Brothers & Sisters

Five questions from Sunday’s episode still rattling in my brain today.

1. What’s the name of Balthazar Getty’s character again? In one scene, I could have sworn I heard Rebecca say to her mother, “You’re working with Tony Walker.” Tony? Who? Wha? I thought it was meant to indicate that Rebecca still can’t keep all those Walkers straight, and Holly was going to correct her, but no. So then I assumed that she actually said “Tommy” and my ears are just going … but Entertainment Weekly’s Michael Slezak heard Tony, too. Opinion in the comments section of his Pop Watch post is mixed, and on the ABC.com full episode player, the actress is very, very clearly saying “Tommy,” no ambiguity at all. So either a) it was an April Fool’s joke; b) it was a mistake in the broadcast version that got cleaned up for ABC.com; or c) Slezak and I need to get our ears cleaned.

2. Did Kitty notice anything familiar about Sofia? It would have been a nice inside joke to have her say to the senator’s daughter, “You remind me so much of my niece!” — because the young disapproving miss was played by the sis of Kerris Dorsey, who portrays Sarah’s daughter Paige. Kitty didn’t even have to Google 10-year-olds, she could have just asked Paige for some pointers.

3. How strange was it to see people drinking iced tea at a Walker table? And not even Long Island iced tea. That’s sure one way Rebecca’s out of the clique. But some of her brothers and sisters seemed to have picked up the slack for her. During the kitchen clean-up scene, Sarah gathered what looks like five empty bottles, after she drained the last out of two of them. Considering that Rebecca, expectant Julia, and abstaining Justin were all tea tee-totalers, that’s more than a bottle apiece for Nora, Kevin, Sarah and Tommy. Wow, I mean, it was a tense dinner, sure, and certainly wine-worthy, but I’m just hoping Julia drove everybody home.

4. Is Sarah really dodging Nora’s phone calls again? That’s cold, girl. You begged to get back into the woman’s good graces, held her as she raged against your father, and then … did the whole “oh, it’s mom again” thing when she finally started calling you? Hope you enjoy that when Paige does it to you one day.

5. Could Justin be any more adorable? That boy sure does clean up nice. Now that he’s no longer tortured and drug-addicted, and not yet messed up by another tour of duty, he’s the loosest, funniest, most loveable Walker of all. Justin 2.0 sounds a lot like Dave Annable does in interviews and castmate accounts, laid-back and a little goofy, so maybe it’s just easier for him to play this side of Justin, or easier for the writers to write for it. Or maybe I’ve just had enough angst from this bunch to last me the rest of the season. I hate the fact that the writers are implying that Justin won’t be so fun and funny when he returns from battle. But I’ll enjoy it while it lasts.

_{Photo: ABC.com}

Brothers and Sisters, ABC, All in the Family, commentary