[6.8/10] I’m going to put this one squarely into the “admired more than I liked it” category. I appreciate the boldness of making your character so cold and seemingly soulless that she (a.) cannot muster even a whit of emotion for (admittedly seemingly terrible) dying mother (b.) mostly prays to win her election and (c.) can only cry and break down when she realizes she lost Nevada and the popular vote.
That said, there aren’t a lot of laughs in the episode which, hey, is okay sometimes. You’re allowed to do some high concept, not “haha” funny material now and then. It just kind of reeked of the reductive pop psychology to explain a main character’s behavior that early Bojack Horseman often devolved into. I get the irony of Selina telling Catherine that the woman who raised her was a narcissist who criticized or ignored, while being entirely oblivious to the fact that she’s dong the exact same thing to her daughter, but it’s all a bit pat.
It was also the same character beat over and over again – Selina would be in some situation where she’d be expected to show emotion about “mee-maw” and would instead be overly focused on the election situation and cravenly considering how she could use her mother’s death to further her political career. Again, I appreciate the boldness of that direction, but the episode didn’t find many new places to go with it, instead just hitting that same note repeatedly to diminishing returns.
There was humor at the margins. Selina and Gary being deliriously happy about the promising returns of Nevada when Catherine walked in was the right kind of cringe humor. I also love how Karen’s wishy-washiness continues to come in handy when needing to stall for time or flip positions before the Nevada Supreme Court. The bits about Ben’s sincere seemingly sincere condolence with his aphorism and Kent’s awkwardness at being in an emotional situation were each nice.
And the final scene was good, if predictable Again, I like the idea of Selina being devastated at her loss in Nevada, but not her mom, whilst using her feelings about the one to ambiguously fuel her public reaction to the former. But it feels like a neat trick rather than something that truly clicked or to where I couldn’t see the strings.
Overall, an ambitious episode, which I can really appreciate, but not the show’s best work.
Review by Andrew BloomVIP 9BlockedParent2017-05-21T16:58:28Z
[6.8/10] I’m going to put this one squarely into the “admired more than I liked it” category. I appreciate the boldness of making your character so cold and seemingly soulless that she (a.) cannot muster even a whit of emotion for (admittedly seemingly terrible) dying mother (b.) mostly prays to win her election and (c.) can only cry and break down when she realizes she lost Nevada and the popular vote.
That said, there aren’t a lot of laughs in the episode which, hey, is okay sometimes. You’re allowed to do some high concept, not “haha” funny material now and then. It just kind of reeked of the reductive pop psychology to explain a main character’s behavior that early Bojack Horseman often devolved into. I get the irony of Selina telling Catherine that the woman who raised her was a narcissist who criticized or ignored, while being entirely oblivious to the fact that she’s dong the exact same thing to her daughter, but it’s all a bit pat.
It was also the same character beat over and over again – Selina would be in some situation where she’d be expected to show emotion about “mee-maw” and would instead be overly focused on the election situation and cravenly considering how she could use her mother’s death to further her political career. Again, I appreciate the boldness of that direction, but the episode didn’t find many new places to go with it, instead just hitting that same note repeatedly to diminishing returns.
There was humor at the margins. Selina and Gary being deliriously happy about the promising returns of Nevada when Catherine walked in was the right kind of cringe humor. I also love how Karen’s wishy-washiness continues to come in handy when needing to stall for time or flip positions before the Nevada Supreme Court. The bits about Ben’s sincere seemingly sincere condolence with his aphorism and Kent’s awkwardness at being in an emotional situation were each nice.
And the final scene was good, if predictable Again, I like the idea of Selina being devastated at her loss in Nevada, but not her mom, whilst using her feelings about the one to ambiguously fuel her public reaction to the former. But it feels like a neat trick rather than something that truly clicked or to where I couldn’t see the strings.
Overall, an ambitious episode, which I can really appreciate, but not the show’s best work.