qafreview, s5e1, s5e2, s5e3

Well. If I didn't know better, I'd think everyone, and by everyone, I mean Michael, Mel, Lindz, and Ben, decided to take a really, really *long* hit of acid. Were they bored acting like normal people or something?



Triangle

I blitzed all three this weekend, then went ahead and did it again, thinking I must have seriously missed something huge. When, exactly, did Mel go from her normal constant-rage-at-the-world self to psychotic and unreasoning? Cause man, it's not like I was her main cheerleader up to now, but this is honestly the first time I want to send Lindz after, well, *anyone* else. I get postpartum mood swings--trust me, I *remember*--but her dial is set at EVERYONE IS AGAINST ME KILLKILLKILL. It's not a little scary. I want, more than anything in the world, to give her an Ambien, lock her in her bedroom, and ask her seriously if anything she has done since Jenny was born makes *any* sense at all. It's not like she's tilting at windmills--she's *making* her own enemies to fight at this point. It's unreal.

Lindz leaves, since Mel can't quite get to the forgiving portion of the show after the affair--and I do get that she'd feel betrayed, and I'm carefully not saying glass houses and stones here, since she made the very valid point that her infidelity was before they were married. Okay, that I respect, even if I'm kinda not as sympathetic as I should be. So Lindz leaves. Michael, who also has undergone a change for the nightmarish in somehow getting a stick surgically wired into his ass--how Ben fits up in there these days is anyone's guess--becomes absolutely fascinated with the idea that he and Ben can suddenly decide they want to father the child, shades of Brian having a similar revelation season one, except Brian has *sense*, and also, doesn't have a brand new moral mandate and prefers to top, not bottom for what amounts to, from Michael's frighteningly conservative arguments, the Conservative Gay Christian Right. If there is such a thing. Or maybe Michael just singlehandedly founded it. Hell if I know.

Now granted, it's not like we couldn't see *this* coming, what with Michael becoming the very picture of obsessive with Mel's pregnancy--Mel and Lindz, what were you *thinking*, you *know* him--but going from sperm donor who is active in his biological child's life to coparenting is a big stretch adn was not part of the deal. At all. And if it was, you don't bring it up *after the sprog is born*, after a *difficult pregnancy*. And please, don't give the single mother crap. I will so beat you over the head and shoulders with a wooden dildo, Michael, if you drag up that shit. Stop that! Now!

I was acutally saying this at the screen. I was also this close to tossing shoes at it, but I love my TV. A lot. It brings me Lex and Brian. And porn. So.

Moving on.

Mel, for some reason completely beyond my understanding, completely overreacts to every. single. thing. that Lindz does,says, or breathes in her general vicinity, then begins the proces of seeing how much she can alienate Lindz and Michael so thoroughly that I'm wondering if she needs to be fed a few anti-psychotics. I get that she's tired and grumpy and very post-partum and betrayed and feeling enemies all around her--but at thsi point, she's made her paranoia real. She's alienated Michael, who lets' face it, isn't the most stable radioactive element in this miniature nuclear explosion, by OTTing everything he says, doesn't say, or preaches. Now granted, I feel that way about Mikey a lot, but OTOH, it's not like she can't see that every time she acts out Dictator for Life, Michael is going to go Brutus on her ass. I'm in the middle of re-reading my Republican Rome books, cut me some slack.

So everyone has lawyers. Now, after sniping at Lindz for two and a half eps (and the end of last season for that matter), she suddenly thinks that the best idea in creation is going to be to *tell Lindz not to come to negotiations*. After she's shown that she isn't open to any reasonable idea from anyone, that her ability to hold a grudge is legendary, and after making it clear to Michael that there will be *no* negotiations on any point of Jenny's visitation. And then expects Lindz, who already has the joy of dealing with Mel's temper tantrums, to *trust her*. I don't trust her. I don't trust Michael, who has, again, become Quayle-like in his deep and really terrifying rants against the evils of single motherhood and managed really prettily to alienate his mother. And is completely shocked that he did so! No! How could Deb, a *single mother*, take it personally that you are ranting against it? Why, how unreasonable of her. And managing to alienate Brian, who is today joining Deb in Switzerland while sending money Lindz-ward, which is about what I'd expect.

And Ben, if you don't stop with the supportive lover shit and *talk some sense* into your husband, I swear, the OTP muppet icon is coming back into permanent rotation. Yay you, you are moving into the suburbs and living in a house and I am so pleased for you. But owning a house does not instantly raise your credit in the Parenting Game of Life. Nor does it promote you to sainthood.

I suppose the highlight, for me in all this, was Lindz's lawyer, who managed, quite effortlessly, to make everyone in the room look like a reject from the second ring of hell. And Mikey, who already made it clear he didn't consider Lindz one of Jenny's parents, is completley appalled, becuase who could have seen this coming? In a custody battle? No!

*facepalms* All. Crazy. Michael and his OMG YOU TOTALLY BETRAYED ME YOU BASTARD with Brian. Brian's vaguely wide-eyed amusement at the silliness of it all. Also interesting, he already had a lawyer's number at his desk when Lindz came by--he saw this coming, which is a lot more than I can say for pretty much anyone else in this fiasco. Deb's incredulous look as Michael ranted. Ben's stoic support. Michael and Mel's complete inability to see how they managed, quite brilliantly, I might add, to escalate a situation that probably could have been resolved over coffee into a way for three lawyers to buy new jags. I am impressed.

Yeah. That's all I got. Brian and Justin, I am sure, will do somehting soon, but so far, all waters are relatively still. I like this. It's new for them, all that calm. I know it's before a storm thing, but still. Mmm. Nothing traumatizing.



I am so glad I'm not spoiled for this season right now. This? Is intersting. In a very alternate dimension way.

Sister

I am appalled to report that my younger sister bought the Paris Hilton sex DVD. Okay, first--there is no first. What. The. Hell? They *sell* that thing?

I need to lay down somewhere and pray I was adopted.

Comments

[auroramama]

I don't know why they've all gone insane, and in fact I have trouble buying the depth of rift between Mel and Lindsey, because when they aren't delivering argumentative dialogue, their body language and expressions still read to me as familial affection.

On the other hand, if you want sanity, you don't tell a new mother whose marriage is breaking up that you're going to take her nursing baby away. What was Michael's rush, anyway? Sure, Melanie's offer to consider it when the kid was three or four years old was ridiculous. But no more ridiculous than demanding live-in custody of a baby who is physically dependent on her mother (and vice versa, since being separated from a nursing baby can be physically painful.)

In any case, I can't help blaming Melanie's paranoia in part on the Gus struggle in S1. I'm biased, but there it is.

[seperis.livejournal.com]

On the other hand, if you want sanity, you don't tell a new mother whose marriage is breaking up that you're going to take her nursing baby away. What was Michael's rush, anyway? Sure, Melanie's offer to consider it when the kid was three or four years old was ridiculous. But no more ridiculous than demanding live-in custody of a baby who is physically dependent on her mother (and vice versa, since being separated from a nursing baby can be physically painful.)

I totally agree with that. She and Michael just--superescalated the entire thing. I will agree, Michael started it--dear God, what was his freaking *rush*, she's not even over the delivery yet--but her reactions, while they make *sense*, are way off the chart. I keep wanting to just--sit her down and make her watch herself, because she's not coming off as reasonable in any sense of the word.

That may be why I like this storyline, actually. It feels--as far as QaF ever is--realistic. Everything just keeps building from what happened before and going *on*, and everyone's too emotionally involved at this point to take a step back and breathe. It's probably, so far, one of my favorite non-BJ plots on QaF to date.