"Call Me Paul"

After mentioning yesterday that they do excellent puns with the show titles, it's not really Exhibit A with which I present you today. Oh well. After focussing on a lot of the dullard elements on Tues night, Wed's show was bursting with brilliance. But first we'll deal with the Paul issue, since that's where the title has directed us. Paul's out of hospital, but not before Elle was forced to tell him everything about Cam (good, dead) & Rob (evil, jail). The whole Elle-Dulliver-Carsmella (OMG SATIRE ON A MAD TV SCALE!!! I promise I won't make a habit of that shit.) triangle came to a head last night after Carmella, just in smalltalk with Paul, mentioned something about Cam/Rob, and so then Elle had some 'splainin' to do. But she cracked the shits massive with Carmella, accused her of trying to sabotage her life and all that kinda crazy stuff, and went the fullon soapie megaslap. CRACK!!!! It echoed around the hospital, and looked very fun for both of them to do, the ole huge slap windup, then Carmella's hed went flying to teh side, and someone off camera slapped 2 rulers together. Awesome. If they're gonna upgrade teh production vaules on July 23, maybe stunts shuold be their first port of call. After Kevin's fake as heck headknock, Lolly's Mum's pool debacle, and Frazer's crossed legs paralytic accident, I reckon if they're going to rely on head and body trauma for so many plotlines, they should make them look either in some way real, or go the other way and completely shonk them up, with blood capsules and everything. Stinger was always pretty ace with stunts, Paul makes a decent fist of them, especially with getting punched out so many times (Dyl, Steph and Ned just recently), and Rosie's headknock a coupla months ago when she stood up from fixing her stockings and bumped her pretty noggin on a picture frame was actually pretty okay too. Otherwise, more stunt training thanks.

So Elle slapped Carmella a beauty, she did the "I'm just a poor wounded boring thing" look and lfed, and came back with Oliver. He's being a total fuckwit right now, which is going against everything we know about him so far. "Elle, did you slap Carmella?" "Yes." "WHY I OUGHTA..." "But she told my Dad that his sons were dead." "Carmella, did you?" "Yes." "WHY I OUGHTA..." "But I didn't know she hadn't told him already." "Carmella, is this true?" "Yes." "WHY I OUGHTA..." "I just told you that. You don't even know why you're angry. You just wanna bone both of us, even though we're being really really really annoying." "WHY I OUGHTA..." etc etc. Elle finally brought the whole thing to a head by shouting "Oliver you love both of us and that's just not cool!" and storming off, so hopefully this whole thing is resolved soon. It's the most frustrating time-consuming but boring storyline since... Ned and Janae. But before that, maybe Sky and JP, or Steph and Max trying to get back together. In that league anyway. BOR-ING! Nonetheless, it looks possibly promising, as Paul is starting to take the piss out of his recent self, saying things like "Did I wear nothign but suits? We're going shopping for some new clothes" so keep an eye out for Paul in a Cosby sweater before too long. Pretty excited.

It was a big night for Karl & Susan though, back from visiting Billy & Anne's new bub, Jackson Kennedy. Good name. As they walked back in, Zeke had a sheet of paper out and a nikko drawing arrows trying to work out his and Rachel's relationship to Jackson, and eventually he concurred they were step-uncle and step-aunt. It's more of this old-school references to past characters that's great. I don't even know when Zeke & Rachel would have met Billy & Anne. I know Rachel stayed with Libby & Darren when she did 2 weeks work experience on the Shepparton newspaper, but... I dunno, just stuff that's fun to think about. No word on how Lance is doing.

K&S didn't really have much of their own plot last night, but featured in a few others. At the hospital, they dropped in to see Paul, as Karl tried to catch him out as faking. It was a pretty pissweak effort, to be honest. Better was when Rachel was caught out being the total control-beast she is right now, and busted for putting the almost-pash vid of Zeke and Lolly on the school blogzine/webzine (I don't know which it is or what the difference is, but I shall endeavour to keep improving myself, thanks Tvan). She was pretty stoked cos it got 310 hits, but everyone was all "Dude, you suck". K&S made her take it off, and then she had to apologise to everyone involved - Lolly, Lou and "especially Zeke". Rachel's pushing Ringo so much to go to uni, but stunts like this proves she still has a lot to learn herself. Mmmm. The best part of the episode however was Karl's announcement to the unwilling room that he's glad they didn't have video phones for some of his first date encounters. "I tried to impress Julie Kavanagh (Simpsons reference?) by eating a really hot vindaloo. I spent all night on-the-loooooo! Nearly passed out from fluid loss actually..." I love Karl.

Zeke and Lolly sat in the gutter and comforted each other later, without tongues, or any kissing actually, I'm just making it sound dirty. But they each admitted that they thought the other was really great, and Lolly made reference to the fact that she misses her home and maybe should go back. Zeke said she's got him here, and they did the head-on-shoulder hug, but sounded like another potential set-up to leave. What we do know about teh July 23 A CHANGE IS COMING is that there's supposedly a big cast makeover, so they've gotta be losing significant numbers, you'd think. Sky and Lolly have made reference to leaving, and their departures wouldn't be huge, and surely Boyd and possibly Oliver are not far behind. Lou's teh other one we've identified as close to deadwood lately, and if Ned ever gets the final sendoff it'll be a good ep. Otherwise, I'd say Carmella could leave and not be missed, except somehow she's become the Gold Logie contender, so they'd be a bit stupid to flick her, even if her storylines and scenes are weak as piss. There are a few characters whose contributions lately have been fringe - Bree, Janelle, Toadie, Steph - but surely they're all safe. The Timminses better not be leaving ffs.

One last storyline I forgot was the Rosie & Frazer marriage talk, talking about some of the big issues, with a priest, which Frazer wasn't a big fan of to begin with. I love both of this couple very much indeed, and they fight really well, in a younger K&S way, where you know they love each other a heap, so each throwaway comment and glare means 100 times more. Compared, Oliver & Carmella's fights are so fucking annoying and trivial. Frazer & Rosie's are 2 strong stubborn wills competing, and it's great to watch. Love them. The big issue is kids - they both want them, but after going to the doc, it seems like Frazer's nuts can't provide them, so that's a bit of hanging tension. The meeting-with-the-priest bit was really just to set up that even perfect couples have problems when things like family and longterm relationship expectations come into the mix. And Rosie wants to live in Italy? I was with Frazer, all like "What the hell?". Really good shit.

That was last night. Thanks for reading. Tonight's the Little Britain cameos, but I don't particularly like that show, so don't expect too much on that.