If you’re an easy crier, please don’t watch this episode
without a box of tissues. In this episode, we deal with the issue of death and
how the family deals with the loss of a loved one. Jesse’s grandfather,
“Papouli” comes to visit. You may remember him from the Season 4 premiere,
“Greek Week.” He is a sweet, kind grandfather who brightens everyone’s day.
When Michelle and Stephanie make a mess in the kitchen, trying to make
something for him, he encourages them to laugh it off and throws flour all
around. He gives DJ advice about a fight she’s having with Kimmy over a pair of
sunglasses. Finally, he teaches Michelle a traditional Greek dance and agrees
to come to her school for show and tell. The next thing we see is the family,
minus Michelle, sitting around the table the next morning. Before they even say
it, you can tell exactly what happened. Papouli died. The family was
devastated. True, he was a very old man, but he seemed very healthy and sharp.
It was a sudden, unexpected twist in life. Michelle comes back from
school, learns what happened, and doesn’t take it very well. Jesse catches her
skipping school, because it’s the day that Papouli was supposed to teach the
dance. They share a moment about missing Papouli, before Jesse steps in and
goes to her show and tell. It’s a very moving, emotional episode that most of
us can relate to in some way.
Some people have criticized this episode, saying that it’s
hard to feel sad about losing a character who only appeared in two episodes.
While it’s true, the audience didn’t spend much time with Papouli, we can tell
he meant a lot to the family, specifically Jesse and Michelle. This episode
also does a great job and showing the various ways that people cope with grief.
Jesse immediately wants to get to work, planning the funeral arrangements.
Stephanie tries to put on a brave face and not show her emotion in order to
help Jesse. Danny gets impulsive and buys a boat. DJ realizes what’s important
in life and makes up with Kimmy. Michelle runs and hides from her problems.
While some of these methods aren’t recommended, for example, you shouldn’t buy
a boat every time someone dies, it’s a realistic depiction of how people handle
tragedy in their own ways. Unless you’re counting Michelle’s goldfish, the only
other death this show has dealt with is Pam, Danny’s wife and mother to the
girls, but this was different. In the pilot, we catch up with the family a few
weeks after her death, so the family had time to process it. In this episode,
we get the raw emotion of dealing with Papouli’s death the very next day. It
brought a new depth to the characters that I very much enjoyed.
#9: 13 Candles
(Season 3, Episode 17)
Another thing that most of us can understand, it’s how
awkward and over-emotional teenagers can be. As of this episode, there are
officially teenagers in the house, because it’s all about DJ’s 13th
birthday party. The living room is
filled with a bunch of hilariously dressed, random teens dancing as DJ and
Kimmy wait for the arrival of Kevin, DJ’s current crush. The rest of the family
has agreed to give the kids their privacy, except Stephanie, who keeps trying
to sneak in because it’s what annoying little sisters do. While this is going
on, Becky is upstairs, practicing dancing with Danny for the next episode of
Wake Up San Francisco. To no one’s shock, Danny is a terrible dancer, and Jesse
steps in to show him how it’s done. This serves two important purposes. First,
it gave a reason for Becky to be at the house, which will be needed shortly.
Second, it got the guys in the right spot to overhear a game of spin the bottle
starting up at the party. Kimmy has rigged the game to ensure that DJ ends up
kissing Kevin. The moment is ruined by the barging parent patrol as Danny,
Jesse, and Joey obnoxiously burst in with thinly veiled excuses. This leads to
the expected over-emotional outburst from DJ who runs off and has a heart to
heart with Becky about how special first kisses are. In the end, things are
good when Kevin comes back and DJ gets her first kiss.
I love how this episode captures how unnecessarily
stressful, the life of a young teenager can be. Unlike the last episode on my
countdown, no one died. There’s no real emergency or anything to freak out about.
It’s just teenagers not knowing how to handle crushes and parents who aren’t
ready for their kids to grow up. Until their last scene, DJ and Kevin keep
looking at each other like a deer in the headlights. It’s as if they don’t know
how to interact with people. Then there’s the so-called mature adults, who
panicked at the first sign of teenage hormones, like they hadn’t even thought
of that as a possibility. The only sane one in this episode was Becky, who
tried to talk some sense into the guys. There was also very limited screen time
for Michelle in this episode, which is a little refreshing. Don’t get me wrong,
I think Michelle is a great character, but sometimes she gets dangerously close
to Elmo/Steve Urkel territory. That’s my way of describing when a show takes a
perfectly good character and focuses on them so much that they overshadow the
rest of the cast. It’s episodes like this that keep the balance in order,
making it a very important episode.
#8: The House Meets
the Mouse, Parts 1 & 2 (Season 6, Episodes 23 & 24)
Full House started
a TGIF sitcom tradition of doing a cross-promotional episode at Disney World
that would later be followed by Family
Matters, Step by Step, Boy Meets World, Sabrina the Teenage Witch, and Roseanne. The setup of why they all end
up going is that Jesse’s band gets booked for a Disney World show, so he plans
for a small, Katsopolis family vacation. Then suddenly Joey gets to go, because
Jesse and Joey’s radio show will do a live broadcast. Then suddenly the Tanners
get to go, because Danny’s show is doing reruns and the girls just happen to
have a school break. If that wasn’t convenient enough, Kimmy’s family agrees to
pay for any vacation that she takes without them. As unbelievable it is that
everyone’s schedule just happens to line up, I’m willing to overlook it,
because this is a fun episode that breaks the norm and gets the family out of
the house and exploring Disney World.
Everyone gets their own subplot to follow, complete with
their own little lesson. The exception to that is Joey. Apparently he drew the
short straw and doesn’t get much, except for a quick scene in an animation
studio where he imagines a cartoon version of himself. Jesse’s story is that
he’s schedule is so busy that there’s no time for Becky. Between his band
rehearsals and his radio show, he’s always stopping in to say hi as he’s
rushing off to whatever’s next. Eventually Becky is fed up with him, but he
wins her over with a song. The Jesse/Becky lesson: Don’t get too busy to spend
time with your family. Danny’s story is that he keeps trying to propose to
Vicky, who also found a reason to visit Disney World. He keeps getting nervous
and then interrupted by one thing after another. He finally gets the courage
and proposes and she accepts. The Danny lesson: Follow your heart and go after
the people you love. DJ’s story is my least favorite, to be honest. DJ misses
Steve so bad that she sees his face on all the male Disney character actors.
She sees him as Aladdin and they don’t even make a subtle reference to the fact
that Steve’s actor, Scott Weinger was the voice of Aladdin. That’s a big missed
opportunity in my book. Eventually Steve misses DJ so much that he paid for a
flight and hotel to meet them for the vacation. The DJ/Steve lesson: Love makes
you crazy? I know it’s a stretch, but like I said, I didn’t care for this plot
point.
Then there’s the Michelle/Stephanie story. Michelle keeps
getting everything she wants, which starts to wear on Stephanie. From the last
piece of candy to the window seat on the plane, Michelle is definitely treated
like the golden child. This only escalates in a “Princess for the Day” contest,
where Michelle takes her turn first and ends up winning. She’s now officially
given reign over anything she wants to do. She proceeds to torment her sisters
by making them ride the carousel and nothing else, until they get so sick of
her that Michelle sneaks away. Michelle going missing is also one of the
interruptions that stops Danny from proposing. In the end, Michelle and Stephanie
make up and all is right again. The Michelle/Stephanie lessons: Be considerate
of others and don’t let annoying people get to you. This is a mega episode with so many plots, it’s surprising
that they kept it to two parts. Any one of these stories could have worked as
the sole focus of an entire episode. This is how most of the Disney World
episodes of TGIF shows go. Since the setting is an entire amusement park
instead of one house, there’s more room to let the characters split up and do
their own thing. It’s also done in an interesting, captivating way that makes
you completely overlook the fact that it’s basically a long advertisement for
Disney World.
#7: The Bicycle Thief
(Season 7, Episode 11)
I love a comedic take on a heist story, and this episode is
just that. There’s no emotional talks, sappy music, or big life lesson. It’s
just comedy that ends up being a heist in reverse. Michelle is convinced that someone stole her
bike. Everyone splits up and searches around town. Danny, Jesse, and Joey all
come back with bikes that are identical to Michelle’s. It turns out that none
of them are Michelle’s bike, which means they’ve all just stolen bikes. To make
matters worse, Kimmy Gibbler and Mrs. Carruthers, a lady from the neighborhood,
decide to barge in and make the Tanner house their neighborhood watch
headquarters. What follows is a lot of hilarious slapstick humor, schemes, and
plots as the family tries to sneak the bikes back to their owners without
getting caught by the Crime Catchers. We later find out that all of this was
unnecessary, since Michelle’s bike was never stolen to begin with. She just
left it at her friend’s house and forgot about it. Which led to a great moment
when everyone gives her the “are you kidding me?” look.
I love these kinds of stories, where something that’s
supposed to be simple, keeps getting more and more complicated. As soon as we
realize they stole the bikes, you can tell that it’s going to be funny. In
addition to crime catchers, the father of one of the kids whose bike was stolen
comes over. This guy has biceps bigger than most children and he knows that
someone named Jesse is to blame. This of course leads to a name switch, turning
Jesse into Joey, Joey into Danny, and everyone else confused. Between this guy
and the Crime Catchers, they also shuffle the bike from the living room to the
kitchen to the bedroom, and eventually out a 2 story window, while Stephanie
distracts everyone with a card trick. Just when you think they have a clear
shot of getting the bikes out undetected, something else happens. You could
probably speed up the whole episode and put Benny Hill music over it, and you’d
still understand it all.
#6: A Very Tanner
Christmas (Season 6, Episode 12)
It’s time for the Christmas
episode of Full House. Once again,
everyone’s got their own plot, and once again, Joey is jipped out of his own
story. I know I’m getting into the higher end of this countdown, but I’m
starting to feel bad for the guy. Anyways, getting back to the episode, Becky
is feeling homesick for holidays in Nebraska. It’s hard for her to get into the
Christmas spirit without snow. Likewise, Danny is finding it hard to get into
the Christmas spirit without Vicky, who is off in Sweden. DJ and Steve end up
arguing about what’s going to happen to them if Steve moves away for college.
While this is going on, Stephanie and Michelle are bursting with anticipation
of what new presents they’ll be getting this year, completely missing the point
of Christmas.
Here we have four problems, and all of them are either
solved by Uncle Jesse or a Santa Claus. Lets start with Uncle Jesse’s
accomplishments. He notices how greedy Stephanie and Michelle have been, so he
takes them to a homeless shelter to help out. This would have been a great
moment, except we don’t actually see them at the shelter, they just talk about
it. The whole issue was rushed and very anticlimactic, when it could have been
a much bigger part of the episode. We did however, get a fun moment at the end
of the episode, when he surprises Becky with a backyard full of snow in San
Francisco by buying 17,000 snow cones. Yes, I think it’s safe to say that Uncle
Jesse is one of the big heroes of this episode.
The other heroes come in the form of three mystery Santas.
Originally, Joey was going to be the only Santa, which leads to some fun
confusion when two more Jolly St. Nicks visit the Tanner house. One of them is
revealed to be Steve, who has decided to go to a local school to stay with DJ.
Another one turns out to be Vicky, who flew back in time to surprise Danny.
It’s a nice moment since both of them had been absolutely miserable at the
party without their significant others. I still think it’s more impressive that
Jesse made it snow and cured greediness and all without dressing up as Santa Claus,
but overall, I’m a sucker for happy Christmas episodes.
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