Louie Recap: ‘Bummer/Blueberries’

“Help what? His head came off.”

The title of last night’s episode of Louie, “Bummer/Blueberries,” is a great new way of describing depressing sex. For instance, there’s a couple that has been together for years, and their obligation to their marriage license is stronger than their love for one another. The husband, in the drollest tone possible, asks, “Hey, honey, would you like to have Bummer Blueberries tonight?” The wife shrugs and replies, “Sure, whatever. Just remember to bring the Vagiteen.”

Sorry for the depressing picture, but let’s face it, the episode, particularly the second segment, painted a pretty disheartening, or flaccid, if you will, picture of seeeexxxxxxual relations, or intercourse, as some call it, some being Dolores, a fellow parent of a student (and possible Seinfeld reference?). She’s even more miserable than Louie (that’s saying something), and the conversation quickly turns from an in-classroom propaganda-spewing plasma screen to whether Louie would like to come over to her place for some NSA “intercourse.” He’s desperate, and he would.

Before long, she’s wearing the world’s least flattering nightgown, one that I think they used on Big Love once, and smothering lotion all over her legs. Louie knows how non-romantic this is and that he should just run away, especially when she asks him to buy condoms without spermicide or lubricant, “sexual lubricant” separately, Vagiteen, and blueberries, but the penis is mightier than the brain, and off he goes to the pharmacy. Upon his return, they begin The Intercourse and she calls Louie “daddy” and asks him to spank her. He obliges and actually starts to get in to it, but just when it seems like she’s going to orgasm, she begins to sob instead. Lucky Louie. Then she eats some blueberries from a bowl and starts talking about middle schools, while Louie watches and listens and wonders what the hell just happened.

Going back further in the episode: the opening stand-up bit is about average guys, like Louie, having shirt-wearing sex with women, and how it’s amazing that females ever agree to let men put their you-know-what in their you-know-what. “It’s a six-pack for a whole other reason,” he says, referencing why he should never be allowed to go on top. This theme continues into the first segment, where Louie awkwardly calls Janice (played by Kelly McCrann), asking her out on a date. She agrees, with her boyfriend in the background, because she thinks it can help her career (she says something about Louie being on-camera, so does this mean that the characters on Louie are aware of the show Louie?). At a street corner on his way to meet Janice, Louie is literally bum-rushed. He ducks out of the way, but the screaming homeless man keeps going — until he’s hit by garbage truck and smashed into a million pieces, his head rolling around in the middle of the road.

Louie is, obviously, horrified, but in a profound way. His revelation: life is meaningless. Why the fuck should he care about meeting up with a not-nice woman just because he hopes he can have sex with her when existence could end at any moment? One second, you’re having a perfectly pleasant day; the next you’re just schmo working at a box factory; the day after that you’re living on the streets; and the day after the day after that, you’re dead because a truck that’s literally carrying filth made from other humans hits and decapitates you.

Or at least he feels this way until Janice becomes intrigued by Louie’s life views, how “awesomely honest” he is, and, dare I say it, a little turned on. They share a romantic kiss on the High Line — and then he tells her what happened on the way to the date. Louie Lesson #437, don’t repeat the following phrase on a date: “He went sprawling in to the intersection and a garbage truck came and hit him, and his head came off. It went duh-duh-duh down the street.” She’s aghast at his story, not only because of what happened, but also that Louie still wanted to go out on a date. “Oh my God, and you saw that? Oh my God, that’s awful. That’s so awful. That’s the worst thing I’ve ever heard of. You saw that and then you came out with me…I think I need to go home.”

“Bummer/Blueberries” was an episode about sad sexual desperation, about knowing that you’re acting like a sucker but still doing it, mostly because you want to get laid. Louie knows nothing good can come of meeting with, or sleeping with, Janice and Dolores, and yet he still goes through with it, partially because he’s very lonely and looking for a conversation with an actual adult, and not his children, but also because, at least with Dolores, he’s hoping for a connection. He stays with her while she’s eating blueberries not because of awkwardness, or at least not totally out of awkwardness, but because he sees someone who’s also miserable and knows that the best thing for a depressed person is for them to have someone to talk to. Louie’s therapy occurs on-stage at the comedy club (where he again calls out a heckler in this week’s tag), but some aren’t so lucky; that’s why he stayed and why he’s an honestly good guy who just wants to get laid every so often.

Josh Kurp edited out two other Simpsons references.

Louie Recap: ‘Bummer/Blueberries’