Episode 1001 The Conjugal Conjecture (September 19)

[Tensor]

6 hours ago, NeckShotLime said:

I believe that there was no actual plan for a wedding redo but then they got the opportunity to have Judd Hirsh on the show to play Leonard's dad and they came up with the idea of another wedding ceremony ( @Tensorwill know more than I do ). 

 

While the dates (the tribute taping with Johnny, the announcement of Hirsch's appearance, and the writing and taping of TBBT) all match, as to how Hirsch became Leonard's father , what  the actual reason for the wedding redo is unclear.   I'm aware of several possible reasons for the redo (some of them overlapping), but all of them have  been either hinted at or based on innuendo.  There hasn't been and official reason for having the redo.   Perhaps that will be one of the things we'll find out when the book is published in a couple of months. 

[chucky]

7 hours ago, NeckShotLime said:

I believe that there was no actual plan for a wedding redo but then they got the opportunity to have Judd Hirsh on the show to play Leonard's dad and they came up with the idea of another wedding ceremony ( @Tensorwill know more than I do ).  So when the lovely Beverly thanked Lenny for not inviting her at the Vegas wedding, she meant it but they had to "tweak" the character a bit to justify the wedding redo so you have a Beverly who felt insulted for not being invited ( and a Beverly who actually cares about her son's happiness!! ) 

Well, that's Raj for you. Only a few episodes before he said he was jealous of Lenny and Howardette and their happy relationships.... I don't pay attention to what he says because he's the one who's unable to be in a healthy relationship , he's more background noise than anything  as far as i'm concerned. 

Also i believe the three major relationships were treated as some big joke at one point or another. Look at Howardette for instance. They had their sweet moments but for a very long time their dynamics were awful , he was a man-child and she was a harpish shrew. It was implied that Penny ruined Bernie's life by setting her up with Howard.... The Shamy were a big joke to everybody .... 

I don't know if Lenny were treated any worse than the other two couples honestly. Maybe we notice more the jokes that were done at Lenny's expense because we care more about those two. I don't know. 

The one thing that bothers me really is that the writers took the time to deepen the emotional connection between H/B and S/A. They never did with Lenny that's why we were stuck with the same jokes with them. 

 

They may have mostly treated the relationships the same, but they had Penny be way too snarky with Leonard. Plus Lenny had way more arguments than the two put together. For someone who is the love of her life,  she treated him very strangely. Most of the time I thought she was with Sheldon than Leonard. 

[NeckShotLime]

55 minutes ago, chucky said:

They may have mostly treated the relationships the same, but they had Penny be way too snarky with Leonard. Plus Lenny had way more arguments than the two put together. For someone who is the love of her life,  she treated him very strangely. Most of the time I thought she was with Sheldon than Leonard. 

No no no !! There might be times where Penny didn't look that loving or caring towards Leonard but when it's important she's got his back and she's there for him. 

[Mario D.]

1 hour ago, NeckShotLime said:

No no no !! There might be times where Penny didn't look that loving or caring towards Leonard but when it's important she's got his back and she's there for him. 

I think this is true  Even though Penny had her snarky moments toward Leonard deep down she truly loved him. Wasn't she the one that brought up marriage when they got engaged and wasn't she the one that suggested they go to Las Vegas to get married?  It just seems to me that because of her "street savvy and smarts" it was more adaptable for her to bust on Leonard and he really didn't seem to mind as long as she woke up next to him in the morning. And as I have mentioned in a previous post the writers did not know how to write for P&L as a loving mature  married couple.

[chucky]

I agree that she really does love Leonard. I just think of the times she said when Sheldon talks of when he was bullied that she wanted to hug him and make him feel better. Then turns to Leonard and tells he had it coming or that he deserved it. The viewing party episode when she took Sheldon's side in the roommate agreement meeting that Leonard didn't want to attend. To me she's been more sympathetic to Sheldon than Leonard. I could go on, I think that's enough of that. Your right,  the writers didn't know how to write them or didn't care as they spent most of their time writing about Shamy. Then write for Howardette and kids. So they threw scrapes to Lenny and Raj.

Edited August 7, 2022 by chucky

[Tensor]

1 hour ago, Mario D. said:

 And as I have mentioned in a previous post the writers did not know how to write for P&L as a loving mature  married couple.

I'm going to disagree with this a bit.  The writers, when they chose to, could write Lenny this way(there are examples in seasons 1-5 and near the end of season six, say "Chew Toy" and later).  But from some bit and pieces I've been able to put together, there were reasons they shied away from writing them that way for a period (season seven through the middle of season 11) although I prefer not to say why, because I don't have all the information to be sure of the reason.

One example from season 12, that a lot of people don't like, Penny drops the bomb that she didn't want kids.  And yes Leonard was angry and walked out.  But, they did later talk about it calmly and lovingly and decided they were then good with it.   And, even when Leonard wanted to donate sperm to Zack, they had different opinions, but did come together to talk about it.  

[chucky]

I agree that they could write Lenny good, when they wanted to do it. But,  those times were few and far between. I'm guessing that they thought that one couple had to have angst in their relationship. To me,  there were too many arguments between Penny and Leonard. For  example,  she didn't want kids or she thought about wanting a one-bedroom loft in LA. Another good one was her wanting her brother to move in with them or her wanting to quit her job to try acting again. To top it off, she talked to Sheldon about it before talking to her husband. That's some of the great things we got from our dear writers. 

[Mario D.]

11 hours ago, Tensor said:

I'm going to disagree with this a bit.  The writers, when they chose to, could write Lenny this way(there are examples in seasons 1-5 and near the end of season six, say "Chew Toy" and later).  But from some bit and pieces I've been able to put together, there were reasons they shied away from writing them that way for a period (season seven through the middle of season 11) although I prefer not to say why, because I don't have all the information to be sure of the reason.

One example from season 12, that a lot of people don't like, Penny drops the bomb that she didn't want kids.  And yes Leonard was angry and walked out.  But, they did later talk about it calmly and lovingly and decided they were then good with it.   And, even when Leonard wanted to donate sperm to Zack, they had different opinions, but did come together to talk about it.  

Once again Tensor you make some very good points and you mention season seven to eleven as a period where the writing for P&L was lacking. But I was thinking more after they got married (seasons nine to twelve) Many fans did not like season eight but I kind of thought this was a season especially the first 9-10 episodes that P&L were the lead stories. But after they married their stories became less and less. Yes there were times when they talked but the conversations did not go deep enough to resolve anything. One instance i recall is when Penny felt that Leonard was taking her for granted and goes to the spa with Amy instead of Leonard. Leonard arrives at the spa to talk things out with Penny but instead of showing this scene they show Shamy  in conversation. Maybe the book will shed some light on these type of situations.

[chucky]

16 minutes ago, Mario D. said:

Once again Tensor you make some very good points and you mention season seven to eleven as a period where the writing for P&L was lacking. But I was thinking more after they got married (seasons nine to twelve) Many fans did not like season eight but I kind of thought this was a season especially the first 9-10 episodes that P&L were the lead stories. But after they married their stories became less and less. Yes there were times when they talked but the conversations did not go deep enough to resolve anything. One instance i recall is when Penny felt that Leonard was taking her for granted and goes to the spa with Amy instead of Leonard. Leonard arrives at the spa to talk things out with Penny but instead of showing this scene they show Shamy  in conversation. Maybe the book will shed some light on these type of situations.

I remember the spa episode. Not only did they didn't show the conversation but Lenny ended up with a relationship agreement. Who's idea was that? That was a waste as it was never mentioned again. Along with the tenure position that wasn't mentioned again. I particularly like how they can't remember earlier seasons.  That DNA structure of Sheldon's was moved by him to get to the wall safe,  but fell apart when Leonard moved in one of the last two episodes. 

[Mario D.]

3 hours ago, chucky said:

I remember the spa episode. Not only did they didn't show the conversation but Lenny ended up with a relationship agreement. Who's idea was that? That was a waste as it was never mentioned again. Along with the tenure position that wasn't mentioned again. I particularly like how they can't remember earlier seasons.  That DNA structure of Sheldon's was moved by him to get to the wall safe,  but fell apart when Leonard moved in one of the last two episodes. 

Wow  We probably can name hundreds of scenes and dialogue that the continuity factor was abused

[chucky]

31 minutes ago, Mario D. said:

Wow  We probably can name hundreds of scenes and dialogue that the continuity factor was abused

Affirmative 

[NeckShotLime]

16 hours ago, Tensor said:

But from some bit and pieces I've been able to put together, there were reasons they shied away from writing them that way for a period (season seven through the middle of season 11) although I prefer not to say why, because I don't have all the information to be sure of the reason.

 

There has to be a logical explanation. To me it just feels like they got stuck and then gave up on them but surely there's more than that. Like you said they have their reasons , I just can't think of any good reasons why they would treat two of their original characters that built the show that way though . The mind boggles. 

[chucky]

41 minutes ago, NeckShotLime said:

There has to be a logical explanation. To me it just feels like they got stuck and then gave up on them but surely there's more than that. Like you said they have their reasons , I just can't think of any good reasons why they would treat two of their original characters that built the show that way though . The mind boggles. 

It's simple.  The show stopped being TBBT and became the Shamy show. It was TBBT in name only. The writers were so focused on Shamy that the rest of cast were basically filler parts. 

[Mario D.]

I re-watched this episode last night on my local channel and I still feel that even though this was a very good episode with all the guest stars and the wedding ceremony, in my mind it was tarnished by Sheldon's obnoxious and inappropriate insulting remarks. The dialogue they gave Sheldon just brought down the whole episode and parts were certainly unnecessary - the fornication remark at the ceremony, the insulting way he spoke to his mother, etc. This continued for a majority of the episode. I just think it took away from the joyous moment for Penny and Leonard, but that seemed to be the usual thing for the writers to upstage Penny and Leonard at their happiest of times.

[chucky]

9 minutes ago, Mario D. said:

I re-watched this episode last night on my local channel and I still feel that even though this was a very good episode with all the guest stars and the wedding ceremony, in my mind it was tarnished by Sheldon's obnoxious and inappropriate insulting remarks. The dialogue they gave Sheldon just brought down the whole episode and parts were certainly unnecessary - the fornication remark at the ceremony, the insulting way he spoke to his mother, etc. This continued for a majority of the episode. I just think it took away from the joyous moment for Penny and Leonard, but that seemed to be the usual thing for the writers to upstage Penny and Leonard at their happiest of times.

I have to agree. The writers seem to enjoy having Sheldon mess up Lenny's happy moments. I'm thinking they seem to think that it's funny. I never did. 

[TLW]

6 hours ago, Mario D. said:

I re-watched this episode last night on my local channel and I still feel that even though this was a very good episode with all the guest stars and the wedding ceremony, in my mind it was tarnished by Sheldon's obnoxious and inappropriate insulting remarks. The dialogue they gave Sheldon just brought down the whole episode and parts were certainly unnecessary - the fornication remark at the ceremony, the insulting way he spoke to his mother, etc. This continued for a majority of the episode. I just think it took away from the joyous moment for Penny and Leonard, but that seemed to be the usual thing for the writers to upstage Penny and Leonard at their happiest of times.

 

5 hours ago, chucky said:

I have to agree. The writers seem to enjoy having Sheldon mess up Lenny's happy moments. I'm thinking they seem to think that it's funny. I never did. 

Well, he actually ruined the first one for everyone else trying to watch it by his insulting remarks to Amy about her eggs having a sell-by date.

[chucky]

4 hours ago, TLW said:

 

Well, he actually ruined the first one for everyone else trying to watch it by his insulting remarks to Amy about her eggs having a sell-by date.

True! He then proceeded to force his on their honeymoon trip to San Francisco. 

[NeckShotLime]

yeah 10*01 was one of those episodes where obnoxious and rude Sheldon was just too much and not funny imo , you just want to tell him to shut up really. I skip his parts when i rewatch it. 

[Mario D.]

6 hours ago, chucky said:

True! He then proceeded to force his on their honeymoon trip to San Francisco. 

Yes  We never really knew if they actually went on their honeymoon with or without Sheldon. Another one of those continuity errors

[chucky]

2 hours ago, NeckShotLime said:

yeah 10*01 was one of those episodes where obnoxious and rude Sheldon was just too much and not funny imo , you just want to tell him to shut up really. I skip his parts when i rewatch it. 

Agreed. I have used the fast forward button a lot on the latter seasons episodes. 

[NeckShotLime]

it's a shame really because , when used right, the character can be very funny but in the later seasons i find him so infantile, petty and just plain rude that he doesn't make laugh , i just wince. I think having so much focus on him has been more detrimental than beneficial to the character. 

[Mario D.]

14 minutes ago, NeckShotLime said:

it's a shame really because , when used right, the character can be very funny but in the later seasons i find him so infantile, petty and just plain rude that he doesn't make laugh , i just wince. I think having so much focus on him has been more detrimental than beneficial to the character. 

And I think that is what Jim Parsons realized and convinced him to call it the end. Such a shame that a terrific show had to end on this note

[chucky]

1 hour ago, Mario D. said:

And I think that is what Jim Parsons realized and convinced him to call it the end. Such a shame that a terrific show had to end on this note

That could be one of his reasons for calling it quits. But,  I believe the show could have continued and be just as good without. It would be truly different,  but good. 

[NeckShotLime]

oh I don't think you can have TBBT without Sheldon. He makes the show, whether we like it or not. 

[chucky]

52 minutes ago, NeckShotLime said:

oh I don't think you can have TBBT without Sheldon. He makes the show, whether we like it or not. 

I think you can. It'd be different, but enjoyable. As Raj, Howard and Leonard are there, it'll still be good. To be truthful,  I've had enough of Sheldon.