"Let's stop fucking thinking!"
Hi, there, sorry for the late reviews, I'm just catching up on everything. On Here and Now's seconds episode we pick up right where we left off, Audrey and Greg are arguing outside the therapist's office and I have to say their insults always cut way too deep, they're always so well crafted, seems like it would be refreshing for someone to just say "fuck off" at least once.
Inside the office, Ramon doesn't beat around the bush and just tells everything to the therapist, Fahrid Shokrani (Fred for his racist patients). He tells him about his dream and the mother, and contrary to what one would expect, he pays attention and when he looks at the picture even seems to remember seeing Ramon that day. Then, of course, he tries to push it down and only recommends he lays off the drugs for a while, even though Ramon advocates for Marihuana passionately enough to get Fahrid's interest peaked.
Later, when he's at home talking to his wife, Layla (Necar Zadegan - 24, Girlfriends' Guide to Divorce), we learn it means "It's coming" in Farsi. He's wondering about how odd it all is since the photo Ramon saw was in his office for just one day and he seemed to remember that day at the beach when he was five, he also realized 11/11 is also his birthday, but Layla writes it off as one of the wonders of the brain and a few coincidences. He doesn't seem convinced but of course, he can't go down the supernatural rabbit hole so easily.
In his episode we delve a lot into Farid's family, their differences and how they manage them, Farid is quite against Islam, but his wife isn't, and his son, Navid (Marwan Salama), follows the religion but wears makeup and a hijab, which could make him a bigger target, so even though the parents try to be understanding, they don't let him go out like that outside their home. We also see quite a bit of hypocrisy from the mother since she wears the hijab not because she's oppressed but because in the US the oppressive thing would be forcing her not to wear it, but yet she's okay with this making her a "target" and not with letting her son go out into the world the way he wants to.
We also learn Navid goes to Kristen's school and seems to have a crush on her. Speaking of school, we see a fun scene where they debate on Sex Ed and then thing get a bit more complicated, they find posters for the Northern European Heritage society, "be proud of your race". This leads to a debate, run by Audrey, where the white kids complain about how only diverse kids get their pride celebrated, and that they're sick of feeling they need to personally apologize for all of history, which could've been an interesting point of that debate but gets a little sidetracked by what they'll do next.
When Kristen learns she has chlamydia she tells Ashley she slept with Randy, Ashley's mad but she takes her to the clinic where they get attacked by a "pro-life" protester who calls Kristen a dumb whore, so she kicks him in the balls (nice!). But then the cops arrive and arrest them both. Ashley and Kristen have very different experiences with the cops, while Kristen makes friends with one of them played by Samantha Sloyan (Grey's Anatomy, Scandal), Ashley gets questioned about everything, from the price of her bag (if she didn’t steal it) to the amount of skin cream she carries, and gets her wig "searched". Eventually, they're let go, since it turns out the guy was a registered sex offender (yeah, the one shouting about the importance of life) and the clinic was close to a middle school so he wasn’t going press charges.
Malcolm picks them up, so Ashley decides to come clean about everything that led to them being at the clinic, mainly Randy, and I mean she comes CLEAN, she tells him she likes to flirt but would never go through with anything. And he's upset, but not as much as I expected him to be, he points out her need to flirt seemed to have put things in motion that ended with her sister getting legally raped and getting chlamydia, she argues he coaches a women’s soccer team and gives them messages. So they decide to not let the argument escalate by agreeing to do the crazy shit together, not apart. She also tells him she has decided not to wear the wig anymore (which is honestly a relief), but she doesn’t tell him what happened to it. This was honestly my favorite story, not only because I find Ashley and Malm's marriage really interesting, but because it showed how the same event can go so differently for two people (Ashley and Kristen) and how subtly they treated these differences, it was truly brilliant.
We also see a new side of Duc here, we see a bit of his "brand" lifestyle, he also seems to be writing a book if he gets his dad to work with the publisher again. We learn he has memories of watching strangers having sex with his mom, who was a prostitute. And we learn he's not celibate at all, he actually seems to have a misogynistic issue there, given the way he conducts himself with these women, there's also the little detail that he seems to like only white women. I guess we'll see more of his journey later, but for now, he's my least favorite sibling.
While Audrey is convinced Ramon has schizophrenia, like her brother Ike, Greg is willing to open his mind and investigates the 11 11 phenomena, since if the 11 11 thing was just about Ramon, then why would so many people share Ramon’s experience? he even starts to see the number everywhere too, which makes me wonder, is this a train you can willingly hop on?. Greg continues to be quite lost and ignored by his family, and this only adds to it, he even has another outburst in front of his students, going back on his life's work, his empathy philosophy, saying it really accomplishes nothing, it only lols you into complacency, so you can get fucked even harder, then he kicks them out in the middle of class telling them to stop thinking and go live.
"Live, love somebody, hate somebody, let's stop thinking, go burn something down!"
We see Ramon and Henry's relationship develop as they open up to each other, Ramon tells him he remembers being a kid and being followed by shadows, so this is clearly not completely new for him. And instead of being turned off, Henry suggests he shouldn't look at what’s happening to him with fear. So Ramon wonders why he sticks around if he might be losing his mind but Henry says he feels he’s where he’s supposed to, and he doesn’t get that feeling very often.
During the whole episode Audrey organizes a dinner for everyone but Ramon to discuss the situation, but Kristen tells him and he shows up, he tries to put her mind at ease but he also implies she should stop making this about her, since he's the one that should be scared the most about losing his mind, but maybe they just don't know what's in store for him. And it is nice when she gets put in her place, her fears are understandable, but her character continues to be quite annoying, though her one scene with Kristen was pretty nice.
It can only get better.
Mom, I think old people lie when they say that. They don't want us to know how truly horrible things are, cause we'd all run screaming into traffic.
What did you think of the episode? I look forward to your comments.
