Season 4, Episode 5: I Do, I Don’t

Happy 2019! I realize I haven’t updated this since spring 2018 which I’m frankly ashamed of. I have vowed to finish this blog by the end of 2019 and goddamn I’m gonna try. I’ve had this review pending since friggin’ April, so I gotta do better. I WILL DO BETTER.

I’ve been missing this place lately, and all you randoms around the world who enjoy reading my reviews. Plus I just like writing these things, I miss this show, I miss this site. ALSO, I found out via a Facebook friend that there is a website called Encore+ which is dedicated to old school (re: mostly 80’s and 90’s) Canadian movies/shows and Ready or Not is on there! I haven’t checked to see if they have the entire series up, but they definitely have quite a few. They also have Edgemont which is a super cheesy 90’s teen show based in British Columbia that I’m most likely going to review next if I ever finish this website (so don’t steal my idea, bitches). But yeah, go check out this site because it’s pretty awesome, and lots of Canadian gold (check out the Heritage Minutes, every 90’s Canadian youth will remember these fondly growing up).

Also, you guys should go to the Encore+ Facebook because they have videos of Lani and Laura answering questions as current day humans! They talk about their fav episodes, fav fan encounters etc. I think it’s awesome they are back together doing something like this and made me want to get back into doing these reviews even more.

The episode opens with Nona stabbing Busy with needles as she works on Busy’s bridesmaid dress for Manny and Sheila’s wedding. Of course Amanda is hanging around, soaking in the Ramone family events as her own family never has anything going on. Amanda asks Lucy if there’s anything her and Busy could help out with at the wedding, much to Busy’s chagrin. Lucy says they can deal with the bridal shower food. This gets Amanda super excited and she starts going on about how bridal showers are “secret societies where woman honor the bride” while Busy just rolls her eyes stating Amanda clearly hasn’t been to many. See I was definitely the Busy when I got married in 2017. I hated the whole planning process and didn’t even want a bridal shower, so I can definitely feel her over-it attitude towards these events.

Amanda brings up the fact that she’s bringing some rando named Cameron to the wedding which leads everyone to start bugging Busy about a date. Busy’s like “get off my damn back” aka is now under some serious pressure to bring a young gent to the event. Oh yeah, and one of the themes of this episode is Busy not being feminine enough for life… or something like that.

Next day at school during lunch Amanda has a friggin’ stack of bridal magazines and is going through all of them looking at bride’s maid’s dresses/finger foods/I honestly don’t even know. This would be sad if she Busy aka related to the person getting married but not actually getting married, but the fact that’s she’s even more removed from this whole event makes it even more tragic. Amanda starts getting on Busy’s case about finding a date for the wedding, with Busy telling her she already asked some dude but was turned down. Suddenly some grease monkey named Jordan walks in with some jocks and tosses a football at “Ramone” stating that he saw her on the field and that she was awesome the other day. Amanda then immediately says Busy should ask him as “guy’s never talk to girls first unless they like them.” Busy is like “that’s stupid AF” but after more prodding by Amanda she eventually goes and asks him. Like the other guy, Jordan comes up with an excuse not to go, and afterwards laughs to his bros stating dating Busy would be like dating her brother. Well Busy’s ensemble is definitely not helping here, as she does look like a dude/sexually confused woman. P.S. Totally remember/slightly digging her name necklace though, I owned one myself.

Later on, Busy is walking down the hall with sage Sag who states that Busy is a rare bird and that common folk such as Jordan do not get her. The validity of his statements immediately go out the window for me though as he then states that “Mercury is in retrograde” and that he will thus bomb his math test. I hate people who throw out that damn phrase when life is being shitty, but it also doesn’t surprise me that Sag would be into new age shit and astrology. I wonder if he has healing crystals in his Columbine trench coat. Anyway, Busy asks him if he wants to go to the wedding, but Sag has a legit excuse in that it is his mom’s bday and he can’t. So yeah, strike three and Busy is out. Aka why is she not asking Monkey Ears, you know that kid has no social life whatsoever.

Later on in the eve, Amanda is testing out food’s for Sheila’s bridal shower. Busy mentions that all the dudes at Dorsey have now rejected her and thus she is going to go stag to the wedding. Amanda then mentions that her beau Cam has a very special friend named Matt Kalinski who Busy should consider asking out. Busy points out that she barely knows this guy and it would be weird to ask him out of the blue. Amanda states that she didn’t know Cam, and that she just obsessively stalked his locker/learned all his interests (again, this is the pre-social media era, so that would legit involve some goooood stalking skills) and that’s how she reeled him in. Busy’s pretty indifferent to not having a date, while Amanda acts like Busy will be shunned by all 900 guests (it’s an Italian wedding, I’m assuming that’s a fair estimate) if she dares to show up solo.

The next day Busy comes home and everyone in the Ramone household has that feeling because they all want sexual healing. We hear Frankie chatting on the phone to his rent-a-date about necking in his car, Sam and Lucy are sitting in the living room getting cozy and remembering their own wedding day and finally Sheila and Manny mapping out all the spots they plan on banging at during their honeymoon. You can tell Busy is starting to feel like a freak because she doesn’t have her own special someone to perform annoying PDA acts with. Sheila then notices Busy and states that her bridesmaid shoes have come in. Busy complains they are too painful, which d’uh, she’s wearing thick socks with them in this scene… silly Busy. Frankie then says Busy just needs a new body transplant or something in general which makes Busy feel even more shitty about her perceived lack of sex appeal.

This then prompts a Ready or Not daydream sequence featuring a bunch of people at the foot of the staircase of the Ramone household. Sheila is up top in her bridal attire about to throw the bouquet. Amanda and some other randoms are all excited, when all of a sudden Busy appears out of nowhere wearing full football gear and charges forward and steals the bouquet. Manny/Sam/Frankie all kinda do some weird yell/booo combo at her while Busy eventually ends up getting charged at by all the women for the bouquet. Yeah, I got nothing. It’s odd.

The next scene is Sheila’s bridal shower which mostly just consists of her getting lots of slutty lingerie from the guests and Busy feeling more awkward about being a woman. It’s pretty boring, and thus no screenshots for you!

The next day at school Amanda spots Cam and no, your eyes are not deceiving you, Matt is indeed played by Ryan Gosling, star of projects such as Breaker High and Young Hercules and a couple movies too.

Amanda and Busy saunter over and Amanda starts some chit chat with the boys, eventually bringing up that some action movie is playing at the movie theatre and that they should all go together. Busy points out that Amanda fucking hates action movies, to which Amanda tells her to shut her pie hole as she has a strategy going on. Amanda then says they should go chill at Amanda’s afterwards and continue on their “old fashioned double date”. The guys agree and Amanda skips off happily with Busy. Busy points out that she was acting like a complete airhead and Amanda states that she was only following the directions of her teen magazine which stated to find out a guy’s interests and choose an activity based on the interests. I’m not defending Amanda, but it’s true that those teen magazines in the 90’s definitely were geared towards making guys notice you through any means possible. I really hope they have improved in the last 20 years. Amanda tells Busy that all that matters is getting Busy a date for the wedding which at this point if I was Busy I would not give two shits about. Apparently it’s really easy to get laid at weddings, so I’m sure she could find one of her male/female thrice removed cousins to make out with.

 

Later on, after the movie, the foursome are at Amanda’s pad discussing the cinematic experience. The guys are going on and on about various explosions and how awesome they were, with Amanda chiming in saying how much she loved the movie. Busy isn’t even trying to hide how stupid she thought it was as evident by her mocking the guys in this shot. Gotta love how the YTV logo is basically making the same face.

Amanda starts getting pissed at Busy for not just agreeing with everything the guys are saying. Ryan Gosling aka Matt asks what everyone rates the movie, with Amanda stating 5 stars and that it’s the Citizen Kane of our time. Both the guys say they found it just “ok” which of course had Amanda backtracking her answer. Busy just kinda sits there not knowing what to say, because she’s having a real hard time playing dumb for two guys she doesn’t give a shit about. Matt suggests they listen to some music and brings up some fake band named Gecko. Busy says that Shy Type aka another fake band is much better and they should listen to that. Matt says he can tell Shy Type uses a drum machine which Busy calls bullshit on and tells Matt that he shouldn’t state facts about shit he doesn’t know about. He says the same, which enrages former drummer Busy. Just as she’s about to school Ryan Gosling on music through a physical beating, Amanda drags her into her bedroom because Busy is ruining everything by daring to disagree with a guy.

In the bedroom Amanda tells Busy she needs to cool her hot head because she’s ruining her chances of scoring a date with Ryan Gosling. Normally I’d definitely be on Amanda’s side, but Ryan is not at his peak here… he definitely got better with age, so I’m Team Busy in that she states she’s not going to play dumb in regards to her musical knowledge for a guy. She states if making a guy feel smarter than her is what being a girl is about then she doesn’t want to be one anymore. Amanda tells her she’s a female, get used to it, to which Busy says that she’s fine being a cat lady for life because there is no way she’s compromising her intelligence to appease a guy. You go Busy, totally with you there gurl.

So Busy is over it and leaves Amanda’s place. The two guys are still there kinda not sure wtf to do when Amanda tries to play off that everything is peachy, but Cam has decided it’s time to blow this pop stand. He also tells Amanda he won’t be accompanying her to the wedding. Amanda figures its because Busy freaked out in front of them, but he tells her it’s because she’s not original in stating the obvious that having no opinion is boring as hell and a normal person would not really want to date someone like that. Wouldn’t it have been hilarious though if he ended up calling Busy and asking her out instead? Nah, I’m pretty sure chicks like Busy scare off teenage boys. So anyway, the dudes leave, Ryan Gosling steals an apple and Amanda is left heartbroken.

The next day all the Italians are weeping at the Ramone’s house as little Manny is finally going to tie the knot. In the midst of all the commotion we see Busy is all dolled up in her bridesmaid dress and the family is literally stunned that she actually looks really beautiful, despite being pretty much a full fledged tom boy the rest of the time. Busy states the obvious in that anyone can look good if they make a bit of effort.

Honestly though, the looks on their faces, you’d think they had just seen that Brontosaurus in Jurassic Park for the first time.

Busy asks Amanda if she’s sad about Cam and she says no because she’d rather mack on some of Busy’s fine Italian cousins. The episode ends with Busy informing Amanda the one she has her eye on is hairier than an Italian rug.

I liked this episode because it was one showcasing how Busy does not back down on her ideals, and when your a teenage girl it can be really, really hard not to give in a try to change yourself in ways you don’t like to be noticed by the opposite sex. Busy realizes keeping it real and being single is ALWAYS better than dating Ryan Gosling. Well…maybe not always…. I mean he’s pretty hot nowadays. JK! Be true to yourself y’all!!

Yaaaaaaaaaaaaaay I finished this review 9 months later. Never again, people! NEVER AGAIN. Melissa’s getting her groove back, and I vow to have another review up by the end of this month. Thanks for reading gang, here’s to more questionable Ready or Not moments in 2019!