My Name is Earl Fodder

My Name Is Earl: Picked On A French Kid

Watch the full episode here.

Randy & Catalina's story is finally told, and it's positively epic. We're talking Hepburn and Tracy, Bogey and Bacall, Grant and Kerr, and Lady and the Tramp all rolled into one. Let's have at it!

The ep opens with Earl and Randy in their motel room. Earl is writing a letter. Randy apparently has been on a Rainbow Sugar Bits binge – there's empty boxes everywhere. The motive soon becomes apparent – he's sending away for a back-of-the-box prize. Whatever could it be?

Earl's writing a letter and sending plane tickets to Pierre, a French foreign exchange student that Earl bullied way back when, requesting that he come back to America so that Earl can make it up to him for the way he treated him. Number forty-four on Earl's list – Picked on a French Kid. This is vaguely reminiscent of Bart Simpson's going to France as an exchange student, but the similarity pretty much ends there.

Randy wants to lick the envelopes. He's thrilled to think that his spit will be going all the way to France. That's farther than his spit has ever traveled before. It's at this moment that Earl gives Randy some truly sage advice, advice that I wish I had received as an impressionable lad. To wit, lick the envelope up and down, not side to side.

Flashback to Earl in grade school. The teacher introduces Pierre to the class. Earl's voiceover says that Pierre " -- was kinda different. That's the kind of kid I like to pick on." Young Earl welcomes Pierre with a hearty, "Welcome to America, Commie!" and nails Pierre's forehead with a big ol' juicy spitball. En guard! All Pierre can do is look heaven-ward and implore "Pour quoi?"

Quick montage – Why Can't We Be Friends (by War) is playing in the background. Pierre is carrying his lunch on a tray and headed to his desk when Earl trips him. Mon dieu! Pierre deposits an apple on the teacher's desk which Earl promptly wings at the back of Pierre's head. Qu'est-ce que c'est? Applesauce?

But Earl, even at a young age, is aware that some things can only be pushed so far. Talking about Pierre, Earl says, "Like my grandmother's French poodle, that little bitch bit back."

Cut to Earl and Pierre grading each other's tests in class. Earl keeps getting 'em wrong and Pierre keeps announcing Earl's faux pas to the entire class. Earl is not happy with this turn of events. "It's funny when people look stupid," he says, "except when that person is me." Earl catches up to Pierre in the bathroom and, with his hands around Pierre's throat, convinces Pierre that his health might have a much brighter outlook if he were to return to France. Pierre catches the next flight out.

Back to present day in the motel room. Earl is tucking his letter, the plane tickets, and a picture of himself (his eyes are closed) as a child (so Pierre will remember him – as if he could have forgotten) into an envelope. Randy licks the envelope correctly. He's looking forward to seeing Willie the one-eyed mailman's expression when Willie sees that he's got to go all the way to France to deliver Earl's letter. Personally, I don't believe it works exactly that way but --

Two weeks later, and Earl and Randy both have reason to smile. Earl got a response – Pierre will come.

Randy's having an even better day. He finally got his Rainbow Sugar Bits night light. And pretty snazzy it is, too. He's happy because he believes that it'll make a nice gift for Catalina because it looks like a rainbow ("She likes rainbows.") even if it does smell a bit like fake fruit cereal. But even better – today is moving day! Randy and Catalina – did I mention that Catalina finally returns? – are moving in together today. Randy asks Earl if Earl thinks that Randy will be sleeping there or will he just be leaving his stuff there. Earl replies that only one person can answer that. They both look skyward. (Cue Gregorian monks.) God? asks Randy. Well, maybe God, says Earl, but more likely Catalina. Randy pretty much just wants to know if he'll be sleeping AT his and Catalina's apartment, or if he'll be sleeping WITH Catalina. Every time he thinks about it, he giggles. And giggles. And giggles. Like a little girl on nitrous oxide.

Cut to Earl discussing the Pierre situation with Darnell in the Crabshack. Earl's constructed a big "Welcome To America" sign to celebrate Pierre's arrival. It's decorated with an American flag and a large blue boot. Earl didn't know what the French flag looked like, so he just drew a big boot on there because France is shaped like a boot. Darnell tells Earl that it's Italy that's shaped like a boot, not France. Well, Earl asks, what is France shaped like then? It's just an amorphous country shape, replies Darnell.

Joy pops up. She wants to know why Earl is welcoming a Frenchman to America. She's not too keen on Frenchmen because she dated a guy from Quebec who had a foot fetish. Earl is stunned by this revelation. He can't believe that anyone could be turned on by Joy's feet because she " -- has one toe that turned away like it's mad at all the other ones." Joy sees Earl's welcome sign and approves of Earl's podiatrical representation of France. Darnell starts mentally preparing a Geography 101 class.

Enter Pierre (played by Ernie Grunwald who actually is Canadian. Also, he was in Stealing Harvard with Jason Lee.). He and Earl greet each other warmly only to have Pierre plant a FIFA-sized head butt to Earl's forehead (a la Zinedine Zidane to Italy's Marco Materazzi). Joy witnesses this spectacle ands is impressed. She thought all French were cheese-eating surrender monkeys, but now she sees that not all Frenchmen are afraid to fight. Joy likes French stuff, she tells Pierre. She likes their nail tips and their way of kissing (which she's been doing since she was twelve). Throw in their toast and their fries and I have to agree with her.

Looking at Earl prostrate on the floor, Pierre bids Earl adieu and says that he is going to leave now that he has done what he came here to do, " -- before anything more than the soles of my shoes touches your pee-hole of a country." Joy senses some sort of insult in there but she's not exactly sure what or where. Earl tries to apologize but Pierre's having none of it. As Pierre turns to leave, Earl knocks Pierre's purse off his shoulder. It is not a purse, says Pierre, it's a Louis Vitton. Earl tells Pierre to keep it down as the Crabshack is not the kind of place where you want people to know that you named your purse. Pierre leaves, but Earl is confident that he will return. You see, while Earl was helping Pierre get his stuff back into his purse, Earl sort of borrowed Pierre's wallet and passport. Very nimble-fingered is our Earl. Pierre's going nowhere.

Earl is nursing the egg on his forehead with a cold bottle of beer when Pierre comes back looking for his wallet and passport. Did you check your purse? Earl asks. Pierre responds in a full French snit that it is not a purse, it is a satchel. Earl tries again to apologize to Pierre, explaining that America likes aliens. Just look at E.T., says Earl. Do you mean the little alien that your government kidnapped and tortured? asks Pierre. Hmmm -- what about Moscow on the Hudson? asks Earl.

Editor's Note – Moscow on the Hudson starred Robin Williams, who also starred in The Fisher King with Jeff Bridges, the brother of Beau Bridges, who plays Earl's father. Just a coincidence I'm sure, but I thought I'd throw that in here anyway.

This debate is going nowhere fast so Earl takes Pierre back to the motel. It's going to take a while for his documents to get replaced and Pierre has to stay somewhere. As they enter the fabulous accommodations, Pierre asks Earl if the concierge is available twenty-four hours a day. Well, says Earl, if by concierge you mean hookers, then yeah, they'll be available when the meth clinic closes.

As a special token of friendship, Earl presents to Pierre a uniquely American memento – a Statue of Liberty bobblehead. She is French, says Pierre. Earl looks on the bottom of the replica and says no, it's from China. No, says Pierre, the real Statue of Liberty was a gift to the American people from the people of France to embarrass the English. Earl is fairly stunned to find out that the Statue of Liberty is a statue of a woman.

So Earl tries to show off the bits of America that he does know something about. He shows off several spectacular local tourist attractions such as the Camden County Gravel Pile and Camden County's Largest Freeway Pileup. (I was just waiting for the Tire Fire, the Leftorium, and the Nuclear Power Plant.) Pierre is blasè. How can Paris possibly compete? Somehow even the Camden County Roadside Art Gallery fails to measure up to the Louvre. Pierre is still not impressed. Earl decides that in order for Pierre to truly appreciate America, he needs to learn from people who love America. So it's back to the gang at the Crabshack.

Quick cuts here, so I'll try to condense --

Joy: America's got everything you want except for a big-ass fence on the border. But we're working on that. (Probable reference to Catalina here.)

Randy: We've got hamburgers as big as your head and marshmallows as small as your pinky toe.

Darnell: We've got baseball, roller coasters, and a system of jurisprudence based on Jeffersonian democracy and not Napoleonic code. That little fellow was whack.

Joy: ..And racial harmony, pursuit of happiness (Ed. Note – In next week's episode, we find out that Joy has a half-sister named Liberty), Seinfeld --

Darnell: We've got Dream Dates, Northern Lights --

Joy: -- Malls, Santa Claus, kid leashes --

Randy: -- Video games --

Joy: -- The Macy parade, the Rose Bowl parade, the Homo Pride parade --

Darnell: And all the wars we won -- the Revolutionary War, the Spanish-American War, the War of 1812 --

Randy: We won that one 18 to 12? Wow, that was a close one.

Joy: -- Women who shave their armpits -- (Hold on to this one -- trust me.)

Randy: We play football the right way --

Darnell: -- Lance Armstrong --

DING DING DING DING DING

There's the coup de grace. Pierre rattles off a veritable bouillabaisse of epithets (to the strains of La Marseillaise). The extent of my French consists entirely of what I learned from playing Mille Bornes, so all I caught was " -- avec un testicule -- " and " -- Tour de France -- " Methinks the French are about as smitten with Lance Armstrong as Chicago of 1871 was with the O'Leary's.

Earl realizes that there might be one person who can convince Pierre of the splendor that is America. Catalina explains to Pierre that America is indeed a wonderful country because " -- there's toilet paper everywhere you look." Pierre likes her a lot. C'est magnifique! America is also " -- the land of the free and the home of the slaves." Pierre likes her even more. Randy is not pleased with these developments. Earl tells Randy that it's okay if Pierre likes Catalina (who wouldn't?) because it's the first time that Earl has seen Pierre smile on American soil.

As proof of how hard it is to make a Frenchman smile, Earl pulls up his flannel shirt to reveal to Randy Mr. Giggle-belly (a face painted on his midriff with his belly button as the mouth). But Randy's not amused either. I was. Maybe I drew it on wrong, says Earl. Randy is very upset because he thinks Pierre is hitting on Catalina like Pepe le Pew and the little black cat (who always managed to spill a bucket of white paint down her back). Pierre then makes ze beeg boo-boo. He kisses Catalina's hand. Randy catches up with Pierre in the bathroom, and, with his hands around Pierre's throat, convinces Pierre that his health might have a much brighter outlook if he were to return to France. Pierre acts all French-like and makes with the hasty retreat.

Earl is big-time P.O.-ed at Randy for making Pierre run away with his French tail between his frog legs. Randy says he didn't like Pierre's hitting on Catalina, and Earl says that Randy better get used to guys hitting on his wife because she's mega-hot (I added the mega part), and if Randy isn't man enough to tell Catalina how he feels about her then he truly does only have a Green Card marriage. Earl's taunting ("Green Card Marriage -- Green Card Marriage -- ") forces Randy to do the unthinkable: he grabs up a urinal cake and tries to shove it into Earl's mouth. Sacre Bleu! Earl disarms Randy, and tells Randy to man up and grow a pair and tell Catalina the truth. Catalina hears the last part and asks Randy what Earl wants Randy to grow a pair of.

"Nads," replies Randy.

Here IT comes. Warm And Fuzzy Moment approaching.

Randy not only grows a pair, but they're made of solid brass and would dwarf la Tour Eiffel. He looks Catalina in the eyes and tells her that he thinks she is " -- the most beautiful, most sweetest girl -- " he ever met. He even wants to squash bugs for her, pick her up over puddles, and be a real husband to her. He tells her that he loves her. She smiles and says that she loves him too. They hug. Even I got a little weepy, a little warm and tingly. Like coming home to fresh-baked chocolate chip cookies.

Break out the Kleenex.

Catalina looks at Earl over Randy's shoulder, shakes her head and mouths "No."

Warm and fuzzy moment officially over.

Earl leaves the Crabshack in pursuit of Pierre, and Catalina catches up to him in the parking lot. She tells Earl that she did what she did because she did not want to embarrass Randy in front of all his friends. Earl tells her that she needs to let Randy down easy, and that if she's honest Randy will understand. And oh by the way, Earl tells Catalina, when she's doing the Can Can on Randy's heart if a breast falls out of her shirt that that might not be the worst thing to happen.

Back at the motel, Pierre's locked himself in his room. Pierre tells Earl to go away because Pierre has an attack dog in his room. One that sounds onomatopoeically French. But Earl manages to talk to Pierre through a bullet hole in the wall. As Pierre's host, Earl even manages to provide dinner for his guest by shoving Rainbow Sugar Bits through the Rainbow Sugar Bits-sized bullet hole.

Next morning and Catalina comes in to talk to Earl. She still works at the motel, which is good because Earl can borrow her master room key. She tells Earl that her problem of how to let Randy down easy is solved. She and Joy worked it out last night at the Shack. Joy's advice is pure unadulterated Joy. The wisdom of generations of trailer parks is boiled down to four words: Have sex with him.

Catalina didn't just fall off the taco truck yesterday. "This sounds a lot like when you told me the public swimming pool was topless only," Catalina tells Joy. Joy laughs. Yeah, she says, my boys still ask about you. So Joy clarifies. Have sex with him, but be really bad at it. Make yourself all stinky and nasty and if you're bad enough he'll never want to have sex with you again. Joy knows it'll work because she did it to an ex-boyfriend who worked at Sam Goody and kept her supplied with cassettes way back in the pre-CD days. If he gave you cassettes, Catalina wants to know, how old are you -- Don't judge me, says Joy, sounding much like her mother.

So, continues Catalina to Earl, she'll be so rotten and nasty that Randy will never want sex with her again. He may never want sex with anyone else ever again, she says, but that's not her problem. (There's a flaw in this logic, but I didn't see it coming.) Randy enters the motel room. Giggling.

Earl uses Catalina's master room key to let himself in to Pierre's room. Pierre is clad only in orange briefs (I would've thought French Blue), and hungrily scrounging the Rainbow Sugar Bits out of the berber. Earl tries again to apologize and talk Pierre into giving America one more chance. Pierre finally tells Earl that his game plan all along has been to use his French accent to score American chicks. Earl doesn't understand. He wants to know if Pierre's accent helps him to score chicks in France. Of course not you ee-dee-yote, Pierre says, we all talk like zis in France.

Flashback to Pierre zooming the girls in Earl's class back in the day. He's surrounded by admiring adolescents who are smitten with his accent. He departs to go to the bathroom, and that's when and where Earl convinced Pierre to beat French feet.

Back to present day, and Earl knows how to cross Pierre off his list. Find the four girls from school that Pierre wanted to smooch up, and let Pierre introduce them to the Continental way to suck face.

Cue Maurice Chevalier's Thank Heaven For Little Girls. Perfect music bed.

Quick montage and Pierre is smooching his way through Camden County. Pierre's doing more kissing than Richard Dawson. There was one girl that hey couldn't find but her sister was very friendly. In the back of Earl's El Camino. And finally, Pierre tells Earl that there was one more jolie fille that he wanted to kiss.

NOTE TO THE WEAK-STOMACHED – You may want to skip this next part.

Cut to Pierre and Earl's grey-haired teacher necking enthusiastically in the school hallway. Her class is watching and learning more in two minutes than they did in an entire semester of Sex Ed.

NOTE TO THE WEAK-STOMACHED – You can come back now.

Pierre himself crosses off number forty-four. You're a good guy, Earl tells Pierre. I feel like I made a friend. Pierre admits that he was wrong about America. Pierre will come back to America, he tells Earl, the next time he needs a break from his wife and kids. Ouch. Earl debates adding Pierre's wife and kids to his list.

Here it comes. This is it. I sort of expected Rocky's Theme, but we got Love Stinks by The J. Geils Band. Catalina's prepping for her night of making with the monkey-love with Randy. She's gluing hair to her armpits and upper lip and generously slathering herself with stinky cheese and onions and a fish. She even dons a jogging suit and runs a few miles using a blow dryer to up the stank factor. She is determined to make this night memorable. As has been stated many times before, it's not so much the smell as it is the burning of the eyes.

Randy comes home to their apartment to find his wife in bed. His hair is combed, he's wearing a dress shirt (I think it was French Blue. I couldn't tell what kind of cuffs it had.), and bearing a nice nosegay. The eldritch stench assaults him immediately. Catalina gazes at him lustfully and whispers throatily, "Make love to me like your father does to your mother." She even shows off her hairy armpits (aka The French Mistake). He approaches his lovely bride.

Earl's VO explains that Joy's advice to Catalina worked better than she could have hoped. It only took two hours of torture to wipe out two years of twitterpation.

The marriage is consummated. Randy's gathering up his clothes. He cannot get out of there soon enough.

Catalina looks like she's been rode hard and put away wet. She tells Randy that their lovemaking was the best she's ever had, that he was so sweet and so loving, and that she felt so loved. Randy explains that he was just trying not to barf. She tells him that she can wash off the buffet table, but Randy replies that she can " -- never wash off the fact that you pretended to be my mother." He retches. We'll always have just a Green Card marriage, Randy tells poor poor Catalina, and he leaves, but not before reclaiming his Rainbow Sugar Bits night light. Come back, come back, she begs Randy. You were amazing. Come back, Randy, come back. Catalina does her best Joey Starrett (Brandon de Wilde at the end of Shane), but to no avail. Randy is gone. FTB.

---

Posted by Randy Welk on February 2, 2007 1:04 PM
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