Craig Reviews Smash: The Coup

*SPOILER WARNING*

I have to admit that when I saw the title for this episode I was very excited by the possibilities, so maybe I was just coming into it with unreasonably high expectations, but unfortunately the episode really didn’t deliver. The events of The Coup aren’t nearly as dramatic as the title would suggest, and with no musical to focus on the show seemed to be floundering this week. It’s all about the personal lives once again, and frankly it’s a little bit boring. I remain intrigued to see where the show is going, but I definitely felt that this episode needed a more solid direction to take. Hopefully this was simply the means to an end that we’re currently unaware of, but right now it just seems like a very unnecessary episode.

 The episode opens with everyone worrying about the future of Marilyn and Ellis trying to crawl further up Eileen’s arse by showing up at her apartment, right before Eileen’s previously unmentioned daughter shows up to play the role of moral compass for the week before disappearing again. Meanwhile Derek approaches Karen to sing a new song by a new songwriter while they explore a new direction for the musical, unbeknownst to Tom and Julia. Michael finds out he’s been fired from the musical, and also seems to have remembered that he loves his family after completely ignoring them for several episodes. Hopefully this week’s awkward scene between him and Julia will actually be the last we’ll see of the character, but I wouldn’t be willing to put money on it. Ellis manages, in his ever sneaky way, to overhear Eileen and Derek talking about Karen and of course reports it back to Tom, who is none too pleased by the development.  To add to this week’s already tangled web we get a bit more development on Eileen’s divorce as well as a storyline involving Dev and R.J. again, which really goes nowhere and feels completely pointless.

Katharine McPhee is undeniably electrifying during the performance of 'Touch Me'.

Musically this is probably the weakest episode so far. The performance of ‘Dance To The Music’ at a bowling alley was just sub-Glee levels of cheesy, and felt so contrived. What I love about this show is that it doesn’t do what Glee does, so seeing them shoehorn in a cheesy number like this is a little discouraging. The song Karen sings after meeting with the new songwriter, Ryan Tedder of OneRepublic fame, fares much better thankfully. Ryan is responsible for a lot of really great pop songs, and as a pop song ‘Touch Me’ just about stands as a worthy addition to his impressive catalogue. In the context of the show it can’t help but feel completely out of place and awkward, but I think that’s what the show was going for anyway. It’s a striking and energetic performance from Katharine McPhee, but all it really succeeded in doing was making me want the proper Marilyn songs back as soon as possible. It's almost a little sad then that this is still easily the highlight of the episode. Thankfully the performance is the catalyst that finally gets things moving once again, even if it is in a slightly strange direction. Julia and Tom are both equally unimpressed that they weren’t consulted, which I can partially understand, though I find Eileen’s daughter’s rage at the whole affair a little harder to swallow. This character showed up about 30 minutes ago and having her get all preachy doesn’t really feel right. Still, preach she does, and Eileen is convinced that exploring a new direction was a terrible mistake. I actually found myself siding with Derek on this occasion, which is a very rare occurrence, but he is unfortunately considerably outvoted. Then, of course, Ellis shows up.

 Let me just get this out of the way right now, I REALLY loathe Ellis. I have loathed Ellis since the beginning, and I think that’s because I’m supposed to, if not then they’re really not doing much to make him a likable character, but this week he really just went several steps too far. What I like least of all about the character is that he’s consistently rewarded for being a conniving little bastard. He’s Tom’s assistant and should never have been this involved in the musical in the first place and yet in this episode he parades around as if he’s running the damn show and ends up getting a promotion for it. When he burst in after the performance of ‘Touch Me’  and started dictating what the next step should be I was praying for someone to, if not literally then at least figuratively, kick his arse, and yet he ends up moving up the ladder and becoming Eileen’s assistant. That a room full of professionals, including the very strong-willed Derek, would all sit there and take orders from an assistant is just not even a little bit plausible. He’s been taken too far now, to the point that he’s no longer a believable character, and I really hope at some point soon someone’s going to finally realise that he’s a jumped-up little bastard who doesn’t deserve what he’s getting.

Then in the final few minutes of the episode a bunch of weird stuff goes down at once. There’s the incredibly odd stand-off between Tom and Derek that goes some way towards revealing why it is they hate each other. It was not what I expected at all, but apparently Derek’s dad is gay or something. I don’t know, I didn’t really get this part, and it felt a bit silly, as if they were trying to force some kind of bullying sub-text in there for no reason. It’s then decided that the show needs a star and Ivy will no longer be playing Marilyn. This is easily the most interesting development to come out of the episode, if only by virtue of being the only plot development. Ivy is clearly hit very hard by the decision and I’m looking forward to seeing what happens next, but it is slightly soured by the following scene in which Derek shows up at Ivy’s and they sleep together. I thought that whole… thing was over and done with after Ivy called him a prick a front of everyone. You’d also think that maybe it might cross her mind that he had some role to play in her losing the job, and maybe discuss that a little bit, but no; it’s straight to the bedroom.

So, all in all, this episode was pretty awkward throughout. Fortunately it leaves the show in a good position to provide some interesting material next week, but the rest of the episode was severely lacking any narrative flow. It’s definitely something the show needs to work on, as whenever there’s no musical to keep things tied together, the show seems to become a string of scenes that don’t really gel together. Still, it looks like the show will be back to business next week, so for now I’ll put this one down as a blip.