Desperate Housewives: Utter Nunsense

I pretty much completely panned the previous episode of “Desperate Housewives” because it was aggressively unfunny. (Sorry, but I don’t think it’s unreasonable to expect laughs from a show that is billed as a comedy.)

This week’s installment almost couldn’t go anywhere but up.

But even with those lowered expectations, “Farewell Letter” managed to deliver both in the laugh department and with its forays into more serious territory.

Last week I said that the writers need to give Susan a new kidney as soon as possible because there’s absolutely no way to make dialysis funny. (I’m even getting tired of hearing the word “dialysis” on this show.) Well, god bless them, last nigh they tried.

After getting out of a speeding ticket because she was late for a dialysis appointment, Susan started using her condition to her benefit, including as an excuse to cut in line at the grocery store (no thanks to “Tom & Jerry” aficionado MJ). When Renee realized what Susan was up to, she convinced Susan to try to get them into an exclusive restaurant for lunch. (By the way, I guess Susan and Renee are best friends now. The show still has absolutely no idea what to do with Vanessa Williams, so I don’t blame them for using her to try and prop up Teri Hatcher’s disastrous storyline.)

A diabetic patron and with an arthritic wife angrily and amusingly complained (there was no Ebola in the house), and Susan was sent to back of the line, where she fainted followed by Renee frantically calling for an ambulance. So even when they go for laughs with Susan’s storyline, they end up at a not funny place. Can she please start stripping on the Internet again?

Fortunately, all the other Housewives fared much better. Well, all of them, except for poor Beth Young, who was booted out of her house after Paul finally confronted her about being his archnemesis’ daughter. Earlier in the episode, Paul had forced his son Zach into rehab, and Zach paid him back by telling Paul that he had shot him because he had wanted to see him die and that no one, including Paul’s ex and Zach’s mom Mary Alice, could ever love him. Paul repeated those words to Beth — someone who actually HAD fallen in love with him — as he threw her out.

The portrayal of Paul as a sort of tragic figure is interesting given that he began this season as a cartoonishly evil character. I don’t know that I believe the idea that Mary Alice never loved Paul — she killed herself because she was being blackmailed — so I don’t buy that he is thoroughly unlovable. Maybe he has some redemption in him before this season is out.

Also, is there any way that the person we saw shoot themselves in the promo for next week’s episode ISN’T Beth? (Paul did shove her gun back into her hand when he kicked her out.)

Beth may or may not meet her end next week, but the relationship between Bree and Keith DID come to its predictable end during this episode.

I commend the writers for doing it in a surprising way. I (and I think many others) assumed that Keith would break up with her because Bree kept the identity of his son a secret. (At worst, he seemed mildly annoyed.) Instead, Keith had fallen head over heels in love with Charlie, who had moved back to Florida with his life. Bree gave a great speech about how she’d fallen in and out of love several times, but had never fallen out of love with either of her children. (Not even Danielle?! Or Andrew at his worst?) Instead of moving to Florida with Keith, she broke up with him.

This relationship was clearly not built to last, but I think the writers did a good job of ending it in an organic way. (Even though Keith DID seem a little too gung-ho about Charlie…I guess visiting him three or four times a year was never going to be enough for him.)

Like Marcia Cross, Eva Longoria (not Parker) skillfully handled her potential downer of a storyline. Gabby’s therapist had encouraged her to travel to her hometown of Las Colinas, Texas and read a leader at the grave of her stepfather, who had molested her when she was little. (I also would’ve talked Carlos, who it turns out is not her chauffeur, into pissing on his grave while they were there.)

Unfortunately, her mission got sidetracked when she realized that she was a major celebrity in her dreaded hometown. Between print and phone interviews, and warning young girls of the dangers of math and science, Gabby came face to face with the nun she confided in years earlier, but who had called her a liar. I half expected another nun-tastic beat down, but instead Gabby strongly and bravely confronted the woman about her unforgivably passive role in her abuse. Probably the best mix of comedy and drama in the episode.

Meanwhile, Lynette’s storyline was definitely on the lighter side of things. After being woken up in the middle of the night so she could tell Preston (or Porter) where the eggs are (***SPOILER ALERT*** They’re in the refridgerator), she decided to make them an omelet herself. Instead, she found that the twins had a couple of lady friends over. The next morning, Tom and Lynette decided it was time for the twins to strike out on their own, which they did…all the way across the street to Mrs. McCluskey’s house.

At first, Mrs. McCluskey loved her new tenants because the girls they brought around stoked her husband Roy’s fire (double shudder), so she was happy to do their laundry and cook for them. (I don’t totally buy that Mrs. McCluskey would be such a pushover.) Fortunately, Lynette was there to sabotage them by bringing gifting the twins a keg, which led to the inevitable crazy party and their eviction. (I don’t believe they got their security deposit back.)

In the end, Lynette realized that she probably coddled the twins (and probably every one else in her life) by doing all their work for them, instead of letting them learn on their own. It was a realistic ending satisfying, realistic ending for the storyline, even if the twins still have to go and learn to not be such thoroughly useless adults.

So what’d you think of this episode? Is there any hope for Teri Hatcher’s character? What would YOU have Vanessa Williams do on this show? Have we seen the last of Keith? Finally, can you make me a Denver omelet?