Happy Endings recap – 2×18: ‘Party of Six’

After a string of great episode in the second part of season two, Happy Endings stumbled this week with an episode that brought all our friends together but didn’t bring much laughs to the table. Let’s look and see what happened.

This week’s episode brought the gang together to celebrate the 29th (or 31st, depending on if you actually know how to count) birthday of the lovely Penny (Casey Wilson). Right off the bat I was really excited to have a Penny-centric episode. But alas, the show didn’t so much focus on Penny, but the curse of her birthday. In fact the whole episode concerns the gang’s attempt to find a suitable restaurant to host the event (they seemed to have forgotten the fact that Dave owns a restaurant….err food truck, and could’ve saved everyone some time by offering it up as a location).

But I digress. As a whole Penny isn’t given much to do, other than take her top off, which is actually pretty funny. But it’s Casey Wilson – she is friggin’ hilarious and capable of so much more!! Give the woman something to do!

The whole episode feels kind of muted. Although there are moments that are seriously funny, it seems like the gang has all taken sedatives and are just chillaxin’. This may be because instead of breaking up the gang, they were together for pretty much the whole episode. Plus they were all sitting for most of the episode which didn’t give much opportunity for the great physical comedy they have shown in the recent episodes (other than Penny brilliant bra-reveal).

Brad (Damon Wayans Jr.) and Jane (Eliza Coupe), on the other hand, are pretty hilarious (as usual). They are the only ones given much to do, with their little side story about Brad almost breaking up with Jane. I loved the “breakup restaurant vignettes.” And seeing him go all lovey-dovey with Jane is so sweet and just made me fall more in love with these two (or maybe just Brad). Side Note: I have to say that I am really enjoying all these trips down memory lane where we get to see ‘old Brad and Jane.’

The rest of the gang are more or less relegated to one liners, speaking in voices and contributing movie homages. Max (Adam Pally) spends most of the episode doing different voices and slowly going crazy from starvation. Alex (Elisha Cuthbert) disappointingly continues her streak as the dumb blonde of the group, a cliche I hope the writers don’t overuse. I enjoy her dim moments, but I hope they do not become her defining trait because her character is far more interesting than that. I did really love her motivational speech and mash up of both Miracle and Goonies, including the marching music of “USA! USA! USA!”

And then there’s Zachary Knighton’s Dave – which is often how his character is referred to. He does seem to frequently get short shifted, but in an episode where everyone has little to do, he does score one of the nights funniest moments when he elaborates on his reason for taking the barely legal waitress to the prom: “I went to her prom, but only because I was writing a story for the Chicago Sun Times and my boss, Garry Marshall, was breathing down my neck.” I not only loved that he referenced Never Been Kissed  (which is a really fun movie), but that he was the Drew Barrymore character. Classic Dave!

Best lines of the night:

• Alex: “You can’t just go around Daylight Savings-ing people.”
• Jane: “I don’t remember you speaking any Spanish that night. In fact, instead of ordering tacos you asked for meat, lettuce, and cheese in one of those crispy, half-moon envelopes.”
• Brad to Dave: “Restaurants don’t have windshield wipers.”
• Jane: “That curse should be scared of us, because we are a bunch of criminals and sex addicts with terrible judgment, and we can ruin everything we put our minds to!” This more or less sums up the show in a single sentence, does it not?

Were you loving the group dynamic? Who do you think shined last night? Would you like to see the next episode focus on the body switching curse they all suffer at the end? (Bonus points to Alex for simply stating “I’m Dave” since he more or less fails to have a defining trait) Sound off below!