When you become underweight enough, you can stop getting your period, thus stop cycling and can't get pregnant. Sort of nature's way of preventing more births during times of famine.

[qtpye]

 

23 hours ago, Ohmo said:

I've read the comments about Madison changing, and one thing that I didn't see mentioned was that she and Kate are friends.  She doesn't know Kevin as well, but he's Kate's brother, and Madison knows Kate and Kevin have always been close.  Over the years, I think Madison has allowed Kate to see more of the "real" her, and now we're seeing a bit of that with Kevin,  Maybe it's because children are involved, but I think Madison is beginning to trust Kevin.  Who knows if it will result in a love story, but I like Madison and I like Kevin whether they are romantic partners or not.

I don't necessarily think Madison will die in childbirth, but I can see her dying when the twins are young children.  The flash forwards haven't given me the vibe that Kevin is co-parenting with someone at that time.  When we've seen his kids, my impression has been that they're living with him full time.

The friendship with Kate has always been presented as very strange to me. It is usually Madison gushing over how awesome Kate is and begging to do her favors, while Kate seems to barely tolerate her or look at her like she is a giant goofball.

It has been presented as fairly one sided and I could imagine Kate not caring very much about Madison's life until she got pregnant with Kevin's twins.

The Junior High version of Kate no longer resembles the adult version in her appearance or mannerisms. She just has a totally different vibe, but that is not necessarily a bad things (people change as they get older).

[BC4ME]

10 hours ago, JudyObscure said:

All this hair touching talk has triggered a lifetime of hair hassles for me.  Parents, teachers, and friends have always felt the need to question and judge my hair.  I've had many teachers take both hands and push my hair back into pony tail position, while informing me about barrettes and headbands. A college teacher pulled me into her office and  said one of the male teachers had asked her to talk to me about my "unkempt" hair. A group of girls in my college dorm busted into my room and asked if they could "do my hair," -- I was foolish enough to let them and I still remember them standing back after all their efforts and saying dejectedly, "It looks like it always does." One time  when I was 30 years old a man stopped me in the middle of the mall and told me my hair looked awful and asked me why I didn't brush it. (Why do people think that if you brush curly hair it will become silky straight?) My nicer friends just recommend conditioners all the time.

The last insult was about a year ago when a hairdresser sat me down and said, " I bet you hate your hair."  I said, "No, I don't hate my hair.  It's thick and healthy and looks very smooth and nice when the weather is right. The fact that it turns very frizzy whenever I get caught in misty rain has not made me hate it.  If you don't think you can deal with it I'll get someone else."

Nearly every part of this above has been my experience, except I don't remember anyone ever touching my hair. It's the type of hair that on the occasional random day might look really good, like just soft ringlet type curls, but 90 plus percent of the time looks like cotton candy it's so frizzy. I've kinda made peace with it but now that I've been made aware that people touching other people's hair is a thing, I'm thinking maybe my frizzy hair must scare people 🙂. I wouldn't have liked it if it hadn't scared people enough not to touch it though. I would never touch anybody's hair, especially without permission. It would never occur to me. I'm white BTW. I wonder if that has anything to do with it. If it does, I can see that shit triggering me if I was black.

So however this adoption mother interview thing ends up going, all I could think was, are you serious? Toby and Kate couldn't keep their shit together for FIVE minutes in front of someone they're trying to impress?

I like Madison better this year. I don't feel as tragic about her being the baby mama as at the end of last season.    

Edited November 14, 2020 by BC4ME

[ljenkins782]

On 11/11/2020 at 9:04 AM, Scarlett45 said:

I don’t think the granddaughter is related to Laurel at all. I think Laurel and the grandfather were in love/married long before the little girl was born, and it didn’t workout for some reason but he remembers the relationship fondly and keeps the photos around. Could be the granddaughter’s uncle/aunt is Laurel’s child (the granddaughter’s parent is a half sibling to Laurel’s child). 

If she isn't related to Laurel, then I definitely do not need to explore this branch of the story. I'm already not that crazy about the reveal of Laurel possibly being alive because Randall's life already seems to be imploding and it seems like that kind of thing will just push him into oblivion. Bad enough that he didn't meet his dad until he was an adult because Rebecca hid his identity, but if it turns out his mom is alive and he's just finding this out at 40? For Randall in his current state, that just seems like too much.

The last 2 seasons of the show are just too divergent in plotlines, especially with the show's penchant for throwing completely unknown characters into the show with zero context and expecting us to be hanging on tenterhooks waiting to find out how they relate to the main characters, which in most cases for me, really doesn't work. Especially for a show that we know is wrapping up soon, I wish they could stop expanding the universe of the show and just explore the characters we already know.

There have been at least three episodes where I genuinely feel like I may have clicked the wrong square on Hulu because the characters are unknown to me and the scenes just drag on for the first several minutes until I see someone I recognize.

And now that Kevin and Randall aren't speaking and everyone seems so wrapped up in their own separate things, there are no uniting threads to pull you back into a central story.

It just seems like the writers have gotten so ambitious that they've lost sight of the basic premise that brought people to the show to begin with.

 

[debraran]

10 hours ago, ljenkins782 said:

If she isn't related to Laurel, then I definitely do not need to explore this branch of the story. I'm already not that crazy about the reveal of Laurel possibly being alive because Randall's life already seems to be imploding and it seems like that kind of thing will just push him into oblivion. Bad enough that he didn't meet his dad until he was an adult because Rebecca hid his identity, but if it turns out his mom is alive and he's just finding this out at 40? For Randall in his current state, that just seems like too much.

The last 2 seasons of the show are just too divergent in plotlines, especially with the show's penchant for throwing completely unknown characters into the show with zero context and expecting us to be hanging on tenterhooks waiting to find out how they relate to the main characters, which in most cases for me, really doesn't work. Especially for a show that we know is wrapping up soon, I wish they could stop expanding the universe of the show and just explore the characters we already know.

There have been at least three episodes where I genuinely feel like I may have clicked the wrong square on Hulu because the characters are unknown to me and the scenes just drag on for the first several minutes until I see someone I recognize.

And now that Kevin and Randall aren't speaking and everyone seems so wrapped up in their own separate things, there are no uniting threads to pull you back into a central story.

It just seems like the writers have gotten so ambitious that they've lost sight of the basic premise that brought people to the show to begin with.

 

I agree to a point. It might have gotten too boring with just the big 3 but I was never a fan of forward scenes. Let them just play out. It also boxes them in to a degree. I know they had an outline for 6 seasons but all these characters didn't feel crowded? Cassidy, long lost relatives, dead/not dead relatives. I liked Nicky but now it seems they dropped him to show Randall's not dead mom or not dead for a while and then died mother. They pushed Miguel and Rebecca's story out longer and had Kevin do many impulsive sexual encounters and one got him twins. Just doesn't seem like the original writing and almost like they are throwing things in randomly. Kate has a difficult pregnancy, their son is blind, we went on that journey with them and now they want to adopt another baby? Dan has his wife take a major role now instead of "Kate's friend"  Did a writer leave? Just doesn't seem to flow the same way.

I might be in the minority but I want to hear about Nicky's life, what did his parents do when he was sent to hospital, why did everyone pretend he was dead? Will he meet Sally again? I know they had different scenarios based on Kate/Chrissy's weight or weight loss but it seems like they are going to go with abuse.  I don't feel you need that to explain weight gain that way even if it happens.

I wasn't surprised when most of my coworkers and friends dropped Million Little Things but I found out talking about TIU with them again this Fall, many stopped watching it last year or before. I know they still do very well in ratings but it just got too crowded for them, you couldn't connect as much. I hope it stays strong and remembers as you said the basic premise it started with.

 

Edited November 14, 2020 by debraran

[ams1001]

5 hours ago, debraran said:

I wasn't surprised when most of my coworkers and friends dropped Million Little Things but I found out talking about TIU with them again this Fall, many stopped watching it last year or before. I know they still do very well in ratings but it just got too crowded for them, you couldn't connect as much. I hope it stays strong and remembers as you said the basic premise it started with.

I saw ads for AMLT recently (oh, yeah... Eddie got hit by a car) and I was debating if I want to bother. I probably will, just because it'll be on after something else I watch.

I'll stick with TIU in part because I know it has an end point (unless they change their minds). So I'll stick around and see where it goes. But it's not "put aside the laptop and pay attention" TV anymore.

[PRgal]

59 minutes ago, ams1001 said:

I saw ads for AMLT recently (oh, yeah... Eddie got hit by a car) and I was debating if I want to bother. I probably will, just because it'll be on after something else I watch.

I'll stick with TIU in part because I know it has an end point (unless they change their minds). So I'll stick around and see where it goes. But it's not "put aside the laptop and pay attention" TV anymore.

I'm with you.  I don't fully pay attention to episodes anymore, but I want to know exactly what happens to the Big 3 in the future.  The past two (or should it be three, since the premiere was a double episode) have been too in-your-face woke to me, something I could get on the news daily.  I don't need that.  

[bros402]

On 11/11/2020 at 7:37 PM, Bulldog said:

So, Kate buys small packs of diapers at a time so as not to "hoard" them? Wouldn't that necessitate making multiple trips to the store each week (and we know they are not having them delivered based on their conversation)?  Doesn't seem very "woke" when people are being encouraged to limit trips to supermarkets, etc.   

.....how is that woke?

Do you know what woke means?

[deirdra]

'Woke' people don't waste gasoline to drive to the store 10 times a month for diapers when once would do.  It would be 'woke' if she walked to the store for diapers, but I've never seen her walk more than 15'.

Edited November 15, 2020 by deirdra

[3 is enough]

I do understand Tess' anger about having her hair touched, and her friend's anger about the teacher not using their preferred pronouns, but a "screw you" video might come back to bite Tess in the future, so I do also understand Beth and Randall's point of view.  The snotty remark about cage free eggs really pissed me off though.

Some people have no boundaries.  I would never dream of touching a stranger's hair or pregnant belly, but others see nothing wrong with it. I worked with a woman who had long straight naturally white-blonde hair. She married an Egyptian man and they went to Cairo on vacation.  She told me all kinds of people were touching her hair.  She didn't like it but she shrugged it off- she was in a place where a lot of people had never seen hair like hers in person, in a culture where personal space boundaries are a lot less pronounced than in North America.  There is no excuse for that kind of behaviour here.

As far as the pronouns go, I will always use whatever pronoun people prefer.  But as someone in my sixties, I do find it difficult to keep up with the rather rapid changes as to what words are acceptable to use these days.  If I say the wrong thing it is simply because I am not aware of the changes and not because I am insensitive. If you have been using a term all your life sometimes it is hard to remember that it is no longer acceptable.  "Manhole", anyone?

I don't think that the little Vietnamese girl is related to Randall by blood.  She did not know "the lady in the picture", so obviously it wasn't her grandmother.  But we know that there is someone with a connection to Randall's mom.  How this gets back to Randall remains to be seen.

 

Edited November 15, 2020 by 3 is enough

[PRgal]

1 hour ago, 3 is enough said:

I do understand Tess' anger about having her hair touched, and her friend's anger about the teacher not using their preferred pronouns, but a "screw you" video might come back to bite Tess in the future, so I do also understand Beth and Randall's point of view.  The snotty remark about cage free eggs really pissed me off though.

Some people have no boundaries.  I would never dream of touching a stranger's hair or pregnant belly, but others see nothing wrong with it. I worked with a woman who had long straight naturally white-blonde hair. She married an Egyptian man and they went to Cairo on vacation.  She told me all kinds of people were touching her hair.  She didn't like it but she shrugged it off- she was in a place where a lot of people had never seen hair like hers in person, in a culture where personal space boundaries are a lot less pronounced than in North America.  There is no excuse for that kind of behaviour here.

As far as the pronouns go, I will always use whatever pronoun people prefer.  But as someone in my sixties, I do find it difficult to keep up with the rather rapid changes as to what words are acceptable to use these days.  If I say the wrong thing it is simply because I am not aware of the changes and not because I am insensitive. If you have been using a term all your life sometimes it is hard to remember that it is no longer acceptable.  "Manhole", anyone?

I don't think that the little Vietnamese girl is related to Randall by blood.  She did not know "the lady in the picture", so obviously it wasn't her grandmother.  But we know that there is someone with a connection to Randall's mom.  How this gets back to Randall remains to be seen.

 

I'm only a year older than the Big 3, and even *I* find it difficult to keep up!  I'm already not a big fan of schools with uniforms that have casualized their dress to the point that kids are wearing sweatpants and sweatshirts (together!!!  It would look much more put-together if the sweatpants were paired with a polo shirt.  That look also doesn't negate comfort).  No need for #1 dress, but no need to look like slobs, either.  I hate slobs.  

I don't think the little girl is related to Randall either.  However, her grandfather had a relationship with Laurel, that we know.  How "special" was she to him?  That's to come.

 

[Neurochick]

On 11/13/2020 at 8:52 PM, JudyObscure said:

I'm just saying that because Kevin actually  is the type of man to want to marry the mother of his child, I think he and Madison have a good chance together.   I think (sometimes at least)   being married, living together and having a child together can make a couple fall in love with each other and end up having a happy marriage. 

I don't think so, not in the real world.

Kevin would have married ANY woman who became pregnant by him.

[LoveLeigh]

On 11/13/2020 at 10:27 PM, ljenkins782 said:

It just seems like the writers have gotten so ambitious that they've lost sight of the basic premise that brought people to the show to begin with.

The writers are trying so hard to fit every theme into the show and it is absurd. Whose family life and whose friends or personal life includes every topic or nationality and race? The only thing they have left out is catfishing and I am sure that soon somebody will be catfished by some guy who had a NDE and is now into the Mandela Effect. 

Actually, the dude into the ME could claim in his world Jack never died. He saw him last week at CVS buying Depends. 

Edited November 15, 2020 by DakotaLavender

[Sheikh Yerbouti]

On 11/11/2020 at 1:07 PM, LeisureTime said:

I'm starting to wonder how much longer we have with the Tween Big 3. As they get older, it's starting to stretch believability that they could turn into the Teen Big 3, especially the Kate actress. Though, it was a nice touch to already have the Buffy poster in her room.

I got really huffy about the Buffy poster because the tv show didn't start until 1997, and this scene would have taken place in the early 90s. Then I replayed and took a closer look, and the poster is actually from the ridiculous, campy Buffy the Vampire Slayer movie that came out in 1992. So all is right in the timeline, in case anyone else was wondering. Oh, just me?

[ljenkins782]

56 minutes ago, DakotaLavender said:

The writers are trying so hard to fit every theme into the show and it is absurd. Whose family life and whose friends or personal life includes every topic or nationality and race? The only thing they have left out is catfishing and I am sure that soon somebody will be catfished by some guy who had a NDE and is now into the Mandela Effect. 

Actually, the dude into the ME could claim in his world Jack never died. He saw him last week at CVS buying Depends. 

Honestly, the way the writing is going, I'm waiting for them to reveal that Jack woke up in the morgue, but had amnesia and has been living in New Jersey under a different identity for all these years. 

I'm just not interested in characters that have nothing to do with the family's actual experiences, which at this point includes Randall's birth mother. She gave birth to him and that's the last interaction they had, so whatever happened to her after that isn't that relevant to this show. William's story was different, he had some involvement with the family and that involvement had ripple effects, but his mother didn't. And the more the show diverges down the path of Randall's story alone and the various branches that come with him being adopted and adopting a child himself, the less room there is to explore anything else in the limited time they have left.

[momo]

On 11/10/2020 at 10:58 PM, Brookside said:

I have a child who asks to be identified as "they".  I am considered an out-and-out bleeding heart liberal by many of my friends, and have no problem with their (my child's) sexual identity, but as an editor it's like nails on a chalkboard.

LOL, As a FORMER writer/editor, same here! But I know it won't take long to get used to it.

[3 is enough]

I found it odd when the potential birth mom said she had to leave because her 8 year old was having a meltdown. Maybe she was just blindly looking for an excuse to bail on Toby and Kate, but meltdowns are something I would associate with a toddler, not an 8 year old.  And the way she was constantly rubbing her belly just seemed off to me.  Did they even say how far along she was?

[CrystalBlue]

4 hours ago, 3 is enough said:

I found it odd when the potential birth mom said she had to leave because her 8 year old was having a meltdown. Maybe she was just blindly looking for an excuse to bail on Toby and Kate, but meltdowns are something I would associate with a toddler, not an 8 year old.  And the way she was constantly rubbing her belly just seemed off to me.  Did they even say how far along she was?

And the Pearsons wouldn't take no for an answer on the car ride offer which is like, getting in a car with strangers stupid, without really knowing who is going to adopt your Match.com hookup baby.  Maybe we'll never see Ellie again and they'll get a text saying it's a no go.  I can hope, right?  Yeah, belly rubbing was in-your-face clue.  Maybe Ellie bonded with the baby at the park meeting and realized she doesn't want to give the baby to the Pearsons because they enjoy letting theirs sit in dirty diapers until Kate buys more on a daily basis.

[bros402]

I am hoping with Laurel, it ends up that she is dead - since Randall having another parent alive would just be ridiculous, even for this show.

[gonzosgirrl]

12 hours ago, bros402 said:

I am hoping with Laurel, it ends up that she is dead - since Randall having another parent alive would just be ridiculous, even for this show.

Since the little girl did not know who the woman in the photos with her grandfather is, *I would say it's probably a safe bet she is dead in the current timeline. Whether or not he has other half-siblings, or if William was really his father, is up for debate. I hope they don't do either, as that moves into nighttime soap territory and I don't want that for the show.

*ETA: it would be weird if this woman was still alive, but not in his life (thus the grandchild not knowing who she is), and yet he keeps photos of her on display in his home. Obviously he had some sort of partner if he had a child/grandchild.

Edited November 16, 2020 by gonzosgirrl

[ljenkins782]

10 hours ago, bros402 said:

I am hoping with Laurel, it ends up that she is dead - since Randall having another parent alive would just be ridiculous, even for this show.

Also, Rebecca's story is already heading into the territory of preparing to "lose" another parent, perhaps not to death but to memory loss that effectively ends the relationship they've shared all these years. For Randall to find his birth mother alive in the midst of preparing for the loss of his adoptive mother...that's a lot. And a lot that I don't want to watch right now with the real world being as depressing as it currently is. Doing a deep dive into midlife crises and parental loss is definitely not my idea of escapist entertainment.

[bybrandy]

On 11/13/2020 at 5:34 AM, PRgal said:

So say you’re applying for a job. The hiring manager’s name is Alex Smith.  You don’t know Alex or the company’s culture. Do you still address the email to Alex?  A title like “Mx.” solves everything. 

Personally, yes.  This is in fact how I do it on business letters and if I've lost business because of it nobody has ever once sent feedback about it either negative or positive.  I don't think people actually pay that much attention to how their letters are addressed.

[PRgal]

5 hours ago, gonzosgirrl said:

Since the little girl did not know who the woman in the photos with her grandfather is, *I would say it's probably a safe bet she is dead in the current timeline. Whether or not he has other half-siblings, or if William was really his father, is up for debate. I hope they don't do either, as that moves into nighttime soap territory and I don't want that for the show.

*ETA: it would be weird if this woman was still alive, but not in his life (thus the grandchild not knowing who she is), and yet he keeps photos of her on display in his home. Obviously he had some sort of partner if he had a child/grandchild.

But it's possible that the grandfather went into Laurel's life either BEFORE or AFTER the grandchild's parent's mom.  It could be BEFORE.  He might have had a relationship with Laurel only to find that HIS own family had issues with interracial dating.  Then he finds a "nice Vietnamese girl" and marries her.  Who knows?

[gonzosgirrl]

25 minutes ago, PRgal said:

But it's possible that the grandfather went into Laurel's life either BEFORE or AFTER the grandchild's parent's mom.  It could be BEFORE.  He might have had a relationship with Laurel only to find that HIS own family had issues with interracial dating.  Then he finds a "nice Vietnamese girl" and marries her.  Who knows?

Yes, true, but it would still be weird to have her photo up like that, and the kid not know who she is, if she was that important in his life and still around.

[Tango64]

The actress playing tween/teen Kate is no longer beleivable for the role. She's grown out of the softer look and she no longer looks like someone who could turn into the present day Kate. Physically it could happen, sure, but I think it would be unusual for an adult woman of Kate's size and age to look back at her pictures from that age and see a very average sized girl.

The closer the flashbacks get to current time, the more the actress needs to be someone heavier. But I guess they're committed to the young actress and won't ask her to gain 60 lbs. a la Robert Deniro in Raging Bull. (I'm not suggesting they should. That would be terrible.) 

[shoovenbooty]

During the scenes with the Vietnamese grandfather/granddaughter, I kept wondering in the back of my mind if they had any relation or ties to the Asian man working with/for Randall. I am too lazy to research what his name was or whether he was Vietnamese. Or is it that I don't care about this storyline? Maybe a little of both.

[BlancheDevoreaux]

I find myself wondering if the actress who plays younger Kate lost the weight she did due to playing a character who is supposed to be fat. Tracey Gold has spoken candidly about how the jokes made on Growing Pains about how fat her character was really made her eating disorder flair up. I can see how a girl of 12-15 would really struggle with playing a character who is considered fat and how that could mess with her own self image.

[kili]

Quote

During the scenes with the Vietnamese grandfather/granddaughter, I kept wondering in the back of my mind if they had any relation or ties to the Asian man working with/for Randall. 

Randall's campaign manager, Jae-won, is Korean. "The Manny" was apparently popular on fictional Korean television.

[Empress1]

1 hour ago, Tango64 said:

The actress playing tween/teen Kate is no longer beleivable for the role. She's grown out of the softer look and she no longer looks like someone who could turn into the present day Kate. Physically it could happen, sure, but I think it would be unusual for an adult woman of Kate's size and age to look back at her pictures from that age and see a very average sized girl.

The closer the flashbacks get to current time, the more the actress needs to be someone heavier. But I guess they're committed to the young actress and won't ask her to gain 60 lbs. a la Robert Deniro in Raging Bull. (I'm not suggesting they should. That would be terrible.) 

But wasn't Kate height-weight proportionate in her teens? Isn't that part of the story? I remember a plot point about teen Kate shopping at 5/7/9, which is a store that only sold (sells? no idea if it still exists) clothes in those sizes, so if she was wearing one of those sizes in her teens, she was small. She started gaining after Jack died and steadily gained over her late teens and early 20s. (I am not 100% sure but I think they did an episode with the Big 3 in their early 20s and Chrissy Metz was playing Kate. I definitely remember one where they were in their late 20s, and it was Chrissy Metz.) She gained hundreds of pounds, so it would take years to put on that kind of weight. 

What will be challenging is if the Young Kate actress gets to be tall, and it looks like she could be - like, if she outgrows the other actresses who play Kate. A quick Google search tells me that Chrissy Metz is 5'5" and Hannah Zeile, who plays high school Kate, is 5'2". 

46 minutes ago, BlancheDevoreaux said:

I find myself wondering if the actress who plays younger Kate lost the weight she did due to playing a character who is supposed to be fat. Tracey Gold has spoken candidly about how the jokes made on Growing Pains about how fat her character was really made her eating disorder flair up. I can see how a girl of 12-15 would really struggle with playing a character who is considered fat and how that could mess with her own self image.

Yeah. I tend to think that she just had a growth spurt, based on how she looks and the fact that she's 13 now, but I can see how it would mess with you to be cast because you are chubby and to have entire storylines centered on how chubby you are. My brother posted a Halloween picture of us when we were kids on his IG, and I was irked about that (it was taken during my awkward years and he's 4 years younger so he was still cute - and his awkward years were less awkward than mine anyway). I can only imagine how much it would suck to go through puberty on TV.

[chocolatine]

51 minutes ago, Empress1 said:

But wasn't Kate height-weight proportionate in her teens? Isn't that part of the story? I remember a plot point about teen Kate shopping at 5/7/9, which is a store that only sold (sells? no idea if it still exists) clothes in those sizes, so if she was wearing one of those sizes in her teens, she was small. She started gaining after Jack died and steadily gained over her late teens and early 20s. (I am not 100% sure but I think they did an episode with the Big 3 in their early 20s and Chrissy Metz was playing Kate. I definitely remember one where they were in their late 20s, and it was Chrissy Metz.) She gained hundreds of pounds, so it would take years to put on that kind of weight.

Yes, there was a storyline before Jack's death about teen Kate becoming obsessed with fitting into a size 7 dress, so she was a "healthy" weight at that time (whether the weight was achieved by healthy means is another story). Then in the flashback several months after Jack's death Kate said that she'd gained 25 pounds. If she continued to gain at that rate, it's not completely unrealistic that she would gain 200+ pounds in the 10 years until we see Kate played by Chrissy in the Halloween 2008 flashback.

[Sheikh Yerbouti]

"Grandpa, the woman you're trying to impress with your cooking...is she the woman in all of the pictures?" Grandpa laughs and confirms yes, it's the woman in all of the pictures. This to me indicates that Laurel is alive, she and Grandpa have either recently reconnected or will soon reconnect, and he's sharpening his cooking skills to wow her. Let's get ready to meet Laurel.

[gonzosgirrl]

27 minutes ago, Sheikh Yerbouti said:

"Grandpa, the woman you're trying to impress with your cooking...is she the woman in all of the pictures?" Grandpa laughs and confirms yes, it's the woman in all of the pictures. This to me indicates that Laurel is alive, she and Grandpa have either recently reconnected or will soon reconnect, and he's sharpening his cooking skills to wow her. Let's get ready to meet Laurel.

That's a good point. But it also now makes even less sense. If she's been around enough to be 'in all of the pictures', why does he need to impress her with his cooking skills? 

[deirdra]

1 hour ago, chocolatine said:

Yes, there was a storyline before Jack's death about teen Kate becoming obsessed with fitting into a size 7 dress, so she was a "healthy" weight at that time (whether the weight was achieved by healthy means is another story). Then in the flashback several months after Jack's death Kate said that she'd gained 25 pounds. If she continued to gain at that rate, it's not completely unrealistic that she would gain 200+ pounds in the 10 years until we see Kate played by Chrissy in the Halloween 2008 flashback.

A big growth spurt, which the actress obviously has had, can also turn a chubby kid into a normal-weight or underweight-for-their-height teen.  It happened to me (and Jerry O'Connell).  If you replace bad habits with good ones, you can live life as a normal-weight adult after you stop growing.  If you are traumatized or not willing to commit to healthy eating and exercise, the weight will rise again.

Like your name, Sheikh.  I'm looking out the window at a City of Tiny Lights.

Edited November 17, 2020 by deirdra

[ljenkins782]

1 hour ago, Sheikh Yerbouti said:

"Grandpa, the woman you're trying to impress with your cooking...is she the woman in all of the pictures?" Grandpa laughs and confirms yes, it's the woman in all of the pictures. This to me indicates that Laurel is alive, she and Grandpa have either recently reconnected or will soon reconnect, and he's sharpening his cooking skills to wow her. Let's get ready to meet Laurel.

Was that sentence in the present tense or the past tense? I admit to not paying enough attention to that part of the episode to know. I tend to glaze over when an episode starts out with completely unknown characters, but I kinda thought it was more like "the person you tried to impress with your cooking." 

If you're right though, we have to have a storyline to meet Laurel, plus learn about her connection to this Vietnamese man who was just introduced? Unless they're planning to go super soap-y and make this guy somehow related to Jack and Nicky's time in Vietnam, I fail to see how this branch of the story is going to do much to tie back to Randall. The woman is his birth mother, but if this guy is just her current boyfriend, he's basically nothing to Randall. 

Quote

I find myself wondering if the actress who plays younger Kate lost the weight she did due to playing a character who is supposed to be fat. Tracey Gold has spoken candidly about how the jokes made on Growing Pains about how fat her character was really made her eating disorder flair up. I can see how a girl of 12-15 would really struggle with playing a character who is considered fat and how that could mess with her own self image.

Oof, Growing Pains has suddenly resurfaced on streaming and regular TV and it's hard to watch all those fat jokes knowing how much they really affected her IRL. Also, you can see her getting skinnier and skinnier, yet the jokes persist. And she was never fat to begin with.

As for this actress, she does look like she had a growth spurt. She's noticeably taller and it seems like she just kinda stretched upward. Hard to know for sure, but that's how she looks. 

And teenage Kate is average sized, so it seems fairly natural, story-wise, that younger Kate becomes teenage Kate, pre-Jack's death. But yeah, the height may eventually be an issue because it seems like preteen Kate is now taller than late-teens Kate.

[Adgirl]

On 11/11/2020 at 6:51 PM, Ohmo said:

The problem I have with the grandfather storyline is that it combines the Laurel storyline with reminders of Jack's Vietnam storyline, neither of which I want to go over again.

I don't think that's the direction they're headed in at all. I think the grandfather is related to Randall's campaign manager Jae Won. 

With so many cruel, immoral characters on TV I enjoy spending time with Jack Pearson each week.

 

[Ohiopirate02]

9 hours ago, Adgirl said:

I don't think that's the direction they're headed in at all. I think the grandfather is related to Randall's campaign manager Jae Won. 

With so many cruel, immoral characters on TV I enjoy spending time with Jack Pearson each week.

 

Jae Won is Korean.  The grandfather is Vietnamese.  

[Mldh598]

18 hours ago, shoovenbooty said:

During the scenes with the Vietnamese grandfather/granddaughter, I kept wondering in the back of my mind if they had any relation or ties to the Asian man working with/for Randall. I am too lazy to research what his name was or whether he was Vietnamese. Or is it that I don't care about this storyline? Maybe a little of both.

Since he was first introduced, I have always felt that Randall's campaign manager Jae-Won was going to tie into the family somehow. I can't remember either, but thought he was Korean since they met when Randall first went to the Korean community when he was running and that's where they met. This Laurel picture is really a stumper, and feels like a stretch, but I guess we'll see what they do with it.

[Sheikh Yerbouti]

12 hours ago, Mldh598 said:

Since he was first introduced, I have always felt that Randall's campaign manager Jae-Won was going to tie into the family somehow. I can't remember either, but thought he was Korean since they met when Randall first went to the Korean community when he was running and that's where they met. This Laurel picture is really a stumper, and feels like a stretch, but I guess we'll see what they do with it.

Actually this makes sense. We've been focused on grandpa and granddaughter being Vietnamese because of Jack and Nicky's war experience. Has anyone confirmed that the language they were speaking was actually Vietnamese? Randall ran for office in Philadelphia and had a Korean campaign manager who helped him reach the Korean community. It would make sense that Laurel and grandpa's story was based in Philadelphia and would focus on black-Korean relations of the early 1980s (presuming this storyline took place after Randall was born and after Laurel "died"). 

Edited because I went back and watched, and the subtitle say "speaking Vietnamese." So there's that. I guess we'll just have to wait and see.

Edited November 18, 2020 by Sheikh Yerbouti

[Adgirl]

15 hours ago, Ohiopirate02 said:

Jae Won is Korean.  The grandfather is Vietnamese.  

So I'm an idiot AND we gotta revisit the Vietnam storyline. Shit day.

[bybrandy]

On 11/18/2020 at 12:06 AM, Adgirl said:

So I'm an idiot AND we gotta revisit the Vietnam storyline. Shit day.

I'd be fine with that because I think Nicky is more interesting than Randall's not dead mom.  But as much as I thought they were tying Nicky into this in the first episode he hasn't so much as made an appearance in the previouslies..  so maybe not.   

[SnarkySheep]

On 11/10/2020 at 10:06 PM, Spartan Girl said:

I like Randall’s new therapist. It’s perfectly fine to go with someone you can relate to more, and this one knows his stuff.

Sure, but Randall's main qualification for a therapist seemed to be race. He started off rocky with his first therapist, but IMO that was more about his discomfort spilling his inner thoughts to a stranger than because of who the therapist was. 

To me, Randall saying that he wanted only a black therapist seemed similar to if he said he wanted only a male therapist. Yeah, you might have some level of understanding with someone who shares your demographics, but you definitely can't ASSUME that will happen, or automatically rule out everyone else in the world. If this were indeed a truth, then all black people (or all men, all straight people, whatever) would automatically be friends with one another because, hey, similar characteristics. But obviously this is not the case in real life.

On 11/10/2020 at 10:11 PM, DoubleUTeeEff said:

6 weeks without a phone in 2020 though??? Makes me wonder how many kids have secret phones they keep from their parents.

LOL, why does everyone nowadays act like every teen has an automatic right to a phone? IMO it's still a privilege, as Mom and Dad are paying the bills, so they can choose to give or not give one, or - gasp! - get the teen an Android instead of the latest iPhone. 

[bybrandy]

3 hours ago, SnarkySheep said:

To me, Randall saying that he wanted only a black therapist seemed similar to if he said he wanted only a male therapist.

But it is perfectly fine for Randall to only be really comfortable sharing himself right now with a black therapist.  There are LOADS of really great male gynocologists but I prefer having a female gynocologist.  I absolutely know that there are many, many, many great options of the male variety and don't mind at all that other people avail themselves of those.  But personally, I prefer a female gynocologist.  That doesn't say I can't use a male gyno and have when mine was out and it was fine.   It's fine for Randall at this juncture in his life to want a doctor that looks like him.

[debraran]

6 hours ago, bybrandy said:

But it is perfectly fine for Randall to only be really comfortable sharing himself right now with a black therapist.  There are LOADS of really great male gynocologists but I prefer having a female gynocologist.  I absolutely know that there are many, many, many great options of the male variety and don't mind at all that other people avail themselves of those.  But personally, I prefer a female gynocologist.  That doesn't say I can't use a male gyno and have when mine was out and it was fine.   It's fine for Randall at this juncture in his life to want a doctor that looks like him.

I agree, I had a wonderful OB who was male and very kind and had a 3% C section rate.for 20 years.  When he retired he told me a woman he trained would be a good fit and she is and understands some things more personally with menopause than a male doctor can. He can read about it, but she understands. My daughter wanted a black or minority therapist because you can put yourself in another persons shoes and be great but actually knowing what it's like to be judged on your skin first, how people will react to you, it helps. Some issues are color blind and others aren't.

Edited November 28, 2020 by debraran

[Jeddah]

13 hours ago, SnarkySheep said:

On 11/10/2020 at 10:11 PM, DoubleUTeeEff said:

 

LOL, why does everyone nowadays act like every teen has an automatic right to a phone? IMO it's still a privilege, as Mom and Dad are paying the bills, so they can choose to give or not give one, or - gasp! - get the teen an Android instead of the latest iPhone. 

They are quarantined at home doing online school. Her phone is her only way to communicate with anyone outside her family. Normally kids who are grounded and have their phone taken away at least go to school and can eat lunch in the cafeteria with their friends or talk to them in the hallway. Quarantine really sucks for all of us. Not being able to have any contact with  friends for six weeks is a lot for a teenager. She doesn’t seem close to anyone in her family either. So, sure, nobody is entitled to a smartphone, but I think people are entitled to having friends and someone to talk to, especially now.

[CrystalBlue]

15 hours ago, Jeddah said:

They are quarantined at home doing online school. Her phone is her only way to communicate with anyone outside her family. Normally kids who are grounded and have their phone taken away at least go to school and can eat lunch in the cafeteria with their friends or talk to them in the hallway. Quarantine really sucks for all of us. Not being able to have any contact with  friends for six weeks is a lot for a teenager. She doesn’t seem close to anyone in her family either. So, sure, nobody is entitled to a smartphone, but I think people are entitled to having friends and someone to talk to, especially now.

I totally agree with the lost cell phone privileges and grounding, but the month and a half is a long time for a teenager.  She could develop mental health issues from isolation and anger.

[debraran]

6 hours ago, CrystalBlue said:

I totally agree with the lost cell phone privileges and grounding, but the month and a half is a long time for a teenager.  She could develop mental health issues from isolation and anger.

I know I'm being picky but if I took my daughters phone away only, she has her ipad and laptop from school so she'd be fine. I doubt a teen in Randall's house has only a phone but for the script, they got the point across. They aren't going to keep her off her computer and skype, text and FB messaging, Instagram still exists. I doubt they will hover over her all day. I think they got their point across. Sure kids want their phones but calls are the last thing they do on them and many things can be done on more than one device.

[Jeddah]

2 hours ago, debraran said:

I know I'm being picky but if I took my daughters phone away only, she has her ipad and laptop from school so she'd be fine. I doubt a teen in Randall's house has only a phone but for the script, they got the point across. They aren't going to keep her off her computer and skype, text and FB messaging, Instagram still exists. I doubt they will hover over her all day. I think they got their point across. Sure kids want their phones but calls are the last thing they do on them and many things can be done on more than one device.

In that case, what’s the point?

[gonzosgirrl]

I'm guessing the video was recording on her cell phone, therefore, no cell phone for six weeks. She'd still have a computer of some sort for school, so it's not like they cut her off from all social contact. She just won't be making any videos anytime soon.