S05.E21: Under the Taipei Sun

[ElectricBoogaloo]

100th EPISODE!

Quote

Eddie ships off to Taiwan for the cultural exchange program, blithely ignoring his parents' advice about how hard it was for them when they came to America for the first time. After all, he's been to Taiwan before, what could go wrong? Plenty, when he ends up separated from his group with no money and next-to-no language skills. Meanwhile, back home in Orlando, the Huangs adjust to life without Eddie. Simu Liu ("Kim's Convenience") guest stars as Willie.

Original air date: 4/5/19

[Concerned]

Grandma killed in this one with how she responded to the depression when Cheers went off the air.

[ClareWalks]

OOF, I am only ten minutes into the episode and I'm already horrified by how Jessica is talking about Eddie. "It's better without him here!" God almighty, what a horrible shrew. I know they're probably setting this up for her to have a huge epiphany that she will promptly forget after this episode.

[Robert Lynch]

I wanted someone to throw their food at Jessica for that remark about Eddie. That was not called for. Even Grandma Jenny seemed to hate that about Jessica bringing up a funeral discussion. And the way she treated her husband and kids was downright cruel with the bike incident. Not funny, Jessica.

Edited April 6, 2019 by Robert Lynch

[biakbiak]

It was obvious that it was supposed to be because she missed him but the reason it didn’t work is because Jessica regularly says horrible stuff about Eddie to him and to others when he is home.

[possibilities]

I liked how the man who helped Eddie made Eddie realize that anyone who can move to an entirely new place and succeed the way his parents have, is exceptional, because it's a tough thing to pull off.

They HAVE TO dial back the "Jessica is awful" stuff. Cutting the brakes? What's next? Poisoning their food? Everyone else is so much more sympathetic, it's really terrible how they've drawn her.

I love Jenny.

I liked how Eddie's gifts for his family were so thoughtful, and he was so excited to get them. I was disappointed the other kid didn't arrange to tell the group about Eddie's plight and help him get back safely. That was pretty callous. But it did lead to the other stuff with the man who actually did help him, which was nice. Still, they could have been lost together and still accomplished that same thing, and not made the other boy into such a terrible friend.

A long distance call from Taiwan to the USA has got to be very expensive. I hope Eddie gave that man some money for his troubles!

Edited April 6, 2019 by possibilities

[Concerned]

Also liked how the family recreated the singing from Sound of Music while bicycling through the Orlando Alps.

[floridamom]

Jessica? What are the writers doing to this character? Cutting her family's brakes on their bicycles borders on criminal and it's abusive. Not funny, ABC. They really need to quit this about her character...the same thing every week with her. She is NOT a loving mother to her children. She likes the youngest son because he serves HER with making herself feel good about herself as his mother. This kid kisses her ass. Jessica just is not a likeable character at all IMO and her family is portrayed as stupid for putting up with her abusive behavior. Her husband needs to have a good, serious talk with her; perhaps cut HER brakes on her bike. She needs a good, lasting lesson that will carry over to other episodes of this show and change her up a lot.

If this family is supposed to live in Orlando, please TRY and find a flat surfaced spot to film this show. I live in Orlando and it looked NOTHING like Florida. Bad choice for those scenes. Also, they were not dressed consistently for the weather of the day.

How is it that Grandma suddenly speaks English? I thought this lady didn't speak ANY English?

[Concerned]

Jessica and Evan are linked in another way. She starred in Crazy Rich Asians and he’s in Shazam which opens this weekend.

[Snow Apple]

46 minutes ago, floridamom said:

How is it that Grandma suddenly speaks English? I thought this lady didn't speak ANY English?

She's been taking classes. There was an episode where Emory heard strange voices coming out of grandma's room (iirc). He and Louis followed her and found out about her class. 

[Robert Lynch]

And judging from the next episode, Jessica would be back to her old bitchy self. How can this show last when you have a loathsome character that thinks she right all the time. ABC, what are you doing?

[CrazyDog]

I really enjoyed this episode, mainly because it was so Eddie focused. I just love him. It was satisfying watching the family realize how much he adds to their lives.

"The wheels are really coming off this meal." Lol, Louis. 

The less said about Jessica, the better. I only liked the brief part where she finally admitted missing him.

Very cool that we're getting to see his trip...I was going to be sad if he was just going to be gone for a few episodes. Maybe Jessica can take an offscreen trip somewhere for a season or two 🙂

The guy helping Eddie was interesting. I wonder if he'll show up again somewhere with his restaurant ambitions.

[ElectricBoogaloo]

Loved seeing Simu Liu from Kim's Convenience on Fresh Off the Boat - Asian tv worlds colliding! I'm glad that Eddie finally realized that his parents worked really hard to become successful .

I thought it was really sweet that the first thing Eddie did was buy souvenirs for his family, and he had good reasons for why he chose each item. Of course, it also showed how terrible he is with money if he spent ALL of his money in the first ten minutes that he was on his own in Taiwan.

Eddie often good intentions but he just isn't practical. Using his emergency phone to call Trent is another great example. He had the best of intentions because he wanted Trent to be able to hear about DDR Extreme, which was really thoughtful, but he also used all of his minutes in one fell swoop.

As awful as Jessica was, I loved that we got to see the family singing Do Re Mi while riding bikes!

[BookThief]

On 4/6/2019 at 7:07 AM, floridamom said:

How is it that Grandma suddenly speaks English? I thought this lady didn't speak ANY English?

It's definitely not suddenly. And she's always mostly understood when the others spoke English. Early last season we found out she was taking English language classes in secret because the boys would speak English too fast when they didn't want her to understand something. It was a plot point for her over many episodes once her family found out. Her ESL teacher was played by George Takei and for her final class test or she had to recite something and she chose something from Batman. She's definitely been speaking English on and off since then.

[ItCouldBeWorse]

Connie Chung isn't old enough to have had a granddaughter in the 90's.  Strange choice.

On 4/6/2019 at 4:32 AM, possibilities said:

A long distance call from Taiwan to the USA has got to be very expensive. I hope Eddie gave that man some money for his troubles!

Eddie doesn't have any money!

The one thing Jessica should have insisted on was that the boys spoke Mandarin at home. (Although I bet that the other two boys would have been able to communicate.)

[jmonique]

The thing this show is screwing up is that Asian moms have high expectations for their children - but they don't hate them. They've gone way too far in that direction with Jessica, and it's pretty offensive. I'm in my 40s and my mom still nags me about zipping up, but she'd never relish in my absence like that (I'd hope).

On the other hand, I burst out laughing when the gang was intimidated by Eddie's height and sprinted away. When my (Caucasian) husband met my Taiwanese cousins kids, all they wanted to know was how tall he was!

Edited April 9, 2019 by jmonique

[biakbiak]

4 hours ago, ItCouldBeWorse said:

The one thing Jessica should have insisted on was that the boys spoke Mandarin at home. (

And in real life they do know Mandarin but this show has long left any connections to the memoir. 

[fishcakes]

I momentarily forgot that the show was set in the 1990s when Louis and Jessica gave Eddie a phone that was just a phone. I was wondering why he was so excited about it until he said he was going to wear it on his belt "like a businessman," and then I was like, oh, right, 20 years ago.

[tennisgurl]

Even with her revaluation that she just missed Eddie and didnt know how to deal with it, Jessica was just so over the top in how awful she was! It was just uncomfortable to watch, especially when the rest of the family was so sad about him leaving. Its just the same as it always is. Jessica is a super high key asshole, admits to some insecurity, then learns a lesson, and then next week she will go back to normal. 

Poor Eddie. He means well (and his gifts were really thoughtful!) but he sucks at any kind of long term planning that goes longer than an hour. Good thing he met that guy who helped him out, I wonder is he will turn up again? I hope Eddie reimburses him for that long distance call, that shit aint cheap!

[spaulding]

I've always liked Eddie ever since the first episode when he had to eat alone in the bathroom.  There are times that Eddie acts like a dick; but it's probably because the real Eddie is a dick, so I wave it off.  

I've never liked Jessica and her "tiger-mom" antics.   When Evan became her mini-me, I started to loathe him too.

In this episode, she tries so damn hard to not admit that she misses Eddie--her son.  In the episode where Evan has a fencing contest, Jessica tells Eddie to stay away from her perfect son (his brother) because Eddie will be a bad influence.  She hates him because he refuses to be molded in her image.

How she acts is beyond the pale.  Eddie isn't a mouthy kid who drinks and does drugs.  He's stealth smart and very thoughtful.  He surrounds himself with nice, loyal friends, including Trent who works hard for Louis.  

Re: Louis and Jessica's success.  I thought that Louis wanted to move to Florida to open a restaurant, but Jessica was hesitant.  So far, Jessica got bored with her real estate business, got a publisher to print her terrible novel, and spent her and Louis's 401K to massage her ego in academia.  She has a business degree from Maryland, so maybe she should have used it.  

I just don't see how Jessica was successful when Louis is the reason why the restaurant is successful. 

And Grandma is still the OG.

[LisaM]

I'm glad that we got to see Trent. The episodes are always better with Eddie's friends. 

[Sile]

On 4/8/2019 at 5:47 PM, ItCouldBeWorse said:

Connie Chung isn't old enough to have had a granddaughter in the 90's.  Strange choice.

Wasn't it Connie Chung's niece?

I kept waiting during DDR for somebody to steal Eddie's parcels and was kind of surprised that he lucked out.  Oh, wait...

[biakbiak]

3 hours ago, Sile said:

Wasn't it Connie Chung's niece?

They said granddaughter. She was technically old enough to have a 15-16 year old granddaughter in 1999, she would have been 53, but she famously adopted her only child in the mid 90s when she was in 48/49.

[Sile]

On 4/15/2019 at 2:46 PM, biakbiak said:

They said granddaughter. She was technically old enough to have a 15-16 year old granddaughter in 1999, she would have been 53, but she famously adopted her only child in the mid 90s when she was in 48/49.

My mind must have rejected that as so ridiculous that it replaced the line with something within the realm of reality.

Right now that same mind is blown with realizing that Connie Chung is in her 70s!  She seems so ageless...

[Camera One]

It was nice seeing Eddie in another setting.  Overall, it was a good lesson for him.  The cultural exchange leader was pretty funny with her fake-out caring about immersion.

Jessica not caring about Eddie was dragged out for much too long.  As others said above, it's not a joke when she normally says these things about her own son.  To be fair, Eddie supposedly cut the brakes first, so Jessica doing it wasn't much worse.  

Eddie calling long-distance on someone else's phone was really inconsiderate and ruined an otherwise nice moment.