After a sequence of fairly decent episodes, “If You Bake It, He Will Come” fell a little flat this week thanks to disjointed story lines that weren’t even that interesting. The episode’s forced theme of positive thinking could not hide the mess of inflated non-drama it actually was.
In an episode stuffed with fillers, the Sarah/Luc story takes the prize for the most useless one. We already knew that Sarah was heartbroken that Luc has to leave soon, so…what was the point of this? To provide an opportunity for Gilles Marini to return? To remind us that Sarah had kids? Those scenes could have been better used to develop and embellish the episode’s other inflated plot lines.
Runner-up in unnecessary stories this week is Robert’s “mysterious” job offer. I can see using it for a one-episode filler plot, but not even finding out what the job is was a slight disappointment since we knew about it four episodes ago. Although, I do have a theory about this. Ever since Rob Lowe announced he was leaving the show, rumors have been circulating that the character will be killed off. The test he took for the job reveals that his heart is not back to normal. Could this be a subtle warning? Chances are good that this story wasn’t as pointless as it appears.
Of course, I could be wrong, and the story line was completely pointless. Time will tell.
Meanwhile, the episode wraps up Kevin’s issues with Nora. Though Nora is supposed to be in deep denial, I’m rooting for her to be right the whole time, even though it’s pretty obvious that Kevin would eventually show up to his birthday dinner she is determined to throw for him. Come on, would a Brothers & Sisters episode not have a happy ending? That, and having the Kevin and Nora be mad at each other for yet another week would have been too much of a stretch. One aspect of this plot that I did like was how it really showed Kevin’s insecurities, and how he feared being seen as weak.
Kevin and Scotty also deal with waiting to hear if they’re pregnant. Of course we find out the sort-of good news at the end of the episode, that they’re “halfway pregnant” (meaning that more blood tests need to be done), so everyone is all happy as usual. But I’m suspecting a fake-out here, that we were only told this news-that’s-not-really-news so that it’s extra dramatic when something goes wrong with the pregnancy in the future.
Last but not least, we find out that after the whole ordeal with finding Narrow Lake, Ojai is still in major financial trouble. As in, they’re about to be shut down by the bank if they don’t find the value of Narrow Lake, and fast. What made the story line extra frustrating was that after all Nora and Holly went through to find this place, we still have no idea why York wants it so much. It kind of takes away from their victory last episode.
While everyone tries to figure out Narrow Lake, Rebecca pours her two million dollars she got from Holly into Ojai to keep it afloat. Holly strongly objects and becomes upset when she finds out. Now, given that she just lost all her money in a Ponzi scheme, I can understand that she wouldn’t Rebecca to go through the same kind of loss. But when she came out with her fears of losing Rebecca again…that seemed totally out of left field. It was Rebecca’s decision that had nothing to do with Holly, so why would Holly automatically start thinking that Rebecca would turn around and blame her one day? Maybe Holly was basing this on how her family’s last major disaster ended with losing Rebecca, not necessarily on exactly what the disaster was.
Unsatisfying story lines and lackluster writing breaks Brothers & Sisters recent streak of dramatic, enjoyable episodes. Hopefully, this is just a transition period, and the show will pick up steam once we get closer to the expiration of Luc’s Visa, the birth of Kevin and Scotty’s baby, and the eventual discovery of Narrow Lake’s secret.
