S08.E12: Tiny Dancer and an Impromptu Picnic

[jewel21]

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Bonnie goes to extreme lengths to protect someone she loves. Also, Jill struggles to make sense of a messy new relationship.

Airdate: 04/01/2021

[sleepysuzy]

My first thought - Rod lives with his mother, who must be a decent mom to take him in while he pursues sobriety. Jill's mom's addiction and suicide are at the root of her psychological issues. Maybe being in a relationship with someone who has a loving and involved mom will be good for her.

Jill and Tammy should talk about their moms more. I know it brings down the comedy, but their acting in those scenes has always been so good. A Mother's Day episode would fit the title of the show.

[greekmom]

On 3/13/2021 at 12:52 PM, jewel21 said:

Bonnie goes to extreme lengths to protect someone she loves.

Are we going to get a closure on Roscoe or Violet??

 

[Sarah 103]

On 3/26/2021 at 8:19 AM, greekmom said:

Are we going to get a closure on Roscoe or Violet??

I don't think we need it. I'm happy with the last check-in we saw on each child and I'm satisfied with that as the end for them. Roscoe is with Baxter and Candace. Violet is able to support herself with her podcast and possibly other forms of legal employment. She wants nothing to do Christy, but overall Violet is doing well. 

[jewel21]

It's going to take a lot of paint and time to cover up that billboard of Christy. I don't see how they can get it all done before the cops show up, heh. 

I did love Wendy and her car siren, hee. And Marjorie and the cat at the end cracked me up so much. 

[Harvey]

He's arrogant and vain and self-centered....why hasn't he called me!?
Oh if that isn't me. Poor Jill. I feel you.🥺

 

I love that Christy is still at least somewhat part of the show, she was not discarded like Roscoe and Violet.

[possibilities]

I actually had a foster cat who had been trained by her previous person to walk on a leash-- and she liked it. But that cat Marjorie was working with was super adorable, even during passive resistance.

 

[EtheltoTillie]

The best thing was the Bob Odenkirk cameo. 

[AnimeMania]

8 hours ago, jewel21 said:

It's going to take a lot of paint and time to cover up that billboard of Christy. I don't see how they can get it all done before the cops show up, heh. 

They could have just painted over the face and be done with it. It is not like the owner wouldn't know who did it and why. Maybe the repair could be a compromise by using someone else's face. Make Bonnie pay for the repair in exchange for not pressing charges.

[FrankOFoley]

2 hours ago, GussieK said:

The best thing was the Bob Odenkirk cameo. 

My thought exactly. This show could carry on, but without Christy the show just doesn’t work right. I’ll always wonder what caused Anna Faris to leave in the middle of a 2 year contract.

[iMonrey]

It's interesting they acknowledged that Christy still exists but didn't show her face on the billboard. I wonder if they asked Anna Faris permission to use her image and she said "no," or if they didn't even bother asking her. 

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I'm happy with the last check-in we saw on each child and I'm satisfied with that as the end for them. Roscoe is with Baxter and Candace. Violet is able to support herself with her podcast and possibly other forms of legal employment. 

Yes but those are both Bonnie's grandchildren. Roscoe in particular is still a minor. You'd think Bonnie would at least want to see them once in awhile or talk about them from time to time. 

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It is not like the owner wouldn't know who did it and why.

He'll know since Bonnie just came by that day and demanded it be taken down. Whether or not he can track her down or prove it is another matter.

[Katy M]

Am I the only one who finds it weird that there was a billboard with christy's picture on it for 20 years and was somewhere where Adam drove by and nobody has seen it.  In 20 years?  Or at least the last however long this show has been on?

[illdoc]

I don't think the billboard has been there for 20 years. I just think that they put up the billboard recently and just used a 20 year-old picture.

[Blakeston]

I really dislike the trope where a man gets a daughter figure in his life, and then suddenly realizes that all women are someone's daughter - and thus worthy of respect.

How much of a clod do you have to be, to need it spelled out for you that women are actual people? And why is a woman's value based on being someone's daughter, and not being a person in her own right?

Adam has his flaws, but I didn't think he'd be this oblivious.

[Katy M]

59 minutes ago, illdoc said:

I don't think the billboard has been there for 20 years. I just think that they put up the billboard recently and just used a 20 year-old picture.

well, they had all that dialogue about whether it had been there for 20 years and decided it had based on the amount of bird poop on it.

[eel21788]

18 hours ago, jewel21 said:

And Marjorie and the cat at the end cracked me up so much. 

Does that mean that all 8/9 of Marjorie's cats are exclusively indoor cats? That would shock me. I would expect them to have a cat door to allow themselves outdoor access at will. That is a good way for cats to get exercise and keep their weights in check, so they don't develop prediabetes/diabetes. 

[possibilities]

Many places it's just not safe to have cats outside. I don't know if she even has a yard, but she seems fairly low income and that would suggest she doesn't have a fenced yard, either.

[ch1]

Marjorie doesn’t strike me as the type of cat owner who would let them run around outside.  Too easy for something to happen to them.  I mean this is the woman who blended fish for them.

[Katy M]

1 hour ago, eel21788 said:

Does that mean that all 8/9 of Marjorie's cats are exclusively indoor cats? That would shock me. I would expect them to have a cat door to allow themselves outdoor access at will. That is a good way for cats to get exercise and keep their weights in check, so they don't develop prediabetes/diabetes. 

Instead they can get in fights, develop absessess, get infections, get run over by cars, get killed by wild animals, or get catnapped for medical research.  i've never had a cat get diabetes.

[SoMuchTV]

47 minutes ago, Katy M said:

i've never had a cat get diabetes.

I have, and it bugged me a bit that she was threatening the kitty with store brand kibble if it wouldn’t exercise. All my research & vet advice indicates that dry food is the worst for diabetic cats, and even the cheapest canned food is better than dry. She seems like someone who would have looked into that. Oh and I don’t think exercise works the same for cats as it does for human type 2 diabetics. 

[Katy M]

37 minutes ago, SoMuchTV said:

I have, and it bugged me a bit that she was threatening the kitty with store brand kibble if it wouldn’t exercise. All my research & vet advice indicates that dry food is the worst for diabetic cats, and even the cheapest canned food is better than dry. She seems like someone who would have looked into that. Oh and I don’t think exercise works the same for cats as it does for human type 2 diabetics. 

All i meant was that keeping your cat indoors wasn't a sure-fire recipe for diabetes.

[SoMuchTV]

2 minutes ago, Katy M said:

All i meant was that keeping your cat indoors wasn't a sure-fire recipe for diabetes.

Oh I’m definitely agreeing with you! Sorry if it came across otherwise. I was piggy-backing on your comment to add my concern about the diet Marjorie was threatening the poor kitty with. 

Edited April 3, 2021 by SoMuchTV

[SmithW6079]

Outdoor cats kill 2.4 billion birds a year. Responsible cat owners don't let their cats roam free.

Why didn't Bonnie ask how much it would cost to change the artwork? Seems to me that Jill could have fronted the money to buy off the strip club manager to put up new billboard art, rather than the group vandalizing the billboard. And will they face the consequences?

Speaking of Bonnie, does Allison Janney seem particularly "refreshed" these days? There's nary a line on her face.

I thought the women were particularly rude in the 5:45 meeting. They've become like every mean girl group we've seen. 

[Winston Wolfe]

2 hours ago, SmithW6079 said:

Why didn't Bonnie ask how much it would cost to change the artwork? Seems to me that Jill could have fronted the money to buy off the strip club manager to put up new billboard art, rather than the group vandalizing the billboard. And will they face the consequences?

Shallow note with a business undertone: AF is cute as a button, but no strip club owner looking to make a profit is putting that boyish figure on a Billboard. Plus, wouldn't new customers to the Club be disappointed when they find out "Bambi" (Christy's stripper name because of her big eyes) doesn't work there anymore?

We've gotten a few Christy mentions lately and it makes me wonder if AF will be back for the finale. She really should be, but no one's really sure how she left things with CBS and the production company. 🤨

Edited April 3, 2021 by Winston Wolfe

[nodorothyparker]

Bob Odenkirk!

Rod was a somewhat interesting one-off character in his initial outing. But we're now what? three or four episodes in? Why are they giving this character so much screentime in the show's home stretch? I guess because he's what passes for Jill's storyline.

I could see the point they were trying to make about the billboard. Christy has moved on with her life on the opposite side of the country. But for as much as Bonnie was obsessing over it, it seemed to only be superficially about Christy and more about her own issues (again!) with being a shitty mother. There was a lot of projection about how Christy would feel about it, how upset she would be, etc., that ignores that the show already touched on this subject when Christy was trying to help Natasha a couple of seasons ago. In their reminiscing about working as strippers together, Christy mentioned that the club was still using her pictures for print ads years after the fact and shrugged it off. It also ignores that Christy uses her poor alcoholic stripper rags to riches story every chance she gets, so it's not likely that it's some great secret. I also don't like the trope of "oh, she's my stepdaughter and thus it matters she's a person" either. I always liked the Adam-Christy relationship, but this wasn't an especially good look for Adam.

Granted, my knowledge of caring for a diabetic cat is well more than a decade old, but I know they do make dry diabetic cat food that my cat at the time didn't seem particularly thrilled with. But seriously, I know the plot point was there for the funny visual of Marjorie all but dragging the cat on a leash, but good luck walking a cat that was never trained for it. They do not like it.

[Mr. Meatball Man]

Not gonna lie, the opening scene confused the hell out of me. I thought Adam took Bonnie to the billboard to show her that Christy herself is sitting on it, contemplating suicide. And then I thought that they probably wouldn't get Anna Faris to appear, but this would be a way to bring Christy back without it being a problem. And then the scene after the cold open explained it and I was disappointed for the rest of the episode. 😔

I'm not going to be ready for May 13, I'm just setting myself up for disappointment. 

[possibilities]

She should get a kitty treadmill and train the cat to run on that. It's just as funny-- funnier! as walking on a leash. They do make them. They look like giant hamster wheels. Watching Marjorie try to train her cat, while the other 8 cats watch, is a rich well of comedic potential. Other cats will want in on the fun. 

 

I know the show is not primarily about cats. But someone should make a show that mines the comedy of cat training and co-habitation. "Call Me Kat" supposedly is a show with cats, but they really don't make the cats the focus. 

[ZoqFotPik]

2 hours ago, nodorothyparker said:

Rod was a somewhat interesting one-off character in his initial outing. But we're now what? three or four episodes in? Why are they giving this character so much screentime in the show's home stretch? I guess because he's what passes for Jill's storyline.

It's possible these episodes were already made or in production before the decision was made that this would be the final season. Maybe they had plans for him if the show continued.

I find it really unlikely that the billboard would be up for 20 years without anyone knowing about it. Napa isn't really that big of a place.

[Blakeston]

12 hours ago, nodorothyparker said:

There was a lot of projection about how Christy would feel about it, how upset she would be, etc., that ignores that the show already touched on this subject when Christy was trying to help Natasha a couple of seasons ago. In their reminiscing about working as strippers together, Christy mentioned that the club was still using her pictures for print ads years after the fact and shrugged it off. It also ignores that Christy uses her poor alcoholic stripper rags to riches story every chance she gets, so it's not likely that it's some great secret. I also don't like the trope of "oh, she's my stepdaughter and thus it matters she's a person" either. I always liked the Adam-Christy relationship, but this wasn't an especially good look for Adam.

I forgot about Christy mentioning that the strip club uses her image! She chose to be very up-front with her fellow law students about having been a stripper. It makes sense that it wouldn't be a big deal to her.

I think the Adam storyline could have worked better if he'd said, "I've been to a lot of strip clubs in my day, and it never hit me until now that a lot of the women were deeply troubled like Christy was, and stripping just to fuel their addictions."

That would be a big improvement over what we got, which was, "I was attracted to an image of a beautiful woman, and now it turns out she's an actual human being!"

10 hours ago, ZoqFotPik said:

It's possible these episodes were already made or in production before the decision was made that this would be the final season. Maybe they had plans for him if the show continued.

I find it really unlikely that the billboard would be up for 20 years without anyone knowing about it. Napa isn't really that big of a place.

Yeah, if the location was so remote that no one in Christy's life had noticed it, it's not very likely to be an issue going forward. The odds of people recognizing her from it would have been highest shortly after the billboard was put up - when she was around the same age as she was in the photo.

They should have just said that the billboard was new, and the manager used Christy's photo because she's one of the prettiest dancers they ever had.

[iMonrey]

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Rod was a somewhat interesting one-off character in his initial outing. But we're now what? three or four episodes in? Why are they giving this character so much screentime in the show's home stretch? I guess because he's what passes for Jill's storyline.

I'm guessing it's meant as some sort of happy ending for Jill since the show is ending. I don't know if they'll bother finding someone for Marjorie or Wendy but Jill has sort of taken Christy's place as a secondary lead.

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We've gotten a few Christy mentions lately and it makes me wonder if AF will be back for the finale. She really should be, but no one's really sure how she left things with CBS and the production company.

They gave the character a pretty respectful sendoff, getting into a prestigious law school and moving up in the world. That makes me think the split was pretty amicable. Chuck Lorre is famous for punishing characters when he's mad at the actors. He's second only to Shonda Rhimes in that regard. 

On the other hand, I do think it's interesting they didn't actually show Christy's face on the billboard. That's telling too.

[ch1]

I would imagine to use Anna Faris’ image they would have had to pay her.  This show has been cancelled so it’s probably money they had no interest in spending.

[SmithW6079]

2 hours ago, iMonrey said:

I do think it's interesting they didn't actually show Christy's face on the billboard. That's telling too.

Was there really any need to see a heavily made-up, nearly naked Christy gyrating on a stripper pole? I don't think there was.

[chitowngirl]

And Anna Farris may not have approved the use of her likeness.

[eel21788]

On 4/2/2021 at 8:01 PM, Winston Wolfe said:

Shallow note with a business undertone: AF is cute as a button, but no strip club owner looking to make a profit is putting that boyish figure on a Billboard.

She was stripping during at least one of her pregnancies. It is possible that the picture was taken early in her pregnancy when she was very voluptuous on top and full, but not obviously pregnant on the bottom.

[Amazee-Dayzee]

On 4/3/2021 at 10:09 PM, eel21788 said:

She was stripping during at least one of her pregnancies. It is possible that the picture was taken early in her pregnancy when she was very voluptuous on top and full, but not obviously pregnant on the bottom.

If the Billboard was 20 years old and the picture was taken early in the pregnancy, then obviously it would have been when she was pregnant with Violet. It would have fit the timeline since Christy was in an abusive relationship with Violet's dad "Butch" and when she found out she was pregnant with her she left. So she was on her own, Bonnie by her own admission was in prison at this point and if Butch also controlled everything when Christy fled she would have nothing and be desperate so I could see her turning to stripping. I can also picture the other strippers looking after baby Violet while Christy was "working".

Pretty sure by the time she got together with Baxter and had Roscoe (which was 2004), she was cleaned up a little bit so I don't think she was stripping anymore. In the video of the wedding that Bonnie showed Adam to hammer home the point on WHY she needed the meetings and how much of a mess she was, Christy seemed to have some of it together while Bonnie was running wild.

[Jillybean]

Who knew there are billboards in Napa? And stripper billboards, no less?

[iMonrey]

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I would imagine to use Anna Faris’ image they would have had to pay her.  This show has been cancelled so it’s probably money they had no interest in spending.

If the actor is agreeable I think they only have to pay them scale, which is nothing for a big network show like this. if the actor wants big $$ to use their image, that's a different story. I'd still love to know what the discussion was like when they wrote this one.

[12catcrazy]

Meh episode.  I think as others have said, another way to bring back Christie.  I wouldn't be surprised if we see Anna Farris on the last episode.

Regarding cat diabetes - I had a diabetic cat for 10 years.  He was young when he got it, but always had a weight issue.  He went into ketoacidosis after he got a tooth infection and spent a week in the animal hospital.  I was lucky that the vet on duty was a diabetes specialist and she told me that I'd never get his diabetes under control as long as he ate dry cat food.   I had 11 other cats to also feed, and did some research and switched all of my cats to canned Fancy Feast classic food, which was fairly low carb.  I got him off of insulin within 3 months and he stayed off of it until he passed at the age of 16.    I have "retired" from being a Crazy Cat Lady and am down to 4 cats and have re-introduced some dry cat food into their diet.  None have weight issues and cats are like people - some people can handle more carbs than others.   And all of my many, many, cats in the past 25 years have been indoor only.   Too much danger outside.  End of public service announcement.  

[wendyg]

iMonrey: What characters other than killing off Charlie in TWO AND A HALF MEN after Sheen melted down and nearly killed the show? He notoriously had problems with Cybill Shepherd, but he didn't have a chance to take any sort of revenge out on her character because she got him booted from the series he created. The only other actors I'm aware of that he had trouble with were Brett Butler (who was using drugs) and Roseanne Barr (who had trouble with *everybody*). It's really notable to me how many actors are happy to work with him again and again - on MOM there's Mimi Kennedy (Dharma's mom in DHARMA AND GREG), on THE BIG BANG THEORY Sara Gilbert, Laurie Metcalfe, and Johnny Galecki (ROSEANNE), Christine Baranski (CYBILL), on BOB HEARTS ABISHOLA Vermee Watson (too many of his shows to count).