Saturday, December 16, 2006

Season 1, Episode 2, Part 2: "You're so Immature"

Gareth comes back to his desk, takes off his coat and puts it on the chair, thus exposing his leathery gun holster with a cell phone in it. Tim laughs and asks if he has a license to carry it.Gareth says, “Portable..phone. Alright?” Gareth tells Tim to change places with Donna. “I'm not moving,” says Tim. Wouldn't he be happy to get rid of Gareth for a change? I suppose it's more of a question of keeping his position though. “Do as I say,” says Gareth as if he has some authority, which he totally doesn't have. “What are you gonna do, phone me?” says Tim. Good comeback there. Gareth says that he is team leader, which essentially means nothing and Tim says he doesn't care. “You are so immature,” says Gareth. Tim takes his phone and says, “If there's one thing I'm not it's immature.” Tim dials a number and Gareth's phone rings. Gareth, who isn't very good at deduction, takes his phone, looking very important, and answers it without looking at it. ALWAYS look at your cell phone when it rings, especially if the person next to you is calling someone and is a known prankster. They will always try this. Gareth says his name and Tim says, “Cock!” and hangs up. Gareth just looks at him annoyed, like “he got me again”. Gareth, you are stupid.

David and Donna come back around to Gareth's desk and he starts to tell David about his idea on moving Donna next to him, when David interrupts him. He has seen the gun holster and can't help but make jokes on it. “Gun holster!” he says and points his finger like a gun. Gareth tries to start talking to him, but he says, “Sorry, I just thought of something” and asks for Gareth's phone. The camera pans to Tim, who looks amused. David takes the phone and points the antenna at Gareth, saying, “I know what you're thinking: did I make five or six calls? Well, the question is, do you feel lucky, punk? Well, do ya?” First of all: that's a really bad impression. Secondly: It's such a cliché. Thirdly.. well.. it's typical David. Gareth was talking about something work related, albeit stupid, and he cuts him off to make a joke. “Clint Eastwood,” David duhs. "Spot on," says Gareth. Well, he probably couldn't do it any better. David looks really happy with himself after accomplishing that, and they move on. Once again we see Tim's face, and he's shaking his head.

David tells Donna, “We're all hooked up here.. to the World Wide Web.. Internet.” Yeah, well, it'd be a pretty lame office if they weren't. “No shopping,” he says to a female employee. Har har. He asks Donna if she can use e-mail, because they've all got one. “Yeah,” says Donna, sounding a bit annoyed David would even ask such a question. David starts to show Donna the female employee's email. “Oh, you've got a new one,” he says and rudely clicks “open”. You do NOT read someone else's email! That's just rude. David gets what's coming to him, as he sees a picture of himself pasted into a porn picture, which is never shown on camera during the episode, but details will be mentioned later. Donna bursts into a laughter which she tries to suppress. The female employee also finds it funny. “Donna should not have to see me as a woman with two men doing that all over me” - he shows a “wanking” gesture. So like David to actually say what's in the picture, even if they can all see it. And I don't think he's only doing that to tell the viewers what's there. “You've got nice boobs,” says the anonymous employee, and David doesn't get the joke. He says they just pasted his head into it. Well, I don't think she meant he really has boobs like a porn actress, even if he is sporting some pretty prominent man boobs. “Who else has seen this filth?” David asks everyone. “You know what I'm talking about.” Everyone raises their hands. Dawn and Tim are at the copier and Dawn leans on it like she's laughing her ass off. David looks around and even Joan the cleaning lady has raised hers. “You haven't even got email, Joan!” David is shocked. “Someone printed it out for me,” says Joan in a scared voice. David says, “Who printed it out for Joan?” and everyone raises their hands again. It cracks me up. This is a real example of the laughs they have in the office, but since the laugh is on David, it's not funny to him and he acts offended. There's another example of this in the second season episode when he finds out he has a couple of weight-related nicknames. To not seem like a killjoy, David turns it into a PC issue: “Well, I'm angry. Not because I'm in it, but because.. it degrades women. Which I hate,” he adds and looks straight into the camera. He says the culprit “whoever he is”, is in the office, and then remembers to correct himself that it could be a woman: “Women are as filthy as men. I won't name names – I don't know any – but women. Are. Dirty.” Very convincing, especially since he doesn't know any names. Dawn looks at David, looking kind of shocked, then they share a little look with Tim.

Cut to David and Gareth sitting in David's office. David wants to share his view on women's rights with the camera, and of course manages to show how much of a sexist he really is. He says that Chris Finch, “bloody good rep”, has an IQ of 142, “one of the cleverest blokes I know, and certainly the cleverest bloke you know,” he says to Gareth. That's really funny, because apparently he doesn't think highly of the intellect of Gareth's friends. I wouldn't trust IQ's too much in determining who is the most intelligent, anyway, and I think that's exactly the point the writers are trying to make. David quotes Chris Finch and it certainly doesn't show his shining intellect: “How could I hate women? My Mom's one.” That is the lamest excuse ever. In fact, I got this same response from a person once who was dissing fat people. I asked what she has against fat people and she said, “I don't hate fat people. My Mom's fat!” Can I just point out that loving your Mom despite a quality you consider to be negative is not a sign that you don't hate other people who have that quality. We all love our family and friends despite their flaws. It's how you treat a stranger with that quality that shows your attitude. David is, of course, too dumb to get that and says, “There's a lot of truth to that.” He looks at Gareth with a smile that says he won the debate with just that quote. Gareth nods seriously. I think these guys put together have an IQ of 100. David claims he isn't annoyed because he's in the picture or “because I'm a prude.. It offends..women.” Why is it that none of the women in the office were offended then? “And their Moms,” says Gareth inanely. “In a way,” nods David. “It's sexist.” Gareth says he hates sexism, and David says he said it first, and shuts Gareth up by saying, “Yeah, but I've always hated it.” Guys, guys..You can both hate it! They're so childish.

David says they have access to the internet, but it's not censored. “Is that a good or bad thing?” he asks rhetorically. Gareth immediately replies, “Bad.” Hee. “Not for us to say,” says David. He demonstrates the evils of the internet by typing “sex..fetish. 2230 matches.” That few? He clicks on one to elaborate. I think he made his point, which was pretty obvious to begin with, but it's David and he must explain. He reads, “Dutch girls must be punished for having big boobs.” He acts all offended and says people, “Dutch or otherwise”; shouldn't be punished for such a thing. He talks with his eyes closed to show his full contempt, then opens his eyes to this gleeful expression at the camera that seems to be saying: “See how much I care for equality?” Gareth says they should be rewarded. “They should be equal,” says David. “Women ARE equal,” says Gareth. “I've always said that,” says David just to get the last word. It's a brilliant scene, because it underlines the problem. Nobody wants to be seen as a bigot. Nobody wants to see themselves as a bigot. But just because they say they aren't bigots, does not mean they're all for equality.

People working/Tim and Dawn flirting. Dawn says, “Do you wanna play with my hair?” I've always found it kind of a weird scene. In the documentary, Lucy Davis said it was ad libbed, because they were told to ad lib some flirting and she likes people playing with her hair. “He couldn't say no off-camera.” His reaction does seem slightly reluctant. He says he has “kind of hot hands, sorry.” “That's alright, just don't touch my head,” says Dawn and bursts out laughing, perhaps because of the spontaneity of the situation. They do look spontaneous, I'll give them that. The flirting scenes are very natural and calm.

David and Gareth are having a pow-wow, and apparently they have to do that away from David's desk. He pulls his chair closer to Gareth, but feels cramped when Gareth leans in to listen to him. He tells Gareth, smugly playing with his tie again, that he has the responsibility for Donna, and “word from the top is..” “Hands off,” completes Gareth. David approves. “Out of bounds,” Gareth continues. David is happy with this. “Look but don't touch,” Gareth adds. “What do you mean by look?” says David suspiciously. Gareth retreats: “Talk to her, be friendly...don't get any ideas.” Yeah, I'm sure that's exactly what he meant. “What if she's up for it?” Gareth asks suddenly. David looks annoyed. I find it hilarious that Gareth thinks he's God's gift to all women. He treats women like shit, he's obviously only after one thing, and he looks kind of pathetic. Not that it isn't accurate though. He doesn't realize women might have a thing called preferences or, you know, freedom of cohice.

Tim tells Dawn she should get someone to sort her desk out. That's the scene. They apparently made one flirting scene that they cut a bit to make interjections to David and Gareth's talk. It works quite nicely.

David tells Gareth to find out who did the picture “discreetly”. Gareth looks like this is the greatest honor ever bestowed upon him, and maybe it is. He says he needs an office for it. David lets him use the conference room. “I need to make a sign,” muses Gareth, and David tells him there's no need for that. He reminds Gareth that if he needs the conference room for a meeting, it's no longer Gareth's. “I'll take the sign down,” Gareth says. “No need to make a sign,” says David, a bit annoyed that Gareth takes the honor of investigating the “case” so much more seriously than he should. Gareth's phone rings again, and he picks it up again without looking at it. Have you learned nothing, Gareth? He closes the phone right away looking annoyed. “Who was that?” says David. “No one,” says Gareth and puts the phone back in the holster.

1 comment:

Passionis said...

Love the way Gareth avidly looks at the computer screen while David makes his point about "sexism", typing sex fetish in the search engine. Eagerly waiting for some picture to pop up, I bet.