Geofferson

Great episode tonight. I must say though that Mike's storyline with his dad (Burt Reynolds) stole the spotlight from Ed and his proposal to Carol (though the last scene was very heartfelt).

kevin75

i thought that the storyline with the burtons was a really neat thing. all week they had been hyping the ed/carol proposal and as it turned out, it was just an afterthought. the eventual propoasal was very well done and appropriate at the pond where all of the important parts of the ed/carol relationship have taken place.

"i'm potent!! you're impotent!!"

Charlie Goose

I thought the Mike plot was kind of weak. It was like "Dad, you're a condescending scumbag to me all the time, but you can't get it hard, so let's make up."
Ed's search for the perfect proposal was good though. Cute pictures of Julie Bowen growing up too.

Nancy in pigtails =

Honk!

MrX

I liked the Mike story. When he went off on his father I was rolling.

Houlihan's

I thought they handled the proposal very well.

Rogue588

Quote:

Originally posted by Charlie Goose
I thought the Mike plot was kind of weak. Ed's search for the perfect proposal was good though.

Nancy in pigtails =

Same here [though I did like Mike's "uh oh" after he pimp slapped his dad ] & I agree about Ed's search.

And MAN was I hoping there was more light when Nancy leaned over as she was getting into bed with Mike...

big whoppa

I really only enjoyed the part where Ed gives Carol her favorite things and proposes.

Damn, Burt looks old.

Patman

The best line of the night was from Phil: "I prefer white meat." I couldn't stop laughing for quite a while. Phil's reply was in response to Eli getting perturbed at Phil and telling him that he was going to shove a turkey drumstick up his ass.

Here's a recap:

"The Proposal"

Pretty good episode. Starting out with the cheesy proposal idea, Ed scales down his plan of attack, leaving Carol befuddled and confused. After a couple of mis-starts (dinner at the Smiling Goat, and renting out a theater to show Carole a montage of her life), Ed stumbles on a list of Carol's favorite things from 1982, and proceeds to give Carol all 25 of her favorite things. It was very sweet, Carol loves it, and finally Ed gets on one knee and proposes to Carol, and offers to move to New York to be with her. Carol is thrill, accepts the ring, and adds one more thing to the list.

Burt Reynolds and Blair Brown show up as Mike's parents, and Mike just seethes when his dad shows up because they don't have a good relationship. Mike's dad always calls him Tin Man. Mike's mom tells Nancy that their sex life is pretty much dead because Mike's dad is pretty much impotent.

Eli can't quite pull the trigger on telling Jennifer how he really feels about her, and with Thanksgiving around the corner, he uses the event he hastily concocts (opening up Stuckeybowl and cooking for other folks in Stuckeyville without any place to be for Thanksgiving) to have Jennifer with him on the holiday.

Mike's dad wants to fry a turkey, buys the needed deep frying pot and eventually winds up burning down Mike's house. Mike's gets so angry that he just cracks and start screaming at his dad: "You're IMPOTENT! IMPOTENT! IMPOTENT!!!"

Mike's parents leave for Stuckeybowl for the Thanksgiving meal, and they are the only people to show up thanks for Phil not putting up any of the fliers around town, so the Stuckeybowl crew with way too much food have Thanksgiving with Mike's parent. Later Mike and Nancy and Sarah show up. Mike apologized for his outburst, and Mike's dad apologizes for burning down the house.

HistoryProf

What a great episode....they handled everything perfectly I thought...and I was heartened to see the 'spoiler' from last week showing Ed propose was a dream sequence in the first minute....nicely done.

The only thing missing for me was he and Carol showing up at Stuckeybowl to announce the engagement to everyone....

and while yes, Burt looks old...He also looks great imho.

lisadoris

There were some damn funny moments in this episode: Mike's whole you're impotent tirad was classic, Mike not only pimp slapping his dad but the uh oh afterwards, Phil's white meat comment, Shirley going on about the yams.

I'm actually glad the proposal itself didn't take up the entire episode. I don't know if I could have handled an hour of sappiness. But I'm sure we'll have plenty of that when we actually get a wedding episode.

tofu

That was great. Best part of the whole episode.

Geofferson

Agreed - that was probably the funniest line on Ed I've ever heard.

guywall

My wide watched the proposal part three times and got teary eyed.
But it was good. I love Phil's "Don't start throwing those big lawyer words at me" whenever Ed says anything in disagreement with him.
The Eli/Jenny thing has become much less painful.

EDIT: Thanks, Colonel Mustard! Thank God she does not read DVDTalk.

Meteu185

Is it just me or do they seem to be moving toward a "Series Finale" for May?

Anyone else think that maybe the producers know more than they're letting on about the show being in it's final year?

dolphinboy

Wouldn't a season finale building up to a wedding potentially be the perfect ploy to boost ratings and get one more year?

Also, don't the producers and creators get syndication dollars after doing 100 episodes? That would be in season 5, so if that's true, you'd think they'd want to try and make it at least another season.

It does feel they're wrapping stuff up, but maybe if Ed and Carol get married there won't be a reason anymore to have so much focus on them. After the marriage, maybe they can have Ed and Carol away for a month on their honeymoon and let the show focus on MIKE and Nancy!!!

kevin75

i really hope that they are not aiming for the end in may. especially since ed seems to be doing better in the ratings.

Colonel Mustard

If you meant to say "wife" instead of "wide", I hope for your sake she doesn't read DVDTalk!

DJLinus

Anyone know what the song was that was playing during the proposal?

hahn

They used that same song in Scrubs last year when Turk proposed to Carla. It's "Question" by Old 97's.

Roto

I thought the whole episode was a pretty big letdown after the past few weeks. Probably because I felt sorry for Mike the whole time because his dad's a jackass. The funniest part was when he "pimp slapped" him back It was too bad, because I liked the idea of Burt Reynolds being on. Too much tension and not enough comic relief. There better be something good coming out of the Burtons' house burning down. I can't think of how, but otherwise I really don't see the point of that. They could've possibly made it funny if we got to see how it happened rather than the miserable aftermath.

Ed keeps blowing off Carol in order to surprise her, so they are both in agony the whole time until the payoff, which by Ed's standard was pretty lackluster because he was short on time. I liked the song though. As always they came up with just about the perfect song for the moment, even though I don't know who it was this time.

Personally though, I liked the imaginary proposal at the beginning more than the one at the end. I think it irks me more that the list could've been great if they would've gone with that from the start. They could've spent the whole episode doing things on that list. Go to Grandpa's house, have some strawberries and Steak'Umms. But then of course, we'd find out Grandpa's dead and it would still be a downer episode.

Patman

I wished they would have shown Ed passed out from exhaustion as being the reason he stood Carol up at the theater. That would have been comedy.

DJLinus

Thanks!

I have class on Wednesday nights and keep on forgetting to tape this show. I've pretty much only seen maybe 2 episodes this season (2.5 counting the last half of this week's episode). The proposal this week totally caught me off guard - knew it was going to come, but not this soon.

Charlie Goose

Fortunately for me, I have no class and everyone knows it.

Honk!

movieking

Great show. Nancy = hot. I find this show to be a bit uneven this season, but the last couple of episodes have been extremely strong...

B.A.

I really did enjoy the sub-plot w/ Mike and his father. I didn't find it funny when he was screaming "Impotent" at Burt - just seemed too stupid. But the best part of the ep was when he finally pimp-slapped his dad back - I was waiting for him to do that the whole show.

They handled Ed's proposal to Carol very well. My wife really enjoyed it, too - she almost started crying.

Phil's white meat comment to Eli was great.

Nancy and Carol were hot this week.

Roto

Nancy and Carol are always hot. I'm a big fan of whoever is responsible for Nancy's wardrobe. She tends to wear a lot of tank tops around the house. Mike is my hero, even if he can't fry a turkey.

Heck, Molly would be hot if she lost the weight. Carnie Wilson's got nothing on her.