First impressions: “Separation Anxiety”
If ever there was an episode that proves my contention that I’ll forgive anything if I get enough family together time, “Separation Anxiety” would have to be it.
I could complain about the anvils constantly falling about Rebecca’s Walker-hood, culminating in Holly’s admission that when she said she was absolutely positively sure that William was her daughter’s father, what she really meant was sorta kinda mostly. I could complain about the way Sarah’s gone from being a sharp businesswoman to someone who’s all dithery about a deal because she’s hot for the consultant. I could complain about how quickly and blandly Robert’s presidential aspirations tanked, or about how this is the second big Walker romance that’s played out primarily during multi-month gaps in the storyline.
But I’m not complaining about a thing, nope, I’m happy as can be, because … could they have packed more Walker togetherness into that episode if they’d used a shoehorn? I just finished writing about how I wanted lots of mixed sibling scenes and spouses with family members scenes and wow, here they all were. A phone chain. A bad party. Siblings ganging up on Mom and Isaac in varying configurations. Kevin over at Tommy and Julia’s like they were all related or something. Julia hanging out in the kitchen with Nora and Kitty. Spouses and boyfriends high-tailing it out of the room when it became clear a Walker firefight would ensue. Wonderful, wonderful, wonderful. All that was missing was Scotty, but at least he was acknowledged by phone call.
It was otherwise a great showcase for the whole extended family. It was full of wonderful little scenes, like everybody debating Rebecca’s bangs or Kevin getting teary over store-bought lasagna. And it was a great showcase for Sally Field, who’s been reduced to advising the young-uns a lot lately and really got to shine here. I liked her with Isaac — the scene when he came in from the campaign and just rested his head on her shoulder was so sweet — and I don’t know why she couldn’t have at least had a little romantic D.C. vacation with him before they parted.
But I’m not complaining. Not even about the apparent headlong rush into the de-Walkerizing of Rebecca. Given all the annoying little hints that were being dropped all episode, I appreciated that, with Holly’s admission, we finally got the cards laid out on the table. And considering how heavily we’re being given to understand that David’s the true dad, I’m thinking there’s still a possibility it will turn out to be a bluff. It’s sort of too obvious at this point to not be misdirection.
Yeah, I’m probably just being willfully optimistic there. But I’m in a good mood. The Walkers are back! And the rest is just details.
Brothers and Sisters, ABC, Separation Anxiety, commentary
April 21st, 2008 at 6:51 am
But if Robert is a US Senator, wouldn’t Kitty have to spend SOME time in DC? You would think it would be Sarah who would do the whole “I need you here” thing, since theoretically, the McAllisters SHOULD be in Washington, oh, say a few weeks out of the year????
April 21st, 2008 at 10:06 am
Good to have the gathering of the clan, but some of the dialogue really sounded wrong. Sarah’s had a personality transplant, and Nora’s big “I want to get away from all of you” speech was completely different from the rest of her lines, both in verbal and emotional vocabulary. (Not to mention how different it sounded from her lines in other episodes, especially “Epiphany.”) Given the production schedule, I guess it’s inevitable that they would farm out different scenes to different writers. I usually love the David and Molly’s scripts for their emotional intelligence, and missed that in this episode.
April 21st, 2008 at 12:25 pm
I disagree Colleen about the Nora material. It was spot-on for the character and Sally delivered it perfectly. Brilliant stuff. The inclusion of “my darling children” was especially effective.
But yeah…Sarah suddenly acting like a lovestruck teenager was really lame. That better have been a blip she’s back to her kickass savvy self next week.
April 21st, 2008 at 12:25 pm
*insert “and” after blip
April 21st, 2008 at 1:28 pm
i’m just glad they’re back… i missed them,esp.kevin and scotty.
April 21st, 2008 at 2:24 pm
I liked the episode. I am not sure I’ll miss Isaac though. I expected far more from this story-line and if fell a little flat. They were sweet in the end and I hope he has better luck next time, IF he returns.
(But I am still hoping for the return of the constructor)
I loved Kevin, as usual. I thought Sarah was good. It was nice to see Julia and Tommy back, I actually thought that Tommy looked very handsome in the scene where talks to Sarah about Graham. (I shock myself here
)
I am NOT going into the J/R story, I am SO sick and tired of the entire story-line and all it’s ’spoilers’ and ‘teasers’ and ‘innuendos’. I’ll see it played out and then I’ll comment on it.
As lovely as this episode was, I am impatiently waiting for the next one. FINALLY Kevin/Scotty together again… I did miss my Scotty-fix, but Kevin made up for it by, once again, having MY favorite quote for the episode :”Hopefully I can pull a muscle before it’s my turn.” That would be so ‘me’.
May 2nd, 2008 at 10:11 am
I thought the Nora speech made sense for her … she is angry at her kids and herself so she lashes out and says hurtful things. The Walkers say terrible things to one another sometimes, and then they forgive each other.
May 2nd, 2008 at 10:13 am
And btw you are very right about Robert and his role as a Senator … they make it sound like he has been out at the ranch recovering since he stepped back from the Prez race, but the man still has a lot of things he needs to be working on. At some point he and Kitty will have to go to D.C. … unless he runs for governor of California or something.