![\"fotc_grass\"](\"http:\/\/www.dreamloom.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2009\/01\/fotc_grass1.jpg\" "\\"fotc_grass\\"")
<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
I did a little scientific research with myself last night, and found that the absolute right way to end a weekend that started with a new and deeply disturbing episode of Battlestar Galactica<\/em> is to sit down with a couple of screwballs on Flight of the Conchords<\/em>. Actually let\u2019s raise that \u201ccouple\u201d to \u201cthree,\u201d because without ol\u2019 Ginger Balls, at least half the screws would be missing. In other news, Bret still looks like mama\u2019s little lost bear cub and Jemaine, while sexy as all hell, still carries himself like Frankenstein. I’m sorry, but it’s true. And I\u2019m sorry again, but all the riches of this show are in the details, so this ended up as more of a recap than a review. What can I say? Let\u2019s not worry about semantics and also, life is hard.<\/p>\n Picking up where we left off last season, Murray is still King of the Dicks on top of the world; i.e., filthy rich manager to new world sensation Crazy Dogggz (whose hits range from \u201cDoggie Bounce\u201d to \u201cDoggie Dance\u201d and \u201cIn the Pound\u201d), working from a brand new office that is miles and worlds away from the New Zealand consulate. His great success is taking its toll on band meetings, though, since he is pathologically incapable of separating the Conchords\u2019 agenda from that of his gold-plated starrrz. Indeed, since we saw them last, Bret and Jemaine have not managed to go platinum, team up with R. Kelly, win a real Grammy, or even keep a handle on all their shoes. They did, however, steal a cushion from the library during a gig, which Murray advises them to return. (\u201cGuys! You can\u2019t steal cushions!\u201d What a great manager.) Finally Bret brings out the big guns, pulling a note from his pocket to read, \u201cDear Murray: We want to fire you as our manager.\u201d Their grand plan? To manage themselves. Yay! What could possibly go wrong? Murray, pissed, tells them to go stuff themselves: he’s got the Crazy Dogggz, who will never, ever die or even get sued by the Polish. But he’s hurt anyway.<\/p>\n Insert quasi-aria by Murray:\u00a0 \u201cRejected\u201d <\/em> At first things go okay for the boys, with a moderately successful gig triggering an offer to write a jingle for a ladies\u2019 organic toothpaste commercial. While pondering said offer during an emergency band meeting, they first review their current merchandise line, which includes Jemaine\u2019s self-monogrammed white T-shirt and a pair of Conchords dolls sewn by Bret, featuring strips of cloth cut from the denim button-down Jemaine is also currently wearing. (That is exactly the sort of silly little detail that keeps me coming back for more.) Ditto the ad guy trying to kickstart their brainstorming: \u201cWhen I saw you guys tonight, I thought, \u2018Here\u2019s two men who know exactly what women feel like.\u2019\u201d Which, to be fair, could be interpreted in a number of ways. Although the fact that Martin_Clark has excessively curly locks and an AOL email address should probably have been a tip-off that he\u2019s a tool. Too bad the Conchords don\u2019t do tip-offs.<\/p>\n Still, kudos to their first crack at ladies\u2019 organic toothpaste jingle writing: \u201cSome women like men; some are lesbian. Femident toothpaste\u2026\u201d Also discarded as possible angles: weaving, women\u2019s rights, wrestling in cooking oil on planes (this one from Dave, who I adore, and who knows women, pretty much, although not really and not at all). Also, some but not all of these discarded angles will eventually appear in the final jingle anyway (see below).<\/p>\n In the meantime, Murray\u2019s luck has gone down the inevitable crapper: turns out the Crazy Dogggz, you know, stole \u201cDoggy Bounce\u201d from an equally terrible Polish band. But he won’t give up the dream without first calling the Conchords in for a little video quiz: \u201cThis Polish one is what\u2019s known as a cover version. Now, the only problem is, this cover version came out 13 years before the Crazy Dogggz\u2019s original version. So my question to you is: is that bad? Or do you think that\u2019s normal?\u201d Normal, yes? No, they assure him, bad. Very very bad!<\/p>\n He manages to sell the guys his desk just as the repo man comes calling, and the two run into Mel while hauling it out of his fancy office building. She is down on the streets leading a fierce mob in a revolt against the Dogggz (one sign reads \u201cCrazy Dogggs Crazy Liars!\u201d and you can hardly blame them for misspelling in a time of such turmoil). She has also \u201cbrought\u201d Doug along with her, although he seems less keen on the slash & burn aspect of the whole affair, especially the part about actually burning CDs. (\u201cWhy did you come, Doug, if you didn\u2019t want to light a fire?\u201d) Oh, Doug, you\u2019re the Conchords\u2019<\/em> version of Toby Flenderson.<\/p>\n Next B&J visit \u201cDave\u2019s House of Deals\u201d to drop off the desk and learn the fine art of negotiation using the \u201cDave double-down technique,\u201d wherein Bret gets suckered into buying a pen he doesn\u2019t want for four times the initial asking pricing of $1.00. (I\u2019ll let you do that math in your head.) And keep your eyes on Jemaine during this scene, because his reactions are priceless.<\/p>\n Then they are off to deliver their jingle, which at an awesome 18 minutes long is a full 17 and 1\/2 minutes longer than necessary. (Jemaine: \u201cWe thought it would be more of a concept.\u201d Ad Tool: \u201cI know you\u2019re from New Zealand, what is this, \u2018Lord of the Rings\u2019?\u201d) Also, the fact that it has nothing to do with toothpaste is a bit of a problem, jingle-wise. But this doesn\u2019t stop Ad Tool from offering the two of them a spot in the actual ad, and the grand total of $1,000 each, which he is able to double down in his own head without any help from them. And just like that, the Conchords are now officially the Femident Boyyyz.<\/p>\n Back on the streets (\u201cFriday\u201d), the guys stumble upon Murray, who has taken up residence in his reliable old Honda. Yikes. He looks more than a little greasy, there’s a pair of underpants draped on the back of the passenger seat, and he is storing office supplies in the glove compartment. Very very bad! And not only do the Conchords not want him back, he also can\u2019t return to the consulate, where he had resigned via a personal letter advising them all to stuff it. \u201cI\u2019m persona non-regates,<\/em>\u201d he says, which Jemaine helpfully translates as \u201cYou\u2019re not at a yacht race.\u201d Correct. And just as Murray is denying, emphatically, that he\u2019s living in his car, his watch alarm sounds to remind him it\u2019s time to move his lodgings before the cops arrive. Still, because he\u2019s Murray, he also takes a moment to admire Bret\u2019s newly woven pants before rolling off. Aw, Murray rocks.<\/p>\n Interior: studio sound stage.<\/em> However, problems arise in the studio dressing room, when Ad Tool and Ad Tool Female try to collect the Conchords\u2019 work permits in order to process payment. Work permits? Green cards? \u201cJust a card, a greenish card?\u201d asks Bret. Yep. And not a library card, either. It should come as no surprise to anyone that both Bret and Jemaine are, in fact, illegal immigrants, possessing neither work permits nor green cards. Oh dear. They call Murray, who as luck would have it is currently sitting in his car outside the New Zealand consulate, shaving. Preparing to grovel.<\/p>\n Except! As luck would have it again, no one at the consulate was even aware that Murray had quit, or been absent for over seven months, and Greg hands him a couple of phone messages without batting an eyeball. Murray steps into his office to find his own never-delivered letter of resignation sitting on top of his desk, with a Post-It attached: \u201cAttn: Everyone. I\u2019m off\u2014stuff it up your noses! Please read enclosed letter. Signed, Murray Hewitt.\u201d Isn’t that beautiful? He crumples it into a ball before reaching down to give his desk a man-sized Murray hug.<\/p>\n And then it\u2019s off to do some quick thinking at the studio, where he arrives minus Bret and Jemaine\u2019s passports and the aforementioned totally nonexistent work visas. Instead, his first piece of advice is to rehire him as a manager\u2014leading to our first round of \u201cYou miss me?\u201d \u201cNo.\u201d \u201cA little bit.\u201d of the season\u2014and his second, after they agree, is to run for it. Finally reunited, our three screwballs peel out of the parking lot in the midst of a torrential downpour, which can in no way dampen the sunny and deluded outlook of dear Murray: \u201cI think there\u2019s a guardian angel looking out for us. Someone up there, someone\u2019s looking down, making sure everything turns out okay for us. I\u2019m sure of it.\u201d Well, okay. As long as he\u2019s sure.<\/p>\n Insert: folk music playing<\/em> I did a little scientific research with myself last night, and found that the absolute right way to end a weekend that started with a new and deeply disturbing episode of Battlestar Galactica is to sit down with a couple of screwballs on Flight of the Conchords. Actually let\u2019s raise that \u201ccouple\u201d to \u201cthree,\u201d because […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"activitypub_content_warning":"","activitypub_content_visibility":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[33,39],"class_list":["post-655","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-reviews","tag-flight-of-the-conchords","tag-hbo"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.dreamloom.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/655","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.dreamloom.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.dreamloom.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.dreamloom.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.dreamloom.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=655"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.dreamloom.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/655\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.dreamloom.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=655"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.dreamloom.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=655"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.dreamloom.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=655"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
\nRejected, thrown away.
\nAffected, I don\u2019t know what to say.
\nEjected, cast out to the sea.
\nDisconnected, they didn\u2019t want me.
\nUnprotected, like a baby in the snow.
\nEjected, like a clown without a show.
\nI objected, pretended I was unaffected,
\nBut still ended up rejected.
\nLike a cake shop without any cakes.
\nLike a cornflake box without any flakes.
\nLeft all alone in the world,
\nLike a little orphan girl who\u2019s been neglected.
\nFeel like I\u2019m cut into two, or bisected.
\nSlung, flung, tossed through,
\nOr trajected, treated as though I was infected,
\nDisrespected\u2014
\nAnd rejected\u2026<\/p>\n
\nInsert: Femident Toothpaste ad, sung while Bret and Jemaine are stuffed inside two gigantic tubes of toothpaste and costumed, naturally, as toothpaste.<\/em>
\nYou are a woman, you wear women\u2019s wear.
\nYou have breasts and longish hair, oh yeah.
\nYou\u2019re kind of fun everywhere,
\nYet you\u2019re still very rare, oh yeah.
\nYou\u2019re a woman and you love to weave.
\nYou\u2019re a woman, you have women\u2019s needs.
\nI know you love women\u2019s rights,
\nYou\u2019re a woman with teeth, now take a bite
\nOf Femident Toothpaste, yeah.
\nFor your feminine dental care,
\nOh, Femident Toothpaste,
\nFemident, Femident, Femident.<\/p>\n
\nThere are angels in the clouds, doing it.
\nThere are angels, doing it doing it doing it doing it, etc., in the clouds.
\nBehind the shroud of the clouds, fooling around.
\nIn the clouds, they\u2019re lying, feathers flying, angels sighing.
\nThere are angels.
\nNobody knows on what goes on under those robes.
\nPushing and puffing and huffing and heaving, etc., pushing, puffing, huffing, and heaving in heaven.
\nUp there, they\u2019re playing the loving game,
\nMaking rain, turning white clouds grey.
\nInsert choirs of angels singing \u201cDoing it\u201d over and over in bright angelic tones while the winged Conchords strum along on their guitars.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"