TV Review: ENTOURAGE, 8.2 - "Out with a Bang"
Episode two of Entourage's final season sees familiar problems rearing their head for most of the characters.
Wow, poor guy must fuck like dog shit Drama
rating: 3.5
In spite of the horrible pun of a title, this weeks episode of Entourage, whilst not having quite as much going on as last weeks exposition-heavy premiere, was a pretty solid episode. Out with a Bang felt like the show was back to its rapid fire best where come episodes end you almost feel like nothing actually happened, but when you look back you realise the episode was pretty stacked. One of my long-running gripes with Entourage has always been that the show just isnt long enough; nine times out of ten, just as you feel like youre really getting into the episode the credits roll. I may yearn for a longer running time but regardless the show remains one of, if not the, most feel good show on television. Out with a Bang began the morning after the night before, when Turtle had burnt down the guys house, and found Vince et al now living in a hotel the Roosevelt to be precise. Rather than dwelling on his now burnt home, Vince reveals that hes spent the night writing a script for his Romanian miner and super-dog film that he wants Drama to play the lead in. Ive used the inverted commas for the word script there because Vinces effort is actually more of an outline as he put it, clocking in at a mere twenty pages and featuring more spelling mistakes and grammatical errors than one of my What Culture posts. Vince already has a way to make up for his lack of writing experience though, getting Billy to give the script the Johnnys Bananas treatment, as opposed to the Medellin treatment. Billys opinion of the idea changes after reading Vinces work, declaring he likes it even if some of it sucks, then in one of the more ridiculous moments of the episode Billy announces that hes going to use some of Vinces amazing selflessness for the yellow labs personality in his re-write. With a dog based on Vince called Johnny and Drama playing the miner could Vinces miner movie turn out to be a metaphor for the Chase brothers lives or am I just getting a little too meta there? Im no doubt looking a bit deeper than one really should at Entourage but if the above was true it would certainly explain why, in my opinion somewhat surprisingly the show is spending its final season focussing on a network movie for Drama rather than a big Aquaman style blockbuster for Vince. That said, it could just be that the writers and show-runners know that the audience really want to see Drama succeed for once. This is why Im not entirely convinced that Andrew Dice Clay deciding he wants a better deal for Johnnys Bananas is going to scupper the show and any chance Drama may have of any sort of lasting success. Had this been three seasons ago, the writing would no doubt be on the wall for Drama, and Dices machinations would ensure he suffered just a little bit longer in the wilderness; this being the final season though, surely Dramas not going to lose his monkey cartoon, is he? Turtles storyline this week was somewhat lacking in any sort of intrigue as he just moped about, unhappy that girlfriend Alex (the absent Dania Ramirez) had not returned any of his calls on her Avion promotional tour. Of greater interest was Eric and Sloans always complicated relationship. After a call back to Erics fuck you to Sloans answer phone last week, she returned the favour, prompting him to assume she was still angry that all his belongings were still cluttering up her home. Taking the day off to go and move his gear, Sloan rather unfortunately returned just in time to find Eric rifling through her underwear drawer, claiming to be looking for his watch. Been there. Just as it looked like another blazing row over money is about to erupt, we instead cut to the ads and when we returned the former love-birds were post-coital not speaking a word. Again, been there. When Sloan later calls Eric to talk things through and announces shes moving to New York, the episodes rather juvenile title suddenly makes sense and on that bombshell the episode ends with a forlorn Eric joining Turtle in the moping stakes. Im pretty sure most people think Eric and Sloan will get back together before the shows over so could Sloans move back east be the planting of seeds for the guys to head back home too? It would certainly be a great way to bring the show full circle as it comes to an end. Speaking of coming to an end, even separated from his wife, Ari continues to self-destruct and make any chance of reconciliation seem a million miles away. This week, after learning from put-upon Lloyd that Mrs. Ari was eating alone in a restaurant she hates, Ari wrongly deduced that his estranged wife was dating a sociopathic waiter who rumour had it had already nailed three of the four Real Housewives of Beverly Hills. After testing out his theory on Mrs. Aris alcoholic sister and continuing to get the wrong end of the stick, Ari, unsurprisingly, had the poor waiter blacklisted, ruining his chances of getting an arc on Mad Men. Of course the revelation then came that Mrs. Ari is in fact dating restaurant owner and chef Bobby Flay, with Ari subsequently, and again, unsurprisingly, declaring war on his love rival. How could anything possibly go wrong with that approach? A Hail of Bullets: - Ari was surprisingly usurped for best one-liners of the episode this week. My favourite line was Dramas deadpan delivery of the opening quote above, closely followed by Turtles assessment of Dramas rather colourful shirt: Why youre dressed for a bisexual paintball tournament is a better question. - It still amazes me to see the great William Fichtner reduced to such a small role on Entourage. Dont get me wrong, any Fichtner appearance is alright in my book, I just think that if you have such a great actor on the payroll you maybe make a little more use of him. - Brilliant, throwaway moment with Drama and Christian Slater on the studio lot as Drama fondly acknowledged Slater only to be greeted with a double flip off and Hey Drama, go fuck yourself. I really love all Dramas unspoken history antagonising most of 80s Hollywood, will we ever learn what he did to make Slater so mad? Probably not, and if you ask me thats what makes it funnier.
Entourage continues Sunday @ 10.30pm on HBO in the US and Monday @ 10.45pm on Sky Atlantic in the UK.