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Original Air Date: November 5, 1987 Review completed April 28, 2008 "Beer and Buffalos Don't Mix" Punky gets a very wild ride home from school with Joey Deaton's dad, leaving her scared and convinced that he's got a problem. Unfortunately, Henry's not very willing to believe that problem in a lodge brother from the Benevolent Order of Buffalos. Joey himself isn't very helpful either, convinced that Punky's just looking to cause him some unneeded problems. Finally, Punky is horrified that Henry has accepted a trip to the new amusement park for both of them and refuses to go. Henry makes her go with him anyway, but after seeing the driving for himself, he confronts Mr. Deaton. Left without a leg to stand on, Mr. Deaton admits to his problem. In case you haven't guessed it yet, I'm pretty sure that this Joey and Mike Deaton are the product of "quick re-naming" syndrome, where you write a script with certain characters and then realize that you need a place to plug in recurring parts. Certainly, the chance to reuse Joey's bedroom set was pretty tempting as well. And if I didn't know better, I'd almost swear that the sudden drinking problem was a joke (in horrible taste) to explain Mike's goofy attitude. Still, that's shooting the continuity right in the big toe, isn't it? Something I'll note right off the bat: The opening scene with Betty playing with her hair with a magazine looks identical to the opening to "Take Me Out To The Ballgame". Heck, I'll probably get accusations of copying pictures from that folder when this episode comes up for capping. For that matter, Henry coming into the room with the headgear is mostly shot-for-shot with "Girls Will Be Boys" too. Bit much, isn't it? (And let's get it out of the way here: "old, tired, full of prunes" comes back a little later too. I suppose they had to get the first episodes in there somewhere too.) Less on the picky technical stuff, more on the story. You know what happens every time one of these Order of the Buffalo segments comes up: Henry is going to end up in a really stupid hat and looking as ridiculous as possible. Someone really likes seeing George Gaynes in that hat. And I don't think it's George Gaynes. Who knows who it really is, maybe Susie Garret giving George a little payback for the in-character verbal joustings. I doubt it, but it's funny to picture. What the heck, let me share a bullet point straight out: "Gaynes dances like he's trying to put out a small fire that's started on his leg." I can't describe it any better than that. Three minutes in, here comes our plot fleeing for their lives down the front hall. Hang on, Punky can smell the beer on his breath? They stuck her in the front seat above the guy's son? Maybe he's got a deeper problem going here than alcoholism, unless he's REALLY been drinking. More importantly, am I the only one really not understanding this "you can't tell an adult 'no'" thing? I remember the safety rules from the primary grades including lots of times to do that. Maybe this should be an "only in the 80s" note too, but I never knew too many kids being shy about that. However, I'll admit that the earlier Deaton segments stay close to character. Mike is a somewhat irresponsible goofball, Joey is a close match for him as his son. Whatever else happens, we'll remember that to add points. I can't really add anything else to this statement, so enjoy the unspoken "Milk-Bone" pun as Punky and Cherie talk things over. You'll know what it is. Augh, I missed the reference to the "Just Say No" club the first time around and just caught Punky saying it a second ago. That is really not a good thing to bring up in context of the series, and even less so in an episode that, again, deals with substance abuse. I'll spoil now that the episode will not play out quite the same way, but the fact that reference to that, er, below-average sponsored episode is here threw me just a bit. And they build puns off it. Thanks, episode. Just what I needed. One more quick shot of good old Joey sweeping mess under his bed. That's still in-character, it's pretty good, all right. Once the heavy talk starts, though, I'm a little confused. Joey's quick anger is weird here. You mean to tell me that none of these people ever think about the situation at all? Joey's just fine with it until he explodes at Punky? There's never talks at the dinner table or anything? I think what happened here is that the writers are using the low amount of screen time so far for the Deatons to shoehorn in a family problem and play it off like it was there all along. That's odd in and of itself, but it's done in such a clumsy way. Not as clumsy as on the original airings, where this episode aired BEFORE "Open Door, Broken Heart" and probably quite confused a few kids by playing with characters who had yet to be introduced, but it's still less than seamless. It comes from literally nowhere, it will be resolved out of nowhere. Some narrative sense. (I know that the above paragraphs are the worst examples of "stating the obvious" in the site's history. Sometimes, you have to in a review. I can't ignore this kind of thing. I can only get it out of the way and hope I didn't insult too many people's intelligence.) Hey, did I mention "Girls Will Be Boys" up there. Here it is again, in the time-honoured, "Henry sucks sometimes" tradition. His constant belittling of Punky's warnings actually prompted me to use a curse for one of the few times on the actual site (the forum is a different story...), and it still bewilders me when Henry just won't believe Punky here. Why is she going to lie? Even if Joey and her are fighting now, she seemed to be just as scared earlier. I guess that part can slide since people really do do stupider things, but Henry never does seem to take the word of his now-daughter very seriously, does he? (Heck, that last point could make for a long debate in and of itself, about the changes as the show goes on. But I'll save both of us the trouble.) Even with everything else in this episode, I'll admit that Punky coming out for a ride in full padding is a cute gag. Don't think that I didn't laugh at anything... when there was something to laugh at, anyway. Also under "short notes", this is one of the (only?) times that we see the backyard beyond the treehouse, and who would have thought that the kids are basically playing in an extended driveway? Oh, crap, I blew my only real comment about the ending a few paragraphs ago with that crack about "instant redemption". What to do now? I can comment that I wasn't sure what Mike was going for when he started up the car with his son walking away. Maybe I'm just demented, but was I the only one who thought the kid would end up run over? Thankfully, Punky thinks that that's too much. Which is odd, for Punky, to think that anything that's not R-rated is "too much". But he doesn't run his kid over, and the episode ends in heartwarmingish fashion. Sympathy for the Dognapper, I guess. I didn't want to be as lukewarm on this episode as I was, but I very much dislike the choice for the alcoholic in the story. Why, exactly, did it have to be this character? There could have been Season Four stories to use Joey fairly well, or he could have even replaced Spud down the road in the Sadie Hawkins episode. (If only that last one had happened!) It could have been a fun move to see Mike and Henry interact in future episodes. But both of those are big "what-ifs" now. It's a confusing thing to see a push for greater continuity on one end of the episode and an abandonment of it on the other end. - Jimmy Vibes SPECIAL NOTE: A gigantic "Thank you" needs to be said to forum member DanOrDanny, who took the time to rip the episode and send it to me upon hearing that my own DVD copy was having problems. That means that he is 100% responsible for this review appearing at all, and for that I and any and all readers are grateful. |