S04.E12: Girard Creek

[chitowngirl]

The Abbott Elementary students and staff are invited to a special grand opening preview of the Girard Creek Golf Club.
 

Airdate January 29, 2025 on ABC, next day Hulu

[JeanJean]

The noodles scene with Gregory and Barbara was so sweet!

And RJ found something he likes!

I love Jacob for not  resting on that laurel, instead sad he can't do more.

[Galileo908]

Mr. Johnson definitely won at the Game of Life. Both metaphorically and literally.

"Pull Michael Jordan out of a golf hole." Space Jam reference!

"But the food. It's got ingredients, and flavor. Together." Poor Gregory can't even handle tuna, whereas Janine can tell when an Arnold Palmer has not enough Arnold and too much Palmer. The laugh I had when she demanded to know what else was in them besides lemonade. (Ohhhh, they're serving Arnold Palmers because it's a golf course. Shoulda known). Very happy there's an episode to finally get him out of the pickiness comfort zone. Him eating the truffles was a hell of milestone. And man, not even knowing what salad dressing is? That's just sad.

Who called that the golf course would use the kids to promote itself and being all performative as hell? Janine and Jacob knew SOMETHING was off. Bringing in the three legged dog for the group photo? (and letting it live was against course policy) And hiding Charlie? I mean, damn that's low. Timely as hell, too. And you just KNOW the course merch had the same colors as Abbott's uniforms was intentional. They were right, they needed a Get Out plan.

Loved Ava and Melissa teaming up to steal truffles. And Jacob finally got some praise! RJ finally found his thing. (and that moment when he's taller than Janine...)

"GREGORY! He fights parents." Great callback!

3 minutes ago, JeanJean said:

The noodles scene with Gregory and Barbara was so sweet!

Loved that so much, and says so much to both characters. I figured Gregory's strict upbringing factored into his very very basic palate.

"It's nice to have hope."

[Annber03]

2 minutes ago, JeanJean said:

I love Jacob for not  resting on that laurel, instead sad he can't do more.

Yeah, I liked that, too. I am glad that RJ found something he enjoyed, though. 

I also loved all the teachers banding together to get back at gof club guy for using the kids as he did. Especially clever how they tied all the respective stories together during that scene, from Gregory's thing with new foods to Melissa and Ava's whole heist bit*. Janine trying to be all tough and slamming the table was great, too :p. 

(Also liked the nod to Gregory's past scuffle with htat parent with the "He beats up parents" line XD.)

*Melissa and Ava boncing over heist films was fun :D. 

Also liked Janine wanting to adopt the dog, 'cause, yeah, same. And the end scene with her and Gregory was good, too - she looked so pretty!

[JeanJean]

20 minutes ago, Annber03 said:

Also liked Janine wanting to adopt the dog, '

Made me sad she didn't actually do it, though.  Felt like they played with my heart a little.

Maybe next week it'll turn out she did!

Edited Yest. at 02:27 AM by JeanJean

[kathyk2]

17 minutes ago, Galileo908 said:

Mr. Johnson definitely won at the Game of Life. Both metaphorically and literally.

"Pull Michael Jordan out of a golf hole." Space Jam reference!

"But the food. It's got ingredients, and flavor. Together." Poor Gregory can't even handle tuna, whereas Janine can tell when an Arnold Palmer has not enough Arnold and too much Palmer. The laugh I had when she demanded to know what else was in them besides lemonade. (Ohhhh, they're serving Arnold Palmers because it's a golf course. Shoulda known). Very happy there's an episode to finally get him out of the pickiness comfort zone. Him eating the truffles was a hell of milestone. And man, not even knowing what salad dressing is? That's just sad.

Who called that the golf course would use the kids to promote itself and being all performative as hell? Janine and Jacob knew SOMETHING was off. Bringing in the three legged dog for the group photo? (and letting it live was against course policy) And hiding Charlie? I mean, damn that's low. Timely as hell, too. And you just KNOW the course merch had the same colors as Abbott's uniforms was intentional. They were right, they needed a Get Out plan.

Loved Ava and Melissa teaming up to steal truffles. And Jacob finally got some praise! RJ finally found his thing. (and that moment when he's taller than Janine...)

"GREGORY! He fights parents." Great callback!

Loved that so much, and says so much to both characters. I figured Gregory's strict upbringing factored into his very very basic palate.

"It's nice to have hope."

Tyler James Williams has Crohn's disease in real life so I thought it would be nice to give that to Gregory. I love that Janine has a big appetite I'm sure she was hungry growing up. Ava and Melissa were hilarious.

[atomic]

I've never had truffles before but Googled how much they cost out of curiosity. Poor Gregory is never going to enjoy those again on his teacher's salary. 😆

[Galileo908]

38 minutes ago, atomic said:

I've never had truffles before but Googled how much they cost out of curiosity. Poor Gregory is never going to enjoy those again on his teacher's salary. 😆

The complete irony in that his one acquired taste is the one of the most expensive ones of all in contrast to his diet of buttered noodles.

Edited Yest. at 03:46 AM by Galileo908

[Blakeston]

Gregory's food sensitivities are pretty extreme, and I suspect that they go beyond just having a military upbringing. If I recall correctly, he said in the past that there are only five foods that he actually likes - and we know that two of them are buttered noodles and boiled chicken sandwiches.

I guess he's up to six now!

Tyler James Williams should use this episode as his Emmy submission.

[jah1986]

Great episode! Of course the golf course was using Abbott, but they got a golf club out of it and RJ found something he really likes, "like a black Tiger Woods".

Loved Janine's "we can talk about it" when Gregory asked if they could get truffles again. Yeah, that's not happening.

There was a mix of character interaction that worked really well, Ava/Melissa, Barbara/Gregory, very nice.

[atomic]

Loved how Ava and Melissa sacrificed the $4K/pound truffles without hesitation for the kids. ❤️ They were the heist duo I never knew I needed this episode. 😅

[ItCouldBeWorse]

13 hours ago, Annber03 said:

And the end scene with her and Gregory was good, too - she looked so pretty!

I was annoyed that they left all that expensive food behind to go eat elsewhere. Gregory know she's a bottomless pit; he should have sat there while she ate and enjoyed both their meals. It was quite selfish of him to take her up on her offer to leave when he knew how much she had looked forward to this meal, and how she has been limiting herself to restaurants that serve buttered noodles when with him.

They should have at least taken the food to go so she could eat it later.

I kept waiting for someone to tell Janine that an Arnold Palmer is just lemonade and iced tea. I'm surprised Jacob didn't know either. I've never played golf, but I feel like it's something that people who read would have come across at some point. But maybe not people their age.

Edited Yest. at 03:55 PM by ItCouldBeWorse

[txhorns79]

I thought the episode was a little clumsy.  I didn't love the golf club storyline.  It wasn't just that he was using the kids for publicity.  He was making a lot of racist assumptions about the kids.  I thought his comment to RJ about being able to work at the club one day as a caddy would lead to the blow up, or his obviously hiding the one white student and white teachers in the group photo to portray the event as being charity for poor black children would do it. 

On the positive side, I did like the Ava/Melissa heist, as I feel like they don't put those two together in their own storyline often, and their grifter spirits work well with one another. 

Edited 21 hours ago by txhorns79

[peeayebee]

19 hours ago, Galileo908 said:

"Pull Michael Jordan out of a golf hole." Space Jam reference!

Ohhhh. I didn't get that at all. Thank you. It's been a while since I've seen Space Jam.

Quote

"GREGORY! He fights parents." Great callback!

Yes! Excellent callback. While I wasn't fond of the whole thing in that episode where he's going to fight the dad, how great that the writers used it in a hilarious and significant way.

There were lots of good parts to this ep, but I really hated that guy. I know we're supposed to, but he was a mustache-twirling villain. 

Also, I know we were supposed to see that the teachers weren't used to such extravagance, but I thought they were eating like pigs. Melissa eating the noodles with her fingers. Janine eating, well, everything... and eating it all like someone who'd never been to any public function. Yes, I know that's Janine, even from back when she was "going to Bone Town." I don't know why I can't just accept the premise and enjoy.

And really, she didn't know what an Arnold Palmer was? I don't think of that as a high-falutin' drink, and it's certainly not limited to golf courses. My sister drinks those often, mixing them herself (because it's no big deal to make them yourself).

Anyway, love the heist film titles that Melissa and Ava traded back and forth. That was fun. I also enjoyed seeing Barbara trying to get Gregory to try something new, and to do it for Janine. Cracked me up when he actually ran away from the server. I loved his "Dusted, crusted, or not to be trusted" line.

Seeing the teachers and Ava confront that guy (name?) was great, esp loved when Gregory came in to fight him, and then actually ate the truffle -- with hate in his eyes directed at the guy -- in order to force him to relent. 

Early on Jacob mentioned wanting to teach Janine how to play Spades. Is that a card game? Like Hearts? Just going by the title, it seemed a problematic game for a white guy to teach a black woman. Maybe I'm going too far.

Nice to see RJ find something that sparks joy.

[atomic]

40 minutes ago, peeayebee said:

esp loved when Gregory came in to fight him, and then actually ate the truffle -- with hate in his eyes directed at the guy -- in order to force him to relent. 

TJW always delivers with the facial expressions, but that one really took me out. 🤣

[DearEvette]

This is on one of the Abbott episodes where the plot is rather simple and the story showcases that the Abbott team really is there for the kids, but in all that they throw away some really funny lines.  The dialogue and jokes were really cracking:

" A sneak peak of our pre-grand opening preview"

“How is that fusion Paris and France are the same place?"

Jacob "I'm still teaching Janie spades."

"He fights parents."

Add me to the chorus of loving Melissa and Ava's heist and their heist film quips.

The only thing that really annoyed me is that place was taking pictures/videos of minors without the consent of the teachers or parents and posting them publicly.

Edited 16 hours ago by DearEvette

[kaygeeret]

I thougt it was a very good episode.

Great writing and as usual the cast was excellent.

Good fun with some substance als well

[Galileo908]

1 hour ago, DearEvette said:

The only thing that really annoyed me is that place was taking pictures/videos of minors without the consent of the teachers or parents and posting them publicly.

1) Yeah, I'd imagine that would've/should've been a point of contention.
2) There's probably permission slips involved. But since that visit was so last minute, it's probably unlikely.
3) The scumbag guy probably would not have cared.

1 hour ago, DearEvette said:

This is on one of the Abbott episodes where the plot is rather simple and the story showcases that the Abbott team really is there for the kids, but in all that they throw away from really funny lines.  The dialogue as really cracking:

" A sneak peak of our pre-grand opening preview"

“How is that fusion Paris and France are the same place?"

Jacob "I'm still teaching Janie spades."

"He fights parents."

"But the food. It has ingredients. And flavor. Together."

"How many Arnold Palmers have you had?"
"I had seven...TEEN!"

[ItCouldBeWorse]

3 hours ago, DearEvette said:

The only thing that really annoyed me is that place was taking pictures/videos of minors without the consent of the teachers or parents and posting them publicly.

2 hours ago, Galileo908 said:

1) Yeah, I'd imagine that would've/should've been a point of contention.
2) There's probably permission slips involved. But since that visit was so last minute, it's probably unlikely.
3) The scumbag guy probably would not have cared.

1) I thought the same thing.

2a) Then I thought that maybe the golf course had sent the school permission slips for the parents to sign with photo permission in the small print

2b) Then I thought that the school district would also have permission slips that parents would have to sign before taking the kids off the school premises (I also thought this about Janine driving the kids in a party bus last week).

2c) Then I concluded that there was no way the school could have gotten a signed permission slip for every  kid in one night (remember, Jacob greeted his class on the first day back from the strike, and mentioned that they would be missing class for the field trip the next day)

3) But they could force him to take the pictures down by threatening a lawsuit

4) But I let it all go, because it was about as realistic as Janine eating all that food and drinking 17 Arnold Palmers without throwing up or writhing in pain

 

[Blakeston]

As clueless as Jeanine and Jacob can be, even they should have figured out what was up as soon as they saw the kids being interviewed on video about how much they love the club.

[Crashcourse]

Janine standing there eating like a pig.  Watch out, Gregory!

[Boofish]

I dated someone who basically hated food. He used no condiments, nothing extra. Salad with no dressing, black coffee - no cream no sugar. Burgers plain. Not even a pickle. But he had none of Gregory's charm or personality. He was just as bland as the food he ate.

On 1/30/2025 at 9:50 AM, ItCouldBeWorse said:

I was annoyed that they left all that expensive food behind to go eat elsewhere. Gregory know she's a bottomless pit; he should have sat there while she ate and enjoyed both their meals. It was quite selfish of him to take her up on her offer to leave when he knew how much she had looked forward to this meal, and how she has been limiting herself to restaurants that serve buttered noodles when with him.

Did I miss something because I thought Janine agreed the food wasn't good and she was pretending as well.

[ItCouldBeWorse]

4 minutes ago, Boofish said:

Did I miss something because I thought Janine agreed the food wasn't good and she was pretending as well.

I rewatched.  Janine said "I can't eat this" because Gregory kept talking about every ingredient, I think. He misunderstood her meaning and asked if they could go get some truffles, she said they'd talk about it, he said "Thank God!" and got up to go, she realized what he was doing and said "ok" and got up, too. They discussed paying on the way out.  I don't think she was unable to eat the salad, garlic mussels and the osso bucco in red wine reduction because of the flavor; it was because of him, although I can see where her original "I can't eat this" might be confusing.

What do others think?