Noiseless Chatter

This, as the theme song to another terrible old sitcom goes, is it. We’ve reached the end of ALF, season one. That’s 25 episodes in the can, and 74 left to go. Of course I’m not counting Project ALF, but I’m 99% sure I’m going to do it. A loyal reader has offered to send me a copy, so I think it’s just a matter of figuring out how to tackle it.

Speaking of sending copies, if anyone out there is feeling generous enough to shell out for copies of the season two, three, and / or four boxsets that were released in Germany, I’ll use those for my reviews moving forward. The reason I specify the German releases is that those are the complete versions of the episodes…not the syndicated ones I’m reviewing here. All other regions, as far as I can tell, got these shorter edits.

If you’d like to shoot one my way, get in touch. If nobody wants to…believe me, that’s fine, too. I’m perfectly happy to keep reviewing these as they are; I just figured I’d ask.

After this episode I will take a break from reviewing for a few weeks, but “bonus” installments will still go up on Thursdays, ensuring that your recommended weekly dosage of ALF will continue uninterrupted. How will you ever repay me?

So, enough stalling. The sooner I finish this the sooner I get to enjoy a break from it, and that’s some damned good incentive.

“Come Fly With Me” is, as nearly every other episode is, a title borrowed from a song. It’s one that was popularized by Frank Sinatra…as was “Strangers in the Night,” the first ALF episode with a proper title. I’m sure it’s unintentional, but it’s a pretty interesting way to bookend the season. Both of these episodes also feature a large amount of Ochmonek action, too, but, again, I’m positive it’s a coincidence.

This one begins with ALF in the living room, excitedly telling Willie that he won a copy of Cat Lover’s magazine. Yes, isn’t it just like ALF to end the season by enraging me with apostrophe abuse? Can’t just let me walk away without fisting me in the ass, can you?

Willie however knows that ALF didn’t win jack shit. What happened is that ALF filled out a bunch of Publisher’s Clearing House* forms and subscribed to the magazines; he didn’t win them, he bought them. Willie then opens the front door and a bunch of magazines slide into the house, because for no reason whatsoever they were leaning against the door rather than stacked up next to it.

It’s not really funny or stupid enough to warrant a mention, I guess, but since this is the season finale I think we should all take a moment to appreciate Max Wright’s inimitable — thank Christ — line readings:

“You’ve subscryyyb’d to HUNdrets of MaGaZeeeeeNS!”

Classic.

The episode proper begins with ALF believing he’s won a talking toaster, as well as other goodies for the rest of the family. It turns out to be one of those real estate schemes, though, where they wine and dine you in exchange for subjecting to you high-pressure salesmanship. Mr. Ochmonek then comes over wearing the BEST SHIRT EVER with a new trash can for Willie, because there was magazine refuse blowing all over the Tanners’ yard.

Mr. O even reaches into the trash can to show Willie some of the inserts, which establishes that not only did he buy Willie a trash can on his own dime, but he ran around their yard collecting all of the junk Willie let blow around like an asshole, too.

Much as I’m pretty sure we’re supposed to think of Kate as a shrew-hearted icebitch, I think we’re supposed to view Mr. Ochmonek as a meddling pain in the ass. And yet Kate comes across as the most human character on the show, and Mr. Ochmonek is starting to seem like a really nice guy. When’s the last time a Tanner demonstrated a comparable measure of selflessness? I’d certainly rather get stuck next to this guy on a bus than Willie. At least when he talks it doesn’t sound like his kidney is on the verge of exploding.

Anyway, Mr. Ochmonek got the same real estate offer that ALF was excited about, and he suggests that they go together. He even offers to fly the Tanners out so that they can make a vacation out of it. There’s no charge, because Mr. O is able to borrow his friend’s plane.

It’s here that we learn Mr. Ochmonek was a pilot in the Korean War. This is the kind of thing the show does often — some late-game introduction of a major character trait that somehow was never mentioned before — but here it makes sense. This is only the fifth or sixth time we’ve seen the guy, and maybe only the second time we’ve spent substantial time with him. It’s fair that we’d still be learning major things about his past.

Willie, on the other hand, just looks like an even bigger piece of shit for not knowing this. How long has he lived next to the guy? The guy that buys him shit and cleans his filthy-ass yard and is friendly to Willie even though he suspects — correctly — that the Tanners spy on him? And he is learning this pretty major bit of information for the first time. What the hell kind of social worker is Willie if he can’t even bear to make small talk with his neighbor?

The guy might be annoying — though it’s hard to say, since everybody on this show is annoying — but he’s not a bad guy. He’s certainly nicer to Willie than Willie is to him, but Mr. Ochmonek is meant to be the butt of the joke. In fact, the whole Korean War revelation is just setup for the big punchline where he shows Willie the scar he received in combat. Kate walks in at just the wrong time and assumes…I don’t know…that her husband was going to suck him off or something?

It makes no sense. It’s just a fake audience laughing their fake heads off because an old man was about to take off his shirt.

Take that, you injured war hero piece of shit.

Guys, I have to say this: I like Mr. O.

And seriously take a look at that BEST SHIRT EVER.

The family complains after Mr. Ochmonek leaves that they might have to see him in a bathing suit, or share the same bathroom. Jesus Christ, ALF.

The Tanners really are the shittiest family on Earth; the guy just bought them a trash can, did their yard work, and invited them along on a free trip, but the moment he leaves, these cockrags stand around bitching about how ugly he is. And, somehow, we’re supposed to like them and dislike Mr. Ochmonek. Huh?

What a pack of assholes.

ALF then comes into the room dressed for the trip, and they break it to him that he can’t come because all he ever does is fuck things up left and right, and also he’s an alien. I don’t know, I don’t care. There’s no chance in hell Paul Fusco would let the show go more than thirty seconds without ALF so of course he’ll end up going with them.

But seeing him dressed like this is actually bringing back a lot of memories. Not of this episode, exactly, but of ALF in a Hawaiian shirt. In fact if you do a search for “ALF Hawaiian shirt” you’ll get a lot of results. Click on “images” to see how often he’s been merchandised wearing one, and you’ll get an idea of how recognizable an accoutrement it became.

The ALF cartoons also slapped a Hawaiian shirt on him for his “default” look, and I find that interesting. If you buy a Bart Simpson doll, the odds are good he’ll be wearing the orange shirt and blue shorts that he wears most often in the show. Buy a Kermit the Frog doll and the odds are good he’ll be naked, because he usually is naked. ALF, though, somehow became popularly merchandised with an outfit he’s, so far, only worn once, for the purposes of a joke.

I wonder if he starts wearing it more frequently later or something. Either way, yeah…ALF in a Hawaiian shirt brings back a lot of memories.

…of ALF in a Hawaiian shirt.

During the flight everyone sits around pissing and moaning about the free fucking vacation that fell into their laps that, really, they don’t even need to go on if they’re just going to be constant shitheads about everything.

Mr. Ochmonek at least has high spirits, pretending to make captain’s announcements and pointing out interesting landmarks, cementing himself as pretty clearly the only one on the entire plane that any reasonable human being should want to spend time with.

There’s a weird moment where Lynn complains about the cargo they’re taking with them, which is a bunch of pigs, and then she asks why they have to fly facing backwards.

That in itself is a fair question; why would the seats be facing backwards? Willie replies that it might be so that they can keep an eye on the pigs, and there’s an extremely clumsy cut halfway through the word “pigs,” zapping us into a scene of the Tanners back on solid ground.

This might be the most poorly made show I’ve ever seen.

Willie gives a nice tip to Danny Bonaduce and the family gushes about how nice their room is. There’s a blandly funny sequence with a salesman who comes into the room and immediately starts a sales pitch, complete with slide show, but it’s nothing special.

It’s a decently effective reminder of the fact that getaway offers like this are really just misleading ways to fence you in to buying something you don’t want or need, but that’s about it. It’s nothing the laziest stand up comedian couldn’t do better, but it’s at least competent.

Willie shoos the guy away, and then takes a big shit in his pants when he opens a door and sees ALF.

ALF reveals that he stowed away in Kate’s suitcase, having removed all of the clothes she packed. That…must have been a big suitcase for him to fit inside of it and still have a functional spine, but whatever.

There’s a funny moment next as there’s a knock on the door, and we hear Mr. Ochmonek shouting excitedly to the Tanners about the fact that they have adjoining rooms. ALF moans, “Can’t we shake this guy?”

Sure, it’s at the expense of good Mr. O, but here the joke is on ALF’s lack of self awareness. It works because it’s not just the “haha, this old man was seriously injured in the Korean War and is now being really nice to us, what a loser,” crap we got before.

That night, Willie creeps around the living room while his family sleeps, because he hears the Ochmoneks snoring and hates it and for fuck’s sake man, do you bitch for 24 solid hours a day?

What an asshole. I mean, I’m willing to believe that within the ALF universe the Ochmoneks are bad neighbors, however all I’m seeing is the family reacting to them as though they’re bad neighbors. So far the Ochmoneks have been nothing but nice, gracious, and accommodating. It’s like watching Homer get fired up at an overly-polite Flanders, but without…you know…the fact that that’s the joke.

He wakes up Lynn and then they panic when they realize they have no idea where ALF is.

Everybody runs around screaming ALF’s name, which seems like a pretty stupid thing to do if ALF is supposed to be a secret and they already know that the walls are thin enough that they can hear people snoring, BUT WHAT THE FUCK DO I KNOW

Anyway, ALF comes in with some catfish that he caught; he wanted to surprise the Tanners with catfish in bed. This is the best kind of ALF: the ALF that means well, but can’t quite get it right. In fact, this episode does a few things right, so while it’s by no means good (at all), it’s at least nice to not end the season on a total misfire.

They shoo ALF away because Mr. Ochmonek is at the door again, so the naked alien takes Brian into the bathroom with him to “scale the catfish.” This, praise Jesus, is not any kind of euphemism.

Mr. O comes in and hears the electric razor going. He says it sounds like their son is shaving, to which Willie fumblingly replies, with a line I actually really like, “I won’t allow him to have a mustache.”

It sure is nice to get an end-of-season hat-tip from the One Good Writer.

Anyway, Mr. Ochmonek, big fucking asshole piece of human garbage that he is, invites the Tanner family out for a pony ride. Ugh. Can you believe the nerve of this dickbag? How could anyone stand living next to a guy who is constantly giving you things and flying you places for free and inviting you to join him for fun activities what a nightmare my god

They don’t want to go, because he’s old and he snores and should be shot to death.

Why are the Tanners such a bunch of ungrateful tits?

Of course that’s not the only reason; they’re also concerned about leaving ALF in the room. This concern becomes paramount when Mr. Ochmonek reminds them that they all need to attend a mandatory sales pitch in exchange for the trip.

It’s more than a bit silly to me that Brian and Lynn’s presence at the pitch would be mandatory. Do these real estate shysters really believe that a fourth-grader holds any buying power within the family?

I can’t imagine that it would raise any red flags if Willie and Kate pretended that one or both of their kids was sick, so that ALF wouldn’t be left unsupervised, but there I go again, forgetting what show it is I’m watching.

The family stammers some vague suggestions of worry, and then there’s this really bizarre moment when Mr. Ochmonek looks directly into the camera and just…stares.

It’s like one of those reaction shots in The Office. You know, after David Brent says something that shocks the entire room, and Tim makes desperate eye contact with the film crew as if to silently ask, “Are you getting this?”

Only ALF isn’t a mockumentary, there is no film crew in the room within the fiction of this show, and I have genuinely no clue what Mr. Ochmonek is supposed to be staring at while the episode waits quietly for him to get his shit together and move the scene along.

This fuck is this show.

Anyway, the entire family goes down to dinner with the Ochmoneks, and I guess that’s the big sales pitch. Mrs. Ochmonek scolds her husband for chowing down on shellfish because he’s allergic, but he tells her to fuck off.

Willie frets about ALF being alone in the room, but Lynn assures him that everything’s going to be fine, because he has the talking toaster to keep him company.

And we cut to this:

…and this is funny.

ALF is really getting good with these cutaways. The smoking TV, the dead cockroach, and now this. I don’t want to oversell it because God knows I’m guaranteed to eat my words eventually, but as of right now I actually have faith in this show to nail its visual punchlines. It’s earned that faith.

As an added bonus, the “talking” toaster just keeps saying things like “toast” and “toasting.” The fact that ALF is enamored enough with it to keep ordering full loaves of bread from room service is pretty funny, and plays into a childlike fascination with novelty junk that really should be a larger aspect of the character.

Again, “Come Fly With Me” might not be much good, but it does manage to give us some nice flashes of what ALF, as a character, should be. He’s at his best when he’s bright-eyed, enthusiastic, and destructively helpful. He’s at his worst when he’s burning the house down, prank calling the president, and fingerfucking the children. Or maybe I’m just too picky.

But this nice visual punchline isn’t the end, of course, because — altogether now — this is ALF.

We return to dinner, and Willie sees the hairy cornflake running around in circles through the window. ALF picks up a fire extinguisher — which was stored outside, for…some…reason… — and runs, presumably, back up to the room.

…and that’s it. Vacation over. ALF started a fire with the talking toaster by cramming it full of catfish, and the Tanners are kicked out of the hotel. Off camera, of course, because that’s easier than writing funny dialogue wherein Willie has to explain to management why he was toasting catfish.

The episode sure went through a lot of trouble to get the Tanners into a situation that it apparently couldn’t wait to yank them right back out of.

We’re back on the plane, and Willie’s complaining about how everything is awful, at which point ALF pokes his head out from behind a curtain and delivers the episode’s other — and last — great line: “You haven’t stopped complaining since I burned down that room.”

Mr. Ochmonek starts hallucinating due to all the shellfish he ate, and passes out. Mrs. Ochmonek is taking a dump, continuing the tradition of ALF using that as its go-to reason for any character to be out of the room at any given time. I’m pretty sure the only things anyone does in this universe is shit and make funny faces while an alien tapdances.

Anyway, ALF flies the plane, because of course he does.

He also does a bunch of tricks which require Willie and Kate to stumble around pretending the plane is doing loop-de-loops or whatever bullshit nonsense nobody cares about.

Now, granted, this isn’t totally out of left field. I hate it, don’t get me wrong, but ALF has flown before. It was a UFO, as the episode points out, but it’s possible that they functioned similarly enough that he might be able to figure out some basics. Who knows? If the principals of flight are the same on Earth as they were on Melmac, then the main hurdle would just be figuring out the controls.

Of course that’s a massive and potentially fatal hurdle…but this isn’t impossible. I’m happy to allow it.

What I’m not happy about is that this conflict is introduced, ALF slips into the pilot’s seat, and he’s immediately a fucking Blue Angel.

Willie and Kate make some scared faces, ALF lands the plane (off camera, natch), and that’s it. Everyone’s safe.

And that’s, in a word, bullcock.

This is what sinks the episode for me. Not that it was good before this, but this scene is what pulls it down into unsalvageability.

I’m not mad that ALF landed the plane.** I’m mad that the episode glossed over his landing of the plane.

That’s pretty major. Keeping a plane in level flight isn’t the difficult thing for untrained, de-facto pilots. That’s easy. It’s landing that’s the major problem, and potentially the most interesting for a work of fiction to explore. How many shows and movies can you name that feature scenes of ground controllers relaying instructions to somebody who doesn’t know how to land?

Countless. Because it’s immediately recognizable as a tense and dangerous situation. ALF is a sitcom so, yes, I’m aware that tension is not its forte. But just as easily a situation like that could be mined for laughs, and I’m more than a little disappointed that the writers hit upon this idea, and decided instead to just cut back to everybody unharmed on the ground.

You know what would have made this a good episode? Mr. O passing out on the way to their vacation…not on the way back. “Come Fly With Me” should have been 20 minutes of ALF struggling to fly and land the plane. The show could have toyed with the conventions of airplane disaster films the same way “La Cuckaracha” played with sci-fi / horror. The family would have to keep Mrs. Ochmonek unaware of both ALF’s presence and her husband’s condition. The lion’s share of the episode would be ALF engaging in funny dialogue with an air traffic controller who is desperately trying to explain in simple terms how to achieve complicated things, without being aware that he’s speaking to an alien who can’t understand them.

It could have been a nice, fun episode with an element of risk, and a great way to end the season. “ALF has to fly a plane” might not be the most original story idea in history, but it’s a lot better than just cutting to the characters safe at home and saying, “oh btw ALF flew the plane.”

So, that’s the episode. Everybody’s safe, and ALF’s toaster shits out some burnt catfish. What a metaphor for anyone who stuck with this show through 25 episodes.

Oh well. At least this one didn’t end with the family reminiscing fondly about the mortal danger ALF put them in, like they did at the end of “On the Road Again.”

Willie and Kate did thank him for saving them, though, which is fine…to a degree. Yes, it’s true that if ALF hadn’t been there when Mr. Ochmonek passed out, they could all be dead. However if ALF hadn’t stowed away and / or hadn’t stuffed catfish into the fucking toaster, they wouldn’t have been forced to fly home while Mr. Ochmonek was under the influence of hallucinogenic oysters, so maybe we shouldn’t be so quick to sing his praises.

But, hey, it’s over!

I made it through 25 episodes of this shit without missing a single week, so I honestly do believe I deserve a bit of deep breathing before moving on to season two.

Next week I will post a more general review of season one (something I’m more than happy to adopt from Full House Reviewed) and then I have another couple of surprises to follow. So stick around.

Thanks for reading. It means more than I can say, and it’s a hell of a lot of fun to have such excellent commenters along for the ride. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I need to go make fun of a crippled Korean War veteran for not being conventionally attractive.

—–
* If you remember, Publisher’s Clearing House used to have Ed McMahon as a spokesperson. He’s also namedropped in this episode. I bring this up because I believe he stars in ALF‘s next clip show. That’s sure to be good.

** Although, you have to admit, crashing and killing the Tanners would have ended the season on one hell of a riveting cliffhanger.

Here we are; the penultimate episode of ALF, season one. And here’s a quick little vocabulary lesson for everyone who thinks “penultimate” means “best” or “platonic ideal of” or some shit: it doesn’t. It means “the one with a bigass cockroach monster.” You uneducated bastards.

Let me get this out of the way right now: “La Cuckaracha” has a lot of problems. Okay? Keep that in mind, because I’m going to have quite a few nice things to say about this one, and I wouldn’t want you to get confused.

“La Cuckaracha” is flawed. At times, deeply so. And yet, God help me, this episode is fun.

In fact, I think I’d stick it alongside “For Your Eyes Only” and “Going Out of My Head Over You,” forming the trilogy of ALF season one episodes that are worth watching. Of course, we still have one left, so it’s possible that it will actually be a quadrilogy, but considering the fact that both of those other episodes were followed immediately by piles of steaming shit, I’m not optimistic.

One thing that I unreservedly love about this episode is that its premise follows both naturally and creatively from the fact that ALF is an alien. The show so rarely acknowledges this for anything other than a passing gag embedded in an otherwise unremarkable plotline that I feel the need to point it out whenever it does happen.

And when it does happen, the episode has a high likelihood of being good. All three episodes in the Not Bad Trilogy hinge on that fact, and wouldn’t be possible without that fact. And while there are other* episodes that rely heavily on it as well, most of them do not. And most of them are garbage. So the moment there is a plot tailored to take advantage of ALF’s extra-terrestrial origins, my ears perk up, and at the very least I end up appreciating the effort.

This episode even begins with a reminder of the fact that ALF IS NOT A FUCKING HUMAN by having him whip out a “slime ball” at the dinner table for dessert. Oddly enough, this scene was also in “Try to Remember,” making it yet another memory of ALF that the Tanner family had before it even happened.

What’s more, ALF says he found the slime ball while cleaning out his space ship. Why he didn’t already do this before they loaned the vessel out to a stranger for a week — or before he stripped the fucking thing down, removed all the plumbing, and reassembled it piece by piece — is something that no amount of creative commenting can rectify. (Prove me wrong, readers.)

So, yeah, like I said, this episode has its problems, and small logical inconsistencies like this are the least of them…but it has something to do with what ALF is, and that’s a huge step forward.

There’s not really a cold open in this episode. There is, but it’s pretty clearly just a single scene that has the credits shat into the middle. This isn’t a problem, but I want to point it out because the fact that the episode proper picks up about one frame after the cold open ends works to its advantage. “La Cuckaracha” feels like a version of ALF designed for the stage, and while it doesn’t take place in real time, the lack of too many “breaks” in the action gives it an interesting, theatrical personality that helps it to stand out, whether or not that was in any way deliberate.

Anyway, the bag containing ALF’s slime ball also contained a cockroach that stowed away when ALF fled Melmac. We don’t see it as it falls to the floor, but from the verbal descriptions it seems very much like an Earth cockroach, except for the fact that it has blue eyes. (A trait which has no bearing on the episode except that ALF gets to make a Frank Sinatra joke later on. Thank God for that, right?)

Kate, understandably, wants to kill it. Willie, also understandably, wants to capture it unharmed, as it’s a unique specimen from a planet no longer in existence and might be worth studying. I can definitely imagine strong arguments on either end, but I’m going to side with Kate on this because fuck Willie.

Willie stands there describing the elaborate trap he’s going to make in order to catch it, and while he’s jacking off over his plans for the roach snatch, Kate grabs a can of pesticide and sprays it.

The camera holds on this image for a good long while, which I found funny. The sheer amount of empty time filled by Kate spraying poison onto an unseen alien bug made me laugh…but the fake audience did not join me, so maybe it wasn’t a joke and was just some unintentionally lousy pacing. Who knows. I laughed, though, so I’m going to count it. It’s also yet another example of Kate being the only not-totally-worthless-all-the-motherfucking-time Tanner, so forgive me for enjoying what I evidently was not meant to.

When she finally stops spraying it, they notice that the roach is gone. She starts looking for it, but Willie tells her to calm down, and this time I can’t imagine a strong argument for that perspective because there is now a pissed off space monster going apeshit somewhere in the place that they prepare their food.

Willie, you fucking dolt.

ALF goes into the living room to order some donuts — a running gag in this episode that isn’t very funny but isn’t offensively awful, either, so, again, PROGRESS — and then he pops up through the window and beckons for Willie to follow him.

He didn’t want to upset Kate, which is why he’s telling Willie in secret, but he found the roach: it’s now a foot long and apparently terrifying.

We don’t get to see it because ALF blew its budget on carving a treacherous network of death-trenches into the floor of every set, but that’s okay; we can rely on Max Wright and Paul Fusco, master thespians, to silently convey the horror for us.

Kate, once again the closest thing to an actual person anywhere on the planet, decides to hustle the kids THE FUCK AWAY FROM THIS.

Willie, once again Willie, tells her not to bother.

He killed it, he says. With the same spray that Kate used, he says. You know…the spray that made it grow 11 inches in about 30 seconds. This isn’t like the more or less understandable logical leap of ALF only now cleaning out his space ship after 24 weeks, because poking holes in that relies on us remembering what it’s been through in that time, which I probably only do because I write novels about every God damned episode of this shit.

This spray thing, however, doesn’t make any sense at all. Willie saw that this didn’t work, and he saw it just a couple of minutes ago. Granted, he doesn’t make the connection between the spray and the growth until the next scene, but at the very least he knew beyond the shadow of a doubt that it did not kill the roach, so declaring victory is downright idiotic.

It’s all just an excuse for the roach to grow again, but surely they could have handled it differently. For instance maybe the roach knocked the can over and waded through the pesticide or something. Or maybe Willie was outside of the room when Kate sprayed it, building that trap of his perhaps, so that he didn’t actually see what she used on it. As it stands, it doesn’t make any sense.

I am amused by the fact that Max Wright enters the scene holding the can upside down, and then has to quickly turn it right-side up when he raises it triumphantly. It’s pretty clearly not a joke; it’s Max Wright holding a prop the wrong way and nobody telling him, making him look like an idiot when he realizes it halfway through his line.

Brian mentions that they named the roach Rodney, which ruffles Willie’s feathers because that’s his brother’s name. Firstly, that’s interesting, because I think this is the first we’ve ever heard of Willie’s family. Or, wait, maybe I’m wrong. He mumbled some kind of bullshit about them in “Oh, Tannerbaum” and how they always used to have a real tree, but I think this might be the first specific detail about them.

Secondly, why is Willie upset that his kid named a cockroach after his brother? Willie himself named a hamster after his wife’s dead dad, so get off your high horse, pal.

Thirdly…is Rodney the character that Jim J. Bullock plays when he joins the cast in the final season? I don’t know much about that except that he plays a relative of Willie’s, and it would be a hell of a boon for ALF‘s continuity if they turned this tossed-off comment in season one into a full-fledged character in season four. I guess we’ll wait and see. Or Dan_the_Shpydar can just tell me in the comments.

Anyway, Kate takes the kids and leaves Willie’s sorry ass…but unfortunately not for good. ALF and Willie panic because ALF called an exterminator, and that exterminator is almost certainly going to use a similar spray on the bug, which they now realize is what’s making it grow. So, yeah, that’s a bad thing, but does this actually prove that Willie Tanner is more worthless than the naked alien that lives in a laundry basket? Both Kate and ALF took steps to deal with the problem in some way…Willie just repeated the shit he already knew didn’t work and made the problem worse.

WILLIE IS THE NEW ALF

ALF hides in the kitchen and Willie confiscates the spray from the exterminator, who arrives quickly enough that the writers don’t have to come up with any dialogue between ALF and Willie lest they inadvertently characterize one of them.

There is a pretty good gag though when the exterminator picks up a magazine to kill the roach with, and Willie instead hands him a phone book.

That’s good. That’s funny. And it’s probably worth pointing out at this point that “La Cuckaracha” is credited to Jerry Stahl, who seems to be your unanimous pick for the identity of the One Good Writer. As I’ve explained before the fact that a particular writer is credited for an episode doesn’t necessarily mean that he or she had all that much to do with it, but I thought it was worth pointing out.

Of course, it’s also worth pointing out that the last episode for which he received an on-screen credit was “Don’t It Make Your Brown Eyes Blue?” which was basically a 21-minute music video about ALF wanting to squirt alien gooze into a teenager, so either way it’s pretty inconclusive.

Anyway, the exterminator goes into the bedroom and sees the enormous cockroach, and then runs out of the house screaming and flailing like Daffy Duck. It’s shit.

On the way out he has to do this unnatural thing where he takes the spray back from Willie, and it’s another one of those really awkward things that isn’t a joke and should have been sorted out in rehearsal, but this is ALF and I’m pretty sure we’re watching the rehearsal.

It’s followed by another good moment, though, as Willie peeks into the bedroom to see the cockroach himself, and emerges shaking. ALF asks him how big it is, and Willie replies, “That depends. Do you measure to the shoulders or the head?”

That’s a funny enough line on its own, but it’s also an act break, which is heralded by some suspenseful music swelling up. And I like that. The fact that the action hasn’t left the two main rooms of the house — which for all intents and purposes are connected — leads to a sense of claustrophobia. The unseen threat is also an asset to the episode, making the whole thing feel not only like a stage play but like a comedy of reaction. It’s nice, and it’s in large part effective.

In many ways, it feels like a pastiche of the sci-fi horror genre — B-movies with giant animals from space, specifically — but the episode unfortunately doesn’t wholly commit. Unlike “Lookin’ Through the Windows,” which did at least sustain its Rear Window parody through the end, “La Cuckaracha” hits upon a recognizable trope or sense of danger…but then pulls back and just lets it be an episode of ALF for a while. It’s a shame because a stronger commitment to the gag would have helped this one out a lot, and would have made its lesser moments more forgivable, simply due to the novelty of the experiment. Instead, “La Cuckaracha” comes off like a half-measure, and that’s disappointing.

ALF and Willie go into the shed to gather up some chemicals, and then ALF hides because Mr. Ochmonek comes in with the spray that the exterminator apparently dropped when he fled the Tanner house.

It’s…weird. First of all, giving us this short scene in the shed breaks the feeling of isolation and danger that came from trapping ALF and Willie in the house. It’s not necessary; we could have opened the next act with Willie coming back into the house with an armful of chemicals, having already collected them. Transporting both characters to the shed just makes it ridiculous that they don’t stay there while they formulate their plan. Why not stay out of harm’s way? They’re both openly terrified that the cockroach is going to eat them, so if they’re going to the shed for any reason, why don’t they stay there until they have a definitive plan for killing the thing? It’s even stranger to set the scene here as there’s no reason for Mr. Ochmonek to come looking for Willie in the shed. Sure, he could have tried the front door first, but, still, why have this crap taking place in the shed at all?

Secondly, the exterminator dropped the spray after leaving the house? The show already gave us a good reason for Willie to be in possession of the tank; he confiscated it, and the exterminator panicked and fled. That’s a reason for the tank to still be on the Tanner property right there, but instead they made the exterminator clumsily take it back on the way out…only to then drop it off camera so it could still be there. If they wanted Willie to end up with the spray, why didn’t they just let him keep it in the first place?

It’s shit like this that really makes me wonder if I’m right about these scripts being first drafts. Cutting literally one stage direction earlier would have made this entire explanation of why Mr. Ochmonek is returning the tank to Willie unnecessary. But they do at least manage to turn it into a secondary plot-point: before returning the tank, Mr. Ochmonek took it upon himself to spray the Tanner home with a shitload of the pesticide.

Again, it’s another excuse to get the cockroach to grow. And, again, it’s another application of pesticide that could have been handled much more gracefully than this clunky nonsense.

Willie puts on his jacket because he’s going to buy as much boric acid as he can in a last-ditch attempt to kill the thing. But ALF can’t come, and he’s afraid of being left alone, so he asks Willie to give him a hug, in case they never see each other again.

It’s…actually really cute. And a little sad. Willie has to leave to get the boric acid, and ALF can’t come because somebody might see him. For reasons totally organic to the situation, these two have to separate, leaving one of them locked inside with the very danger they’ve been trying to avoid. The hug has meaning. It’s a gag, but it isn’t just a gag.

It also has a great punchline as they separate and ALF says, “Now tell me that you love me.” It’s a strong moment, given more heft by the fact that there’s an actual element of risk to what’s happening…and that’s something that this show could really use a lot more of.

As soon as Willie leaves, the cockroach begins to skitter around, stalking ALF.

Yes, the cockroach puppet (what we see of it, which is never much at a time) looks awful. However it also seems like it’s supposed to look awful. I’m sure there were budgetary reasons that we couldn’t see a massive monster space roach running around, but “La Cuckaracha” is using that to its advantage: it’s having fun.

This is where the episode takes its main turn into solid B-movie horror territory, and it’s also the best part. It’s safe to say that the cockroach isn’t scary, but the atmosphere is at least tense, and there’s a feeling — at last — that the folks working on this show are enjoying themselves. That’s evidenced in the moment when the cockroach pushes open the kitchen door and shoves a bunch of shit off the end-table. It doesn’t do that because it’s scary…it does that because it’s fun. It’s a nice touch, and I don’t need to believe in the existence of the cockroach in order to enjoy it. I only need to invest in the situation, and I do…because, at last, it’s a pleasure to do so.

ALF flees to the bedroom and attempts to phone for help, but the cockroach kicks down the door and he then must flee to Willie and Kate’s bathroom. There’s some impressive understanding of visual grammar here as ALF backs slowly through the small room, leaving himself with less and less room to evade the monster, and the camera holds tight focus on him the entire time.

It emphasizes not only the claustrophobia, but the impending end of the episode. This is it. The hero was trapped before, but now he’s even more trapped. Earlier, there was no exit. Now there’s no room at all. He’s fenced himself in, and the tight camerawork underscores that quite nicely.

There’s even neat little nod to the pilot when ALF finds himself next to the toilet. He considers it for a moment, and says, “Hmm…no-one ever told me where these things lead…”

He doesn’t attempt to escape through the shitter, but I like this. This bathroom was pretty much his first experience of life on Earth, and now, trapped, he’s worried that it might be his last.

The cockroach hacks through the door with its roachcock, managing to evoke The Shining without ALF screaming “There’s Johnny!!!” or something. It’s admirable restraint for this show.

We then get a POV shot from the roach as it closes in on a terrified ALF:

He has just enough time to try to fight it off with a plunger, but it doesn’t work. He then grabs some perfume and sprays it around hoping to buy himself some time…but the scene ends.

The next thing we see is Willie returning home with the boric acid, and he finds ALF sitting on the living room floor. He says, “What did you do??” and then we cut to this:

…and it’s really funny. This is like the cut to the smoking television in “Weird Science.” The timing is perfect, and it’s starting to seem like this silent, visual punchline is something that ALF might come to do very well.

It turns out the perfume killed it. Willie says that he got that perfume for Kate on her birthday, and ALF asks, “Why? Did you have a roach problem then, too?” EVEN ALF’S DICKITUDE IS FUNNY GUYS

This one…wasn’t half bad. I actually quite liked it, with a few reservations. I wish they committed more to the stylistic experiment than they did, because what we’re left with doesn’t lean enough into the curve to be as memorable as it should be, but by ALF standards it’s positively stellar.

There’s a short epilogue about ALF bringing a Venus Fly Trap into the house…which is actually from Venus. It eats a pencil and that’s that, ho ho ho, but the fact is that the bulk of this episode was pretty damned good, so who cares about the pointless closing gag?

In a way I wish that this were the season finale, because it would be great — and reassuring — to end on a high note. But we still have one episode left.

I have a bad feeling about this.

MELMAC FACTS: On Melmac, cockroaches have blue eyes. Melmac also had a Detroit, which produced a lot of good R&B groups. Melmac’s Detroit was infested with Jaffies, blood-sucking maggots that take the shape of their host, and it became known as Jaffytown.

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* These would be the pilot, “Help Me, Rhonda,” and “Wild Thing.” That’s a grand total of six episodes (by my count) out of 24 that have anything to do with the identity of the show’s title character.