JoA Recaps for Season 1

TeeJay · 24 Oct 06 :: 23:00

I just uploaded the recap for 1x16 Double Dutch to the site. But I might just as well post it here too:

1x16 Double Dutch
by TeeJay

Joan and Grace are having a deep conversation on their way to... where exactly? Well, as deep as two 16-year-olds can have a conversation. And of course Adam is part of that conversation too. Grace tells Joan she thinks Adam and Iris are not gonna last. "Why, are his lips gonna fall off from making out too much?" Joan sarcastically asks. Grace is a little of a mystery here. "I was trying to be positive. It's not me. Rove and Iris are perfect for each other. They'll probably have a house full of emotionally damaged babies by senior year." What is she saying? That she thinks Adam and Iris are hitting it off? Or is she being cynical after all? Or is it just me not getting what she's playing at? And why emotionally damaged? Is that a knock on Iris or Adam, or both?

Bit of a funny moment here, because there's Black-Musician God, giving us a very very bad rendition of "One Of Us". This is when God tells Joan to learn how to jump rope. Soon it becomes clear that this is about Casper, a young African-American girl whom Joan is supposed to... well, she doesn't really know. Become friends with, for a start. Which Casper doesn't really make easy.

In school, there's Adam with his arm around Cousin It in the hallway. Being giddily happy, smiling at something Baby-Voice said. Ughch. That's also exactly Joan's reaction. Looking at Grace, she says, "And still I fall." Adam walks up (Iris still in his arms) and proudly shows her his latest sculpture for art class. Joyfully, he asks Joan what she thinks about it. And he wants her approval so bad. But then Baby-Voice opens her mouth. God, I wish she didn't. "It's awesome, right? A's so talented." Joan is agape. A? Yes, Iris is calling him 'A' now. Dumb, much? Confidently, Adam says to Joan, looking at the sculpture, "I think your mom's gonna be blown away." I think not, but more on that later.

So Grace can't really like Adam being with Iris that much, can she? Because she tries to assure Joan, "He's not that into her. Trust me. He's hot for someone else." Joan asks who. Grace says, "Your mom. Sorry, dude."

Oh, Jesus! Glynis and Luke kiss in public. In the school hallway. So not sexy. Not at all.

In art class, Adam proudly presents his artwork to Helen, smiling, expecting her to like it. She doesn't. She tries to find some connection of it to their assignment, which was to do a self-portrait. When Helen sees a turtle in it, Adam explains, "It's a catalytic converter and an exhaust pipe." "You see yourself as a catalytic converter and an exhaust pipe?" Helen asks. Well, clearly not. It seems that he didn't really do the assignment but just did what he felt he wanted to do. And of course Iris is totally supportive of that.

Helen wants to talk to him about that after class, but Adam suddenly grows a backbone (where'd that come from??) and confronts Helen in class, in front of all the students. Way to go, Adam. Not. Helen takes his bait and bluntly tells him what she thinks about his latest work of art. That there is no feeling in it. She assigned a self-portrait because she wanted introspection from everyone and Adam avoided it. "Real art, it takes risks, it creates a dialogue. Do the assignment, Adam. Take a risk."

Joan does indeed make friends with Casper and even brings her home to have dinner with the Girardis. But as soon as Will takes off his police badge and Casper sees it, she bolts, making excuses that she has homework. Wonder what's up with her? What'd she do? Turns out she lives at a shelter and doesn't go to school. To Joan that means God wanted her to help Casper find a better life, get back into school.

Kevin's dating some girl. Didn't even remember her... And it ends with a kiss in a café. I have to admit, I didn't pay much attention to her or Kevin here.

Why does Adam wear a toque during PE? That is seriously weird. And Friedman's adorably dorky. And he calls Grace Marge. Not cool, dude! Iris is hovering sickeningly close to Adam. Does she ever leave his side? Is it weird that I want an Arcadia Eagles t-shirt? Grace plants an idea in Joan's head to steal a utility bill to get Casper enrolled in their school. Yeah, real smart, that.

In the art room, Adam is alone with Helen, showing her the self-portrait assignment he finally finished. He pulls the black plastic cover off it, and it reveals... a really disturbing collage of some sort, having ripped and glued back together photos of Helen's face and eyes all over it, bound by rope. Adam knows it's daring and bold and only just manages to look Helen in the eyes. She's disturbed, all right. "What are you trying to say here?" she asks Adam. "You wanted me to look inside myself, so I did. That's what was there," Adam replies. So, what does that mean? That Adam sees a broken Helen Girardi inside of him? Or that he sees Helen as holding him back, shackling him? I mean, that is kinda creepy. Helen doesn't know what to say, so she doesn't. Adam walks out, embarrassed and maybe just a little ashamed.

Apparently, Joan's scam to get Casper into Arcadia High worked, because she's introduced in to the class in PE. Good work, Joan. Or not, because Mr. Price busts her ass for it when he learns that they used fraudulent documents. So Casper has to leave school again. Bummer.

In the meantime, Adam tries to fix whatever went wrong with Helen Girardi. He waits for her in the art room and tries to apologize. "I kinda freaked. I'm sorry." But Helen tells him she doesn't want an apology. "Your piece, it hurt me, it made me angry. I hated it. But it is what I asked you to do." Adam is confused. "You wanted me to hurt you?" No. Helen wanted him to take a risk. Which he did. "I wanted to put yourself in your work. To make people think, to make them feel something. That isn't always pleasant or pretty. But it is art." Adam is actually kinda flattered. And Helen says with a smile, "That turtle? Let's be honest. Crap on a stick." Oh yeah.

At home in the Girardi household, Luke and Will finally have a talk about how they see each other, how they feel about each other. Loved that.

The next morning, Joan finds out Casper bolted. Apparently her dad came back and took her away with him. And Joan asks Black-Girl God what kind of sick sense it makes to first form a connection with Casper, only to have it severed again after a few days. And God tells her, "The connection you and Casper have, you think that's gone just because she went away? Is your connection with Adam gone because he's with Iris? Real connections, they can't be broken by time or space. You can't fix everything, Joan." Apparently not. Let hope she can fix Adam some time soon. Because Baby-Voice just doesn't suit him.

Trivia (by TeeJay):
There's another deleted scene in this one that involves Adam. And I wish they would have kept it. It's before he confronts Helen to apologize about his artwork. And apparently, he had a really hard time with it. Because in the school hallway, he walks up to Joan to talk to her. Alone. (Thank you, there is a God!) At first Joan suspects he might have broken up with Iris. But, no, no such luck. "We're cool, yo," he tells her. Hmpf.

But sometimes Iris just doesn't understands things. Like Joan does. Because he had this thing with her mom. "I messed up... pretty... totally. I made something... that— I think I hurt her." Joan asks him why. And Adam confesses that Helen is the only one he wants to like his stuff. And that he didn't want to freak her out. And that's he's not good at talking about those things. "Well, you better get good if she means something to you," Joan tells him. Obviously Adam did, because he later managed to work it out with Helen. Thank goodness.

-TeeJay

shrams · 25 Oct 06 :: 08:00

Nice work, TeeJay! It's been a long time since I've seen that episode, but now I remember it fairly well.

"I was trying to be positive. It's not me. Rove and Iris are perfect for each other. They'll probably have a house full of emotionally damaged babies by senior year." What is she saying? That she thinks Adam and Iris are hitting it off? Or is she being cynical after all? Or is it just me not getting what she's playing at? And why emotionally damaged? Is that a knock on Iris or Adam, or both?

I think she's saying, sarcastically, that Adam and Iris are perfect for each other because they're both so emotionally damaged (Iris by...whatever. Not sure they know much about her at that point. Adam has been damaged by his mother's suicide). Therefore, if they ever have kids, (probably sooner rather than later, by accident rather than design), the kids will likely be emotionally damaged, too, because it's unlikely Adam and Iris will be able to solve their own, or each other's problems. They're both too broken to "fix" the other. It's definitely Grace being cynical again.

This wasn't one of my favorite episodes, but I thought the lesson Joan learned was a good one. It also reminded me there were often scenes in the sides that didn't make it into the episode, so those of us who read the sides for spoilers often had an incorrect preconception of upcoming episodes.

Good job on the recap, and it was nicely detailed. I'd like to see more for other episodes.

TeeJay · 25 Oct 06 :: 08:05

Thanks for the praise, Shrams. We have recaps for episodes 1x02 to 1x16 and 2x01 to 2x05 (I think) up on the site in the JoA section. I'm doing season one, Deb is doing season two. And we're mainly concentrating on the Adam/Joan aspect. And we're working on more. Eventually, we want to have them up for all episodes.

It also reminded me there were often scenes in the sides that didn't make it into the episode, so those of us who read the sides for spoilers often had an incorrect preconception of upcoming episodes.

That's one reason I try to avoid spoilers like the pest and will not watch any previews on TV. (Deb, you remember me going La la la la with my hands over my eyes, don't you? )

-TeeJay

domesticelefant · 25 Oct 06 :: 17:52

Tina, do you think we should make a spoiler warning for the German season 2 section? I mean, I don't know if it will air in Germany at all, but maybe it will and maybe there are still some fans here besides us. I just wanted to know your opinion.

TheCentralScrutinizer · 25 Oct 06 :: 18:05

Shrams, where were you getting sides and do you still have them? If you do, I NEED to see them. I want to eventually read all the JoA scripts in their entirety, but so far, I've only read Jump and The Gift. I think the place we got those had two others but they weren't heav A/J eps so we just picked up those two. It fascinates me to no end to see what was left out and what was made up on the set.

Deb

TeeJay · 25 Oct 06 :: 18:14

Samsy-Marie wrote:

Tina, do you think we should make a spoiler warning for the German season 2 section? I mean, I don't know if it will air in Germany at all, but maybe it will and maybe there are still some fans here besides us. I just wanted to know your opinion.

I would like to think that people who don't want to be spoiled about s2 will stay as far away from anything that has the word Season Two in it as possible. But if you wanna issue spoiler warnings, go ahead. I mean, I'm a spoiler-hater, so I should be the first person to scream yes. But then again, if something has a clear indication that there might be spoilery things inside, I personally would stay away.

Is there anything specific you're thinking of where you think it's necessary to issue a warning where it's not clearly indicated that something is about season two? I don't have a problem with putting a little note on the German recaps page that there's spoilers inside. Is that what you meant? However, I don't think we need to do this in every recap. It would be clear that they're season two. No need to say that again.

-TeeJay

domesticelefant · 25 Oct 06 :: 18:20

I didn't mean to say that we have to do this for every single episode. Just a warning that it's Season 2 and it didn't air in Germany yet. Because maybe it will air at some time here and maybe some people still want to watch the show without spoilers. If Season 2 will not air here at all and there are some people who like to know what happens in Season 2 they can read still read it, if they want.

shrams · 26 Oct 06 :: 05:00

Deb, I don't think I have any, except maybe for a printout for The Gift, which you already have. I don't think I transferred the files from my old computer. People were getting them from a site where actors could get the sides to use for auditions, but when they realized fans were getting hold of them, they made it a pay-only site, and it was harder to get them. Later they took things off that site, I believe, and posted them somewhere else, for the benefit of actors, but so fans could spoil everyone with inside info.

TheCentralScrutinizer · 26 Oct 06 :: 05:11

Wow, that's really wild. Didn't know such sites existed and it's a damn good thing they caught on and did something about it. LOL. Well, somehow I will read all of those scripts one day. There are some very interesting differences in what was on the page and what ended up onscreen in the two that I read. I can't get enough of that kind of stuff. Especially as it relates to Joan and Adam, of course.

Deb

TeeJay · 26 Oct 06 :: 07:37

Samsy-Marie wrote:

Just a warning that it's Season 2 and it didn't air in Germany yet. Because maybe it will air at some time here and maybe some people still want to watch the show without spoilers.

Yeah, that sounds good. Go for it.

-TeeJay

shrams · 26 Oct 06 :: 08:11

Well, somehow I will read all of those scripts one day. There are some very interesting differences in what was on the page and what ended up onscreen in the two that I read. I can't get enough of that kind of stuff. Especially as it relates to Joan and Adam, of course.

http://www.scriptcity.com/tvscripts.asp … &offset=80

This is the link for Script City. They have 9 JoA scripts, for $10 each, I believe. They have the Pilot, Touch Move, The Devil Made Me Do It, St. Joan, Recreation, No Bad Guy, Night Without Stars, Requiem for a Third Grade Ashtray. Those are also the only ones I have. There are other places on the net that sell scripts, but they have either no JoA episodes, or some of the same ones.

TeeJay · 26 Oct 06 :: 12:26

Thanks for the link, that's actually where we bought the script for Jump and The Gift from. I'd loooove to get a script for T&E. I'd love more to get Chris's script with his notes (if he took any). Deb, maybe we should have asked him for that if he still has it.

-TeeJay

shrams · 26 Oct 06 :: 17:44

Huh, they don't have "Jump" or "The Gift" listed. Weird. I don't have those two. There might be more scripts out there somewhere, but I don't know where they'd be.

TeeJay · 26 Oct 06 :: 18:25

Actually, they do. At least they showed up when I searched for "Joan of Arcadia"... Can you open PDFs, shrams? If so, I have an easy way to get those two to you.

-TeeJay

domesticelefant · 26 Oct 06 :: 20:05

I'd like to read the T&E Script too.

TheCentralScrutinizer · 26 Oct 06 :: 20:23

Wow, cool, so Script City has more now. Yep, that's where we got Jump & The Gift, but they only had two others listed back then. Looks like we need to go back to that well. Recreation and No Bad Guy would be my picks from that list. We'll have to get those someday, huh, TeeJay?

And I'd also like to read Independence Day so I can get more of an idea of how to fix what was so fundamentally wrong with it.

Deb

domesticelefant · 26 Oct 06 :: 20:32

Oh, I would want Recreation and No Bad Guy, too! Maybe The Devil Made Me Do It. Yeah, I like to agonize myself. LOL

TheCentralScrutinizer · 26 Oct 06 :: 22:12

Hey Shrams,

Do you have those on paper or in PDF form? Ours are PDF. If yours are too, maybe we could share?

Deb

shrams · 27 Oct 06 :: 05:01

Hm, apparently I have something called PDF Services that I think is part of MS Word, but I have no idea how to use it yet. I'll try to figure it out this weekend.

My scripts are all on paper; maybe that's why there are different ones listed. The list I have only shows the paper scripts.

I could try to scan the scripts, but I have a feeling it would take a long time to do that. Not only is the computer new (I switched from PC to Mac about a month ago) but so is my copier/scanner. I haven't done any scanning with this machine yet. I haven't used MS Word much either, except occasionally at work. I've been using WordPerfect for about 15 years, so I've got a high learning curve with a lot of aspects of my computer right now. I can try to see if I can scan, then convert to PDF. I just don't have a lot of free time right now, and I'll have even less soon. I'm going to start working another hour a day at work, in about a week, and fairly soon after that, try to go to full-time.

I can try to play around with it a bit this weekend, and see if I can scan one of the scripts. The Adam-related ones I have are, again:

The Devil Made Me Do It
Requiem...
Recreation
Touch Move
Night Without Stars
No Bad Guy
St. Joan

Which one should I try to work on? Vote!

TheCentralScrutinizer · 27 Oct 06 :: 05:08

Shramsy, you would be our hero if you could scan even one!

I pick Recreation. What do you guys say? We'll be happy with one for now. Maybe you could give us another one for a Christmas present or something. My second choice would definitely be No Bad Guy.

Buy hey, you know what? If you want to, you can just scan the Adam scenes. That would cut down on your work. And we'd love that. I bet we could even get away with posting just those individual scenes here. Since they're not the whole script, they would have no commercial value. What do you think, TeeJay?

Would you be willing to send us those pages for posting, Shrams? No rush. Just as time allows. Kind of like I'm getting Fanboys script pages from Sean in tiny chunks --- which is actually great fun.

Just an idea...

Deb

shrams · 27 Oct 06 :: 05:27

Yeah, that sounds like something I could do. I had been thinking along the same lines, that if it could be posted on the site, without anyone getting in trouble, it would make it a lot easier for other fans as well.

Sure, I can certainly at least scan the Adam scenes from one script, and see how that goes. I just downloaded Adobe Reader 7.08, so that might help. I'll definitely try it out this weekend.

TheCentralScrutinizer · 27 Oct 06 :: 05:38

Cool beans. If all else fails, maybe you could fax them to me and I could scan them. You rock.

Deb

shrams · 27 Oct 06 :: 05:54

I just scanned the last scene (4 pages) from Recreation, in PDF. Now the problem is figuring out how to post them here. Could I send the document to one of you as an attachment to an e-mail, or should I try to cut and paste into a thread here? The scanner at work is quite a bit different from this one, and I'm used to it, but this is weird. It's an HP LaserJet 5600 All-in-One. I have all four pages saved as one document, so I don't know how that's going to translate, size-wise. I could try individual pages as separate documents. Anyone have any suggestions? I've tried reading the instruction manual, but so far it's not helping.

shrams · 27 Oct 06 :: 06:00

Just trying this out:

Dang, it won't let me paste the file I copied. Grey's Anatomy is just about to start, so I'll work on this some more after work tomorrow.

TheCentralScrutinizer · 27 Oct 06 :: 15:22

TeeJay, if she sent them to you as PDFs could you maybe convert them to JPEGS and upload them as you would a picture?

Hang in there Shrams, TeeJay will know what to do.

Deb

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