What have we not ruined of Ruxin’s yet? Sex life? So let’s get right on that by having his wife Sofia accuse him of “breast favoritism” and shut him down for the night.
But we’re not just picking on Ruxin this episode. Kevin’s got his own problems in the bedroom because Ellie’s room is under construction. Water damage has forced the MacArthurs to repaint in Ellie’s bedroom, and until it’s done, Kevin is best friends with a tube sock.
We get a reunion of sorts in “Carmenjello.” This week is the first episode in a long time to feature almost the entire The League family. We were just one Baby Geoffrey sighting away from the entire cast with both Ellie and Sofia back into the plot.
So far in Season 3, we haven’t seen much of the struggles of parenting in the MacArthur home. Other than her ruining of the Sukkah, Ellie hasn’t given us many touching moments like the Mr. McGibblets encounters of seasons past. And that’s not necessarily a bad thing, as I find a lot of the Ellie storylines a little distracting.
But this episode gives us a great understanding of what it’s like to be a parent. No matter how occupied Kevin and Jenny think Ellie is, she always seems to get into something she’s not supposed to (like underwear stickers) or walk in on the two of them while they look for “zipper fairies.”
It’s difficult to think about nothing but fantasy football when you have a kid.
Apparently, we won’t find out how Ruxin’s career has been affected by his hidden illness in “Yobogoya!” But we do, at least, know he’s working on a new case, one that Mr. Hudabega referenced in the last episode — a paint company who had to recall cans because they were exploding.
Is it just me or does Ruxin seem to have the same defense for everything? Pay less than what you would expect for a given product? Well, then you should expect a product that will a) give you indigestion, b) explode, or c) kill you. Sure, it seems rock solid, but it’s getting repetitive. I never knew being a defense attorney could be so simple.
And clearly, Ruxin isn’t clipping any coupons.
Struggling with how to show Sofia he doesn’t favor one breast any more than the other, Ruxin goes to Andre, who has been the problem solver of choice as of late. The two decide the best solution might be making a statue of Sofia’s body to show her that he loves it, and, decision made, Ruxin hands over a picture that he just happens to keep in his suit jacket pocket at all times for “personal use” of Sofia topless. That’s handy.
When he’s not helping solve everyone’s problems, Andre’s making donations back to the gang’s high school, and the school has decided to honor Andre at a ceremony for an unknown new initiative. Dropping in on his alma mater, Andre asks the janitor for direction to the principal’s office, but he mistakes the janitor’s company name for the janitor’s own name and calls him “Carmenjello,” labeling himself as a racist for thinking all black people have unusual names.
Granted, the league members agree with his mistake. There are a lot of unique names in pop culture and especially the NFL — Jacquizz, Plaxico, Jermicheal, LaRod. But Carmenjello is still pretty out there. So Andre will have to make it up to Steve, the janitor, somehow in order to clear his conscience.
Meanwhile, recovering nicely from his plot of take over the world with the pee bib, Taco’s new investment opportunity is “forever stamps.” They never go down in value. Only up! It’s pure genius. Genius, I tell you. So Taco, ever the careful one, gives his collection of stamps to Kevin for safekeeping.
Ruxin’s problems soon turn into Andre’s problems when, returning to his office, Andre discovers he’s lost the photo of Sofia Ruxin gave him, and he’s not able to console Ruxin with an offer of a photo of Aunt Kiki. So picky, that Ruxin.
Instead, Andre distracts himself with trying to solve his racism problem. He takes Steve, the Carmenjello janitor, to the spa for a “peace summit” couples massage. He botches a few references to Affirmative Action in the process, but overall, he’s doing a great job of making up his accidental racism to Steve. He even asks Steve to look for the picture of Sofia that went missing.
But they happen to be at the spa the same time as Kevin, who takes an interest in Steve’s skin color. You see, he’s been searching for the perfect cinnamon paint color for Ellie’s room in order to get Ellie out of his hair and his bedroom. Steve’s skin tone just happens to be the perfect cinnamon blend, in Kevin’s eyes.
In an attempt to capture it in a photo, Kevin sneaks into the room with Andre and Steve to take a picture, but while he manages to stealthy massage Andre’s cossacks without getting caught, the iPhone camera shutter click tips Steve off (and ticks Steve off). So Steve — a little sensitive despite his ability to slot his own skin tone on the color wheel, no? — assumes he’s once again getting mocked and angrily explodes on both Kevin and Andre.
Andre’s chances at making amends to the janitor are ruined; nevertheless, Kevin now has a picture to model his paint mix after.
Against better judgement, Kevin sends Taco after the paint, but first, Taco must get some more forever stamps from Kevin’s house. There he finds Ellie decorating her mother’s underwear with his stamps because she mistakes them for “underwear stickers.” Rather than recover the stamps themselves, Taco just takes all of Jenny’s underwear because it wasn’t sexy anyway, at least in Taco’s opinion.
Since forever stamps aren’t exactly the universal currency Taco thought they were, Taco can only exchange Jenny’s underwear and stamps for recalled, exploding paint cans. But since Taco doesn’t notice such small details, he makes the purchase anyway without concern.
Back at Ruxin’s house, Sofia discovers Ruxin playing with the breast implant he took from Andre’s office as a stress ball. She feels he’s trying to suggest she get a boob job, when, in fact, he’s thinking quite the contrary. To convince her otherwise, Ruxin has to take her to see Andre, who’s being honored at the school that afternoon.
So the league ends up coming together for Andre’s dedication ceremony at the high school. It seems they’ve named him the mascot of sorts for their new abstinence program, much to his dismay. Andre awkwardly takes the stage to defend his honor, but no matter how graphic he gets, Andre’s monologue comes off more 40 Year Old Virgin than Eyes Wide Shut. You know, bag of sand?
Taco’s not done with his forever stamps campaign. Full of the giving spirit, he’s donated the last few pairs of her underwear to the abstinence cause, forever stamps and all.
Horrified by the sight of her underwear in a plastic cube, Jenny sends Kevin in to retrieve the underwear, but he’s too clumsy to pull it off and ends up knocking over the donation cube in front of the entire audience. So Jenny herself, in the chaos, is left to grab her own underwear and flee the scene.
Just as the event falls apart, Ruxin and Sofia arrive in search of Andre. They find him on his way out, and after discussing Ruxin’s decision to have a statue made, they notice a commotion around the high school hallway.
It seems the topless photo of Sofia Ruxin lost turned up at the high school, but Steve, the janitor Andre offended, chose to wax it into the floor rather than return it to the racist Andre.
The sight of her photo waxed into the floor sends Sofia off in a rage and Ruxin’s spank bank as a permanent fixture of the high school.
So he does what any desperate guy would do…
Ruxin snaps a photo of the picture in the floor on his phone and leaves the scene. At least he’ll have some way to remember it.
Back at the MacArthur home, Kevin and Jenny are finally ready to paint after Taco fetched the “Carmenjello” mix for them. But rather than get to work, they try to take a moment to themselves, which is soon ruined when one of the paint cans (remember, these are of the recalled variety) explodes, leaving a lovely silhouette of Jenny going after Kevin’s zipper fairies on the wall for Ellie to see.
Memorable quotes from Episode 7:
RUXIN: “Are you accusing me of breast favoritism?”
RUXIN: “What if we tried like where you’re like a French courtesan from the 19th century who loves to give blow jibbers?”
RUXIN: “Annnnnnd scene.”
RUXIN: “It’s like a sexual Foxtrot.”
RUXIN: “Well, if you are purchasing something that is half the price of your competitors, then there is a reasonable expectation that that product will explode in your face.”
KEVIN: “Tell her that cinnamon only exists in spice racks and strip clubs. That’s it.”
JENNY: “I was looking for zipper fairies in daddy’s zipper.”
KEVIN: “Well, start packing your bags, fairies, because you guys are going home to a tube sock.”
RUXIN: “A stressplant? I like that. I don’t know why women don’t just grab onto their own whenever they’re stressed out.”
ANDRE: “Why do you have a topless photo of your wife in your jacket?”
RUXIN: “What? I’m not allowed to have porn in my house, and my roster sucks. So I need some material.”
ANDRE: “That’s like if a serial killer wrote a romance novel, he would jerk off to his wife. Extended family, sure. Like your aunt or something, fine.”
ANDRE: “High school was my jam.”
RUXIN: “That’s what we made you tell the principal.”
STEVE THE JANITOR: “Why would someone name their baby ‘Carmenjello’? What kind of women would do that?”
ANDRE: “Taboo is my favorite Black Eyed Pea. I love the show Martin! You so crazy…”
TACO: “No, because diamonds aren’t forever. But forever stamps are. I invested all my money that I made pretending to be that old woman’s gardener into forever stamps.”
TACO: “I am sitting on thousands of pennies right now.”
TACO: “The front door is half cardboard, and it gets really moist in there. So I think it’s going to make them all stick together.”
KEVIN: “Taco, where’d you get this briefcase?”
TACO: “Stole it from some moron.”
ANDRE: “It says ‘Kevin’ on it.”
STEVE: “Nobody wants to get pounded in a day spa.”
KEVIN: “No, it’s got nothing to do with race. It’s about the color of your skin. That’s all.”
KEVIN: “I mean, Beehive is where I had you, accurately.”
STEVE: “CARMENJELLO! Say it! Right now!”
TACO: “Is the sex you have even that good?”
TACO: “Monogamy’s so sad.”
TACO: “These are cheap panties you get in a 12-pack at a Costco. Not. Sexy.”
SOFIA: “You hate this breast!”
RUXIN: “No, I love that breast, and I love the other one. It’s one of the main reasons I married you…I take that statement back already.”
SOFIA: “Not the ‘Dre guy.”
RUXIN: “No, he’s not allowed back in the country.”
TACO: “I didn’t give your underwear to people. I exchanged them for goods and services.”
KEVIN: “This is like virgin Christmas.”
JENNY: “Garbage time doesn’t count, Andre!”
TACO [to Jenny]: “Nothing says abstinence like your underwear.”
ANDRE: “I fingered a girl in my day. One time, girl told me just to put the tip in…and I did.”
RUXIN: “You gotta do what you gotta do, guys. Got it? … All your teachers smoke pot.”
KEVIN [on his zipper fairies]: “She didn’t find any. I think they’re dead.”
