30 Odd Foot Of Slap

It sure didn't take long for The Slap to run into the problem most shows with large ensemble casts can't avoid: focusing on one of its million characters that it's impossible to care about. The first moments of the latest episode explicitly establish that Anouk didn't see the titular Slap, which means she officially has less to contribute to this story than any of us do as of right...now.

Maybe Anouk could have still been relevant to the central/titular issue of the show if she hadn't seen it BUT was a parent herself and therefore prepared to mommyjack the situation with a ridiculous yet extremely watchable overreaction to the slap. But I guess that will have to wait a few years for the NEXT kid Harry slaps the shit out of, riiiiiiiight?

Let's count down this week's featured characters from least to most slapworthy!

7. Virginia

I guess they had to give Anouk the line "You are English, aren't you" because until she said it I was pretty sure Blythe Danner, playing her mother, Virginia, was trying to do German? Anyway, I'm putting her last on the slap list to protest how hard the show was working to make her a hateful cliché of a distracted mother, starting from the fact that her daughter calls her by her first name half the time and ending with the reveal that in her long-ago divorce, she'd wanted to give custody of Anouk to her husband, only for him to die first and force her into raising Anouk after all. Her big crime in this episode is not to want to tell her daughter she has a brain tumour? I'm not so sure Anouk invites confidences -- besides which, meeting Anouk's little toy boyfriend would only confirm that (a) Anouk's not a serious person and (b) it's a good time to put an ocean between them.

Slapworthiest Line: "Jamie, it's not good to lie to a psychiatrist. We always know."

6. Hector

Slapworthiest Line: When he correctly identifies the obscure opera reference (ugh) that inspired the name of Jamie's stupid band (uuuuuugh): "I spend a lot of time alone."

5. Aisha

When your fortysomething friend comes to you to say she wants a referral for an abortion, how about you just give her one? Having just come from a barbecue with Hugo should point up the fact that Brooklyn may not need any more brats right now.

Slapworthiest Line: "We have to talk about what happened at the barbecue. I think things are starting to spin out of control."

4. Rosie

Sadly, the milkmaid is mostly sidelined this week in favour of all this boring shit about Anouk, getting just one scene to defend her decision to press charges against Harry, and another one to apologize to Anouk and do a pretty good impression of a reasonable person. I'm basically living for her episode, though, and it can't come soon enough.

Slapworthiest Line: "What do I tell Hugo? Just forget?!"

3. Anouk

I guess this is probably blasphemy because she's an Oscar nominee and stuff, and even grading on a curve given the howler-ridden dialogue she has to deliver, I think Uma Thurman...might not be a very good actor. All her scenes with Blythe Danner are like affectation contests, and I didn't buy a second of her interactions with Penn Badgley's Jamie -- not the scenes when she's supposed to be trying to get rid of him any more than the ones where she's supposed to like him. As for the final decision not to terminate her pregnancy and stay with him to raise their eventual baby: did you...not see him playing with his band? You can't have a child with that. Forget the Olive/Oliver stuff he's saying now: when that kid comes, he's definitely going to want to name it Kombucha.

Slapworthiest Line: It's a tie! To Rosie: "The way you love your son is one of the most beautiful things I've ever seen in my life! Don't ever let anyone tell you it isn't." To Jamie: "I am making Turkish coffee and writing all night."

2. Hugo

Without visibly appearing in any new scenes -- just raging offscreen with enough aggression and volume that hearing it is enough to embarrass EVEN ROSIE...

...and prove Anouk's point from earlier in the episode that maybe Rosie could teach Hugo why he shouldn't wave bats around other kids -- Hugo becomes the episode's slapworthiest runner-up. Impressive.

Slapworthiest Line: "Arrrrgh, argh, yaaaaaagh!"

1. Jamie

Even if Jamie hadn't said anything in this episode, I would want to slap him for that hair alone.

But he does talk, and every single thing he says is THE WORRRRRRRRST. I did narrow it down to one ultimate worst line, but since we're here, let's puke at all the contenders.

Slapworthiest Line: Guys, you can see it was hard. But I stand by this as the winning loser.