S3 E10: Bad Omens and Baywatch Nights

714 Delaware St.

Herein we talk about the Conners as though they are real people once again. We return to Lanford to discover that Louise has COVID! As the family put together a Covid care package for her, we get a chuckle out of their collection of late Blockbuster DVDs. Darlene’s confession about visiting the indoor hotel pool to relax throws us for a loop. We doubt that such a humid mildew party would be very relaxing. Jackie confronts a bad Yelp reviewer at a beer garden, and Neville gets stern about her domineering behavior. We question Conner family counsel, as Jackie and Darlene advise Becky to lie to an old friend. We laugh at well-placed Henry David Thoreau jokes, complain about unrealistic plot points, such as the notion that the Conners would have a can of tuna on the verge of expiring. That’s not a thing! Oh, but Dan’s new camper is so cute– did he inherit it from Arnie? Did Arnie die? Can we know what’s up with Arnie? There’s more bad Conner-munication, as Dan demands to be Ben’s partner at the hardware store, and the two men with Daddy Issues square off over their pride.

S3 E5: Becky & Mark 4 Ever

714 Delaware St.

Well, we hope you’ve all been enjoying safe and happy holidays. We’ve been on a bit of a break ourselves, though we will be back with more commentary on The Conners and more of the old show soon! In this episode, we revisit the elopement of Becky and Mark Healy (RIP Mark and beautiful Glenn Quinn), which is portrayed in the back-to-back Season 5 episodes “Terms of Estrangement,” parts 1 and 2. We find Becky to be egregiously hard on Dan as the bike shop goes under, and we spend quite a lot of time on the ways the financial situation the Conners find themselves in here connects to their current situation on The Conners. We celebrate the writers of the original series for their one-liners, non-sequiturs, and inclusion of the ever-vain Nancy and her newly liposuctioned butt. In all, we remember how young our Becky was, but how much she loved Mark (and he loved her, too!). As per usual, we digress into realms of pop culture only somewhat related to the topic at hand. Thanks again to Brenda for suggesting we take some time to cover these two kids in love.

S2: E19 – The Kiss, Part 1

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We’ve been wanting to do this one for a while, and the moment seemed right. This is the first half of our discussion of the classic Roseanne episode, “White Men Can’t Kiss,” in which DJ is supposed to kiss a girl (his future wife, Gina) in the school play, and doesn’t want to, because she is Black. DJ’s racist response creates conflict and concern between Dan and Roseanne, who both newly recognize and reveal some of the racist attitudes that they both unconsciously hold. In our conversation, we talk about what the episode does that feels very progressive, even now, and we try to unpack ways that this episode and the two series have missed opportunities to do and say even more about anti-Black racism. We are pretty academic and serious here, but we also accidentally talk for too long about Shia LeBouf and the movie Cocktail, as well as our mutual love of hand-me-down, mismatched bedsheets. We’ll post the second half in the very near future, so stay tuned!