1026  - The Joke's on Al


Wooh...Season 10 has effectively been emasculated by SKY with the dropping
of SIX episodes...we are now straight into the season finale. Still, I'm led
to believe this isn't a bad thing...

Right, to business. This is an odd episode which packs in far too many ideas
for its own good. We have the Griff subplot (funny but totally unresolved;
perhaps a poke at the now-cliched tradition of drama shows like TXF ending
seasons on a cliffhanger), Al and Jefferson's contest and June Morgan. Bud
and Kelly have little to do but Christina Applegate gets the best line(s)
with her query about filming through walls, which had me ROTFL. Al and
Jefferson's contest is a key point of the episode for the first act but
strangely vanishes in the second, right until the very end. In fact, I think
'disjointed' is the word I'm looking for here.

There are two other good lines/vignettes; the NO MA'AM meeting is one of the
rare samples of *good* use of the lads this season, and the priest (excuse
me, his name's gone from my memory)'s line about Ike being the 'dork of
honour'. The June Morgan subplot is not surreal, however, but simply silly;
the whole wedding idea is daft, she isn't even the good-looking babe he
describes her as, and her motive escapes me. Why would inveigling Al into a
false marriage get Peg? Just because she (presumably) would get to sleep
with him? 

Oh, and Ephraim Wanker's in it again, having apparently decided that now
he's going to take Grandma home. Peg has seemingly persuaded him just like
that despite episodes like "Bearly Men" and "Love Conquers Al" where it
seemed nothing would work. I'm not an Ephraim fan. Bleah.

Average episode, rubbish season finale. Rating 5/10.