Holidays aren’t magic.
Anyone could be forgiven for thinking they are. TV loves to inject glitter and light into the Christmas season, with tales of miracles and good will and snow falling at just before the dawn. The Matthews certainly seem to believe it too, in "Girl Meets Home for the Holidays." No one says it outright, but then, they don’t need to. It’s understood that Christmas is special—you can hear it all in the Matthews neurosis family meeting around the tree, as everyone worries about who could ruin it for who. We all want to believe it, because we've all been told it for so long. The truth, however, is more complicated than a TV special. “Holidays” softens the blow for its young audience, bur surprisingly, it lands all the same. Holidays are just days, days that suck for a lot of people—because suck sucks worse when you’re surrounded by evidence that maybe the problem is you.
Not to say that “Holidays” is perfect. The pacing is fidgety. The transitions feel false. Some of the jokes fall flat. But then, that’s Girl Meets World, and whether intentionally done or not, family gatherings do usually feel a lot like this episode, meandering and slow and running round and round the same little hiccoughs. The premise is also blessedly simple. The entire Matthews family are gathering at Cory and Topanga’s home to eat food, share gifts, and be merry. Amy’s a little worried about relinquishing control of the food (and Topanga, in turn, of being nitpicked) but that’s about it. It’s a cute little problem, for a cute little family. Barely worth a runner and, wisely, the show doesn’t really try.
Shawn Hunter has never had cute problems though—and make no mistake, while the show knows there’s some delight in bringing back Amy and Alan and has its fun with “SURPRISE!” teen Uncle Josh, it’s Shawn the old guard’s here to see and on Shawn we focus, as he tries to put on a good face for the holiday. Rider Strong does good work here filling in the gaps of what little we’re told of Shawn’s current life, suggesting in downcast gazes and tensely knotted fingers the tightrope Shawn’s always found himself walking between success and tragedy. He’s doing what he wants to do. He’s traveling the world, living independently, expressing himself with the talent he found late in BMW’s run. Peace isn’t necessarily happiness though, even if it’s more than Shawn at his darkest would have imagined for himself. How content one can feel in it waxes and wanes, and you can feel him swing between both, as he surprises Cory for the day.
It’s hard to say though, whether he would be happier living Cory’s life. When he admits, looking more inward at his own mind than at Maya, that he would never let anyone grow up the way they grew up, Riley’s diagnosis of his reluctance towards her starts to feel only half-true. Yes, she represents what he doesn’t have, but it’s possible Shawn’s too afraid of repeating his parents’ mistakes to truly allow himself to have it. Even Minkus can reproduce, but while Cory can tell him to find someone, it doesn’t automatically erase the feeling he’s too broken to make Cory’s life work. That’s always been their relationship, as referenced cleverly in Cory’s sitcom spin off dreams for them. Cory has the apartment, Shawn is the neighbor; Cory has the deli, Shawn is the cop who eats at it; and Cory has the life, while Shawn looks in on it. Riley is, as Shawn puts it, Cory with Topanga’s hair. She is the perfect combination of the people he’s fixated upon for most of his life and of the life they share that by necessity cannot include him. She represents what he doesn’t have, but more than that, she represents all the interwoven reasons why that’s true—all the things you don’t mention, when it’s the holidays and you haven’t seen your best friend in a while, and his cute little family with their cute little problem don’t need yours added to it.
This makes him, of course, a perfect fit for Maya, who mostly supports this week but manages to steal the spotlight anyway. I don’t know what the show’s plans are in terms of bringing Rider Strong back, but they’ve opened the door via Riley to an interesting relationship there, one with just enough teeth to not feel maudlin. Carpenter and Strong also play well together, both the right amount of afraid and spiteful of their similarities, and while some of the “Okay” and “Fine” doubling up feels forced, the bond is surprisingly natural. GMW has a lot of decent combinations in its cast, but not a lot of winning ones. It’d be a shame to relegate this one to one-offs, though obviously that’s between Strong and the show to decide.
There’s confidence in “Girl Meets Home for the Holidays," a knowledge that little could go wrong with all these blasts from the past in one room. It’s nice to see that confidence used not to coast, but to risk a more somber holiday half-hour than I would expect from the Disney Channel. Sure, it may pull back from real drama, preferring the sentimental half-light of the tree to the pitch black outside the door, but it knows the dark is there—knows, ultimately, that’s why we light the tree at all. “Holidays” may have been foolproof from its inception, but it’s also a winner in its execution, and the best possible outing for any new onlookers curious in the Matthews’ cute little life.
RANDOM THOUGHTS
- Other World inhabitants made in labs: Betsy Randle, for being impervious to aging apparently, and Uriah Shelton, for being mini High School Era Eric Matthews.
- Speaking of Shelton, petition for Joshua Matthews to attend school in New York City now. Shelton’s got more charm and humor in his casually shrugged shoulder than Fogelmanis and Meyer have combined, and his relationship with Auggie was unbelievably adorable.
- The home stories really do work so much better than the school stories—maybe because there’s less pressure to Disney them up?
- Where’s Morgan?
- WHERE’S ERIC?
- No, but seriously, did I miss a line somewhere? I understand that they know why they’re down two siblings, but we don’t.
- Happy Holidays, everyone—or, at least, peaceful ones, in this currently less than happy time.
