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Original Air Date: April 27, 1988 Review completed March 31, 2008 "The Nun's Story" A nun is collecting for a rummage sale, and Punky sees it fit to give her an unknown brass urn in the back of Henry's closet. This is a bad idea because the contents of that urn are Henry's Aunt Mabel, and Henry is finally laying her to rest the next day. Punky (after a lot of convincing) gets Cherie to help her recover the urn from the nuns, but their plan to sneak in in habit hits a snag due to a) the monsignor visiting, and b) no one believing it in the first place. Still, the nuns can't help but understand the situation and give the urn back. Too bad Henry had another one that actually had the ashes in it. Two out of three ain't bad, I guess. I started off the first episode of the third season going over a bunch of changes to the show, but there's not really much to go over this time around. Punky didn't change her look, the sets are the same, same old titles. No, seriously, same old titles. Not a scrap of new footage in the titles right now. That will change in a few episodes but... it is an odd stylistic choice, no? Odd note of the day: Windows Media Player won't play the Season Four disc. VLC? Fine. WMP? No. Well, whatever, as long as I get something that plays on the computer. Switching windows >> looking over my shoulder. The first scene did two things for me. At first, they made me think that the trip in "Going to Camp" was actually going to be bind the last few episodes together, which would be a HARD thing to pull off for a syndicated show. Which is why they didn't. So that got me to thinking about my second choice of focus for the scene: Giant mounds of junk food. I should not have started this before lunch. Hey, how do they keep getting giant mounds of junk food on set anyway? Cue the nun, and yes, I have indeed made a "there's the nun, here's her story" pun to myself every time I've watched this episode so far. What, you thought all of this prose was just shtick? Of the angles I thought of when thinking about a nun on Punky Brewster, a lot of jokes about perpetual agony were not high on the list. John Callahan's "Quads" can do it because it's just that kind of show. And admit it, you don't know what I'm talking about. Just like when Cherie busted out that line about a blue nun. Haha, seriously, Punky Brewster hates nuns. Almost as much as Nell Carter. (You'll hear about that more in... 14 episodes.) Punky Brewster seems to hate Henry at this point too. It took five minutes for him just to get on-screen, and his first lines are about stuffing Betty in a trunk... never mind, bad talking point. Henry rules. But my gripe is actually more that they're hitting the "cheap" point a lot. Like, four times in as many minutes with solid jokes on it. Oh, and here's Margaux. There goes Margaux. I think we just re-defined "cameo". Margaux fans are going to hate most of this season. Quote! "Sooner or later, I'm gonna have to cough up her ashes!" Well played, Punky. Well played. And then you have nuns complaining about Jehovah's Witnesses. Character development is not a high point in this one, but they're hitting some good lines. Can I get a "thank God!" for the nuns seeing through the disguise straight away? You had to laugh at Punky and Cherie thinking they could get away with being disguised as Andrea the Giant, but the way the last season generally went for me had me thinking the show almost would have went with it. No, the characters admit that it's a ridiculous idea, but they give a reason for this ridiculous idea to play out. Really good play. (Let's just leave out that they're whispering at levels no one could miss, okay?) On the other hand, around 19:00 was perfectly good proof that yes, pop culture references expire. Boy, did these ones expire. I vaguely remember the V8 jingle that got a mention here, but I know that line about "all over the table" was one too. Amazingly, I didn't watch THAT much TV in the 80s. I don't even watch that much TV now, the Internet gives me weird pop culture things to obsess over. Nex... it's over. Cripes, maybe there is a change after all, these things are getting even shorter. If Punky had made it to Season Five, we'd be watching fifteen-minute episodes. At least now I can trace exactly when TV went with an 18-minute half-hour episode. If that makes any sense. It will, just read it a few more times. Play-by-play didn't reveal much about the episode critically here, but I feel motivated to keep doing it because it's much easier to follow. Trying to cap the earlier episodes with the reviews as a guide sucks because I went all over the place and can't follow the point now. What I tried to sprinkle in (and what I'm clarifying... right now) is that this was a fine episode to start off with and a good way to show that things are back on point after a scary patch towards the end of last season. Punky may be over after this, but at least she'll go out with a bang rather than a whimper. (No dog wedding jokes here.) - Jimmy Vibes |