We’ve talked about random character motivations in this space before; Two and a Half Men is well known for character inconsistencies. This week’s Two and a Half Men featured the random introduction of the name of Walden’s (Ashton Kutcher) company, ‘Walden Loves Bridget.’ It also introduced newly-crazed Bridget’s (Judy Greer) random choice to remove Walden as the head of his company and Walden’s mom Robin’s (Mimi Rogers) equally random choice to Bridget over her son.
Each of these revelations is given a cursory motivation within the episode but has little connection with the characters’ past. On the bright side, the Bridget takeover story does create a fun story for Alan (Jon Cryer) when Walden asks him to the board of the company as his 50,000 dollar a year stooge. Is there anyone better qualified than Alan to be a stooge?
Despite the mentioned randomness, Slowly and a Circular Fashion as a one off story, is a relatively well-structured episode of Two and a Half Men. It integrates the characters in near perfect fashion, which is nice.
The story ties Walden and Alan in a way that the show’s arch requires. One of Alan’s conditions for stooging for Walden is getting his name on the lease to the beach house, and it brings Zoey (Sophie Winkleman) closer to Walden by having her serve as his lawyer.
Alan’s legendary spinelessness spins the story in expected fashion as Bridget and Robin try to bribe him to their side and Walden bribes him right back. Yes, you totally saw this story coming but Jon Cryer is so good at playing a craven, greedy loser that predicting how bad his compulsions will be actually becomes fun rather than merely predictable.
The episode’s end seemed to indicate that this storyline will continue in the future. However, the show’s history of random stories doesn’t promise that we will hear any more about it. I, for one, hope that Alan’s place on the board keeps coming up as anything that places Jon Cryer in a place of greedy, self-absorbed spinelessness is a comic goldmine for the show.
Random notes
- From the creepy file Walden and Alan have now each had sexual encounters with each other’s mother. (Ugh).
- No ‘Half’ man this week as Jake (Angus T. Jones) gets no storyline.
- It’s surprising how well Zoey is sticking around. This week tied her even closer to Walden with Walden throwing around the word ‘love’ without actually saying I love you. Sophie Winkleman is catching up quickly on the rhythm of the show and it will be interesting to see whether she can become a series regular. I doubt she will get that far, we’d have heard by now if that were in the long term plan for the show, but Winkleman is making a strong case.
Published: Jan 3, 2012 05:39 pm