Parenthood Review: “Lean In” (7×09)

Parenthood really could have gone out for the year on a better note. “Lean In” is a middling episode at best, with stories that are repetitive, grating, and frustrating. As much as I love Sarah and Hank, it’s a rough week indeed when their portion of the show is the sole highlight of the episode.

“Frustrating” really is the best word for how I felt after finishing this episode. It’s not bad, per se, but it simply fails to deliver on any of the promise of Parenthood—fails to deliver on the promise of the season, of the series, of the characters, of it all. “Lean In” is at turns lazy, manipulative, and clichéd, but worst of all is the complete lack of awareness on the part of its characters. The various Bravermans act like real assholes this week, but we’re meant to root for them all the same. This is always true of Adam and Kristina, but here the problem is especially egregious where they are concerned, and it bleeds over into most of the other stories, as well.

It’s an occasionally problematic fact of the series that Parenthood’s characters occupy a bubble of white, upper-middle class SoCal privilege. But “Lean In” is written from within that same bubble, and it makes for some truly unsatisfying storytelling. Take for example Adam and Kristina’s story this week, which has them confronting Dylan’s parents over their decision to pull Dylan out of Chambers. Last time I wrote about Parenthood I defended the narrative decision to place Max’s parents in the school environment with him, but this week it becomes an awful mess. It’s a terrible idea for parents to supervise their children at school, but that doesn’t mean it can’t generate interesting conflict. The script for “Lean In,” though, just makes Adam and Kristina out to be schmucks. Well, more so than usual, at any rate. Kristina’s speech to Max last week was heartfelt and touching; this week, her insistence that Max was not harassing Dylan is wrongheaded and, frankly, insane.

What’s worst is that the whole thing is resolved by a family meeting, in which Max apologizes to Dylan for making her feel uncomfortable, and everyone more or less hugs it out. The whole thing takes a complex issue (actually, several complex issues) and reduces them to a pat, trite conclusion that lifts up the Bravermans without them having to actually address the flaws in either their administration or their parenting. Max learns a lesson and that’s great, but after some great, nuanced handling of this situation, the show really biffs the landing here.

As bad as all that is, the bits with Julia and Joel are even worse. If Kristina and Adam’s parenting this week is misjudged, then Joel’s romantic overtures are flat out insane. Joel is a creep this week, period, but the show plays up this latest development with maximum melodrama, an excruciating point that the overbearing score during their lunch scene drives home. It’s basically the second act climax of a Lifetime movie up in here. Which isn’t to say that Sam Jaeger isn’t great as Joel, but neither he nor Erika Christensen can make this dreck romantic.

It is as always a problem of perspective. The show has never been particularly interested in Joel as a character, which means that the divorce story has been pretty heavily weighted toward Julia. As a study of divorce and its many different phases, and the effect it has on not just the couple, but their families as well, the story has until now worked just fine. It was about Julia, and Joel was an object in it (the same way that Chris, Sydney, Victor and even Zeek have been). But now, this turnaround of Joel’s is thoroughly unbelievable, and so is Julia’s conflicted nature as a result. As for the story’s totally shocking and not at all stupid cliffhanger conclusion, the less said the better. How lazy and reverse engineered can a plot really be? Like with Adam and Kristina, the writing takes something interesting and new and takes it to the most unsurprising, uninteresting place possible.

But the show tops itself even in this regard! After a story with Zeek and Drew that is literally a repeat of the previous one, the episode closes on Zeek having another incident in bed, begging Camille to call an ambulance. Now of course this scene was spoiled by the crack team at NBC’s promotional department, so any potential impact it might have had is entirely out the window. By the time the episode ends you are basically rolling your eyes. I understand the logic behind ending the season here, especially since we began here as well, with Zeek’s health problems, and it’s a fine way to go about things, but it’s hard to be too surprised or affected by a “twist” we literally saw coming a week ago.

It’s a disappointing conclusion to the fall season, sadly. There are still bizarre pacing decisions, with Mae Whitman and Dax Shepard once again taking the week off; there are stories that are repeated wholesale from previous episodes; and there is just lazy, rote, cliché storytelling for too much of the time. The usual charm of the actors, even, is mostly lost, whether amid Zeek’s unnecessary gruffness with Drew, or Joel’s inappropriate declarations of love, or Kristina and Adam’s unbridled asshattery. Here’s to hoping for a stronger back half.

Stray Observations

• Sarah and Mark’s brief reunion here is nice, even if Jason Ritter is being trotted out as a “road not taken” for Sarah and not much else. That’s much better than him serving as the third point of a triangle, which is why I’d feared. It’s a nice enough story on that level, then, further solidifying that Sarah and Hank are for real, Betsy Brandt notwithstanding.
• Did Drew Holt get a haircut? No. He has been very busy studying.
• Well, you have Thanksgiving and suddenly it’s been two weeks since Parenthood aired! Sorry for the delay in getting this up—you’ll understand my reluctance to think about this episode any further, surely.