11/15/13
View Logs: Hello Ladies S1 Episode 5
Episode Title: Pool PartyI must admit that Hello Ladies is gradually getting a little stale on me. It's starting to become a little too easy to predict the content of each episode. Stuart will come up with a scheme to meet women. It'll work just for a little bit at first but things don't go exactly to Stuart's plan or things aren't moving along fast enough for him. Thus, he tries to force the situation and this makes him super awkward but he's so concentrated on his goal to meet women (specifically hot model women) that he doesn't notice how badly he's screwing up the situation. Then he'll either get flat out rejected or leave out of frustration and find out that things would have turned out far better if he didn't push it.
Einstein's definition of insanity is doing something over and over again while expecting a different result each time. While that definition might have been a little too general, it is fairly apt to describe Stuart's methodology. In my previous view logs I've thought of Stuart as a dick. I still think so but now I think he's a very insane dick. There is something severely irrational with his character and now this show is gradually starting to make me feel worried about his mental health than funny. Maybe that's part of the point but I'm finding myself a little more confused and frustrated than laughing my case off.
Admittedly, there are some very funny moments in Pool Party. The bits with the male stripper bartender is actually very funny (just... watch the episode for this joke, me explaining it in text won't do it justice). It's also funny to see the "unattractive people" actually mingling better with the hot models because they didn't come to the part with some ulterior motive to get a hot girlfriend and thus they were able to interact as people. Theoretically, this episode is actually great. It continues to highlights Stuart's folly and serves as a marvelous example on why so many people (cause women do this too just not stereotypically) are single. They don't treat the others like actual people, just a means to an end.
But here's the issue. I've put this together about half way in the episode and the rest of it was waiting for me to see if I was right or wrong. I've stated a while back that one of the worst experiences you can have through fiction is suspecting a structure then just waiting to see if you are right. Even if you turn out wrong, that wait time should be minimized as much as possible. There's gradually getting more and more of that with Hello Ladies. Now, this doesn't mean that I thought episode 5 was bad. But it's not packing the punch that amazing comedies like Louie or Parks and Recreations can and Hello Ladies is actually written similarly to Parks and Recs. It is quite a good experience retrospectively however and the messages of each episode is thought provoking. I just wish it could be that and a better experience while watching it.
