Life is a series of small adjustments...
...and polkas.
Another great episode. I will start with the fact that I don't think I laughed and I was unsure where it was going at first...but once Steve is at work with the General things take off. It remains low key throughout but, my my my, it's entertaining.
Mike and Steve swap cars one morning after Bub pulls an extremely passive-aggressive bit at dinner to convince Steve that the house is out of food. Mike will pick up Bub and take him grocery shopping in the station wagon. Steve will travel in Mike's souped-up jalopy. Well, this is the day, Steve is driving a Two-Star General and his aide around town. There is a very funny scene with nice silent movie music of the three of them crammed into the front seat going all over town. Then, the episode takes off.
Cars break down. People miss their bus stops. Mike polkas with a lovely young lady. And, I kept thinking, "If there were cell phones, this episode would be fifteen minutes shorter." And, then I kept thinking, "God, this kind of stuff was so much better before cell phones." mainly because there's actual suspense! The general is coming over for dinner to discuss a big contract. The jalopy breaks down. Steve is on the bus. Mike is waiting at the stop in the station wagon. A boring man puts Steve to sleep. Steve winds up in some Little Poland neighborhood of town. (Or, possibly, Little Bavaria. I'm not sure there was a difference at that time.) Calls keep going back and forth. People keep missing each other....It's fantastic.
There's a lot of verve here and, although the show never goes fast, it never grinds to a halt. Like a few of the previous episodes, it's more like a mini-movie with the theme being in the title. Both Steve and The General say that life is a series of small adjustments. And, that's what this episode is except for the fact that, in the end, Mike has been adjusted to Polka Town, which is actually pretty funny.
I was, again, surprised. I've no clue where this show is going but if it keeps up the invention and keeps arriving at places like this...God, I'm excited to see what's next! I almost watched two episodes last night but I did not. I kept strong and watched an episode of Get A Life instead. But, I almost faltered. Maybe one episode a week is the perfect way to watch this sort of show. Then, you can really appreciate what goes on and look forward to watching the next one.
So far, so good. And, it is holding to my one drama then one wacky template. That means the next one will be a calmer, more dramatic one. Maybe I should go back and re-watch the second episode. I may like it a lot more now.
Oh, this episode was produced, co-written and directed by Peter Tewksbury. How often does that happen in sitcoms?
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