Louie: The Road part 2

May 30, 2015 4:01 AM - Season 5, Episode 8

Louie's tour takes him to Oklahoma City, where he clashes with the club owner and his opener before a tragic end. Steven Wright co-wrote the story.
posted by Etrigan (13 comments total)

This brings us to the end of a dark and uneven abbreviated season (abbreviated because he got high). I have to wonder whether Louis CK the auteur has run out of gas, or whether he really should have just taken the delay and got his ducks more in a row.
posted by Etrigan at 4:54 AM on May 30, 2015 [1 favorite]

I thought this episode went nowhere. I didn't buy Louis CK the character's crying breakdown. Fun to see Jim Florentine, though. I wonder if this script could have used some more revisions before being filmed.
posted by wittgenstein at 6:42 AM on May 30, 2015

I didn't buy Louis CK the character's crying breakdown.

Especially since one of his Known Jokes is "You don't have to be smart to laugh at a fart, but you have to be stupid not to."
posted by Etrigan at 7:22 AM on May 30, 2015

I like the show but at this point, I don't think it has enough gas for a new season. The other guy dying was a bit Maude-ish in it's meanness (look, he was a hack, and a bit of an asshole, but like Louie, he has kids and actually seems to enjoy life more than this seasons' sadsaCK) and lack of purpose - instead of having Louie coming to his daughter with a funny story about the photo, a better ending would be Louie playing somewhere in flyover country a bit more upbeat (without being hackish) and less of the "I'm Louie CK from NY and I'm fat and about to die" persona.
posted by lmfsilva at 7:43 AM on May 30, 2015

Wow, this sounds like an amazing episode of Louie, during the future season when he gets a Louie-esque show, like on Seinfeld:

Then, the night before FX chief John Landgraf was going to announce the delay, C.K. smoked a lot of marijuana, felt a burst of inspiration for stories he wanted to tell this season, and wrote pages and pages on his computer, breaking out all of what he felt would be an amazing season. He called Landgraf and asked if he could produce on the original schedule; a frustrated Landgraf told him they had already allocated most of his budget to other shows, and the best they could do was a half-season. So C.K. agreed, Landgraf announced that, and in the sober light of day, C.K. finally read what he had written… and it was gibberish. He didn’t use a single idea or joke from it in making season 5. Don’t do drugs, kids. Or, at least, don’t make big decisions while high.

Or maybe I'm thinking of that episode of Mad Men where Paul is up late getting high at the office and has a brilliant idea but instead of writing it down he jerks off to his last good idea.

I actually liked this episode, and I thought the ending was perfect and very Louie-like. Louie doesn't learn lessons and he doesn't wrap things up with bows, life just goes on. I guess I have a thing for that "dreadfully mundane --> shocking accident --> life goes on" thing. See also the lawnmower episode of Mad Men.
posted by bleep at 1:35 PM on May 30, 2015 [1 favorite]

Actually I think I was thinking of that episode of Mad Men where Don and the whole office get high on "B12 shots" and Don turns in a bunch of nonsense at the end.
posted by bleep at 1:39 PM on May 30, 2015 [1 favorite]

I don't know. This episode kinda confused me too. I get the sense that Louis CK, as his real life children are getting older, is very conscious of what he does and the legacy he leaves. It's obvious from his comedy that he's a very sensitive guy and a caring father, but he can also be crude, nasty, and wryly observant. Personally, I prefer that Louie, the one who isn't trying to impart a moral lesson in every episode. I hope he turns it back around and gets back into the groove of the earlier seasons.
posted by LuckySeven~ at 11:19 PM on May 30, 2015

Was anybody else really, really hoping he'd show up to his show in the Civil War uniform?
posted by one_bean at 2:41 PM on May 31, 2015

Was anybody else really, really hoping he'd show up to his show in the Civil War uniform?

I wouldn't say hoping, but I did really think that it would go like "Hey, where's my clothes? Dammit, I have to get to a show!" and then he just goes with the uniform and they end up loving him and he has to deal with that.
posted by Etrigan at 5:19 PM on May 31, 2015

That would have had a certain narrative symmetry, but CK generally resists that stuff. His stories go the last way you'd guess, and usually it ends up feeling more like real life because of it. We never would've predicted Kenny would just crack his head and die a few hours after reaching a kind of accord with Louie, but that's how life works sometimes. Sometimes, totally out of nowhere, somebody just cracks his head and dies.

CK worked a similar shock with the Parker Posey character, but I thought this sudden death worked a little better. The Posey one felt a little contrived, like CK was very deliberately saying, LOOK HOW RANDOM LIFE IS, but this one felt more like real life being cruel and random. Kenny really was kind of a gross guy (the stuff he said to the club-owner's daughter was just vile) but eventually we saw that he had a soul under that... and then boom, he dies trying to take a pizza-shit.

I liked the photo thing at the fair, too. It felt like one of those lovely moments that a depressed, lonely person can have sometimes, when you suddenly find yourself experiencing some weird, intense connection with strangers... and then it's done and you say your awkward goodbyes and never see each other again. In another TV show he totally would've ended up dating the daughter. She seemed like a real sweetie, playful and open-hearted. She's the kind of woman Louie "should" be with, but that's not how his life works so he ends up fumbling around with neurotic, prickly women like Pamela instead.

The more I think about this season, the more I like it and the more it seems like an improvement over the last few. If this was the last one, I think it was a good note to end on.
posted by Ursula Hitler at 6:38 PM on May 31, 2015 [2 favorites]

Thanks for your thoughts, Ursula Hitler. Although I didn't really like this episode, I agree with your POV and it gives me something to chew on til the next season starts. (Also, Pamela's the bomb. She's not any more neurotic and weird than Louie so :p )
posted by LuckySeven~ at 10:05 PM on June 3, 2015

I'm on Netflix delayed airing, so just getting to this episode. Since we're in the middle of US campaign primaries, I can't help but see some parallels between the local hack comic using cheap tricks to win more crowd favor than the headliner in fly-over states and the similar tactics that seem to explain the popularity of Trump's political presence. Staring at my Facebook wall of Trump, I'm tempted to have a Louie crying moment myself.
posted by p3t3 at 7:10 PM on March 9, 2016

(Also, Pamela's the bomb. She's not any more neurotic and weird than Louie so :p )

Oh, I didn't say she was! They're both pretty damaged in their own ways.
posted by Ursula Hitler at 12:15 AM on March 10, 2016