Season 3, Episode 7 (originally aired July 29): “Open Mic Night”
Microsynopsis: Steve is determined to get his bar mentioned in a local hipster magazine in order to gain more customers. He invites a writer from the publication to attend the bar’s open mic night, for which the bar’s regulars have signed up to perform uncomfortably bad acts.
Good: There’s plenty of Susan here. She wins an award at work, and armed with the confidence it brings, she mimics her mother’s accent and character in a way that leaves bar patrons in stitches.
Bad: The excitement generated in the bar for open mic night is simply ridiculous. The whole “let’s put on a show” vibe feels like a summer camp where nobody has any talent. You know that summer camp gag where one person wraps his arms around another from behind, while the person in front puts his arms in a pair of pants and the pair acts like one bizarre little puppet? They actually do that in this episode. And that’s only the second-creepiest, second-most infantile performance on open-mic night.
Hapa moment: Susan gives her mom a hint about what her open-mic act is going to be. In her best impression of Ok Cha, Susan says, “It’s a-not my fadda!”
Overall: This may be the worst episode in Sullivan & Son’s three-season run so far.
Final grade, this episode: D minus.
Twelve-year-old Momo has recently moved with her mother Ikuko from a condo in Tokyo to a tiny, rural island in Japan, where Ikuko grew up and where both try to deal with the recent death of Momo’s father.
Momo doesn’t tell anyone, but her last words to her father were shouted in anger, a horrible expression of childish disappointment that she can never take back. As she tries somehow to manage the guilt, grief, loneliness, pain, and adjustment of this new life, mysterious things happen in her house and neighborhood. Small personal belongings disappear. Orchards are raided for their fruit before it is ready for harvest. Snacks disappear from the kitchen with only trash left in their place. Momo sees strange shapes and movements out of the corners of her eye as Ikuko leaves each morning, but nothing’s there when she turns her head to get a better look.
Microsynopsis: Billy Gardell returns as Lyle Winkler, Steve’s childhood rival. He opens a bar across the street from Sullivan & Son, not to make a profit, but to drive Steve out of business over some middle-school slight. The new bar, Lyle & Son, is cooler and more exciting, and for a while even Steve’s regulars find it difficult to stay away. Steve and Lyle agree to a loser-leaves-town bartenders’ challenge. Meanwhile, Carol’s hanging out with her new boss (played by Frank Caliendo) who drives her crazy with annoying impressions. She likes her new position but is afraid to express her displeasure for fear of losing her job.
