Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip
The Disaster Show

Episode Report Card
Joe R: C+ | 1 USERS: C
It Was A Bad Show

Allison doesn't know what the hell is going on, and Dylan explaining that her squibs didn't go off isn't helping. Tom says Cal "bailed her out," which: not. Allison pretty much says the same. "Did I look stupid?" she asks. Tom says she can see for herself when the clip hits YouTube in a couple minutes. Allison's putting phantom Matt and phantom Danny on her list, not to mention putting Tom there twice. Tom condescends that this isn't her "little White House show." This is live, and you don't get to do it twice. He says (Super Loud Meta Reference #2) they've "been in a slump lately" and they need to bottom out before they can rebound. Thus, every couple of years, there's a "disaster show." She says he seems awfully calm about this, and he says it's because they all know how to make it look like it was her fault. He skitters off, lucky to make it out of that smugly little conversation with all ten fingers. Meanwhile, Harriet passes by and shows Allison her impression of the squib-less flopping. "It's gonna be my screen saver!" she giggles. You know, hairpin turns from humorless basket case to snarky giggler aren't what make complex characters. A little modulation, perhaps?

In hair and makeup, Harriet finds Jeannie and says, about "the thing" they talked about earlier? She didn't mean it. Harriet keeps talking about "the thing" until Jeannie brightly goes, "Oh, about me going out with Matt?" This gets the attention of the B-team (Alex, Sam, and Dylan), and pretty soon they're all rapid-firing about who can go out with Matt, and can Alex go out with Dylan, and Dylan wasn't really listening, etc. It's tiresome. Harriet thinks so too, and says, "I don't know how much more I can take." "I hear that," says Jeannie. With a tone. Harriet's almost out the door before she turns around and asks what that's supposed to mean. Jannie doesn't want to have this conversation, but after one more, "Oh, go out with Matt!" she says she's not sure how much more she, or any of the rest of the cast, can take of this whole Harriet/Matt nonsense. That probably counts as Super Loud Meta Reference #3, although this really should have been a major plot point about seven episodes ago.

So Harriet starts to throw her seniority around, telling everyone to sit down and explain what Jeannie just said. Jeannie says she never should have brought it up in the first place. Dylan starts to say something, but Harriet cuts him off with, "You're not even supposed to be in the same room as me, Rook." Yeah, that pulling rank thing was kind of bad-ass in the pilot when it seemed like she had a real backbone and some presence. Now that she's been reduced to a shrieking harpy/simpering moron, it just comes across as bitchy. Sorkin did this to MLP on The West Wing as well -- took out anything strong and replaced it with a molten silver core of bitch. Not that I didn't love Amy Gardner until the very last, but still. Anyway, this time Dylan isn't cowed and he soldiers on, saying he's not sure why Harriet and Matt aren't just together. "That makes two of us," she says. "That makes five of us," says Jeannie. Hell, if it means one car accident on the way to work would end up offing them both, then count me as #6. Harriet gets a look on her face like she's Coming To A Realization.


Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip




Get the most of your experience.
Share the Snark!




The Latest Activity On TwOP