Part of Two Guys and a Girl‘s growing charm in season two was its formal experimentation with episodes like “Two Guys, a Girl and Halloween” and “Two Guys, a Girl and Barenaked Ladies”, half hours that displayed a comedic and narrative versatility it felt the show almost discovered accidentally. “Sunday in the Apartment”, the first ‘bottle’ episode of Two Guys and a Girl, is the latest attempt by the series to shed its traditional sitcom trappings for something different – only problem is “Sunday in the Apartment” lacks the energy and ingenuity of its previous creative endeavors, in what amounts to a mindless, unnecessarily acerbic half hour of manufactured conflict (and by “manufactured conflict”, I mean “half hour of bickering”).
Following the events of “Career Day”, “Sunday in the Apartment” sees the gang gathering at Pete and Berg’s apartment in anticipation of attending a Patriots game – a treat from Pete himself, after taking Sharon’s new job out from underneath her (well… kind of) in the previous episode. When it seems the game is going to be rained out, the group then tries to agree on what they’re going to do instead; it’s a perfectly capable premise for a bottle episode, one that naturally builds in conflict from the various things characters would want to do with their day off (Ashley wants to go to an art museum, Sharon wants to wedding plan, etc.), or what they’d prefer to eat, and so on and so forth. Unfortunately, “Sunday in the Apartment” uses those conflicts as the backdrop for more interpersonal drama – which not only feels a bit counterproductive, but actively works against itself as the characters get more and more acidic in their behavior.
It’s not inherently uninteresting; “Sunday in the Apartment” certainly follows suit with previous episodes this season in suggesting that Berg and Ashley’s relationship has an expiration date, with Berg’s expressed frustrations at not being able to spend his only day off without her, and Ashley’s growing indignation at anything Berg shows interest in. Had this been the only Ashley-centric conflict of the episode, “Sunday in the Apartment” would be in perfect position to use their incendiary interactions as primer for the other, sillier stories of the episode (which includes the return of Irene, last seen in season two’s “Two Guys, a Girl and Valentine’s Day”). But “Sunday in the Apartment” suddenly decides to make Ashley the anchor of the entire episode, rather than its initial focus of shaming Pete and building out multiple different, enduring character arcs (or even landing on Sharon, who spends the whole episode arguing with Johnny over the grandiose desires she has for their wedding). That shift – particularly in the episode’s second act as she and Pete begin trading jabs and her pork aversion becomes a grating plot point – throws the episode out of balance, and can’t recover to land the moment when she confronts everyone in the group about their supposed “friendship” with her, leaving it feeling hollow and rushed.
It’s just a few degrees too much, in an episode with no gravity to pull towards any of its other stories; which is odd, because all of them are setting up some of the bigger arcs and shifts in the group dynamic lying in the season ahead. Some of these are nascent ideas in this episode – Pete and Ashley’s “friendship”, which becomes a focal point towards the end of season four, for example – but there are some real foundations being laid here, with Berg and Ashley’s fundamentally discordant relationship, Sharon and Johnny trying to build a life together, and Irene’s reignited obsession with Pete (which is a lighter, more comedic accent, at least until late in season three). The only issue is the introduction of these stories is so toxic and so defined by their most selfish aspects, that they drown out anything interesting about their conflicts (like the class divide between WASP-y Sharon and blue collar Johnny) for lowest common denominator material.
There are the bones of a really good episode here, though, had the running gags and arguments led to something other than Ashley feeling like she’s left out of the group, an idea that comes out of left field enough that it feels tacked onto the episode. What appears to be a continuing referendum on Berg and Ashley’s relationship (arguably the most effective aspect of the whole episode) quickly shifts into the entire group’s acceptance, or lack thereof, of Ashley over the past season. While it’s not completely unfounded, it’s a weird place for “Sunday in the Apartment” to land, and feels like a strange third-act shift away from the more interesting parts of the episode. But with Ashley not having much agency across the half hour – except over her outfits – she just comes across as whiny for the first half, and a bit desperate in the second half, an entirely inconsistent depiction of the strong-willed, confident woman we saw in her earliest appearances.
I really want to like “Sunday in the Apartment” for its bits of humor and its willingness to explore so many major story arcs in a bottle episode, but it all feels a bit jumbled and discordant by the time it’s pushing towards its resolution. Thankfully, it was neither the first nor the last of Two Guys and a Girl‘s experiment with the sitcom format; no television show has a perfect batting average, of course, so I’m willing to begrudge the season an early misfire in the spirit of its continued evolution.
Other thoughts/observations:
- as noted, “Sunday in the Apartment” marks Irene’s return to Two Guys and a Girl, where she will become the show’s quasi-fifth cast member moving forward. Her introduction here, which is mostly jokes about her mental breakdown following Pete’s rejection, is… not the best. It will take the show a bit to figure her character out, but her manic energy and desperation to endear herself to the group certainly offer a new energy to the show.
- “Money isn’t everything.” “That’s what people without money say.”
- Berg doesn’t want to go to the art museum: “they’re showing the works of Boris to Tears!”
- Johnny: “No chicken dance? What kind of wedding is this?”
- The pizza delivery guy is played by none other than American Idol‘s original co-host, Brian Dunkleman.
- Pete suddenly getting defensive on Irene’s behalf because it serves his own frustrations is… classic Pete, unfortunately.
- Sharon’s wedding demands include a 20 foot train of satin, rose petals, three harpists, a huge church, a horse drawn carriage, and 200 white turtle doves.
- Up next: Two Guys and a Girl goes body-swap horror in “Halloween 2: Mind over Body”.