S03.E22: The Child Is Father To The Man

[Primetimer]

What's worse than Dylan? Two Dylans.

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[Primetimer]

And you might need a bottle of something brown to get through the Visual Aids for 'The Child Is Father To The Man.'

Read the story

[Beeparoonie]

Jut wanted to say Hi All - new to the forum as a member, but a longtime lurker/reader/listener. Just wanted to say that the visual aids, esp. Dylinner Child and his grapes, made me laugh very hard. OMG, love you guys!

[benteen]

I don't think I ever hated Kelly more than in this episode where she didn't want to go to the funeral of her boyfriend's father because or her eating disorder nonsense.  The contrast between her and Brenda as Dylan's girlfriend couldn't be more stark.

[benteen]

Forget an urn or a picture, they should have had a pair of Jack McKay's sweat pants hanging on display next to his coffin.  Jack deserved to die for his crimes against fashion alone.

 

It's interesting how the Jack McKay out of jail storyline really didn't last that long at all.

Edited March 17, 2016 by benteen

[benteen]

Might have been the funniest Visual Aid yet!

[Beeparoonie]

Totally agree about Kelly! Ok, I get that it's hard to always know how to deal with the death of someone's loved one, but omg, all the whining that she does! God forbid Dylan and his duster spend any time grieving - it's gotta be alllll about Kelly and her feeeeelings.  Wahwahwah.  Grr!  Also, girl, if you are going to decide to finally eat something, at least try chewing your chips with your mouth closed. Ugh.  But then, Dylinner Child keeps talking with his mouth full of grapes, so...maybe these two are meant to be.  Still - Team Brenda!

[Lisin]

I don't think I ever hated Kelly more than in this episode where she didn't want to go to the funeral of her boyfriend's father because or her eating disorder nonsense.  The contrast between her and Brenda as Dylan's girlfriend couldn't be more stark.

 

Right?! I mean no one wants to go to funerals, you do it out of respect. It's not like "oooh, can't wait for the funeral" or whatever... Kelly is just such a brat. 

[Nanna]

Gotta give it to Brenda, she acts like a decent human being here, putting her own feelings aside and thnking about what's best for Dylan. Whereas Kelly seems to have topped being likeable from one moment to another. Dylinner child is SO horrible. I don't know how anyone could have thought this was a good idea. "Let's really give Luke Perry a vhance to show his great acting skills. Let's see, how about making him play two exactly identical versions of Dylan - at once!" Seriously writers it's not okay to be that drunk during work hours.

[SoupThrower]

So much foreshadowing!!!

Kelly burning Dylan, Brenda some girl that he knew and David getting high.

Donna was awesome except for the whole David thing. Don't think Dylan and David were friends in the first place. Though David saved himself by saving Dylan in the long run.

Also shut up Kelly. So annoying and the Dylinner thing. How does it even eat? Why does it eat? How did it get into the liquor cabinet? HOW?

Remember watching this episode recently and Cindy was so happy to see David and he was grateful and courteous. He was so precious.

[sinnerforhire]

Remember watching this episode recently and Cindy was so happy to see David and he was grateful and courteous. He was so precious.

To you? Would you give the world to him?

[kfree9]

Forget an urn or a picture, they should have had a pair of Jack McKay's sweat pants hanging on display next to his coffin.

Or draped elegantly around the urn.

The urn really won the visual aids this time. I laughed so hard.

[marny]

Laughing so hard at the horrified look of the child when he sees the Dylan he will eventually become.

[AndySmith]

Donna having a more sensible funeral outfit than both Cindy and Brenda? What the how?

Edited March 17, 2016 by AndySmith

[AndySmith]

I can kind of see where Kelly is coming from, if I look at it sideways enough with squinty eyes...she's using her body issues to mask her own daddy issues. Or something.

 

[Pdxblonde]

Best visual aids so far! You guys made my lunch hour so much better (it's been a bad day at work).

[CicelyAlaska]

I remember watching this as a tween and being all up on mopey Dylan. When angry teen boys meant sensitive emotional boy.

[MissEwa]

The Dylan-Urn stare-off had me laughing for a good ten minutes. In fact, all these visual aids are much funnier than they have any business being given all the death and grieving.

I do have to give it to Brenda - I am pretty sure if I was seventeen and by boyfriend dumped me for my best friend my reaction to this whole thing would have been far less kind. Kelly, on the other hand, has obviously starved her brain to such an extent that she's become a completely different and terrible person.

I remembered as the whole Jack-out-of-jail storyline going on for much longer but he was out for what, two weeks before he exploded? That's some OC-level plot-burning, show. And SO MUCH of season three left.

[armyhadahalfday]

L.A. native, born and raised. The outdoor marketplace accosted by Dylan's duster is Olvera Street in downtown Los Angeles.

Oh! And I'm pretty sure that in the "I HATE BOTH OF YOU NEVER SPEAK TO ME AGAINNNNN" scene, they're at Roxbury Park in BH. Definitely very close to Century City, but still feasibly walkable/stompable from Walsh Manor. IRL it's across the street from Beverly Hills High.

[Nanna]

BTW, it bothered me 20 years ago and still does that it seems to change Dylan's feelings for Jack that he is now a FBI spy or whatever. Sure, it's nicer to rmthink about than him being a mobster, but he was still a shit father for all of Dylan's life (except for one glorious summer or whatever).

[lottiedottie]

Forget an urn or a picture, they should have had a pair of Jack McKay's sweat pants hanging on display next to his coffin.  Jack deserved to die for his crimes against fashion alone.

 

It's interesting how the Jack McKay out of jail storyline really didn't last that long at all.

I swear when it originally aired, it felt like it went on for-ev-er.

[penguinnj]

I gotta say that on the "Kelly is weird and uncomfortable" with death thing does come up again in a shocking bit of continuity when the kid Brandon runs for student council dies in the Peach Pit parking lot of death. She even references it. Although I think she calls it the beginning of the end or some such garbage because they stay together for another almost whole season and I would say are the happiest as a couple- without too much angst or whatever- as soon as she is "cured" of her eating disorder. The episodes around prom and graduation, I think are the happiest they ever get on this show. I confess I liked them as a couple when I was a tween and I always thought they got short changed in the happy episodes department- that was before I realized you only get about 2-4 of those in any soap opera before tragedy hits.

[FozzyBear]

I don't think I ever hated Kelly more than in this episode where she didn't want to go to the funeral of her boyfriend's father because or her eating disorder nonsense. The contrast between her and Brenda as Dylan's girlfriend couldn't be more stark.

Oh just wait. Kelly "always in a snit about some fucking thing" Taylor is about to rise like a Phoenix from the ashes of cool Kelly and she can not be killed by anything less than a total 90210 apocalypse. College Kelly is the worst. The. Very. Worst.

I seriously don't understand what was supposed to be going on with Jack. Was he using Dylan's trust as part of the plan? Was the money going back into a trust when the FBI did whatever they wanted to do?

[Sarah D. Bunting]

If I think about this too hard, my head starts hurting, but I think what we were supposed to infer was that Jack wanted Dylan's cashish to put up a whole whack of money for a drug deal with the Mafia. Why they went this route when he's supposedly Giant Pants Boesky, I don't know; could have been some kind of laundering/payback scheme. Certainly we weren't supposed to care about the McGuffinage that led to the smithereening of McKay Sr. when the dying-quail grief of the heir apparent was supposed to give us such titanic lady boners. Alas, we olds find Dylan's attempts to keen rather dull and are forced to examine his father's finances in more detail in order to try in vain to stay conscious. 

[AndySmith]

I always thought Jack needed the money to pay back the mob. The shady business deal(s) that landed him in jail included mob money, so he went to jail rather than give evidence to the feds? Then he cut a deal with the the FBI, but he needed access to Dylan's money set up some kind of entrapment money to entice the mob? But then they blew him up instead? Or something?

 

Granted, this is all based on what is happening now, not including future retcons we get about Jack.

[Qoass]

Personally I believe that Jack was really supposed to be not only merely dead but really most sincerely dead.  Then, later on, they jerry-rigged some bullshit story to bring him back when a new story-line occurred to them.

[FozzyBear]

I always thought Jack needed the money to pay back the mob. The shady business deal(s) that landed him in jail included mob money, so he went to jail rather than give evidence to the feds? Then he cut a deal with the the FBI, but he needed access to Dylan's money set up some kind of entrapment money to entice the mob? But then they blew him up instead? Or something?

Granted, this is all based on what is happening now, not including future retcons we get about Jack.

Ok maybe I'm just getting this from TV, but when law enforcement is setting up a sting don't the usually use money they had prior access to so they can track it? Also so, Dylan legally gets his trust dissolved and gives it to Jack and Jack gives it to someone else and something illegal happens? And part of the FBI plan is to dissolve this trust and give it to the mob? Because that will prove something? Why do they need Dylan at all? Couldn't Jack just work with the Feds on a sting operation since the mob still thinks Jack is a criminal? So part of Jack's deal to get out of jail is this weird plan that puts his son in physical danger and maybe loses all his money to the mob if anything goes wrong. And we're supposed to applaud this? For reasons?

[seasquared]

Has anyone ever tried to play a drinking game wherein you drink every time any one says the word "look.." before making a statement? You're wasted by the first commercial break!

[sinnerforhire]

Also, why are they constantly saying each others' names? They know who's who. Do they think we don't? A drinking game based on that would also have you wasted by the first act break.

[Nanna]

We did a drinking game in senior high when the shows was on at Thursdays in my country. We would drink every time Brandon said something condescending. Lucky for us that the show only lasted 45 minutes.

[SoupThrower]

Also, why are they constantly saying each others' names? They know who's who. Do they think we don't? A drinking game based on that would also have you wasted by the first act break.

 

I guess since there are a lot of people and makes it easier for anyone who tunes in for the first time. 

[SoupThrower]

 

Oh just wait. Kelly "always in a snit about some fucking thing" Taylor is about to rise like a Phoenix from the ashes of cool Kelly and she can not be killed by anything less than a total 90210 apocalypse. College Kelly is the worst. The. Very. Worst.

 

 

COLLEGE KELLY!!!

 

Made Brandon look like a better character. 

Edited March 19, 2016 by SoupThrower

[Tooch]

This is one I haven't caught a rerun of in at least ten years but I still remember thinking the final song when he's hugging Dylinner child was soooo sad. Now I just crack up at the cheese!

 

Found it on YouTube. Awww.

 

[Tooch]

It's unfathomable how quickly college Kelly starts sucking lemons. It happens before they even start CU, when her rich-ass boyfriend takes her to fucking Europe for the summer and she spends the whole time dragging him to goddamn shoe stores and whining like an asshole. Oh god she is the woooooorst. I don't know why they didn't have Dylan and Brenda hook up that day they spend fishing just so she can get a nice bitter dose of her own medicine. In my mind this is what happened, and yaaaaaas it is so good.

[AndySmith]

I thought they had problems in Europe because Dylan wanted to spend all of him time just sitting at an indoor cafe reading and Kelly wanted to go out and explore the city (shopping included)?

[Tooch]

I recall him telling Brenda that he had to sneak away from Kelly's fiftieth shoe store of the day to go find Balzac's house on his own. I just saw it as proof that he and Brenda were always more compatible. But that's my Brinda Bias showing!

[FozzyBear]

I recall him telling Brenda that he had to sneak away from Kelly's fiftieth shoe store of the day to go find Balzac's house on his own. I just saw it as proof that he and Brenda were always more compatible. But that's my Brinda Bias showing!

My take was they were both being huge assholes. Because they both are.

[SoupThrower]

My take was they were both being huge assholes. Because they both are.

 

As the great David Silver once said "A sanctimonious pain in the ass". Good old meth Silver. 

[benteen]

As the great David Silver once said "A sanctimonious pain in the ass". Good old meth Silver. 

 

David Silver "Oh, you're so special to me!"

[SnideAsides]

I mean, David's a pain in the ass too, but he is by FAR the least objectionable person in the main cast. Which is really fucking depressing.

[kite-wombat]

Oh just wait. Kelly "always in a snit about some fucking thing" Taylor is about to rise like a Phoenix from the ashes of cool Kelly and she can not be killed by anything less than a total 90210 apocalypse. College Kelly is the worst. The. Very. Worst.

 

... I think that the first year of college has some occasionally decent Kelly ... or rather, some Kelly that isn't yet awful Saint Kelly. Saint Kelly arrives with the double whammy of dating Brandon and hating Valerie.

 

I wish Donna more often got to play the role of telling everyone how stuff is done. The awful Walshes were meant to be the down-to-earth folk in this 90210 universe, but on those rare occasions that we get to see Donna play that role I think it's what she should have been all along. Less ... "stuff" ... more eyerolls at everyone else's idiocy.

[carrier76]

This legit used to make me cry every time I watched it (and I have seen it A LOT).Specifically, the scene with Dylan struggling to tie his tie...and the one above, with the "Can't Cry Hard Enough" song. It's still sad...?

I'll show myself out.

[Cilantro]

When Jack blew up, Sarah, Tarrrra (I have to spell it like Aaaaaaaandrea), and Dave missed the opportunity to say, "We never saw him again"

[Sarah D. Bunting]

Because we do see him again. (Spoiler?)

[Ions Earring]

Oh..Apparently- this is what 2 buildings fucking looks like

https://jezebel.com/this-statue-of-two-buildings-fuckin-is-apparently-too-s-1819106819

[thesupremediva1]

On 3/17/2016 at 11:33 PM, penguinnj said:

I gotta say that on the "Kelly is weird and uncomfortable" with death thing does come up again in a shocking bit of continuity when the kid Brandon runs for student council dies in the Peach Pit parking lot of death. She even references it. Although I think she calls it the beginning of the end or some such garbage because they stay together for another almost whole season and I would say are the happiest as a couple- without too much angst or whatever- as soon as she is "cured" of her eating disorder. The episodes around prom and graduation, I think are the happiest they ever get on this show. I confess I liked them as a couple when I was a tween and I always thought they got short changed in the happy episodes department- that was before I realized you only get about 2-4 of those in any soap opera before tragedy hits.

Yeah, I cosign your whole post. Kelly was great with Jack and Christine, and fit perfectly into the little happy world Dylan wanted when his dad got out of jail. Brenda still had Jim looming over her, and that - ultimately - is why I believe Dylan "chose" Kelly at that time. He told her in the pool that it was always her, and even though I believe they are soul mates, I don't think he wanted to make a decision until he saw what a normal "double date" with him and his dad could look like. It wasn't Brenda's move-in or summer in Paris that killed her and Dylan - it was her discomfort about and around Jack McKay. 

Which is why I find it so ironic that Kelly's discomfort around Jack's death is what put her and Dylan in such a bad spot. Kelly and Dylan were never a perfect couple but they were a very real and relatable couple. I never quite responded to the Romeo and Juliet crap with Brenda and Dylan. Dylan and Kelly came from the same place, grew up together, and understood each other. They fit together pretty seamlessly, when he wasn't trying to imitate Lord Byron and she wasn't trying to play St. Kelly of the Beige Baby Voice. I love the prom and graduation eps, and actually all of the senior year eps. They are TV gold.

Senior Poll is the best ep, and it's mandatory canon for any D/K shippers. Dylan articulates their connection so perfectly. And this happens after Jack's death, so whatever Kelly did wrong in those few eps, Dylan moved past it. The sad thing is, I don't think she did. 

Then cut to the rest of the series and Dylan attempting, constantly, to win her back. While she's with Brandon, before he gets married, and so on - the show was good with this relationship's continuity and not much else near the end. I was glad they referenced her inability to handle death when Josh Richland passed. I wish it had been more strongly referenced after Toni died. In my opinion, Kelly's discomfort with death is the only excuse for not having a heavy scene between her and Dylan before he leaves. 

Pieces of this episode are some of the best this show ever did, and Luke really shined. When Jack came back in season 10, I couldn't be upset about the lazy writing, because I kept thinking of child Dylan crying and I just wanted that kid to have his father back. And, sucker that I am, I sobbed when Dylan basically stayed behind and let his dad move on without him so he could be near his Kelly.

Edited July 5, 2018 by thesupremediva1