Written by Jason Katims
Directed by Lawrence Trilling
Airs Thursdays at 10pm EST on NBC
This week, on Parenthood: Kristina hears the results, Ryan reacts poorly, and Julia and Joel boil over
Much of this season has centered around a few arcs, most notably Kristina’s bid for mayor. This week we get our answer as she loses the election, seemingly due to her unwillingness to go negative last week. Her scenes throughout the episode are moving and well done, particularly the return of Rose Abdoo as Kristina’s friend and fellow cancer patient, Gwen, but one can’t help wonder where they’re going next. This has been a departure, to say the very least, and it remains to be seen what the show hopes to get out of having Kristina run, other than some drama. Hopefully this will be an arc that leads into some interesting new territory for the show, rather than a bizarre diversion.
Ryan and Amber’s relationship woes continue this week, with the inevitable physical confrontation. It’s a shame to see such clear dysfunction between them, but at the same time a relief that their arc is moving to its next stage. Tying Zeek in with Ryan’s anger issues makes sense, given they’re both former military, and it’ll be interesting to see what the show has next for the character. They shared some nice moments last season but have yet to this year. Amber calling Zeek in at the episode’s final moments doesn’t mean that’s where we’re headed, but given Ryan’s lingering pill usage and PTSD, it would certainly make sense. How that would tie in with Zeek and Camille’s own marital struggles remains to be seen, but there were some interesting parallels between the two couple being made earlier in the season. Perhaps they’ll return.
The other significant ongoing story addressed this week is the continuing deterioration of Julia and Joel’s relationship. Obviously Julia bursting into Joel’s meeting is a significant overstep, but the show continues to not fully explore Joel’s motivations and point of view. It seems obvious from the audience’s point of view that Julia is hugely struggling, doing her best to hang on. She’s never been a particularly subtle negotiator; it’s not surprising her attempts to repair their marriage are blunt and somewhat clumsy. She wants to get things back to normal through sheer force of will and the power of her argument and personality. That’s not how relationships work, we know that. But Joel isn’t helping matters and while that’s probably more realistic, this would be a far more interesting arc if the audience could identify with both sides of the equation equally.
Elsewhere this week, we finally get some more quality Max and Hank time. It’s nice to see Hank’s daughter Ruby back and Max’s C plot of asking her out is great. Also fantastic is Sarah’s response to Hank’s frankly terrible parenting. It’s nice to have a reminder now and again that while she’s a flake, Sarah did raise two pretty great kids. The dynamic between Sarah and Hank is great here, decidedly less frustrating than when Sarah last saw him and was basically terrible. We still don’t have a particularly solid answer for why Hank moved back from Minnesota, other than that Ray Romano is great and the show didn’t want to lose him (and may not have expected, when they wrote him out, that they’d be picked up for season five), but if we keep getting scenes with Max or Sarah like we do this week, it doesn’t really matter. And if they can endeavor to bring Ruby and her mother back to Berkeley (ish) without it feeling too contrived, more scenes with Sarah helping Hank negotiate teenage daughters would be very welcome. Overall, this is an episode of transition, as two of the three main arcs reach a turning point and the third approaches its breaking point as well. We’ll have to wait to see where they’ll go next, but given how strong the season has been to this point, we’re undoubtedly in good hands.
What did you think of this episode? Were you surprised Kristina lost? How long before Julia and Joel go kablooey? Who else wants Gwen to recover more than pretty much every other dangling thread? Post your thoughts below.
Kate Kulzick