Under One Roof 3x4

Under One Roof

 

Busy is practicing with Neon Vomit in her garage this time because it is convenient to the storyline. Her family appears with a large banner with "Viva Ramone" printed on it. Dom rightly insults Neon Vomit's playing and Sam suggests they play an Italian melody like O So Lo Mio. As her parents dance around, Busy embarrassedly mutters apologies to her friends. Oh, and there is some audition coming up, as well as the Ramones' family reunion.

 

 

Amanda commiserates with Busy about embarrassing parents. Sam and Lucy have invited Amanda to reunion either because she has no life outside of Busy or because she wouldn't be in enough scenes in this episode otherwise.

 

 

Look at the Liz's hair in this scene! Here he is lecturing Busy for her choice of a veal sandwich by telling her disturbing facts about how the calves are treated before their slaughter. "Do you think they do that with chickens? I really like chicken," Amanda asks later while the girls are on their way to get Busy's nose pierced. Busy thinks Joanie's (the other girl in the band) looks cool. Would they really let a thirteen year old get her nose pierced without parental consent?

 

 

There are no comical trying-to-hide-the-nose-ring scenes here, which I appreciate. Sam flips out and forbids Busy to wear it while Frankie and Dom tease her about having a shiny booger.

 

 

Next Busy refuses to eat any steak and announces that she is a vegetarian. Dom teases some more and Frankie accuses her of being trendy. Sam, being a butcher, is offended by Busy's statements that eating meat is like murder. Busy sasses her father and ends up grounded, though the audition is the next day.

 

 

But Busy sneaks out anyway. The group lands the gig after the judges hear them play for only a few seconds. But surprise, surprise, the show has been moved to the same day as the family reunion.

 

 

When the family gets home, Busy takes out her nose ring and makes a show of saying how good the meat looks to butter up her parents for the coming blow. She slowly explains how she won't be coming to the reunion because of the show. Sam explodes in anger and says if his family can come from Italy, Busy can come from upstairs. Later Dom talks with her and asks that she give in and come to the party because it means so much to Sam.

 

 

Sam and Lucy try to reason with Busy and tell her how important the reunion is to them. Sam talks of the family he hasn't seen in years who are coming. They say they know how important music is to her and want her to play a drum solo at the reunion. Busy refuses, saying she wants to play with her band, and then insults her relatives. Sam tells her to go to the showcase because he doesn't want her at the reunion anymore.

 

 

Neon Vomit then gets some bad or good or maybe just convenient news, because it wraps up the conflict of the story really quick. The talent show has been canceled due to Ukrainian wedding season. 

 

 

Some happy shots of the reunion, followed by Busy sadly looking out her window. I'm not sure what she's holding out for. She's not missing her show, and she was the one who acted like a little bitch to her parents. Amanda brings in some sort of meat sandwich and seems to convince Busy to come down and join the party.

 

 

Busy somehow manages to get Neon Vomit all together in time to play a punk version of O So Lo Mio at the reunion. Everyone dances and has a good time, and we can see a little bit of the Frankie/Amanda to come as they can be seen dancing together (not sure if that was intentional or not).

 

Although Busy and her father really only reconcile because of the convenience of the showcase being canceled, it was more realistic that way. Does anyone really think Busy (and especially her band) would give up the show to play at the reunion of their own accord?

 

Next episode: Busy almost gets raped while Frankie and Amanda get closer.

Tongue Tied 3x3

Tongue Tied

 

Manny and Dom are watching what I think is female wrestling while Amanda is asking Busy personal questions for a magazine quiz called Are You Normal Or Not? The men are discussing boobs and liken Busy's to a surfboard.

 

 

The girls are staying at Amanda's father's apartment for the weekend. Unbeknownst to them, Leonard also has a friend from France and his two sons also staying over.

 

 

Leonard suggests the kids go over to his gym. While in the dressing room, Amanda lets Busy have first dibs on which guy she wants. Not knowing any better, Busy chooses the less cute one. Amanda thinks "something might happen" in the 24 hours the boys are there. 

 

 

Francois and Jerome have a discussion aided by subtitles which are somewhat hindered by the network logo bouncing across the screen, but it seems that Jerome (the one Busy likes) is insecure about his body odor. The show was starting to steal plot lines from itself at this point. Danny had a breath problem not too long ago and if I remember correctly this issue will come up again. Speaking of Danny, he apparently doesn't exist in this episode.

 

 

Francois calls Amanda "jolie" and she laughs and says yes, she can be very jolly. Busy wants to exercise on a certain machine and Jerome tells her in French that her arms are too small, and that another lady's arms are large. Weird thing to say, but oh well. In French "arm" is "bra," so Busy gets a sad look on her face. This is dumb. I'm from Texas and I understand French better than Busy and Amanda do. Of course, that's only because of the subtitles, but still.

 

 

Busy wants to know what Amanda's magazine says about breast size, but when it comes time for her to be measured, she snarls at Amanda, "like I'd let you touch me." Lay it on as thick as you want, writers, but we can still see the gay. It turns out that Busy is two inches smaller than normal. Amanda's father wants Busy and Amanda to entertain the boys for the evening and gives them $30 to eat at the mall. Amanda decides to buy French food and eat at the house instead. Busy is still glum about Jerome's comments, though. Busy is a little out of character here. She normally wouldn't care what some random stranger has to say about her bra size.

 

 

The kids go to the mall, still at a loss for a way to make conversation. Busy purposely wears a baggy shirt and Amanda wears her purse crossed over her chest to make herself appear larger since this episode calls for it. Busy freaks out when Jerome points at a mustard stain on her shirt.

 

 

With the boys still squabbling over Jerome's supposed smell, Amanda takes Busy to buy a bra because she will need it for something that happens later in the episode. (You can't stuff a bra if you aren't wearing one, and Busy was braless until this episode.) I actually think this scene is just a time filler, because we could have imagined that Busy bought her first bra off screen without any fanfare. A montage set to an instrumental version of the Ready Or Not theme of the outside of Busy's changing stall ensues.

 

 

Amanda and the boys sit down to a lunch meat and Cheetos dinner (they ran out of money buying Busy's bra). Amanda comments that Jerome takes lots of "douches" (baths). Then Busy comes in with her bra stuffed and I think we are all glad for her that she wasn't naturally well-endowed. That just looks...wrong.

 

 

Francois hatches a plan to be alone with Amanda. He gets Jerome to agree to go outside with Busy. Busy, for her part, is thrilled that her bra stuffing plan seems to have worked.

 

 

Once Busy and Jerome are outside, Francois asks to sing for Amanda. His song of choice is Alouette, only he sings "Amanda" in place of Alouette. The song is supposed to be about plucking the feathers from a bird, so it must sound really stupid if you understand French. Scenes of Busy and Jerome sitting in a car (I'm not sure why) making stabs at conversation are looped together with scenes of Amanda looking none too pleased at Francois's singing. Also a little out of character.

 

 

Busy adjusts her tissue when Jerome isn't looking, causing it to stick out noticeably. Amanda emerges from the house with Francois at this time and tries to subtly alert her to the problem.

 

 

Busy is depressed about humiliating herself in front of Jerome. Amanda tries to give her a pep talk, but it doesn't seem to do any good.

 

 

Jerome comes in and wants to take a picture with Busy. She initially refuses, but he calls her tres jolie (she suddenly can understand a little French). The episode ends in a freeze frame instead of the actors improvising.

 

I think this is one of the worst episodes of the series because it's a total cringefest and, as stated, everyone was a little out of character.

 

Next episode: Busy starts acting more like her band mates.

The Last Hurrah 3x2

The Last Hurrah

 

Lola tells a lame ghost story and throws a cabbage head at Amanda. The boys raid the cabin at about that time, causing her to wet her bed. The actors on this show really were up for any kind of humiliation, weren't they? Busy actually tells Lola about it and doesn't defend her when Lola calls Amanda a wimp.

 

 

It turns out the boys stole Lola's bra and hung it on the flagpole. The kids (except Jessica) all blame Amanda for not turning on the light and the counselor makes them promise not to try to retaliate against the boys.

 

 

Amanda sees Busy and Lola talking together and gets jealous. I went for as long as I could without saying it, but this whole thing looks like a love triangle. Wouldn't you think so if Busy were a boy? Anyway, the girls were merely planning a counter attack on the boys' cabin. After more ribbing about her bed wetting incident, Lola reluctantly agrees to have Amanda along.

 

 

Amanda and Lola disagree over a strategy to get to the boys' cabin. Lola wants to wait until lights out and Amanda thinks this would be too predicable and they would get caught. They finally agree to try Amanda's plan.

 

 

There's one girl in the cabin who's supposed to be really fat and eats everything in sight, like Lola's ghost story cabbage. Moving on. There is some foreshadowing in the form of dialogue about Amanda having stomach cramps.

 

 

The girls find a canoe, but after a while it proves to have a leak in it. They paddle to some little island that Lola thinks is the haunted beach from her story. Everyone blames Amanda again.

 

 

A spider lands on Busy's arm and she freaks out until Amanda picks it off her with her bare hand. Amanda needs to use the bathroom and doesn't want to do it in front of the other girls. When a TV character has to pee, it's usually for a good reason.

 

 

...But not this time. Amanda just got her period is all. And boy is she excited about it, even under the circumstances. Why would you blurt out that you got your period in front of someone who's been teasing you about wetting the bed? Busy tells Amanda she doesn't give a shit about her reproductive organs maturing because the canoe just floated away. Lola is still freaking out about her ghost story. Amanda sits her down and gives her a Walkman to listen to, which is a weird way of calming someone down. Busy trips over a log and sprains her ankle.

 

 

Amanda wraps Busy's ankle as Lola is still vegged out on the Walkman. Busy suggests Amanda do what Ora in Cabin 5 did when she got her period - go out into the woods with her mother and dance naked. This almost sounds like a clever plot to get to see someone's dim-witted friend and her mother dance naked. I'll bet there isn't even an Ora in Cabin 5. Busy finally apologizes. Not for being a bad friend, but for thinking Amanda was a wimp.

 

 

Busy sits back in a very unladylike fashion while Amanda talks about what scares her the most - her mother dying. This has nothing to do with the episode or the show in general, but it's such a common kid fear that I'll let it pass. Amanda claims her period gave her "woman power." Amanda uses her powers to get up before the others and find the boys cabin.

 

 

Cherry rides up on a boat later to rescue the girls. She is none too happy, of course, and tells them they'll probably never get into another summer camp again. That's pretty harsh.

 

 

It turns out that Jessica, fearful for the girls' lives, had to tell on them. She wrote this cute message in Amanda's autograph book about being pen pals 4-ever. Busy's friends are still too busy harping on Amanda to share any heartfelt goodbyes. Amanda sits quietly off to her self the whole time.

 

 

Then after the mean girls leave, she unfurls the boys' flag for Busy. There's no way she wouldn't have rubbed it in Lola's face. It doesn't even make sense. Busy talks about how yucky boys are as the credits roll.

 

There was really nothing accomplished with these camp episodes except to show that both Busy and Amanda can be assholes sometimes, but the location was a nice change of pace.

 

Next episode: Some French guys are visiting and Busy misinterprets things into thinking they're saying she has small breasts.

My Buddy Buddy 3x1

My Buddy Buddy

 

Busy and Amanda will be on location at a summer camp for the next two episodes. Amanda is all excited about the summer, but Busy thinks it'll be a drag for no other purpose than for the irony that she will have a better time than Amanda in this episode. Things are already off to a bad start when a counselor named Cherry informs them that they have been placed in separate cabins, despite the fact that their parents had requested that they be together.

 

 

Amanda spends a few minutes at her cabin before heading over to find Busy, who has gotten over her doldrums and is having a pillow fight with her cabin mates. Ok, not the greatest picture.

 

 

Amanda calls her mother to complain, but Phyllis is already on a plane to Barbados. Suddenly, a small girl comes up to Amanda, introducing herself as Jessica Niblet. She gives her a permanent marker, explaining what the word means. It's too bad she didn't give her the synonym "indelible" for future reference. Jessica also tells Amanda about bugs and the fact that she wants to be an entertainer like her uncle when she grows up.

 

 

Things are wild back in the cabin and some water or something spills on Amanda's stuff. A girl named Heather gets to speak the most because she's the better actor out of the group of mean girls. Heather and her friends invite Amanda to go scope out the boys' camp, but Jessica intervenes, wanting Amanda to go to the nature hut with her. Amanda scowls at Jessica as the other girls leave.

 

 

Amanda and Jessica are pitted against Busy and her new friend Lola in a three-legged race. Busy and Lola win by a mile and Jessica and Amanda fall in the mud. Amanda's cabin mates complain that if not for her and Jessica, they'd have the best cabin. The counselor just stands by and says nothing.

 

 

It's mail call time. Heather gets nothing and Jessica gets the above from her uncle. Because when your favorite niece is having trouble adjusting at camp, you should really send her a ventriloquist dummy. Amanda makes kind remarks about Buddy in front of the other girls.

 

 

Another one of those scenes where the main girl of the episode recaps the other on what she missed out on. When Amanda says she's still working on getting transferred to Busy's cabin, Busy laughs and says they could use a nerd to pick on. Amanda takes this jovial comment to heart as Busy runs off with Lola.

 

 

There's a talent show/campfire where Jessica does an act with Buddy. Even Busy says how horrible poor Jessica is. Amanda is kicked or shoved out of the campfire ring by Heather. Afterwards, Amanda tries to gain acceptance by the mean girls (including the one who just kicked her) by suggesting kidnapping Buddy.

 

 

The girls all take turns saying their comedic goodbyes to Buddy, except Amanda, who seems to be feeling some guilt. It's too little too late, though. Heather accidentally smashes Buddy's wooden head on the floor.

 

 

Heather dumps Buddy's remains down an outhouse toilet thing. Jessica is devastated to come back from the nature hut and find a sock-stuffed head on her beloved dummy. Heather tells a story about another cabin coming in and raiding them while the other girls smile.

 

 

Good God, more ten year olds smoking real cigarettes on TV! Amanda even tries it, though she was so against even Busy smoking on a previous episode.

 

 

Despite Busy's advice, Amanda confesses to Jessica that they were the ones to wreck Buddy. Jessica doesn't exactly jump up and down with joy just because Amanda was honest about this (she'd already guessed the truth), so Amanda still feels guilty.

 

 

In the end, Cherry tells Amanda that two girls in Busy's cabin have conveniently come down with the chicken pox. Two girls, and luckily no one wanted the other spot.

 

This episode is a little hard to watch at times because of how Jessica is treated. We do get to see Amanda finally stick up for what is right, and Jessica is in the next episode so we know she's going to be okay.

 

Next episode: Amanda gets her just desserts when Busy turns on her in favor of her new friend.