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Episode Recap: "Gracie's Bully"
There is nothing more terrifying than having your 10-year-old classmates meet one (or both) of your parents, and I know this from experience. I felt for poor Gracie Carr, who so obviously wanted both her bully and her mother to disappear from this class trip to the station. She was probably thinking that the only upside was not having to have class.
If only Kelly and Chuck knew that they were probably just making the situation worse for their daughter by wanting to confront the bully, whether through a "conflict resolution" session or the terrifying way that Kelly ended up going about it. (I'm well out of elementary school, but if tomorrow Patricia Heaton said to me, "I will come into your room while you are sleeping and I will rip your head off," I would probably faint.) As soon as Xander Tucker gets over his fear of Kelly, he's going to start bullying Gracie sevenfold. Perhaps by then Chuck will no longer be blinded by Xander's gorgeous, divorced mother and will actually be able to stick up for his daughter's well-being.
The Ryan and Montana storylines kind of fell flat tonight, which was too bad, because they just weren't given enough to do. Ryan's mini-me was the kind of funny, self-assured person that Ryan will never, ever be, which is what made the whole thing more depressing than funny. Mini-Ryan obviously knows how to deal with people — even if he only gained a girlfriend by pulling a fire alarm for her and getting suspended — but just the thought of taking girl advice from a 10-year-old kid was a little creepy. Montana's inability to pronounce "Monongahela" would, in the normal world, probably have disqualified her from a "meteorologist" position in Pittsburgh (if a fifth-grader can do your job better than you can, you deserve to be fired), but I'm OK with suspending my disbelief, because Ayda Field always plays Montana with such conviction that I can't help but crack up. I suppose my real problem with the Ryan-Montana stuff is how awkward the attempts to throw them together are. I'm talking about the halfhearted way that Ryan has been forced to hit on Montana when the two have absolutely no visible chemistry.
On the other side of the chemistry spectrum, we have Gary and Marsh. Gary's investigation into Kelly and Chuck's "boat" (the "She's My Daughter 2") could be dragged out for weeks and I wouldn't care. It's something about how little he thinks of his so-called superiors that always works, and that, combined with his love/hate relationship with Marsh, gives us the best matchup on the show. Poor Marsh. As if crying at Casey at the Bat (and dressing up in full turn-of-the-century baseball regalia, complete with mustache) weren't enough, he's now out $150 for betting that he wouldn't cry. What can I say? I just love these guys.
To tide you over till next week, here are the best lines of the night:
• "They're riveted because they're watching a 60-year-old man have a nervous breakdown."
• "A grown man staring at a bunch of kids? Their teacher is ready to call Dateline."
• "I've seen you laugh at footage of bullfighters being gored!"
It's a new episode next week, but I'm not sure how the writers' strike will be impacting how many new episodes we'll be seeing in the near future, or even if we'll be seeing them in the near future. More on that as it happens.
Check out clips from Back to You in our Online Video Guide.
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Nov 7, 2007 9:09 PM
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The scene where Ryan is trying to teach Montana to pronounce Monongahela was hilarious to me. There are some words that no matter how hard I try, I just can't pronounce correctly. One word that comes to mind is "cellular". I can never get that word right no matter how hard I try so that scene had me cracking up. And I cannot say how much I love Gary and Marsh. They make the show for me. If Gary is not on, I am disappointed.
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Nov 7, 2007 11:40 PM
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The mother of the bully, played by the tantalizing Charisma Carpenter, should have been given a bigger part. That was typical "frazier" behavior to flirt with her.I saw her on a Lifetime movie a year ago and find her to be a very attractive woman. I hope the show keeps improving and gets a full season. Cant believe what I just read about "24" being delayed due to strike. Sure hope the writers can agree on a new contract. This will hurt many talented people in the industry and we viewers love our TV.
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Nov 7, 2007 11:59 PM
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There was an inside joke for us Buffy the Vampire Slayer fans. Cordelia, Charisma Carpenter's character, was the queen bee of the school and outwardly despised poor boy Xander but was making out with him in the broom closet on several occasions. He loved her and did everything he could to win her, including casting a spell with a vengeance demon! So Charisma & Xander are together again!
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Nov 8, 2007 3:55 AM
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People in Pittsburgh don't refer to the river as the Monongahela, they just call
it the "Mon River"
This includes meteorologists in Pittsburgh.
But the show was funny.
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Nov 8, 2007 8:52 AM
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I thought the show was quite good. Kelly using Chuck as a punching bag and then the ear flicking between the two was just hilarious. Hope the strike ends soon. I'll miss this show!!!!
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Nov 8, 2007 9:20 AM
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It's "Casey AT The Bat", not 'Casey AND The Bat'. Didn't you ever take a Journalism course?
Then we all wonder why the youth of today speak bad english!
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Nov 8, 2007 11:55 AM
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joenamherst - A journalism course has nothing to do with Leah mistakenly typing "and" instead of "at". It was a typo and now it's fixed. Using it as a scapegoat for the entire nation's poor grammar... seriously?
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Nov 8, 2007 1:00 PM
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I thought it was pretty obvious that Xander was picking on Gracie because he liked her... And since he's admitted as such to Gracie, I doubt that he'll "start bullying Gracie sevenfold."
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Nov 8, 2007 8:53 PM
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Casey Marsella - Leah also wrote "They're teacher is ready to call Dateline". Not to be too harsh, but in all honesty, a mistake like that is one that should be solved with a high school education.
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Nov 9, 2007 8:50 AM
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Hey folks, I appreciate all the feedback. These blogs are something we staffers do because we want to, and we don't get paid for them. We have a limited amount of time to get them up and we're often working late at night. We're all prone to typos, and I can't promise they won't happen in the future, but as soon as you point them out, I'll fix them. My brain is quite aware of the their/they're distinction, even if my exhausted typing fingers aren't.
Again, don't hesitate to let me know about typos in the future, as I want them to get fixed just as much as you do. 
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Nov 9, 2007 9:21 AM
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Hey Leah, I'm a freelance tech writer, working on my PhD in technical writing, and often teach courses in technical writing. I can't tell you how many typos and subject/verb agreement mistakes I make daily. We think as we write, and revise as we write, and we make mistakes. And then, as we read over it, our brain jumps over the mistakes because it knows what we were trying to do. I doubt that if the critical masses here took a look at their sent emails (a person-to-person forum where accuracy is more important than a blog) that all of their emails would be free of mistakes. Let he who is without sin cast the first stone.
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Nov 9, 2007 9:43 AM
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Hey Leah, I'm a freelance tech writer, working on my PhD in technical writing, and often teach courses in technical writing. I can't tell you how many typos and subject/verb agreement mistakes I make daily. We think as we write, and revise as we write, and we make mistakes. And then, as we read over it, our brain jumps over the mistakes because it knows what we were trying to do. I doubt that if the critical masses here took a look at their sent emails (a person-to-person forum where accuracy is more important than a blog) that all of their emails would be free of mistakes. Let he who is without sin cast the first stone.
princessebird - Well said!
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Nov 9, 2007 11:07 AM
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