Ellen: Three Strikes

Rockin' out to "Born to Be Wild"

Ellen: Three Strikes
ABC
March 29, 1995
Sitcom
DVD
B-

This story by two writers who didn't work on any other of my shows feels uneven, although it is nice to see more of Ellen's parents, as she's released to their custody after an animal-rights protest.  And we find out that Joe's father was a hunter, and Joe's mother made Joe wear a dress.  (When Ellen wears one, everyone reacts like she's in drag, which in a way she is.)

Clyde Kusatsu, who's Judge Mitchell Sung, played three different roles on M*A*S*H and was Kim Lee on Who's the Boss?  Cop Roger Eschbacher would later appear as Derek.

Roseanne: Happy Trailers

Roseanne: Happy Trailers
ABC
March 29, 1995
Sitcom
DVD
B-

This Doyle & Youngers story for the most part isn't great (the over-the-top performance of Sharon Stone as trailer trash doesn't help), but I really like the talk Roseanne and Darlene have towards the end.  Mark and Becky move into a trailer park and her parents want to help, but the young couple wants to be independent, especially with Roseanne and Dan's baby on the way.  Note that Dan makes a joke about them not buying lottery tickets anymore, which would become ironic in retrospect.  Also, David and Darlene seem to be on better terms at this point than recently.

John McConnell returns as Bob.

Ellen: $5,000

Ellen: $5,000
ABC
March 22, 1995
Sitcom
DVD
B

Newman & Stark wrote this very funny episode where an IRS agent (Dann Florek, great here, at a point when he'd been on Roseanne the first of three times, as Darlene's Principal, before coming back as a doctor) encourages Ellen to spend her refund of the title amount, but she gives it to Helping Hand, only to find out that the IRS made a mistake.  Meanwhile, Joe is an illegal immigrant from Canada, and Adam is taking pictures of Paige as inanimate objects.

Roseanne: Husbands and Wives

Roseanne: Husbands and Wives
ABC
March 22, 1995
Sitcom
DVD
B

It feels like a lot of this season is about getting a little derailed and then getting back on track, as in this Kevin Abbott story which finally deals with the aftermath of Fred walking out on Jackie.  Roseanne and Dan try to get them back together, but both Fred and Jackie are reluctant.  Fred realizes he overreacted when he has to defend Jackie to her mother, but Jackie realizes she prefers being on her own.  They reconcile, for the moment.  Meanwhile, Darlene and D.J. fight like in the old days.

Ellen: Gladiators

Ellen: Gladiators
ABC
March 1, 1995
Sitcom
DVD
C

Not only didn't I care about Ellen's triangle with Nitro and Ice (Dan Clark and Lori Fetrick, who had both appeared on Who's the Boss? six years earlier), but I didn't care about Richard Day's subplots of Joe trying to be polite to customers, and Paige and Audrey getting in a car accident.  Note that Audrey gives Adam a big kiss, although she's supposed to be over him.  Customer #2, Raymond Forchion, would be Smitty the following year.  This is the first of two Ellen episodes directed by Trainor.

Roseanne: All About Rosey

Roseanne: All About Rosey
ABC
March 1, 1995
Sitcom
DVD
C+

Ulin & Sandaas wrote the frame for this hour-long clip show, which I might've given a B- if they could've kept the same frame throughout.  Things start out well in 1965, when Roseanne (played screechingly by Fishman) and Jackie (Metcalf's approximately eleven-year-old daughter Zoe Perry, quite good as approximately nine-year-old Jackie, her second time in the role after being in the '92 Halloween episode) visit a female fortune-teller, played by Goodman.  For $1, he can show them Roseanne's life from '88 to '94.  And then we get opening credits that splice together the various credit sequences, a bit like the morphing credits in Season Eight or Nine.  Certainly, the episode is propelled by nostalgia, although as always when a clip show runs late in a series, especially a series in decline like this one, there's going to be regret that things aren't as good as they used to be.  (Even the Darlene-teasing-D.J.-about-masturbation-at-the-dinner-table sequence from Season Six already looks classic compared to Season Seven.)

In the next frame, set in 2025, a Bev-looking Jackie takes D.J. to a Psychiatrist played by Eric Christmas (many, many credits, including both Harold and Maude and Attack of the Killer Tomatoes).  Goodman plays middle-aged D.J., who's traumatized by the Becky switch.  And then in the final frame, covering about half the episode, Roseanne is visited by other TV Moms:

• Barbara Billingsley as June Cleaver;
• Pat Crowley as perhaps the most obscure TV mom, Joan Nash from Please Don't Eat the Daisies;
• June Lockhart as Lassie's Ruth Martin (not looking much different than she did on It's Garry Shandling's Show eight years earlier);
• Alley Mills as Norma Arnold from The Wonder Years;
• and Isabel Sanford (who hasn't been heard on one of my shows since Wait Till Your Father Gets Home) as Louise Jefferson.

You can see from that odd assortment that, with the exception of Billingsley and Lockhart, these aren't the classic TV Moms that would've been thought of even in the '90s.  Yes, Sanford is a TV icon, but we remember her marriage to George much more than her motherhood of Lionel.  (And even Lockhart is associated more with the dog than her son.)  It gives the episode a feeling of being thrown together, and the contrasts of old-fashioned TV with Roseanne feel a little forced.  I'd much rather have had them stick with the first frame throughout.

Bob Telford appears as Bill in archival footage.

Ellen: The Sleep Clinic

An unsteady triangle

Ellen: The Sleep Clinic
ABC
February 22, 1995
Sitcom
DVD
B

This might be the best episode of the season, although not quite a B+.  It's very funny, insightful, and even at times sexy (though a sexiness played for laughs).  In this Mark Driscoll story, both Ellen and Audrey are having erotic dreams about Adam, but Audrey has a crush on Adam and ends up seducing him, while Ellen ends up seeing a therapist, Dr. Whitcomb (Paxton Whitehead in his first of three appearances in the role).  Adam has Ellen pretend to be his girlfriend, after he regrets giving in to Audrey, and of course Ellen's visiting mother is thrilled that Ellen has finally found a man.  (Mrs. Morgan seems to like Adam a lot more than she likes Paige.)  Ellen and Adam do end up kissing (for the first time in twelve years), a light kiss to make Audrey happy and then a deeper kiss after Audrey leaves.  And yet, Adam and Ellen feel no sparks.  So I guess it's not a sailable ship.  But, yeah, it's fun watching Arye Gross get to make out so much.