Spaced.

I'm going to spend time with my little cousins tonight and maybe watch a movie with them but I should be able to watch these two episodes and participate in some of the discussion tomorrow or a little later next week.

I agree with you on the accents. There were some things that I couldn't quite parse. For instance, I didn't know what Brian said after he was asked if he was gay.

Overall a good start to a sitcom. Beginnings mostly served to set up the series and introduce us to the main characters while Gatherings let us hang out with the full cast and watch them interact. I know that the "house party" plot is considered a cliche, but I don't really view it as one. It didn't feel forced to have all those characters in one place. I liked the music choices; they were all fun but the kind of song that you're sick of hearing so many times.

One thing I'm not on board with yet is the look of the show. It just looks ugly most of the time, especially the lighting. Maybe this is because I mainlined the first season of The Middle recently, one of the best looking sitcoms on the air right now. Hopefully I'll grow to like it.

So far I like all of the characters except for Marsha. Pegg's hair in the first episode was a little disconcerting, but either it got better or I got used to it. Daisy is definitely an interesting character and I look forward to seeing more of her. Brian feels like the oddest one in the group so it will be interesting to see if he becomes more normal as the show goes on or if he'll stay weird. Mike doesn't feel like a full character yet but my familiarity with Frost is helping me like him (Attack the Block ftw!). Twist is pretty.

From what I've heard the next batch of episodes is when the show goes crazy, so I look forward to that. Neither of these episodes were anything to write home about, but they showed potential. And with the talent attached to this show, I'm confident that potential will be fulfilled.

Spaced charmed me right from the start. It helps that the leads are so damn relatable. Pegg's Tim seems just the right amount of uncomfortable in his own skin, and a little bit like a lost puppy. His reaction during the doorway scene with his ex, when he admits how much he still loves her and she adopts that relieved/superior look as though she's still retained her power over him felt right on point, and made my heart ache a little for him.

Stevenson is talented and believable as the scatterbrained, yet confident, young woman attempting to hold her life together. And kudos to all involved for showcasing a talented lead actress in 1999 who didn't fit the standard-issue barbie doll mold. Not that there's anything inherently wrong with a stereotypically beautiful lead actress -- it's just refreshing to see a variety of talented folks get a chance to do their thing.

In terms of aesthetics, I've actually zero problem with the look of the show in Beginnings. The apartment, set design, and lighting have a worn-in, comfortable feel that for me offsets the awkwardness between the two leads as they get to know each other. And there's clearly a chemistry building between them. In Beginnings, I was struck by the time they spent together on the sofa, as it seemed almost "relationshippy" in a way. But that does make sense in context -- both are recently out of long-term relationships and in that shaky period when it's so difficult to be alone and so easy to fall into relationship default mode, albeit awkwardly, with someone new.

Gatherings feels like an episode that might improve upon rewatch. It moved a little too slowly for me at times during the party, but I'm new to the show, and likely missed some subtle character moments. But the exposure to the rest of the characters, and their many idiosyncrasies, was enjoyable. Everything about Brian was amazing, from Bad Sandwich, his creepy "hmmmmm" at Tim's mention that girls would be in attendance, to his heroic coat-stowing at the party. Also, his odd little dynamic with the upstairs neighbor is deeply weird, and I love it. I want to know about The Deal. Or do I? Hmmmm...

JanetSnakehole: In regards to Stevenson, I totally agree. It's awkward to phrase this, but she's no Jennifer Aniston -- and I love that. She looks like a regular person! And it's a great balance to strike between goofy yet intelligent and capable. It's the same with Pegg. He's indeed no David Schwimmer. So this is your first time watching the series?

Affro: the blurriness is weird, but ultimately I don't care because the show is so inventive and energetic with its camera-work that it outclasses many modern HD shows because they're mundane. TV used to be watched on black and white sets and then on crappy fuzzy sets for decades. But the shows were still quality. Heck, you don't even need the picture to realize you're doing with something special -- just listen to some classic shows and you can tell it's something different, especially comedies that rely on dialogue. You don't need 2000 dollar speakers to know what good music. I think this group of people could use an iPhone and still put out great television. (But yeah I wish it wasn't so blurry/better lit....)

I don't understand the problem with setting up the series in Beginnings. I mean, the only point really is that we enjoy the episodes, and I thought that one was enjoyable. Comedies are about putting characters in situations, and this was our only chance at seeing the first encounters and our two main characters uncomfortable and new with each other. Excessive set-up is boring, but they were doing a lot here, weren't they? Taking into account this was the first episode and they learned as time went on how to craft the show.

Humor is so subjective, personal, and situational (you have to be ready to laugh, things can change based on your mood, etc.) that I don't feel it's my place to tell you to laugh. I just know that Spaced has a lot of crazy, specific jokes that I enjoy, and it's definitely ahead of its time. But, hey, some people don't think the Simpsons is funny....

Here's a discussion that got buried in Disqus:
(Replying to Digifreak)


Link.

(Starts with Eric's response to my review.)



Link.



Link.



Link.

"Art" is definitely the funniest episode so far. Lots of quick exchanges and callbacks. Still pretty weird, because a lot of the things referenced like performance art or womens magazines or Suzi Quatro or finding porn by railway sidings seem very specific, or at least outside of my personal experience. Also because it's kind of focused on Brian, and how passionate about his ex Vulva ("is that another womens magazine?") he is, and how hung up on his memories of their relationship. It's surprising because Brian seems so withdrawn and apathetic, but obviously he's got romantic and professional problems, just like Tim and Daisy. (Once again, the show is pretty brutal about the challenges that face the characters in getting their lives together. This ep has a funnier ending than the last one, but it's still hard to imagine an American show not having a little "Hang in there" speech. It's about adjusting my expectations as much as anything, I guess.)

One reason I liked "Art" better is because all of the fantasy sequences and all the weird, cinematic, perspective stuff fit right into the story. The performance art (Vulva's and Daisy's) allowed for them to be a little dark and weird, and maybe a little bit mean towards Pretentious Artists, but still be in the show's world. Tim's equally dark "zombie movie" was his speed-addled-daydream from playing his First Person Shooter game (this bit was a little loose but also seems ahead of it's time in portraying a gamer hallucinating that their game is real). Daisy got to have her own, much brighter, surreal sequences at her job interview, also rendered askew by drugs. All of these riffs start out a little weird or even annoying, IMO, but get funnier as they go, or as they're repeated. By the time Daisy was hearing Carnival music instead of the Interviewers, I was definitely won over.

Hey I finally got around to writing about Spaced.
 
Art:

This show just has a lot of fun. The episode starts with a highly stylized Resident Evil parody, following the barrel of the gun. But it's not a pointless parody: Chekov's zombie comes back at the end of the episode, where Tim, acting out a dream of every video game addict, saves his friends from a sour party. The pop culture references are almost too much, but they're saved in moments like this -- it's creative storytelling, and ultimately through whatever medium that's what this is all about. 
 
Art gives us some background on Brian's character, that enigmatic introvert. Of course, it's deliberately weird, and if I knew more about the art world I would say how accurate of a satire it is (I remember reading something from some arts folk about Brian and Vulva.) The art scenes would be excessive if it weren't for Brian's character: he's so sweet and, in his own strange way, sincere. I also love how terrible the art fiends were made out to be: "Know any famous or important people?" 
 
Daisy, meanwhile, sells her plot -- she blows a job interview. Someone more interested in feminism would comment on what Daisy represented compared to the business suit feminists in that start-up magazine (post-post-modern whatever.) To the character's credit, she never came off as a cliche, she wasn't marginalized because of her gender, and she was as likely to be the butt of a joke as a male character, but nothing derogatory. She embraces being the ditzy one. I'm glad you all had this white man's take on feminism. Thank you. 
 
Art isn't my favorite episode, maybe because of how "wacky" the art scenes are, but I still love it.

-I'm loving Mike more this time around: was he pretending to ride a motorcycle around a tree in a park?
-Brian has never encountered these video games.
-"Subtle blend of extreme violence and lateral thinking." "What, like 'It's a Knockout?' " Brian's reply is like Tim's reply earlier in reference to his art.
-Vulva is non-gender specific.
-Daisy was researching Huge Fat Cocks. Just had to note this.
-"Why are you in Sheffield?" "Fell asleep on the tube." "The tube doesn't go to Sheffield." "Yeah, I know. I um must have changed at King's Cross." I loved this exchange. Mike has all these odd side adventures off camera, like Kramer.
-Kid Mike has a mustache. The phone ringing brings him out of his dreaming.
-"Macro-biotic! Dust me CLEAN! Breath--azyler! Use it! A cleaning spray! Kne--jerk. Suck it in! Filter it out! Go on! *grabs buttcheeks*" Was the art show an advertisement for a vacuum cleaner?
-"My mom's cousin went to school with Enya. Well, they were in different grades, but they had the same percussion teacher." "I hate your mum, and I hate you."
-Brian sees the primal nature of Tim.
-Based on some brief googling, Twiglets are a pretzel-like crispy wheat snack. They are named for their similarity to twigs (British cuisine is renowned for a reason.)
-The show does this a lot, like the opening scene of the pilot: you think the rabbits at the end are a dream sequence but it turns out to be real. Oh poor Daisy....

Battles:
 
I think we all want to make a comparison to our Paintball episodes (and if you don't, fuck you anyway), but this felt like a different beast: it was about a man getting back his balls by shooting another man in the balls. Like last episode, a video game is an entry into the heart of the episode: Tim is upset over his girlfriend, so he's drowning Lara Croft in a video game (that's a nice touch because if you played that video game it was strangely fun to drown her sometimes.) His taste for violence would be revisited later in the episode. 
 
Daisy's side plot is one of her most endearing. After being dumped by Boss Hog, she almost lets the lie about being with Tim slip to Marsha, but somehow uses that screw-up for permission to get a dog. She goes with Twist to a dog pound, and they instantly regress to childhood. This eventually leads to one of my favorite jokes in the show: the revelation that Daisy was so starved for a dog as a kid she pet a leash on a cardboard box and walked it around the neighborhood. It's endearing, hilarious, and heart-breaking. I also love it when she chases a group of stray dogs, desperately yelling, "Play with me!"
 
The war sequences are, obviously, stellar. I think the show is like a live-action successor to the Simpsons. Matt Groening liked to talk about a "rubber-band reality" where the show, changing tones on a dime, would go deep into a certain genre or parody, but it would quickly revert at the end of a joke. You can't do this too often (stretch out the rubber-band) or go too far (break it.) It was an art working within this universe. They switch between quick-cutting, fast-paced action sequences to meandering but intelligent 21st century Clerks-ian speech so effortlessly I hardly notice the abrupt shifts sometimes. But part of that is the cast -- I love hanging out with these weirdos.

-Common Spaced switcheroo, like Brian last episode when he was imagining talking to Vulva: you think Daisy's breaking up with him, but she gets broken up with.
-Brian shows up as a ... what? "You've got some paint on you," which is reminiscent of a line in Shaun of the Dead.
-Being upset over his girlfriend leads to him wanting to shoot things leads to him going to paintball where he sees the guy who was with his girlfriend. Plotting!
-Mike is boxing with a tree?
-"They are the jungle!"
-He goes to the dream sequence, doesn't see mike, calls for him, comes out of the dream sequence, doesn't see mike, calls for him....
-The duel ... the duel. 
-Nice detail: Mike spits up paint.
-Battles is the most highly stylized episode so far, and I wonder if anyone thought it went too far. (Although Art is extreme in its own way.)

I went through all of this show a little over a year and a half ago and with "Battles" everything that I loved about it really came flooding back. I don't know if I have anything informative to add after Eric's and Blicero's comments, at the moment, but I'll just list some of my other favourite moments that I don't think have been mentioned yet:
- A character slipping into fantasy is almost always great in this show: "And I'd do it again, I tell you! I'd do it again in an instant! AHAHAHAHA!" *jumps through window*
- Tim mimicking the Evil Dead(?) poster.
- The recurring gag of Tim and Mike recalling their childhood is a great one.
- "When you get that feeling, it's like..." "Sexual healing."
- Brian's story about the death of his dog is hilariously dark and grotesque.
- Everything involving Colin. He's so cute!

I also agree with Blicero that the way the show slips in and out of genre parody is more akin to The Simpsons than Community. In that first episode or two, I thought those transitions were often pretty jarring but it seems with "Battles" the show has ironed it out. They really found their rhythm with this episode.

Blicero compared it to the Simpsons before I did. I was just saying I agreed with him.

I agree, Eric, that "Chaos" is great but I actually think I prefer "Epiphanies", which has to be my favourite episode of the series up to this point. The way everything comes together at the end at the dance club, with Brian getting his moment of redemption, Tim and Daisy drunkenly confessing their admiration for each other (a scene that just felt so true to life), and Mike's moment in the spotlight, is just so so pleasing for me. And I quite like the bike messenger guy. I can barely understand a damn thing he's saying but I found it hilarious when he broke into dance just listening to common household appliances.

I recently broke into Capt. Blicero's house and stole his phone. On there, I found his comments on the episode "Chaos."

*******************************************************************************************************

Spaced: "Chaos" by Capt. Blicero (posted on the AVC board here).

Chaos

I suppose if Battles is Modern Warfare, then this is Remedial Chaos Theory in a very loose way with the exception of the title.

Tim makes the point about the entirety of Star Wars owing itself to one minor character, but Chaos hinges itself on one minor character, Colin, and a seemingly random and inconsequential event: finding jaffa cakes, which leads to Tim taking out the dog because Brian has to deal with the cakes. Tim, of course, is rather dismissive of the dog and yells at the sky for aliens to abduct him; perhaps if Brian had taken Colin out the situation would have played out differently.

But I think the larger point of the episode is that despite all the references and intense stylistic diversions the story always comes back full circle and gags have real substance. The freelance vivisectionist stalking about the background is not a chance for the show to mimic a horror movie but a way for Tim to deal with Colin emotionally: he loses him, feeling guilty and terrified; Daisy blames him; then Tim takes it into his own hands and plans a great escape. This unites the whole clan, as they act out the prisoner escape from Star Wars (A New Hope) complete with the music and character names. (We also see an accusation of Leia (Daisy) liking Han (Tim), as well as Jabba liking Chewie.)

The note being given by the guard himself is a brilliant twist because it ties up any loose ends about how someone found the information and why it was so easy to break-in. It's a story of a whistle-blower trying to stop a dark operation -- led by, of course, the creepy vivisectionist. As a denouement, he's brought down by the dog mentioned at the beginning of the episode: nice story-telling.

-"To top it all off, her hair looks stupid all the time."
-There's a reveal in the opening scene where it looks like Tim is talking to no one (the Simpsons had some great reveals in their heyday), but actually Mike is literally dressed as a bush. And they're playing hide and seek....
-The class warfare dog: class is a huge issue in the UK but before the Wall Street protests it was rarely thought about here in the US.
-Tim mentions the odd-numbered Star Trek rule. He would soon know the rule....
-Another Shining reference: a Family Guy-esque cutaway. Family Guy was known for its cutaway jokes, but they were first done on the Simpsons back in like season 5 before they got sick of them and stopped doing them.
-"Three good Star Wars movies later." While editing, they saw the Phantom Menace and thought it was horrible; they had to throw a joke in.
-The "chaos" story of Star Wars is very interesting, but why didn't the gunner shoot? They were running low on "laser?" They didn't know droids existed (he didn't shoot because the scanner showed no life)?
-Jaffa cakes are a layered treat with sponge, orange filling, and chocolate on top, typically.
-Abduction, screaming at the sky
-Was that red riding hood?
-Mike's military skills are used once again.
-Empire music at the start of the 10 pm session.
-Great outfits. Mike is excited to show off his stuff, including a ski mask. Brian has a leather jacket and a beret. Twist is fashionable. She bought it today. She brought a makeup bag. Masha's just smoking in the background.
-"Twist you're ... Jabba." "Is Jabba the princess?" "Yes."
-Very sexy hip thrusts. "Do you fancy Chewie?"
-Really nice direction in the episode like the transition from kicking in the door to the Brian's back in the security office.
-"To manage or oversee. Three letters." Run!

Epiphanies

The episode starts with a flashback: Brian is in a pub filled with people loudly singing the last third of "Come On Eileen" by Dexys Midnight Runners. It's a song that evokes nostalgia, one from the past, and it's a near-anthem for boisterous singing-along. Alcohol is used to reduce social awkwardness and bring people together. Brian is there, still quivering, in between a loud group of men, and right as he starts to join in with the group pop-wow he knocks a drink out of someone's hand. Everything stops. The man looks at Brian. Then he punches Brian in the face.

After the opening scene, Brian recedes into the episode, which is soon taken over by the Northern Irish bike messenger Tyres. He talks in quick bursts and rants, accompanied by fast-paced dance music (I am not an aficionado of the rave/dance world, so my terminology will probably seem Grandpa-ish.) One aspect lost on American viewers is his fixation on class. Tyres is part of the working class, and he's highly patronizing to anyone not pulling his or her own weight. I thought his views on the "moochers" was particularly astute -- "I wouldn't mind so much, but you seem to be having such a shit time!"

Tyres is a literal whirlwind, and when he leaves an empty wind can be heard. Even though it's late in season 1, the group is still coming together, and Tyres, the catalyst, leads to the group of reluctant friends coming together again, working out the kinks of friendship and readying themselves for the evening. The dance club itself is marvelously shot: it's disorienting without being excessive. What's notable is how straight the club is show -- straight meaning it's not twisted to reveal character insights or to stage comedic situations, even with the delightfully fun sequence where all their names are shown on the screen like credits. It's just pure ... club.

Through the plot catalyst that is Tyres, Brian is brought to a club to confront his fears. And history repeats itself -- he knocks a drink out of someone's hand. There's a pause. You can tell that Brian is thinking about the incident from many years ago. The song itself, "Come On Eileen," is an appropriate choice. It's a dirty pop song, but it's also one steeped in memory and the past. It borrows some words from an Irish lullaby. One verse goes:

Oh I can hear that music
I can hear that song
Filling me with memories
Of a mother's love so strong

Its melody still haunts me
These many years gone by
Too ra loo ra loo ral
Until the day I die

The music lays a heavy imprint on the mind. Melodies of the past dredge the past itself. To Brian, the song was a haunting reminder of a night gone awry in a pub. It was still affecting him to that very day. He was visibly shaken. Its melody still haunts me ... These many years gone by ... Too ra loo ra loo ral ... Until the day I die.

Back in the club, the man looks at Brian. Then they embrace and dance joyfully. There's no meditation here or explanation. It just seems that this time instead of rage Brian encountered humanity. This is his epiphany. Who knows if it's because of Brian joining the Spaced friends? Who knows what happened before the "Come On Eileen" played in that pub? Life is opaque. And Brian, one who's wary of the public and its people, is susceptible to all of humanity's highs and lows. The episode ends with another song and in transcendence. But instead of "Come On Eileen," a dirty little drinking song, it's one of power and assurance: the theme to the TV show A-team. It's a song of triumph, as the young people have conquered the night.

"My work here is done." - Tyres

Stray thoughts and quotes:
-Tyres appearance was so disorienting to me the first time I saw the episode. Thank god for subtitles. I watched it without subtitles at first and I literally understood only 20% of what he said.
-Tim and Daisy pretend like they're not a couple, once again.
-The musical montage with Tyres is one of the most intensive stylistic diversions the show ever did (or at least for season 1.) It was jarring the first time I saw it, and along with his heavy accent it made for a weird episode.
-This is a cliche, but on Spaced the camera is a character.
-Mike was on Crimewatch two weeks ago.
-Those are some loud ... whipping sounds on Brian's canvas before Tim knocked. A later revelation gave more insight: "Huge."
-What's that song in Tim's head when he's thinking of Amber?
-It's amazing how little time there is between Daisy slamming the door and the sound of the screeching tires.
-The flashbacks are so confusing. Tim is his adult age. Mike is played by a younger actor, but Mike's adult voiced is dubbed in.
-Mike starts to go back into another flashback (the music starts) but Tim pulls him out.
-"I'm on a special diet. I have to eat like a bird." "What, like this?"
-"I had to dress up as an Israeli elderly woman once." "Did you?" "I didn't have to."
-"Can I borrow your video recorder?" "What you going to do? Stick it to a canvas as a piece depicting a nation of cathode junkies, selling their imaginations for quick-fix media hits from the Blockbuster syringe?" (Pause) "No, I want to record "Ready Steady Cook." "
-Never a more awkward couple than Brian and Twist.



Annnnddddddddddd with that stray review we're onto the season finale! Because of how slow people are in watching the show, we're only doing one episode this week, and we'll begin season 2 after that.

Ends

"Daisy is so small scale her good qualities require a little bit of honest patience to see."

Can you expand on that?

"The unfinished poem that threatens to reveal a subconscious attraction to Daisy is a little cheezy for this show"

I saw it as so over-the-top and cheesy it was a joke.

Hey let's talk about Spaced: Ends, the last episode of the first season!

Spaced: Ends

Spaced by built by the chance encounter of Tim and Daisy and their ensuing friendship, but this was all predicated by sharing a space together in an apartment. Appropriately, the season finale is about a possible break in the dynamic pairing. Tim's ex-girlfriend calls him out of the blue and then announces that she's broken up with the evil and very tall boyfriend, giving Tim a ray of hope. This leads to friction between Daisy and Tim, as Daisy doesn't want to move out if Tim leaves and doesn't want to leave him at all -- whether or not there are romantic feelings involved. Of course, this fight culminates in an epic video game battle set to the fighting game Tekken.

And other characters are wrapping up major arcs. Mike has an appointment to be let back into the Territorial Army, and we finally see the end of the flashback scene with kid Mike and kid Tim: Mike jumps out of the tree and apparently damages his eyes. We also hear the end of another story that's been alluded to -- Mike stole a tank and tried to invade Paris, not before taking a detour to Euro-Disney. But that's all in the past: he's back in the army.

Another mystery was revealed, this time involving Brian. The awkward glances between Marsha and Brian stem from an inappropriate way Brian was used to pay his rent. But, again, that's in the past -- Brian and Twist start a relationship and go out on a date to an art museum. (As for the revelation for the last character, Marsha, she uh ... smokes a cigarette.)

The foundation of the series, however, was still in jeopardy, as Tim's ex-girlfriend admitting she wanted to get back together. But Tim backs out. He chooses his friends, he chooses the life of Spaced. Even though he says near the end of the episode, "Life just isn't like the movies is it? We're constantly led to believe in resolution in the establishment of the ideal status quo, and it's just not true," this is the status quo for the series. The band stayed together. There were no seismic shifts in the sitcom -- a couple people got together, normal for a comedy, and the two main characters dance into the night. But I don't care. I like the characters too much for them to disappear.

-The skateboard intro is a lot of fun and might now seem like a piece of history. For a time (I think the late 90's into the mid 00's) skateboard videos were pretty popular, from ones with ball-crushing falls to ones with Rodney Mullen.
-"I see my ex girlfriends. Well not so much as see as watch...."
-(Alarm blares) "What was that?" "New doorbell." -- this is a fun joke on diegetic/non-diegetic music.
-"Do you believe in life after love?" "That's a song."
-I'm really surprised Pegg could lift Mike like that.
-One important point is that Marsha would have allowed Daisy to stay on her own. With a vision of a lonely future, this leads to Daisy finally having the motivation to write. But does this mean anything else?
-What do people think of Daisy and Tim by the end? Do you view them like a potential couple? What are Tim's real feelings? And hers?
-I really love the dog on the table at the end.

[About getting back with Sarah]
Daisy: What do you mean, you have a "funny feeling"?
Tim: I can read her like a book.
Daisy: Never judge a book by it's cover.
Tim: He who dares, wins.
Daisy: Look before you leap.
Tim: Do you believe in life after love?
Daisy: That's a song.
Tim: ...shit.

Tim: I just had a moment of clarity, you know, I woke up. It's like... you know when you have an orgasm on your own? [Daisy looks increasingly disgusted and uncertain during the following:] You know, you're sort of lying on the sofa watching some porn movie you bought on a drunken lonely night in Soho, and you're lying there and everything's going really great, you're getting totally turned on by these absurdly graphic images, everything seems so right, and suddenly - phht! Bingo! You wake up. And you're lying there sweating, desperately looking for the tissue which you know is still in your pocket, and the remote control which is somewhere on the floor, and it's like walking in on yourself, you know? It's just like "What're you doing?" That's how I felt tonight feeling my heart miss a beat everytime the door opened. "What the fuck are you doing?"
Daisy: Well, that's... love, isn't it? Load of old wank.

I have held you in my arms a thousand times,
closed my eyes and known we would always be together.
I have smiled at you through all your many lies,
unknowing and unthinking, that eternity would be never.
As distance dulls the memory, and bitter history grows hazy,
I realise my one true love, is in fact a girl called...

I don't mean it as a negative. The opposite, actually....that it's rare to see a female character (especially a lead) whose personality isn't so big or telegraphed that it can be broken down into a few simple characteristics. Maybe because it's unexpected from a TV show, it took me awhile to figure out what I thought of Daisy. Both she and Tim seem easygoing and a bit annoying/bitter towards each other early on, but Tim still fits a type, give or take.

I guess it's that Daisy is a little bit tentative. She doesn't put on airs or pretend to be anything, she just seems unsure of who she is. I like that we can see that uncertainty even when she's making a joke, or trying to throw a party: She's never sure even those simple acts are going to come off right. Again, it's odd to see a female sitcom lead threaten to be a non-presence at times. But it lets us kind of discover her at the same time Tim does. She's intelligent and funny and a good friend.

Some of this comes from having re-watched Spaced at the same time I watched New Girl, where the characters have quirks and broad, brassy tendencies before they get fleshed out as people. I just find it fascinating that Spaced lets us settle in to being interested in the main characters, rather than catapulting them at us. Until we get to know them, until they have time to gain some confidence and show us all their sides, they (like real people) can seem like they're not entirely there.

"Art" and "Battles"

Art
- "Such aesthetic wonders, such vibrant times."
Oh Brian, the reality was almost never as good as one remembers, my weird, wonderful dear. At this point, I could watch an entire episode of Brian in the mirror rehearsing his opening lines. Vulva represents our darkest fears that an ex actually thrives without us - urbane and successful, with adoring minions at his or her disposal. But Brian emerges from the dreaded experience stronger and more confident than before. He is a monkey man now! YOU GO, BRIAN.

-I enjoyed Tim's arc this episode. Though he spends the bulk of it high and drunk, his reactions are a nice counterbalance to Brian and Daisy's struggles. And he's sweetly supportive of both in his own way. I liked him getting increasingly shitfaced in the background during Brian's sputtering encounter with Vulva - you just knew something was about to go down. And it did. His entire hallucinatory explosion at the party was awesome. And he was endearingly sweet in his support of Daisy after her disastrous job interview.

-Daisy's interview experience teaches her that now she's got to bring her "A game" to the working world, and to life in general. Time was, you could wear a short skirt, show a bit of cleavage, and get the job!
So Daisy (complete with glittery cheeks) found herself in over her head during the hilariously serious interview at FLAPS magazine. Apparently, working at FLAPS requires a grilling similar to a that of a postdoc candidate for a biocontainment level 4 research laboratory.
I chuckled at "twenty to forty year old woman who doesn't say no." It was a nice send-up of condescending, infantilizing "lifestyle" magazines targeted at women. And Daisy's awkward "girl power!" was a funny reaction to feeling out of place in the midst of women who seemingly have it all together. I feel ya, girl. During the kids and husbands talk, I too zone out or blurt awkward things like "girl power!" whilst flashing a peace sign.

-It would be a shame to leave "Art" without a swipe at the snotty interviewer lady on Daisy's behalf. Those Patrick Cox's she liked were HIDEOUS. I wouldn't wear those to go scoop dog poop in the backyard! I'll defer to Tim's fashion wisdom, "I think you should burn those, because if you lose them, you might find them again."

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Battles

This episode was a ton of fun, and I've nothing substantive to add to the existing discussion. So I'll just list some impressions.

-What? There's a dog? No one told me there would be a dog! This changes everything!
Disclaimer - I'm a "big dog" person (sorry, Tim) and an Alsatian "jaws slung with bloody slather, eyes lit by the fires of Hades" sounds right up my alley. But Colin is adorable and seems just weird enough to fit in seamlessly with this bunch.

-God, I love Daisy. I had to pause the episode at "Colin? That's what I called my box!" I really respect that Wright gives Daisy her fair share of screentime and story. She feels fully formed already, largely due to Stevenson's contribution. Daisy doesn't hold back or act like "one of the guys". She is loudly, obnoxiously, messily, unapologetically female. She is completely herself, comfortable in her skin, and this is super-refreshing to see.

-More "ex" drama, as Daisy fancies herself the urbane, successful glamazon, dumping Richard. Man, this show is hitting all my buttons in life right now. Also, Tim advised her to confess to Richard? Interesting.

-So Brian dressed his childhood dog in period costumes and took amusing photographs. Here, he dresses Colin after Marsha's completely creepy "he has needs." Maybe Brian uses this practice as a coping mechanism for stress and anxiety? I love that we're only four episodes into the series, and this is something to consider.

-Liked the quick cut from Daisy's 1,2,3 count to GO GO GO in the paintball match.

-Mike's "sexual healing," complete with expressive arm movements, wins the episode.

-Me during the standoff -- NO TIM, SHOOT HIM IMMEDIATELY -- don't get tricked into a gentleman's count - he wasn't "sporting" when he stole your girlfriend!

-What a great little bunch of friends. Tim saved Brian last episode, and Mike saves Tim here. POP WHAT MIKE?! POP WHAT???

-A dog, on his bed, chewing bamboo during a lightning storm? Poor Tim!

CaptBlicero: Yes, this is my first time watching the series. I'm enjoying it so far!