694: Anger Mismanagement

[Peachey Keen]

Does this episode make you mad or happy?


--Edit--
Wahoo! My first ToO post using my Android!

[Leonard Meltsner]

All I have to say first, is that after the Ravioli scene, there was music transitioning into the next scene that was from Album 46-ish, and I totally thought Liz or Mandy was gonna yell after it.

[LizzieG]

A couple observations:

• Olivia's anger on behalf of Amber reminded me of Connie's anger on behalf of Jack in "Rewards in Full"
• Mrs. Cramer = Mrs. Sutton

When I first heard the promo and realized that this was (in part) a Parker family episode, I was really excited for it. Parker family episodes are great, particularly those with a David/Eva/Lucia dynamic. Episodes with that dynamic are a real delight to listen to. I particularly liked the hair-salon-in-the-living-room scene and the Taco Barn bit. While I liked that storyline more than Olivia's, hers was pretty good too, and avoided being cheesy or over-the-top (particularly in the scenes with Wooton, where "over-the-top" often lives). I liked Whit's over-the-counter-adviser role too.

I'm so glad they replaced the actress who played Valerie in "Kidsboro"; now, the character sounds much more like a real person that age (and kind of like Courtney Vincent, but snottier and a drama queen). I'm also glad that Amber (from "Opposite Day") was mentioned, and that Olivia's still her friend -- good character continuity.

I've really enjoyed the character of Lucia, and I'm glad that she's moving to Odyssey and that the writers are giving her more to do with this hair salon business (a door-to-door hair salon business really is a clever idea).

On another note, I'm glad that the next episode features Camilla. Especially considering that we've had two Parker family episodes this season, it's been entirely too long since we've heard from her.

Probably my favorite episode of the season so far, though most of this season so far has been a pleasant surprise. I think I've finally adjusted to the new Odyssey!

[CreativeThinker101]

Odyssey has always done their A-plots and B-plots well, with the exception of a few. This episode is also done well, but not spectacular. Let's start at the beginning. Valerie. Her voice is exasperating. Does anyone else notice how annoying the new girl voices are? Hope Levy's version of Olivia, Emily, even Amber, and now, Valerie. Olivia's anger at Valerie is actually quite well-acted. I think Kelly Stables does a much better job of Olivia, even if she were 39 years old too. Ted Humpreys and Amber the science geek are both mentioned in the first scene, which excited me. I don't know why, I just like hearing about current characters. I think Grandma Lucia is and engaging character, clashing well with both David and Eva, though not having chemistry with any of the Parker children. Olivia is obsessed. It was okay at the beginning, but later in the episode it becomes very annoying. I've never really favored rants by kid characters. Heather did them all the time (Poor Loser) and I disliked them. Olivia does them a lot too. I find myself relating to the woman who wanted to change from football to cooking. That's totally me. Not that I would demand something of somebody else in a public place, but I constantly ask my dad to change from baseball to Food Network. Mrs. Creamer is kind of too much like those cranky old ladies who befriend the characters. Valerie sounds like a supermodel. These random transitions are due to the fact that I am listening to the episode now, and reviewing it as I go. Also, I think the moral is a little misleading. 'Love is not easily angered' is not what this episode is really all about. It's about controlling your anger and using it. That's what it's supposed to be about. Odyssey has done a good job since Album 51 of Whit or Eugene displaying the moral, but unfortunately they haven't done a good job of the new characters acting out the moral.

[DanP740]

Valerie's voice: really. really. annoying. Her character reminds me of someone from Down Gilead Lane...
The cranky lady: Not bad
The grandma: you're moving to Odyssey? Please no...
Hair salon in living room: can anyone say zoning regulations?

2/5

I didn't really like this episode, and not because I have rheumatism.

[Steve]

Dumb dumb dumb dumb dumb and dumb.

Last week's episode was good. No, phenomenal. This episode was well...dumb. The entire thing was annoying. The idea of a hair salon in a living room was just...bad. The whole float thing barely made sense. As you have figured out, I will not be listening to this episode again for a long long long long long and long time.

[Graces4you]

Valerie has a new voice. I have listened to about 4 min. of it and I am not loving it. I think this is the other shoe dropping. We felt that the new season was promising and then there's a horrible episode. The other shoe has dropped.

[Smaug the Dragon]

The best part of this episode: David Parker. He is such an awesome character! I love the chemistry between Eva, Lucia and David, and some of Mr. Parker's one-liners had me laughing out loud.

Er... the rest of the episode... wasn't my cup of tea. I got bored listening to Olivia's constant ranting. And no offence intended to any Wooton lovers, but can we please have a break from the zaniness?! I didn't mind Wooton initially, once every few episodes is manageable, but he's been in almost every episode recently and I really am getting sick of him. Sorry, I'll stop now before I get really angry.

*shuffles off huffing and growling and muttering under breath about how unfair it is that we listeners have to listen to such silliness. "I'm so ANGRY! Hrrrghhh!" *

[JesusFreak777]

Actually, I thought Wooton was VERY balanced in this episode. He offered good advice while being a little silly AND getting into very real situations. I enjoyed the episode overall, and really love the Parkers. Valerie was annoying, but since I know people like her in real life, she was written well.

4.5/5 for me

[Christian A.]

This was a really great episode. It truly felt slice-of-life, even though it had the slightly extreme situation with the salon in the family room. Probably the main reason it felt that way was because it had a strong moral, and a very applicable moral at that. I don't think I know anyone who doesn't struggle with anger mismanagement. And I feel like I'm the "chief of sinners" in that regard. I feel like I'm always working on it, but always falling back into temptation and sinning. Thankfully, I think this episode had a permeable enough message that it will stick in my head and maybe help me in some situations.

I think the reason many of the episodes in this season so far have such great morals and takeaway values is that, because the writers decided to base the album on 1 Corinthians 13, they had to start with the moral and then work out the episode--rather than working the other way around, starting with an entertaining episode idea and then fitting the moral into it. I believe that's also the reason that I didn't like A Penny Saved as much. If I remember correctly, it, along with A Penny Earned, was added into the album at a later date than the rest of the episodes. So I assume the writers had already come up with the storyline and had to fit it into one of the "love is" or "love is/does not" morals. That's probably why the aspect of love was harder to catch in A Penny Saved. It was very obvious in Wooton Knows Best, The Amazing Loser, and this episode, Anger Mismanagement. With the way this season is going, I'm starting to really look forward to the rest of this album (except A Penny Earned, but maybe Mr. McCusker will surprise me).

The first specific thing I wanted to mention about the episode is that I actually really liked Wooton this time! All of his humor felt like old times, and it was all laugh-out-loud funny. Plus, I noticed that none of it disrupted any serious moments. Sometimes, it even added to the seriousness of the point he was trying to bring across to Mrs. Kramer or Olivia. A couple of times during the episode, I was reminded of Grady, because of the teaching mode that Wooton was in with Olivia.

All three of the situations where the characters' patience were tried were very true-to-life circumstances. With Mrs. Kramer, it was an example of when someone gets angry at you for something you didn't have anything to do with. With Mr. Parker, he got angry because others kept him from doing what he wanted to do. And with Olivia, she got angry because someone else had stolen the spotlight for something they didn't do. Each one of those is something that most people have to deal with on a regular basis, so I thought it was great that the writers made the episode so applicable to everyday life.

Olivia's voice continues to really please me. Kelly Stables gives her a voice that expresses her tendency to change emotions and over-express herself. Although it does get annoying and uncomfortable sometimes when she expresses herself a bit too much, it still fits her character really well. And this episode was the perfect way for her to show those qualities, since she shifted up and down from angry to happy to annoyed to patient.


I noticed that Valerie's voice was changed, and I'm glad. Whenever I listened to the Kidsboro episodes I always got her and Jill mixed up. There were literally times where my whole understanding of the episode was messed up because I thought Jill was Valerie. And since Olivia and Valerie had a couple exchanges, it was good that the actress was switched to avoid more confusion. In addition, I think the voice change was good for Valerie; she now sounds more like the popular "chick" girl that she is described as being. In my opinion, she sounds more obnoxious and full of herself than she did before.

I loved Mr. Parker's character in this episode. As usual, the actor pulled off the perfect husband and father voice, and as a result, I really felt for him the entire episode. His reactions and emotions were so genuine, and I was annoyed together with him when he missed "one of the best games in professional football history." I thought he handled his anger quite well, though--better than I would have in his situation. And I liked how he still maintained his role of leadership in the home by making all the decisions.

I didn't know that running a salon would be particularly of interest to a European grandmother, but go figure. It certainly made for an entertaining side of the show. I thought Mrs. Parker and Mrs. Ortega were really in character throughout the whole thing. All of the actors and actresses did amazing jobs.

So I really, really liked this episode, as you can see. Unlike Wooton Knows Best, I didn't even have a single complaint (unless you count Olivia's over-expressiveness). I don't think this one had as strong of a moral as Wooton Knows Best did, but it definitely surpassed it in entertainment and cleverness value. I learned from the episode, which is not a very common occurrence in Odyssey episodes, so I don't think I can give the episode any lower of a rating than I gave Wooton Knows Best. I really feel like this episode deserves a 9.5/10 just like its predecessor.

[Leonard Meltsner]

Just to point out, when Wooton says "Cat sweater!!", and Olivia says "What game are we playing now?", it's a reference to Opposite Day, when Wooton was yelling out things, ex: blue things, whilst delivering mail.

[Catspaw]

I finally listened today, and I enjoyed this episode. I think anger is an easy topic to relate to and I thought that it was dealt with quite well. I enjoyed the family interactions and Wooton's patience and extra kindness to a cranky person on his mail route seemed perfectly suited to what we know of his character. I agree with what a lot of other people said...the people who enjoyed the episode, not the other people.

[Knight Fisher]

Well I was originally not going to listen. But I decided to give it a try. After the scene in Whitsend at the beginning, me and my sister decided not to waste our time. We listened to With a Little Help From My Friends. Much better. Olivia and the rest are impossible for me to relate to. I'm fluent enough with computers to be able to go with Matthew. But then they pull him erasing files at Whitsend, because he thinks they are duplicates. Or WiFi Keyboard. Bring it back to the really world Paul Mccusker.

[Taps]

This episode was REALLY good! I really like the new Odyssey! The first three were better in my opinion though.

[Moontide]

then they pull him erasing files at Whitsend, because he thinks they are duplicates.

That is not too hard to do on systems. For example on Unix with hard short cuts, the short cuts act almost exactly the same way as real files, so it would not be all that hard to be confused about it.

[Steve]

then they pull him erasing files at Whitsend, because he thinks they are duplicates.

That is not too hard to do on systems. For example on Unix with hard short cuts, the short cuts act almost exactly the same way as real files, so it would not be all that hard to be confused about it.

Same with a Mac, as on most newer ones, the alias files are not labled that they are shorcuts.

[whittaker96]

I really enjoyed this episode. For the first time, this felt like I was listening to an episode before the hiatus. Andre Stojka sounded the most like Whit he's ever been, and the chemistry with the Parkers was fantastic. I love Mama Lucia and her relationship with Mr. Parker. Wooton was used well, and it was nice to hear him doing something intelligent on his mail route again (Opposite Day: Dress Like a Dairy Product Day or something?). I'm loving Kelly Stables with Olivia (although I still want Jill) and I love Valerie's new mean girl, popular voice. Honestly, the old Valerie sounded fat. And she's supposed to be "the most beautiful girl at Odyssey Middle School." -Ryan Cummings, Kidsboro I'm excited to hear future stories with Lucia's salon business, and Odyssey is going places!

87/100

[Moontide]

Same with a Mac, as on most newer ones, the alias files are not labled that they are shorcuts.

The new Macs are Unix-based.

[Jason Whits Son]

My review can be found here.