Season 21, Episode 74
First aired 18 May
2017
We open at the B&B, where Eric and Laoise are sneaking
downstairs after a night of wanting each other’s sex. He jokes that Máire’s
going to catch them, which Laoise finds about as funny as food poisoning, and he
playfully asks her if she’s always so cranky in the morning. I’m not sure why
he imagines she’d be any different in the morning than she is the rest of the
time. He’s unable to resist her sexy nuclear blue Walmart greeter’s vest and
they start making out, but manage to pull themselves apart seconds before Máire
appears and has to turn the hose on them. She wonders what Laoise’s doing there
given she doesn’t, you know, live there anymore, so Laoise says it’s because
she had a stone in her shoe. Well, that explains everything. She continues that
living at Micheál’s is super-iontach,
and in fact she’s cooking him a huge feast tonight to thank him, and she’s here
at the crack of dawn because she needs to borrow Máire’s recipe book. So,
forget all that stuff about a stone in her shoe she made up earlier, because
she’s drunk and didn’t know what she was saying, I guess. She and Eric flirt
with each other some more, which Máire is completely oblivious to, because
these days she’s really only tuned into male homoeroticism.
Back at the IKEA showroom where Micheál lives, he’s moving
things around the set when Laoise slinks in. He’s surprised because he thought
she was still in bed, and in fact, now that he thinks of it, he doesn’t
remember hearing her come in last night, either! Laoise, of course, is a quick
thinker who is capable of making up a believable lie on the spot, unlike all
the male characters on this show, who would’ve immediately launched into a
story involving a nuclear-powered robot who learns to love just in time to
return to his home planet. And, if it were Mack, also a really big dog. She
starts explaining that she ran into some friends at the pub and whatnot, but
Micheál interrupts her and says that unlike at Máire’s House Of Snooping And
Vermin, she doesn’t have to answer any questions or explain herself here at
IKEA Ros na Rún. She breathes a sigh of relief, which in her case looks more
like an annoyed grimace of relief, and I’m sure it’s the end of the teen sex
hijinks for this episode.
At Gaudi, Adam thanks a waitress for the empty coffee cup
she’s just set in front of him, but Fia is too busy pretending to drink out of
hers to say thank you, or even to ask if she can have one with something in it
next time. It seems the next stage of Pádraig’s plan to destroy the restaurant
is to transform every meal into a children’s imaginary tea party. Máire arrives
and completely blanks the pair of them, which is a relief to Adam, but Fia is
suspicious, because she’s known her grandmother long enough to know that her
only two modes are “passive-aggressive silent treatment” and “intrusive pest.”
Fia looks fab today, by the way, with some really great jewelry and that
bonkers yellow Gustav Klimt hoodie over a simple black shirt. Clearly hanging
around with all these gay men has improved her fashion sense, because in the
olden days she would’ve worn the bonkers jacket over an insane Jackson Pollock
bustier and an enormous plaid crinolined Cyndi Lauper skirt. She asks Adam what
kind of bee is up Mamó’s arse this time, but he nervously explains that she’s
always in a mood, ha ha. Fia gives him a brilliant “Girl, NO” look, so he
explains that Máire’s been distant to him ever since he got into that imaginary
brawl the other day. Fia wants to go argue it out with her, but Adam’s priority
here is to keep them apart as long as possible, so to distract her, he takes
her hand and tells her smilingly that he’s been thinking about that holiday
abroad she was banging on about the other day. She looks very happy at this,
because it’s the first time he’s been able to mention it without throwing up.
A particularly violent episode of The Odd Couple has broken out at John Joe’s, where Colm is
practicing telling his story about how his smashed-in face is due to crashing
his car into a dinosaur when he was startled by a blue genie named Babu
materializing out of his e-cigarette. John Joe warns him that nobody is going
to believe this nonsense, because he has many years of experience lying to the
local townsfolk and therefore has a much better sense of exactly how gullible
they are.
Back at Gaudi, Adam is spraying rainbows and unicorns at Fia
from every orifice, telling her how lovely it would be to go on holiday to
Chechnya or wherever as a family, and as a bonus, disappearing for a while
would give Máire a chance to get over whatever UNREASONABLE AND TOTALLY WITHOUT
BASIS problem she has with him at the moment. Right, because Máire has never
been one to carry a grudge, or to latch onto something and refuse to let go of
it, like a dog with a holy bone. He says he’s found a last-minute deal for this
weekend, and it’s a great bargain because the hotel just burned down, so if she
agrees, they could be on the scenic coast of Belarus quicker than you can say
“I Will Survive.” Máire finally decides to come over, and Adam starts to get up
to leave her alone with Fia, which of course is the absolute last thing he
would ever do right now, and Fia
tells her that they’ve decided to go on holiday this weekend. Máire, who does
not seem to think this is a very good idea for some reason, starts sputtering,
and when Fia walks off to pay the bill, Adam gets all up in her face and
angrily asks her if she wants to ruin Fia’s life. Yeah, Adam’s already on that
particular case, and he doesn’t need any help. He bogs off in a huff, and when
Fia returns, Máire starts telling her that she can’t go traipsing off around
the world with a boy she barely knows. Of course, having a baby with your
mother’s boyfriend really changes the way one looks at things, so Fia breezily
tells her that she’s known Adam for four and a half whole months. She could
have another half a baby by now! Máire dismissively tells her that four and a
half months is nothing—why, she’d dated Peadar for a year and a half before she
even told him her name!—and that it’s important to know whether someone is gay
before traveling with him, because otherwise you will be surprised when his
holiday playlist turns out to be Robyn’s “Dancing On My Own” over and over.
They argue for a while, and Fia complains that Máire’s opinion of Adam changes
like the wind, which is completely accurate, and that if she knew him the way
Fia does, she wouldn’t be so tough on him, which is perhaps slightly less
on-point.
At the community center, Mo, who’s also looking fab today in
a space yoga outfit, asks Colm where the rest of his face is. He responds by
trying to flirt with her, and it’s yucky, and then Laoise arrives and asks him
what the hell happened to him and how much longer his nose will be in the shop.
He explains that he crashed his car into a tree, so Laoise says it must be a
write-off, and because he is stupid, it seems he didn’t think about the fact
that people might ask questions when his face looked like an imploded tower
block but there wasn’t a scratch on his car. Mo continues dismantling this
story by asking why there was nothing on the radio about the accident, which
makes me think that whatever radio station she listens to must be very
different from the ones here, because for a car crashing into a tree to make
the news here, the car would have to be carrying Madonna, Oprah Winfrey, and the
Dalai Lama, and the tree would have to be the Statue of Liberty. She also
points out how odd it is that he’s all smiles after totaling his car and face,
so before she can ask any more questions, he volunteers that he’s applying for
a broker’s license, because it will allow him to take more tax write-offs on
his money laundering. By now Laoise is long gone, but Mo stands around
listening to this nonsense much longer than one might expect, and it’s really
time for her to extricate herself from the metaphorical car crash that is
Colm’s life, because there’s another big tree coming his way, and he keeps
getting the brake and the accelerator mixed up.
Out in the street, Eric grabs Laoise’s arse and its environs
and tells her he’s got romantic plans for them tonight, which involve him
taking her out on his friend’s boat. This may or may not be a euphemism. He
continues that there will be fishing, which I know is always a top consideration
for my dirty weekends, but somehow
Laoise doesn’t think this sounds very romantic, complaining that she doesn’t
want to be “up to my ears in fish scales and spewing my guts up.” Amazingly,
that also describes every date with Micheál, and he doesn’t even have a boat.
Around the corner, Micheál runs into Máire, who’s furiously
polishing the street. He tries to make polite conversation with her, but she
talks nonsense and acts like a crazy person, I mean even more than usual. Her
neurons finally start firing in more or less the same direction and she tells
Micheál how happy she is about his relationship with Laoise. Of course, he’s
under the impression that he and Laoise are only friends, but Máire winks and
insinuates and puts on her rah-rah skirt and thrusts her pelvis around, telling
him about the big fuss Laoise’s going to be making over him tonight, with the
fancy dinner and the riding Eric. When Micheál looks at her blankly, she
worries that she’s spoiled the surprise and dashes inside, leaving him alone on
the pavement looking simultaneously surprised and pleased with himself.
Caitríona returns home from the CaitrionaVision Song
Contest, in which she came in 153rd place, and is warmly greeted by Maeve,
who’s made a miraculous recovery from yesterday’s combined case of school-itis
and Little Madam Measles. Vince is annoyed by all of this, and of course
Caitríona is a smiling, passive-aggressive wagon about it, telling him it’s not
his fault, it’s just that he’s completely incompetent and incredibly stupid. He
wanders away to go jump off the roof or whatever, and Maeve whines to her
mother that she was on the brink of death and Vince made her go to school
anyway, and Caitríona coos that she knows, but that Vince can’t help it that
he’s a moron, and also a terrible person. Maeve insists that Caitríona never go
out of town without her again, threatening that it would be very dangerous to
leave her there on her own again. Yes, especially since she’s recently acquired
an imaginary friend who tells her to burn things. She carries on for a while
and eventually overplays her hand so badly that Caitríona realizes she’s a
manipulative, self-absorbed little liar. GEE, I HAVE NO IDEA WHERE SHE GETS THAT
FROM.
Seán, who we’d almost forgotten is a thing, confronts Colm
in the shop, and the two of them argue for a while and compare their artfully
applied scars and cuts. If you connect the scabs on Colm’s face, it spells “Anto
Was Here.” Meanwhile, Máire has summoned Adam to the B&B for a word, and
that word is “Quaaludes.” She tells him he’s got to tell Fia the truth before
she gets hurt, and he insists there’s nothing to tell, and that they’re in
love, and that it would be really cool if Erasure made a record with the Pet
Shop Boys. She says she’d prefer the truth come from him, but if he won’t do
it, she’ll tell Fia herself, because Fia is the only person in this
relationship she gives a damn about. I’m paraphrasing, but not by much. Of
course he gets furious and jumps up shouting and slams his chair down and then
runs out the door, leaving her to do her famous “cowering in fear” move, which
I am trying to turn into a new dance craze called “The Máire.”
After the break, Caitríona actually has the nerve to go
interrupt Vince at his job and ask him to look after Maeve until the babysitter
comes. He sarcastically asks if she thinks he’s really up for that task, what
with his incredible stupidity and all, but she chuckles and flings her hair
around and acts sort of like a human being, because she wants something. She
confesses that Maeve can’t be trusted, and makes it all about herself for a
while, but fortunately just before we climb into the TV and hit her with that
giant plastic ice cream cone, she actually apologizes to Vince for not
listening to him. We’re then reminded why we like Vince as he rhetorically
muses, “I wonder where she gets it from?”, and Caitríona giggles and flirts
with his bicep and so on, because down the road she will be able to use that
line in her memoirs as justification for why she had to murder him.
Mo and John Joe run into Colm, and she invites him to join
them at the pub tonight for a drink, which we hope means that poison she
ordered from Amazon has finally arrived. She wanders off and John Joe warns
Colm that he’s barking up the wrong tree with Mo, what with her not being a
complete imbecile and all, but he replies that now that he’s out of Anto’s
clutches, he’ll have plenty of time to focus on seducing Mo. Eww.
Micheál returns home from the mime school where he works and
finds the house empty, though it’s clear Laoise has been preparing it for a big
evening, with wine and candles and a giant purple bag from a store called
“Elegant Undies,” which I swear I’m not making up. She probably could’ve gotten
a good price on those barely-worn leopardskin briefs O’Shea gave Eric last
episode. Micheál sees all this and looks very pleased with himself, and then
calls Peatsaí, who I guess still exists, and asks him if he’ll stay late to
close the spaghetti farm where they work. Of course Peatsaí refuses, because
he’s an arsehole, so Micheál has to come up with a Plan B, which I hope
involves him walking up and down the streets of town stark naked while singing
Laoise’s name to the tune of “Mandy.”
At the café, Colm does a hilariously inept job of
“discreetly” passing Seán an envelope containing €5000. He might as well just
announce loudly, “I know it looks like I am secretly passing Seán a giant
envelope full of cash under the table, but I’m actually grabbing his penis!” He
explains that it’s the proceeds from his caper with Andy years ago before he
landed in prison, and that he wants Seán to use the money to pay off King Kong
a little at a time, and also give some to his awful wife, Annette. I suppose
this scene is here to try to give Colm some redeeming qualities so we won’t
keep vomiting with rage at the thought of him with Mo, but it’s far too late
for that. Fix him up with Berni, no problem, but not our Mo. She deserves
someone “Evan or better” on the Ros na Rún local bachelor scale.
We see Micheál putting a sign on the door of the door store
where he works saying they’re closed for the day to unforeseen shagging
circumstances. He has surprisingly good handwriting, unlike that note Réailtín
left him the other week when she was pulling a sickie that was written in
letters 12 inches tall.
Meanwhile, Eric arrives early to Laoise’s for their date, or
whatever the kids are calling it nowadays, and they immediately start making
out in the middle of the living room. I can’t judge, because I’m always a
little turned on when I go to IKEA, too.
Micheál arrives at the pub for a brandy, to oil up the old
cogs and springs, I suppose, and John Joe starts smirking about him and Laoise.
He acts as if this is 6th grade and Micheál’s going to have to hide his
spontaneous erection behind his algebra book. Tadhg takes this opportunity to
point out that given how Laoise’s been jumping from man to man, it was only a
matter of time before she landed on Micheál. It does feel like a bit of a “Do not pass Go, do not collect $200”
situation for her. John Joe adds that Micheál didn’t exactly ask Laoise out,
but instead asked her to move in with him, which elicits mixed responses from
the assembled barflies. Colm wanders in and starts flirting grossly with Mo,
something we never get brain-meltingly tired of seeing, but then Dull Tony
arrives, and Mo really is in the worst love triangle ever. I’m including
“Tiarnán and Bobbi-Lee’s two breasts” in that competition. Colm slinks off to the
bar to commiserate with John Joe, because they are the only two in this scene
who can understand what the other is saying, and in a very kind gesture, John
Joe announces that he hopes Tony’s pint gives him diarrhea. I’m not sure Tony
is exciting enough for something as dramatic as diarrhea, but we’ll keep our
fingers crossed.
Micheál arrives home to sex Laoise up, but finds that Eric
has already done so. Half their clothes are on the floor and the other half are
in various stages of “on them,” and there is zipping happening, and Laoise is
mortified, Micheál is stunned, and Eric basically looks like he’s ready for
another go, and wouldn’t be totally averse to Micheál sticking around to watch
or whatever. Laoise tries to sputter excuses, but Micheál silences her with a
hand gesture like a traffic cop and then wanders away, shaking his head. It’s
really a shame he didn’t walk in about 5 minutes ago.
Back at the B&B, Adam tells Fia they need to talk, and
we’re as surprised as she is when he bluntly announces that he’s breaking up
with her. It’s a good thing her Gustav Klimt jacket has a big fluffy hood on
it, because she may get whiplash from all the back and forthing with him today.
He says it’s all become too difficult and that he’s too young for this, plus
Máire is complete horror, but she responds that it was only a week ago that he
said he loved her. I’m assuming she means for the first time, and not that he
only tells her he loves her once a week, at the end of Antiques Roadshow. She can’t believe that just this morning he
invited her to go to Spain as a family, and now he’s breaking up with her, and
she asks if it’s because of Liam Óg, and this is all heartbreaking for various
reasons.
He insists it’s nothing to do with Liam Óg, and just then Máire arrives home, which you can tell Adam thinks is exactly what this nightmare was lacking. Fia falls into Máire’s arms and saysthat Adam’s just dumped her. Máire pats her back and says it’s for the best for both of them, and Fia angrily asks if she knew he was going to break up with her. Well, if Adam’s going down, at least Máire’s going down with him. The three of them argue for a while, and Adam finally tells Fia he can’t be with her because … he can’t finish the sentence, so Máire jumps in and finishes it for him: “Because Adam is gay.” Adam’s face crumples as he looks desperately at Fia, who’s stunned, and Pádraig better be grateful he’s not here for the slaughter, because it’s all going down today!
He insists it’s nothing to do with Liam Óg, and just then Máire arrives home, which you can tell Adam thinks is exactly what this nightmare was lacking. Fia falls into Máire’s arms and saysthat Adam’s just dumped her. Máire pats her back and says it’s for the best for both of them, and Fia angrily asks if she knew he was going to break up with her. Well, if Adam’s going down, at least Máire’s going down with him. The three of them argue for a while, and Adam finally tells Fia he can’t be with her because … he can’t finish the sentence, so Máire jumps in and finishes it for him: “Because Adam is gay.” Adam’s face crumples as he looks desperately at Fia, who’s stunned, and Pádraig better be grateful he’s not here for the slaughter, because it’s all going down today!
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