S02.E15: A Date to Remember

[possibilities]

All they have to do is turn the TV on and let Isaac watch Ru Paul's Drag Race, Good Trouble (lesbian moms show that aired on Freeform), Queer Eye, or some other show with prominent same sex content. PBS has aired documentaries about the history of the Stonewall Rebellion and other aspects of LGBTQ rights and culture, and the legalization of same sex marriage is all over the news. There are lots of options, from the factual to the fanciful. But it's CBS and they prefer to keep the couple as chaste as possible and pretend it's for historical purposes. Better to keep Isaac afraid to kiss, and to educate the ghosts exclusively on the 21st Century via The Bachelor.

[iMonrey]

Quote

Munsee is the language of the northern tribe of the Lenape, Unami is the language of the down-river Lenape.

So would Sasappis speak Munsee or Unami? I'm not clear on where Woodstone Manor is supposed to be. Or maybe he speaks both? 

Quote

Is that the same couch where they all watch TV? I can see that getting pretty inconvenient. 

No, the library is downstairs. The TV is upstairs where Trevor and Thor sleep.

[ZuluQueenOfDwarves]

30 minutes ago, iMonrey said:

So would Sasappis speak Munsee or Unami? I'm not clear on where Woodstone Manor is supposed to be. Or maybe he speaks both? 

No, the library is downstairs. The TV is upstairs where Trevor and Thor sleep.

Unami was spoken where I live, in Philadelphia, so I assume that Sasappis would’ve spoken Munsee. 

[shura]

20 hours ago, ZuluQueenOfDwarves said:

The Iliad references the notion of mortality forcing us to grow and adapt the way that the gods can’t. Madeline Millar (in Circe) specifically calls the gods childish for demanding that they be entertained at all times, because work, survival, and change have no bearing on their lives, so they are eternal toddlers, adorable or throwing tantrums as they feel like it. Our mortality makes us aware of what is truly precious in life, and immortals envy us our growth and adaptability. Since the Joes have specifically referenced the Iliad before, I think the childishness of the ghosts is a deliberate reflection on that concept. 

The problem here is that, while the Greek gods were never mortals and never had to grow out of their toddler phase, our ghosts have been functional mortal adults that grew and adapted and should know better than to act like toddlers.  I suppose they, like the Puritan ghost, may have reconsidered some things, but it doesn’t really make their childishness attractive if they keep it up.

13 hours ago, eel21788 said:

15 hours ago, iMonrey said:

Where would Jay have gotten rams testicles anyway? It's not like you can just go into a grocery store and buy them.

I don' know about NY but in rancher country you can get them from a butcher.

Jay as a chef probably has connections with local farms too and can get things like that when needed.  Then there is always the internet.  They are called “lamb fries” apparently.

[eel21788]

23 hours ago, shura said:

Jay as a chef probably has connections with local farms too and can get things like that when needed.  Then there is always the internet.  They are called “lamb fries” apparently.

Here in CO, they're called Rocky Mountain Oysters.

ETA: for some reason I feel the need to clarify: when they're breaded and deep fried, they're called Rocky Mountain Oysters

Edited February 20, 2023 by eel21788

[Chit Chat]

2 hours ago, possibilities said:

There are lots of options, from the factual to the fanciful. But it's CBS and they prefer to keep the couple as chaste as possible and pretend it's for historical purposes. Better to keep Isaac afraid to kiss, and to educate the ghosts exclusively on the 21st Century via The Bachelor.

Even though Isaac is aware of what has changed since his living days, he might not be comfortable with being intimate with Nigel, no matter how many times he sees that attitudes have changed about it.  He'll be ready when he's ready!

[Johannah]

On 2/17/2023 at 3:00 PM, HurricaneVal said:

...

This was also my first thought when I saw the flashback, how much Flower was styled as the Ali McGraw character in Love Story, how it was right from her era, and thought she'd flipped the story in her head so it was her fiance who died.  I wonder if we'll just be left to wonder, and it was an inside joke with the writers, or if we'll explore this more in the future.  I don't doubt that Flower has a deeper backstory than just hippy-dippy stoned, former cult member, bank robbing, space cadet, flower-child.  I just think that....wasn't it.  I hope it becomes a running joke, where Flower offers a reminiscence about her past that contradicts in some way with other reminiscences so we're left wondering.  Maybe that is the joke, that she's so spacey that she can't even remember her past correctly and instead has created these little vignettes of her life based on cultural references.

I also think this would be fun.  I didn't catch the Love Story reference - only saw it once and wasn't impressed enough to remember details - but for those not on a site like this, it would be cool for them to gradually notice that Flower's "memories" are movies (or other popular culture from her days).  Cool idea!

[Annber03]

11 minutes ago, ChitChat said:

Even though Isaac is aware of what has changed since his living days, he might not be comfortable with being intimate with Nigel, no matter how many times he sees that attitudes have changed about it.  He'll be ready when he's ready!

And even with his reservations, he has been the first one to make some of the bigger steps in their relationship. He was the first of the two to say how he felt, with the whole "I like you" conversation, he's the one who ultimately initiated their first kiss, and he's the one who decided they should live together in the mansion. I think he definitely wants that intimacy with Nigel, he just doesn't always know how to ask for or get it, and sometimes just needs that extra kick or reassurance to remind him that it's okay to go for it. 

[Mabinogia]

6 hours ago, ChitChat said:

It would be funny if Jay started talking to Thor about this and maybe he could make the lights flicker whenever Sam lies about what the ghosts are saying.  Maybe she'd quit doing that to Jay. 

I would love that. They did rat her out once last season I believe. I forget the details though. Drats, gonna have to go watch Season 1 again, poor me. 

 

5 hours ago, enduringforce said:

Sas is really going to love the Heatty/Nigel thing as he loves drama, it really makes his afterlife fun.

wait until he finds out that Trevor and Hetty are, um, doing the laundry. ;) I'm sure he could have some fun with that tea. I love Sass's love of drama. 

[shapeshifter]

1 minute ago, Mabinogia said:

wait until he finds out that Trevor and Hetty are, um, doing the laundry. ;)

I hope we get "doing the laundry" as Trevor & Hetty's euphemism for having sex. 
And then I hope it goes viral IRL, giving the show extra props.

[Browncoat]

1 hour ago, shapeshifter said:

I hope we get "doing the laundry" as Trevor & Hetty's euphemism for having sex. 
And then I hope it goes viral IRL, giving the show extra props.

One of my exes and I called it "doing the laundry" -- back in the late 80s.  

[ZuluQueenOfDwarves]

When I worked at a daycare and the teachers wanted to dish about their weekend we called it “baking cookies”. 

[Skooma]

12 hours ago, shura said:

The problem here is that, while the Greek gods were never mortals and never had to grow out of their toddler phase, our ghosts have been functional mortal adults that grew and adapted and should know better than to act like toddlers.  I suppose they, like the Puritan ghost, may have reconsidered some things, but it doesn’t really make their childishness attractive if they keep it up.

But the thing is that a small toddler cannot interact with the world without an adult's help and the ghosts find themselves in the exact same position.  They cannot interact with the world of the living without the help of Sam so they are helpless without her for stuff they bother her about.

And the American ghosts are far better mannered about the "bothering."  The British ghosts are way more "bothering" Sam's equivalent and often en masse surrounding her all at once and shouting over one another as well.

10 hours ago, Mabinogia said:

I would love that. They did rat her out once last season I believe. I forget the details though. Drats, gonna have to go watch Season 1 again, poor me.

It was when Sam lied about Pete not wanting to play D&D with Jay anymore.  Trevor wrote "she lied" on the steamy mirror in the bathroom.

[Mabinogia]

7 hours ago, Skooma said:

It was when Sam lied about Pete not wanting to play D&D with Jay anymore.  Trevor wrote "she lied" on the steamy mirror in the bathroom.

Thank you! Yes that was the one. That one really bothered me because she had to see how happy D&D with Pete was making Jay. Jay gave up his friends to move there with her and she gets this new group of friends, the ghosts, but Jay really had no one. Sure D&D sucked up a lot of time, but she could have worked out a compromise, an hour a night or a couple hours every weekend, something to make her husband feel less alone. 

[DanaK]

2 minutes ago, Mabinogia said:

Thank you! Yes that was the one. That one really bothered me because she had to see how happy D&D with Pete was making Jay. Jay gave up his friends to move there with her and she gets this new group of friends, the ghosts, but Jay really had no one. Sure D&D sucked up a lot of time, but she could have worked out a compromise, an hour a night or a couple hours every weekend, something to make her husband feel less alone. 

I believe she did ultimately work out a compromise

[Trillium]

On 2/19/2023 at 10:36 AM, enduringforce said:

Sas is really going to love the Heatty/Nigel thing as he loves drama, it really makes his afterlife fun.

But Jay and Sam were boring in this episode. 

I think this is why I didn’t enjoy it much. It’s Valentine’s Day. It’s not my thing but I feel Hallmark movie loving Sam would be all about it, yet their celebration was an afterthought. 
 

I know it’s hard with a large cast to give everyone equal time but I think the Thor and Flower story can take a back seat for a while. 

[chaifan]

My take on the Flower backstory...  I think it is likely taken from Love Story, but more as a writer's inside joke, or maybe someone in the writer's room is a big fan of Love Story.  I don't think, and honestly hope not, that Flower's memory is not real.  I just think it was an homage to Love Story by the writers. 

I like the idea of Flower being super smart before all the drugs.  We see her as flaky and sort of stupid, but she's just baked. 

I love that Hetty and Trevor are still together, and that they're keeping it a secret.  I'm expecting Nigel to discover it, and use it as blackmail against Hetty so she leaves him and Isaac alone. 

[Mabinogia]

6 hours ago, chaifan said:

I like the idea of Flower being super smart before all the drugs.  We see her as flaky and sort of stupid, but she's just baked. 

I agree. We only know Flower from the hippy/cult/commune stage of her life, and as a ghost she's riding an eternal high, so we don't see the real Flower. I think it's pretty likely she was on a successful path before losing her fiancé (I honestly have a terrible memory, oh, maybe I'm eternally high too. Fun, so I think he was fiancé but could be wrong) caused her to pretty much lose everything she was working for. Missed too much law school and ended up dropping or flunking out, spiraled into depression, took drugs to get out of it, got hooked, went all hippy and died high.

I also agree that if anything the homage to Love Story was just one of the writers loving Love Story and thought it would be a fun backstory for Flower. Nothing more and I really hope it's not a false memory. That would annoy me to no end. It would make it very hard to invest in anything emotionally with her. Like when a show keeps killing off characters then bringing them back it gets to the point that when a character dies no one cares because they're going to be coming back anyway. 

[possibilities]

It would really hurt Thor if she told him that story and it wasn't true.

[Chatty Cake]

Why was the show on a respite this week? 

[Ilovepie]

On 2/20/2023 at 5:21 PM, Trillium said:

I think this is why I didn’t enjoy it much. It’s Valentine’s Day. It’s not my thing but I feel Hallmark movie loving Sam would be all about it, yet their celebration was an afterthought. 
 

I know it’s hard with a large cast to give everyone equal time but I think the Thor and Flower story can take a back seat for a while. 

Totally agree! It was frustrating seeing Sam put the ghosts ahead of Jay's feelings multiple times. And then all of the work he did for, let's face it, two dead people, is ridiculous, not to mention wasteful since nobody is actually going to eat it.

I think it's time to stop pairing off all of these ghosts. We now have Nigel and Isaac, Hetty and Trevor, and Thor and Flower. Not to mention Pete pining after Alberta. They've been together for years and years and suddenly everyone is hooking up? Flower remains my least favorite ghost, so I really could have done without this pairing. But I would be lying if I said I wasn't all about the Hetty/Trevor pairing - they are weirdly awesome together!

[Mabinogia]

13 minutes ago, Ilovepie said:

They've been together for years and years and suddenly everyone is hooking up?

I will fanwank this one as them all being "inspired" by Jay and Sam who I imagine have a great sex life. lol I mean, the last living they had to watch was a very old lady who seems to have lived alone so that was probably a dry spell for them all. haha

[North of Eden]

Got emotional seeing Flower losing her love but ALSO a drug free well put together future as a lady lawyer.She must have spiraled into Mary Jane addiction afterward. This show knows how to pull the heartstrings!

[Annber03]

8 hours ago, Mabinogia said:

I will fanwank this one as them all being "inspired" by Jay and Sam who I imagine have a great sex life. lol I mean, the last living they had to watch was a very old lady who seems to have lived alone so that was probably a dry spell for them all. haha

The actor who plays Trevor even suggested that was a factor in all the romance in the air this season - they've got Sam and Jay to observe and so he figures that all the ghosts are kind of being all, "Monkey see, monkey do" in response :p. I can totally buy that. 

[possibilities]

I bet the guests are also... role models. 

[iMonrey]

Quote

I also agree that if anything the homage to Love Story was just one of the writers loving Love Story and thought it would be a fun backstory for Flower. 

How is everyone getting "Love Story" from that very brief flashback? Does it have something to do with the record player? I think I saw Love Story eons ago but I remember nothing of it.

Quote

I will fanwank this one as them all being "inspired" by Jay and Sam who I imagine have a great sex life. lol I mean, the last living they had to watch was a very old lady who seems to have lived alone so that was probably a dry spell for them all.

And prior to the last owner of the manor were no doubt generations of stuffy, upper-crust rich people who married for money and land deals like Hetty and Elias. Also, they've never been able to communicate with the livings before Sam came along. 

I have to think that Sam is the catalyst for the ghosts to finally mature, evolve and eventually move on (but hopefully not until after Season 7 or so).

[shapeshifter]

2 hours ago, iMonrey said:

Also, they've never been able to communicate with the livings before Sam came along

Have Thor and Sass stated that no other livings (besides children) with the ability to see ghosts have ever been at the Woodstone long enough for them to have conversations with the ghosts?

[christie]

27 minutes ago, shapeshifter said:

Have Thor and Sass stated that no other livings (besides children) with the ability to see ghosts have ever been at the Woodstone long enough for them to have conversations with the ghosts?

When the handyman's son saw the ghosts didn't someone (Thor? Sass?) say that some children can see them but they grow out of it or am I remembering it incorrectly? Anyway, we know that Hetty, as a child, could hear Thor singing to her but she couldn't as an adult.

[basil]

On 2/19/2023 at 11:35 AM, shura said:

On 2/18/2023 at 10:25 PM, eel21788 said:

On 2/18/2023 at 8:12 PM, iMonrey said:

Where would Jay have gotten rams testicles anyway? It's not like you can just go into a grocery store and buy them.

I don' know about NY but in rancher country you can get them from a butcher.

Jay as a chef probably has connections with local farms too and can get things like that when needed.  Then there is always the internet.  They are called “lamb fries” apparently.

In the episode where Hetty possessed Jay, she (as Jay) created a wedding menu based of foods from her time that Jay had to acquire. There were some fairly unusual items, iirc.

They also cleared their home of pigeons in the process. :)

[AncientNewbie]

I could go either way on Flower, probably because I don't have any strong tie to the character...let Love Story be one-off as an inside joke about her real history or let her keep combining things she's experienced as a Ghost as false memories. That could set up storylines about digging into her real past, I guess? 

If I'm fantasy booking future eps, I'd also like to see Sass being "modern" in all the other time periods, because as much as I enjoy the character, he is very 21st century in his mannerisms. I'd love to see him mimicking the Roaring 20s speech in a flashback or cursing Danes in Norwegian with Thor as the two of them sit on the space the house will be built...

[iMonrey]

Quote

Have Thor and Sass stated that no other livings (besides children) with the ability to see ghosts have ever been at the Woodstone long enough for them to have conversations with the ghosts?

In the pilot Isaac said they had never had access to a living before. Neither Thor nor Sass contradicted that statement.

[Mabinogia]

5 hours ago, AncientNewbie said:

If I'm fantasy booking future eps, I'd also like to see Sass being "modern" in all the other time periods, because as much as I enjoy the character, he is very 21st century in his mannerisms. I'd love to see him mimicking the Roaring 20s speech in a flashback or cursing Danes in Norwegian with Thor as the two of them sit on the space the house will be built...

That would be fun. I do see Sass, more so than the other ghosts, being interested in learning the customs, speech, etc of the time. The others, while they do enjoy watching modern shows, still seem very rooted in their time period but Sass, an observer of people, seems most willing to change with the times. 

[chaifan]

On 2/24/2023 at 4:34 PM, Ilovepie said:

They've been together for years and years and suddenly everyone is hooking up?

I blame it on the washing machine.  😁

On 2/27/2023 at 11:04 AM, AncientNewbie said:

If I'm fantasy booking future eps, I'd also like to see Sass being "modern" in all the other time periods, because as much as I enjoy the character, he is very 21st century in his mannerisms. I'd love to see him mimicking the Roaring 20s speech in a flashback or cursing Danes in Norwegian with Thor as the two of them sit on the space the house will be built...

I love this!  In my mind, Sass has been picking up language and mannerisms from everyone he encounters, progressing with the times.  In addition to a scene with Thor, it would be hilarious for him to be welcoming Alberta to the afterlife using all the fun slang of her time, then doing the same with hippie Flower.  That would be a great montage for a Sass-centric episoe. 

[eel21788]

2 hours ago, chaifan said:

I blame it on the washing machine.  😁

I love this!  In my mind, Sass has been picking up language and mannerisms from everyone he encounters, progressing with the times.  In addition to a scene with Thor, it would be hilarious for him to be welcoming Alberta to the afterlife using all the fun slang of her time, then doing the same with hippie Flower.  That would be a great montage for a Sass-centric episoe. 

I'd just like to see the actual Welcoming Ceremony. With Trevor's flashback, we only got to see a few seconds before they decided to take it in the other room. What are people's reactions to finding out 1) they're dead, 2) they're still not leaving, and 3) they suddenly have a lot of new friends?

[Mabinogia]

4 hours ago, eel21788 said:

I'd just like to see the actual Welcoming Ceremony. With Trevor's flashback, we only got to see a few seconds before they decided to take it in the other room. What are people's reactions to finding out 1) they're dead, 2) they're still not leaving, and 3) they suddenly have a lot of new friends?

Yes. I'd love to get flashbacks of each of them reacting to their own deaths. I also wonder if there were any ghosts there before Thor. If not, how horrible must his death experience been, with no one there to explain to him what just happened. 

[PaulE]

On 2/18/2023 at 2:16 PM, kwnyc said:

Does anyone else think Nigel is a passive-aggressive twit? Too bad there is only one queer ghost, because Isaac doesn't have another potential love interest (except for Nigel's lying ex).

I find him repellent, but then I have Irish roots (Hetty would HATE me!) ;-)

I did think him a twit at first but I have to admit I've grown to like him, perhaps because of the way John Hartman plays him.  There's a certain pathos to his life as a ghost.  First of all, he's been stuck in that miserable shed with only two of his subordinates for company.  And he's a loyal Englishman but has to spend eternity in a foreign land among people he considers rebels.  It was funny, but also a bit pathetic, to see him in the earlier episodes trying to maintain his dignity by acting as if the war hadn't ended and insisting the shed was the sovereign territory of King George III.  I don't know if it would be a good idea to upgrade him to a main ghost but at this point I'd hate to see him go completely.

[mojito]

Not understanding the discussion about 1970 and "Love Story". Why couldn't Flower have seen the movie in later years as a ghost?

[shapeshifter]

3 hours ago, mojito said:

Not understanding the discussion about 1970 and "Love Story". Why couldn't Flower have seen the movie in later years as a ghost?

My understanding is that Flower would have had to see the movie since Sam & Jay moved into the house, as there was no TV there previously.
However, you are right, @mojito.
It's possible Flower's "Love Story" story was the result of her having seen the movie recently.