S05.E16: My Name Is

[jewel21]

Quote

Hoping to revive the GAU football program, Spencer and Jordan take a page from the Billy Baker playbook and revisit some former football stars as potential walk-ons…without Coach Kenny’s blessing. Olivia, Layla and Patience look for an escape from their current life stressors and ultimately rediscover themselves in the process. JJ tries to straddle football and the fraternity, and Coop gets great news but it may cost her something precious.

Airdate: 04/17/2023

[Artsda]

Is JJ going to go to rehab?

Spencer and Jordan act like they are the coaches and not freshman.  It's ridiculous. They're not the coaching staff. 

They all act like they 10 years older than the Homecoming characters. 

When Jordan was saying he was going to walk Olivia down the aisle I thought can he do that and be best man?

[KWalkerInc]

I hope that J.J. meant that he is going to rehab and not just wander off to deal with his problems alone.  I am glad he had that realization about the path he was headed down.  Although they may have been looking for a reason to not include the actor for at least the next several episodes (for budget), at least it was believable.  Sometimes in the press releases, the CW puts that J.J. Parker is playing Hunter Clowdus instead of the other way around, which seems slightly clueless.  My recording froze just as J.J. was yelling for help and I was afraid I'd have to rewatch the whole thing on demand (no FF-ing permitted even through the content, not just commercials), but then it fixed just as the commercials started.  I thought at first Keith might die and it would lead to a lot of legal problems for everyone in the beach house, but at least they didn't go quite that heavy.

Even though they were pointing out all the reasons Coop was in the wrong, I really don't care that she and Sky broke up.  Sky isn't even mentioned in 80 percent of the episodes, so I think the show would survive.  But Coop will probably apologize and get taken back again for some reason.  The random reappearance of Granny makes me think she would have some role in it too, but maybe not.  Coop is right that it was strange that the professor just now started criticizing her for being "street."  It would seem like it would have been brought up for conflict when she first interviewed or started auditing the class, unless he hadn't taken her seriously then or is going to say that he's trying to help because he knows how judges are in court or something.  Even though she was at all the classes, it's also weird that she can now officially be in the class.  We couldn't add or drop courses more than two weeks after the start of a quarter when I was in college long ago.  But I have no idea what the timeframe is for the episodes now, with football season over and no oddly timed holidays mentioned for a while. 

For some reason, I felt oddly invested in Kai and Sal's tryouts for GAU, even though they'd never been mentioned before.  I don't think Coach Kenny will ever get Spencer and Jordan to respect his boundaries, although at least they didn't try to make him feel guilty by explaining that they were trying to follow Billy's legacy through their actions.

The quinceanera (I tried to put the tilde on and got bumped off the page!) stuff was cute, and of course inspired more epiphanies.  I thought they would get kicked out, but of course Valerie (?) was a big Patience fan.  At least there wasn't any crap with Miko for once.

This episode was directed by Karimah Westbrook (Grace).  It was actually pretty good for pre-sweeps filler!

[Lonesome Rhodes]

Very pleased we got the new bottom for J.J.  There was no way he was gonna stay sober with the ridiculous schedule he embraced.  A subtle, but excellent, point about the nature of a fall for an addict was also portrayed.  It is widely known and accepted that the "slip" didn't happen in the moment the addict uses/drinks.  It happens before, sometimes much before, because the addict was not fully in the recovery process.  J.J. was clearly not, thus he was susceptible to the Siren cry of, "PAAAAAARRRRRTAAAAAYYY!"  

The recruiting by Spence and Jordan demonstrates yet again just how lousy the GAU program is right now.  They would not win a game next season.  Where are the assistant coaches?  You have a tryout session and there are no position coaches to work with the fellas?  Puhlease.  And now they are out of schollies to give?!  Impossible situation.

I liked the scene with the elder standing guard at the quinceanera.  Those things are no joke.  It is near-incredible to me how often families with not very much go hog wild spending for these.  There could, and should, have been more Spanish spoken/heard.  I get that the family was mixed-culture.  But, this is decidedly a Hispanic event - as evidenced by the lady guarding the door.

Just as with the spinoff show, we have a faculty member who is demanding and particular.  Why would he waste time and energy on Coop before she proved to be the exception and showed her mettle?  He honored her by treating her just as he would any student.  Language usage is everything to a lawyer and this guy was setting Coop up for success.  There are not many jidges who would accept a brief relying on slang or street communications.  It is also important to understand that this is the only class Coop is taking.  It's one thing to keep up with the reading for one class.  Quite another to deal with three or four. 

Smaht move to bring in fresh characters who will go through the minefield of negotiating different cultures and encounter serious roadblocks to success.  All the originals have pretty much established themselves in the world-at-large.  

Overall, this was a fine episode with some super serious messaging.  This is the promise of the premise being realized.