Leonard’s mother Beverly (Christine Baranski) visits shortly before Christmas, suddenly telling Leonard she’s divorcing his father and that his dog Mitzi died. Meanwhile, Leonard is forced to admit he hasn’t told her about his relationship with Penny.
To me, Leonard’s relationship with his mother borders on unrealistically cold. In this episode, for instance, we learned she communicates more frequently with Sheldon than with Leonard. On the other hand, this does make Leonard seem a more sympathetic character. I’m curious to see how he relates to his father, brother, and sister. If he made it this far professionally and personally without much, if any, emotional support from his family, more credit to him. I liked that no one really comforted him this episode. That would have seemed too hokey.
I wasn’t as much a fan of Penny and Beverly getting drunk on their way back to Beverly’s hotel. I suppose it was the only way to get Beverly to open up and for Penny to work up the courage to tell her she was dating Leonard, but it reminded me of the boys getting stoned in “The Adhesive Duck Deficiency”—a bit too typical. Beverly finally showed some approval of Leonard and Penny’s relationship in the end, but I wondered how much of it was the booze talking.
There was no B story this episode and only a brief scene with Howard and Raj facing Beverly, revisiting the homosexual aspects of their friendship.
Summing up, while I enjoy watching what Beverly brings out of each character, she seems robotic herself. Imagining how unloved Leonard must have felt growing up is only fun up to a point. I hope she recurs sparingly or doesn’t hog as much of an episode in the future.
I hope Kunal Nayyar still got paid for this episode despite having not one line of dialogue.
Beverly’s attraction to Sheldon was obvious on the way from the airport. They could have skipped all the useless talk about the busboy we never saw and found more screentime for Beverly and Sheldon. (Or, hmm, maybe a line or two for Raj.) As it was, the kiss was just a ratings grab that it took four writers to come up with.
I think Sheldon’s abrasiveness could have been nicely tempered if he’d actually made that cup of tea for Leonard. Anyone else attempting to comfort Leonard would have seemed hokey, maybe – but Sheldon doing so within his limited understanding of typical human interactions would have worked.
Beverly acted WAY too promiscuous in this episode. And her crap about the busboy was SO LAME! Not that I want her to get together with Sheldon-or ANYONE to get together with Sheldon, but really, they ruined her character. Oh yeah, and HOW COME RAJ HASN’T SPOKEN SINCE THE VENGEANCE FORMULATION? Really? He needs more screen time. This episode was soooo disappointing-I ship Sheldon/Nobody, but I may have laughed at that kiss, considering the circumstances, if I hadn’t known about it prior.