2 Broke Girls checks out its latest “And the Reality Check” from its freshman season, which sees Max (Kat Dennings) and Caroline (Beth Behrs) turning to Max’s employer Peaches to find a home for their horse Chestnut amidst The Real Housewives of Tribeca. It’s a difficult-to-access plot for certain, one that might leave even casual viewers re-evaluating their view on the series.
I asked myself why I watch 2 Broke Girls during the view of ‘And the Reality Check’tonight (other than the fat stacks of cash and corporate jet on retainer of course), feeling like there isn’t anything for me to enjoy. Perhaps holed up in my ivory tower of a New York City apartment for some decades now, I’ve grown out of touch with the fads pop culture likes to parody. I’ve not watched a single episode of any reality…housewives TV series or what-have-you, rendering me unable to appreciate the references therein, be they disabled animals on parade, or unrepentant fathers backing toddler beauty pageants.
I also find myself separated by the majority of hipster culture by at least a mile or so of water, but I swear I’ve heard the ‘homeless or hipster’joke done to death before, not that I’d expect a renaissance of original humor from 2 Broke Girls. By the end of ‘And the Reality Check,’I simply wondered, ‘for whom is 2 Broke Girls written?’Are there sects of sitcom-watchers intent on a good hipster bash? Young women in run-down housing in regular disparity with the culture of the rich? It’s not that there couldn’t be an audience for such a mishmash of farcical New York parody, I simply have trouble finding a foothold for my own tastes.
The core of any good story lies in relatable circumstance, arguments and actions we connect with enough to find ourselves entranced in the parable from a third-person perspective. Some nights 2 Broke Girls can accomplish that, but the girls working to find a home for their horse Chestnut amidst a culture of snobbery and Reality TV wannabes doesn’t exactly land within the realm of the relatable. They’ve got the logic vote to be sure, addressing why two young women of limited means couldn’t keep a horse in Brooklyn, but little else going for them.
Closer to mining truth and drama are Max’s reluctant admittance of attachment to her four-legged companion, and even Caroline’s brick-wall realization that things like snow prove less magical and more problematic with poverty, but this feels like territory the show has mined before, particularly with the previous episode ‘And the Very Christmas Thanksgiving.’It also doesn’t help that Kat Dennings didn’t exactly produce a believable ‘crying face'(for lack of a more eloquent description) in her teary goodbye to Chestnut, but let’s face it, crying rarely looks natural on a cynic.
I couldn’t help wondering if there were details to the series that I might have missed in earlier episodes, namely that Max seems to stumble, and choke on revealing to her employer Peaches that she shares her apartment with Caroline Channing. What’s become of the Channing name, in all the time 2 Broke Girls hasn’t explored its own premise? We see brief glimmers of the socialite persona that Caroline crafts for her public image, but to date there’s been precious little movement on the character’s actual journey, particularly in episodes like tonight where the even the cupcake business falls to the wayside.
You know you’re stalled for storytelling when your own internal device in counting how far the 2 Broke Girls move closer and further from their dream shows no movement.
But then again, like Max, we’ll always have cats on the internet to bring the LULZ. At least those we can’t even create the illusion of having to think about.
And Another Thing…
- Continuing with how out of touch I am, can someone explain to me what Instagram is all about?
- Yes, Tony Montana had much cocaine in Scarface. This is humor? You’re literally just describing a thing that happened.
- You will NOT call yourself a New York-based show if you use exteriors of the Upper East Side for a woman auditioning for Real Housewives of TRIBECA. BAD CBS.
- On the flip side, I will give a polite golf-clap on account of the truth behind New York women carrying high heels in their purse.
- I’m a little impressed with how casually they reference drug use on the show, when How I Met Your Mother goes to such clever length to hide it.
What did YOU think?
