In this episode, Dina and Glenn negotiate the terms of her surrogacy; Jonah creates conflict with Kelly by not taking her belief in angels seriously; and Cheyenne’s mother Brandi is out of jail and wants Harmonica’s 2nd birthday party to be Green Day-themed.
I’m gonna keep this one on the briefer side because it kinda fell flat for me. I felt like there was some stuff that stretched character plausibility. Most of all, I didn’t get why Amy felt the need to interfere with Cheyenne’s issue. I could get why Amy would encourage Cheyenne to pick a theme suitable to the baby rather than her mother, but it doesn’t make much sense that she would push “mermaids” so specifically or be insistent on it when Cheyenne herself didn’t seem that interested in the theme. (Also, the correct answer to “What’s the best piñata for a Green Day-themed birthday party?” is “One of the bombs labeled ‘DOOKIE‘ from the album of the same name.”) It does provide some payoff when Amy and Brandi bond over what a clown Bo is, but Brandi flips that on Amy by pushing Cheyenne to break up Bo, using Amy’s agreement with her as ammunition.
We also discover that Jonah is a big Green Day fan, which is funny and feels fairly appropriate (particularly since the first songs that come to mind for Jonah are some of the lame later-period ballads– sorry not sorry, you can keep “Good Riddance” and “Wake Me Up When September Ends”).
Speaking of Jonah, his major plotline this week stems from some break room bullshittery that wouldn’t be out of place in The Office, as the Cloud 9 staff has a debate over which creatures are real and which ones are mythical. (Marcus believes mermaids are real– or, to be more accurate, they used to be real, but they evolved legs to walk on land.) This leads into Kelly disclosing that she believes in angels, based on an experience from falling into a pool and nearly drowning when she was five years old. Smartest guy in the room Jonah, of course, can’t let this go, and eventually presses her on it to the point she cancels their weekend plans. This is funniest in how it affects Garrett, who has been planning a weekend-long gaming session with Jonah gone, and so desperately pushes Jonah to patch things up with Kelly. One of the best scenes in the episode is Garrett giving a stock rom-com speech to Jonah urging him to go to her, and Jonah realizing he’s only doing it for selfish reasons, but that making it no less effective.
Back to the main plot: Glenn prints out a surrogacy contract for Dina to sign (“It was the first result on Google, so it’s probably good”). I was surprised at how offended Dina was by this, as her Dwight Schrute-ness led me to believe contracts and formal structures might be her thing, but it does make perfect sense that she’d want to review the contract and include her own considerations. This leads to a Glenn and Dina showdown where they both seem willing to engage in mutually assured destruction, Glenn by using Sandra as a surrogate and Dina by having unprotected sex with Marcus. Mateo, of all people, puts an end to their shenanigans, essentially telling them to get over themselves and work it out. And they do.
Like I said, not one of my favorite episodes of the show. But even a mediocre episode of the show isn’t bad. So, of course, I’ll be back to tune in next week.
ATTENTION CLOUD 9 SHOPPERS
- The cold open had Dina in a little more sadistic mode than I would expect from her. (Also, TV viewers are getting a lot of belly hormone injections this week, between this show and Crazy Ex-Girlfriend.)
- Cheyenne’s mom is played by Mary Hollis Inboden, whom I don’t recognize from anything but apparently had a regular role on Boss and was one of the main cast members of The Real O’Neals.
- Matt Oberg plays Glenn’s lawyer. He’s appeared on the show before; I mostly recognize him from Fresh Off the Boat and as Buddy Calhoun, Amy Brookheimer’s brief fiancé, on Veep.
- Mateo was in position to resolve Glenn and Dina’s dispute because he spent the entire day in the break room. He “just wasn’t feeling it.”
- I don’t even remember how Amy and Cheyenne reconciled.
- Possible funniest moment of the episode: Dina telling Glenn about the vaginal reconstruction clause in her contract: “The ‘before’ photos are on the final page.” Cue Glenn taking the last page from the contract and throwing it in the trash, while being very, very careful not to look at it.
- What did everyone else think?