Veep ‘Nicknames’: Grainery Gang Bang

From beginning to end, ‘Nicknames’ is about two important parts of politics: public image and political strategy. The episode opens with a C-Span 2 shot of Selina falling asleep in her chair, and throughout the extremely cynical and hilarious half hour, challenges her authority at every turn, both in her identity with internet bloggers and her ability to do anything but shut herself down in government.

At the end of the day, every politicians decision comes down to self-preservation, something Veep takes sharp jabs at constantly, none better than the political events in ‘Nicknames’. Everything that’s been building up about the clean jobs bill over the first five episodes comes to a head here, even though there’s really not a whole lot of actual political discussion on the bill. After POTUS pushes clean jobs to the side once again, Selina is forced with a choice: either let her supposed ‘legacy’ project die without a whimper, or convince someone else on the Senate to amend POTUS’s favored bill to include the meaty parts of Clean Jobs.

It ends up with Selina filling in for the President on the Senate floor, and voting down her own bill in the name of preserving her one-sided relationship with POTUS, who clearly treats her as a rug to wipe his shit-covered feet on politically. If that self-degradation isn’t enough, the other cat comes out of the bag: the VP is one of the biggest jokes around in the blogosphere, giving us a little bit of insight into why her presidential run failed so miserably. There’s a hilarious scene where Mike, Amy and Gary are just rattling off nickname after nickname, and it’s quite revealing in terms of her public perception – not to mention being a riot.

With much of the episode tied up with Clean Jobs and the debate around it, there’s plenty of opportunity for the trademark snappy dialogue exchanges, which are just getting tighter and tighter in each episode as the writers settle into the characters. I like how Mike is becoming the butt of most of the jokes – it’s too easy to pick on Gary, and since the first couple episodes, they’ve realized Tony Hale is funny enough just being Gary, and he’s too innocent to be the one everyone picks on constantly.

Speaking of being picked on, my favorite scene of the episode stems from the Dan & Jonah story, where we find out how ruthless Dan is when it comes to getting the information he needs, and more importantly, how insecure and lonely Jonah really is as the piss-on assistant in the White House. The first half of ‘Nicknames’ Jonah is his usual self, rattling off hilarious lines about how his cock is like a cappuccino frother (one of the industrial ones), and hilariously being into no name metal bands. But Jonah’s been a huge butt of jokes, and his reaction to Dan’s face-to-face insults added a human layer to Jonah that he’s been missing thus far, and Timothy Simons plays the guarded hurt feelings of Jonah great in that diner scene.

Veep wasn’t content sitting on Clean Jobs storylines for the entire first season, and with Selina moving onto obesity (a topic she feels quite strongly about), the quick change in direction will keep things moving through the second half of season 1 (and it’s politics, so you never know if clean jobs might show up again). Politics is an ever-changing landscape, and often times, bills and opportunities come out of nowhere, requiring quick decisions that can either propel one forward or bury their career in the sand. The jury’s still out on what Selina’s vote in ‘Nickname’ means for her career, but either way it will make for hilarious viewing.

Grade: A

Other thoughts/observations:

– Dan’s speech about the bill is largely forgotten afterward, although it was about the harshest thing anyone’s ever said to her thus far. Dan’s definitely got some balls on him. Also, Mike’s response was classic; “If I don’t understand it…”

– so much funny shit was happening, I couldn’t write notes fast enough. So here’s a few things rattled off: Gary’s Zumba classes, goofy smiles on Vogue covers, Amy’s line about Dan sending pictures of his dick to himself, and of course, “a salad spinner of fuck”.

– some of the things Dan does makes me cringe. His constant need for self-preservation and advancement is reckless, and has led to a number of really dangerous situations on multiple occasions already (remember what he almost said with a press recorder in his face?)

– ‘Nicknames’ definitely shows Selina at her cruelest, and its not a pretty sight. Politicians as tunnel-visioned and self-serving as herself shouldn’t be viewed with much sympathy, but there are times where her temper tantrums are abusive to the people that employ her (and keep her loyalties and philosophies she can’t remember in order).

– couple good nicknames: Mammory Meyer, Veep Throat, Piss Face, Vaselina, Batcave, Grizzly Madams… there were about a dozen rattled off in five seconds there.

– “Get some FUCKING NUTS!!!”

what did you think of ‘Nicknames’? Feel free to leave your thoughts/comments below!