Not A Couple Show Notes: Will & Grace Episode 3.15 — “My Uncle the Car”

NotACouple
Jul 25, 2017 · 4 min read
Ellen as a nun couldn’t save this episode. Ellen. AS A NUN.

There is perhaps no metaphor better for the disappointments of W&G Season 3 than this: The show airlifted Ellen DeGeneres in to play a thirsty nun, and we scarcely guffawed.

It’s not the only introduction that doesn’t land. This week also marks the first appearance of Beverley Leslie, aka Gay Harlan, and it also marks the first and last time we see “Black Jack” (at least it better be the last time).

Honestly, guys, we really don’t know what this show is trying to do with itself half the time.


Summary: The Will & Grace gang compete to see which one of them can have the worst plotline this week. It’s Jack, but everyone else REALLY puts in a valiant effort. Ellen is there too.

“This episode was brought to you by lesbian cheesecake nuns. We feel like there should be a pun in there but that would be sexist.”

00:00: The title of this episode is SO DUMB.

01:03: This episode was a goddamn dumpster fire, despite the addition of America’s future lesbian sweetheart Ellen.

03:31: Baby Matthew didn’t know what double dipping was until he had real friends.

04:08: Jack is extremely underutilized in this episode, but for once that’s really, REALLY a good thing.

JACK: “‘Jack, I know this may come as a shock to you, but your father is a black boy. Gotta run. It’s coconut shrimp night. Kisses, Mommy.’”
WILL: “She said your father’s a black boy?”
JACK: “Oh my God… I’m black. I’m black, and my mother says “black boy.” I’m black, and my mother’s a racist.”

05:40: Tragically, “white guy thinks he might be half-black” is actually a real thing that happens more than once on network TV shows.

Tess: “They’re relying on old-ass stereotypes that have to do with actual systematic injustice in the world, and they’re making it a joke because ‘haha isn’t it funny when it happens to a white guy.’ No, it’s fucking not funny; this is terrible.”

09:03: This episode lands firmly in the “extremely dated” category, both in initially suggesting that Jack is black and in everyone else’s humoring response.

11:48: This episode introduces Beverley Leslie, “who is a person, I guess.”

KAREN: “You came between one of the most sacred relationships there is — a woman and her housekeeper.”
BEVERLEY: “Well, what can I say? She just prefers being around masculine energy.”
KAREN: “Let’s leave your wife out of this. I want you to stay away from Rosario!”

Matthew: “This whole episode, this guy is basically Gay Harlan. Except we’re not even saying he’s Gay Harlan, which is kind of uncomfortable actually. … It’s literally all the things I hate about the rich people on this show, plus Jack.”

13:40: Rosario is technically treated like a person this episode, but just barely.

Matthew: “I was amused by the parallels between him stealing Rosario and Rosario cheating on Karen. But also it kind of hinged on the idea that Rosario is not a person and more like a Roomba with blood.”

15:47: This plotline exposes one of the biggest potential problems with the W&G revival: The juxtaposition of its super-liberal marketing with its super-conservative Karen.

18:30: The A-plot this week is about a car we’ve never heard of that belonged to an uncle we’ve never cared about and we’ll never see either again.

19:11: Ellen DeGeneres as a bleak, cheesecake-selling nun sort of redeems this episode, but only sort of.

SISTER LOUISE: My family sent me to a convent when I was three. Actually, they told me I was going to the zoo. I was all excited. They got me dressed up, gave me a lollipop, I ended up here. All I wanted to do was see the penguins. Ironic, isn’t it? What’s sex with a man like?

21:11: Grace had to be a lot stupider than she’s usually written for this plot to even get off the ground, and it still didn’t work because we don’t know or care about her family.

Link Roundup

My Mother the Car: This episode-namer was a TV sitcom from the ’60s, in which a man purchases a car which turns out to be the reincarnation of his dead mother. Seriously, we can’t make this shit up. TV Guide ranked it as the second worst television show of all time, after The Jerry Springer Show.

After more than a decade, Richard Belzer has finally left “Law & Order: SVU,” by which we mean he shows up every 10 or 12 episodes to remind us the truth is out there and it probably owes the IRS money or something.

John Munch’s Royalties: Okay, we know you’re all surprised by this, but Matthew and Tess were just slightly wrong on this — it’s TV writer David Simon who gets royalties every time SVU’s Detective John Munch appears on the show, not Munch’s actor Richard Belzer. But Belzer is part of the reason Simon got those royalties in the first place — after actor Benjamin Bratt left the original Law & Order, Belzer called up Dick Wolf and pitched his character from Simon’s Homicide as Lennie Briscoe’s new partner. Ol’ Dick had already cast that role, but loved the idea enough to send Munch to SVU. And the rest is history.

Slapsgiving 3: Slappointment in Slapmarra: The infamous conclusion to Marshall and Barney’s seasons-long Slap Bet, which tragically featured yellowface. It was super disappointing all around.

Next Episode: S3E16-17: “Cheaters”

NotACouple

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Will & Grace podcast run by @TheRealSpiffen and @matthewreddin. We upload on Thursdays!

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