Episode
Reviewed: Unbecoming
Jay
(701)
Writer: Bob Hoose
Director: Bob Hoose
Sound Designer:
Jonathan Crowe
Music: John Campbell
Theme: Love always trusts
Scripture: 1 Corinthians 13:5
Original
Airdate: 12/10/11
Review Written by:
Ben Warren, Staff Writer
Rating (out of 5):
Episode
Summary
Jay schemes a way
to ditch his cousin Cindy by leaving her with
Barrett, but Priscilla grows jealous of the new
friendship.
The Review
The reason
Unbecoming Jay seems to
exist is to showcase Whit Hertford's
pitch-perfect delivery and comedic timing. "Jay Smouse has become one of our
favourite AIO characters", the Odyssey Team tweeted just the other day. Out
of all the characters introduced since the show's hiatus, fans have reacted
most enthusiastically towards Jay. He's gone from being Vance King's
sidekick in
Target of the Week
to seemingly replacing Vance King altogether. Between appearing on the
Odyssey Scoopcast and being one of
the few characters to chit-chat with Chris, I wonder: does Jay Smouse
deserve all this attention?
Many have said Jay is a much better character than Rodney ever was; however,
after listening to Unbecoming
Jay, I wonder if there's a chance Jay might go down the same one-note
road. What makes Jay such an attractive character is that he isn't
restricted to being "that evil bully"; his actions aren't nearly as
predictable as Rodney's were. Jay is better fleshed out and more
three-dimensional. As long as they keep rotating his role between evil
sidekick (How to Sink a Sub),
empathetic human (The Green
Ring Conspiracy), cunning manipulator (Unbecoming
Jay), and just one of the
gang (The Amazing Loser,
The
Malted Milkball Falcon), he'll be just fine. I
felt like a lot of questions were raised about Jay and his relationship with
Uncle Wally in The Green Ring
Conspiracy that I hope the team doesn't continue to repeatedly create
episodes like
Unbecoming Jay that rely
solely on Jay tickling our funny bone.
That said, I'll admit that the episode wouldn't have been nearly as
entertaining without Jay being a manipulative brat. Oh sure,
Andy Pessoa and Abigail Revasch give
fine performances, and the awkwardness between them worked well;
however, it was really Jay who stole the show. Another fun part was seeing
Barrett trying to juggle his friendships and repair misunderstandings. While
part of me wonders whether the storyline could have been brought to a whole
new level using adult characters, I think these kids carried the episode
well on their own.
Episodes about making new friends don't always work as a full episode. Who
here really thinks that we will hear from Cindy again? Was she simply
brought in to no longer be heard of again? Despite the fact I somewhat
enjoyed her personality, my instincts say yes. However, we
often don't really know the importance of introductory episode until much
later. Jimmy's first episode with Lawrence Hodges, for instance, would've
seemed awkward if Lawrence never showed up on the show again. In a way,
since so much focus is on Barrett making Cindy feel welcomed, the episode's
strength will depend on whether it was worth the audience's time to welcome
her.
I'll come out and say that
Unbecoming Jay is a perfectly fine episode. It's applicable and somewhat
fun. I don't have much against it. If I needed to criticize something, I'd
say the episode is, at times, a little cheesy and the storyline doesn't seem
important enough to warrant being the focus of a full episode. Furthermore,
I'll probably have to remind myself of this one in a few years; maybe,
however, that's only because it has the misfortune of airing between the
superior How to Sink a Sub
and Childish Things.
Rating
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