Five questions: “Love Is Difficult”
Five questions from this past Sunday’s episode still rattling in my brain today.
1. Did Sarah and Joe notice how much that marriage counselor looked like a member of the family? Joel Grey bears such a resemblance to Ron Rifkin that it was a plot point in Alias. So seeing him here, being all passive-psychiatrist-like, made me wish Sarah would just shout out, “You look exactly like my Uncle Saul, and he’s fooling around with his dead brother-in-law’s mistress, so why should I listen to you?”
2. Is Julia some kind of Stepford Wife? Doesn’t she seem kind of excessively deferential to her husband? I mean, the doctor announces they’re having twins, and her first thought is to ask Tommy, “Is that okay with you?” Like, if it’s not, she’s going to hold one of them back during delivery? The only fight we’ve seen this couple have is over Julia wanting too much sex. Hmm. Did he order her up from the Fantasy Wives catalog? The fact that she just disappears when not needed is probably a bonus feature.
3. Do those twins have different fathers? In real life, okay, Julia was probably taking fertility drugs to facilitate the artificial insemination, and that would account for twins. But in a TV show? The only reason for there to be twins when two men have donated sperm is for the twins to have two different biological fathers. And, sigh, do we really have to go there? This whole sperm donor plot is annoying enough without that little twist thrown in.
4. Where did that dinner table scene come from? It was awkward enough that Tommy wanted to name one of the twins after their deceased philandering embezzling father, but what made it even more odd was that the scene seemed all out of sequence. We went from Tommy telling Sarah he was going into business with Holly (which, any other week, would have gotten his ass kicked but good — how lucky for him Sarah had already been beaten down by marriage), to Tommy meeting his mystery half-sister, to … everybody happy happy at the dinner table hearing about the twins, with no mention of business or any other unpleasantries. This, from a family for whom hard truths at mealtime is a treasured tradition. It made me wonder whether that scene had been somewhere else, and gotten cut, and then at the last minute they found it on the editing room floor and said, “Hey, we’ve got to put this somewhere.”
5. How come Desperate Housewives gets three of our minutes? Actually, I’m going to blame any choppiness in this episode — the dinner table weirdness, plus some abrupt cuts to commercials — on the fact that Desperate Housewives went to 10:03, and Brothers & Sisters didn’t get three minutes on the other end. What gives? Does B&S need three minutes less commercial time? Or are the show creators being asked to make their story three minutes shorter? Give us back that three minutes, you pushy housewives! Stay off the Walkers’ turf!
April 17th, 2007 at 12:09 am
As a dad to two children conceived via donor insemination I like many parents of DI kids are interested to see if the show will seriously address some of the issues out there affecting donor conceived persons. For one we are curious what the plans are whether the kids will be told.
There are many issues the writers have glossed over before they all dove into this story line. I am sorry you find the issue annoying but as one of the only mainstream dramas to ever take on this subject (involving three main characters) ABC has a responsibility to address it properly without making it a joke.