“Silent Night, Holy Night” (“White Christmas” Recap)

OK, there's no way that I could not use the opening line from that song for my recap post title tonight. Not after that performance – can we retroactively nominate Ariel Winter for a Grammy? That was such a nice surprise to let her show off her singing talent.



Remember a few weeks ago when I thought “Spread Your Wings” was going to be the Christmas episode and I thought maybe it would lead to a Scrooge-like story for Alex (before changing my answer to “It's A Wonderful Life”)? Based off her private scene (another nice unexpected surprise) I guess in the end I sort of had the right idea after all.

(Of course since I did change my answer if this was a game show I'd still be taking home nothing but lovely parting gifts...)

It will be interesting to see if there will be any followup to Alex changing her tune (pun not intended) about Christmas – will she finally start lightening up about other aspects of her life, or will she revert to being laser-focused about academics at the expense of living her life to the fullest? I suspect the answer will probably be the latter (like how nothing changed in the aftermath to ”Under Pressure”), but we'll just have to wait and see about that – for now I'm just going to enjoy what we saw and heard tonight (now I'm not so down that we have to wait a month to get to the next episode – this one should keep me warm for a while).

On the other hand, it was sad that it took so long for everyone else to see she was really making an effort to get into the spirit of the season, and not just being sarcastic.

And that she was doing homework during the holiday break in the first place.

Seeing that Fig was an MIT professor really makes me wish again that we found out last season whether or not Alex got accepted there and if so why she ultimately chose CalTech over MIT.

And while as expected Jay announced he would be retiring, also as expected for now it won't affect Alex's life (the show will probably be done before any important effect happens). And what that means for the show and this blog (obviously when one ends in all likelihood the other will end shortly thereafter) is another thing that remains to be seen.

Finally, more scenes of Alex and Joe together, please (/me does soulfully big begging puppy dog eyes)?

Alex's Lines Of The Night: In the spirit of the season, it's a tie (no, not as in a gift Alex might give to Phil...) between two things Alex said to Fig:

1) ”My sister thinks quantum theory is a game show, and my brother once tried to take his pants off over his head.”

2) ”We are a lot alike, like you said, and sometimes we can give off a negative vibe without meaning to.” (Fig: “What's your point?") ”Well, I was thinking maybe we could make more of an effort to be more positive and actually, enjoy, Christmas?”

And with that, it's time for (again?) another break – this time until early January and “Spread Your Wings”. I'll be on a mini-hiatus myself (I don't plan on doing retro recaps like last year), if for no other reason that it's busy time in retail and my free time is limited but when I hear some news* about future episodes I'll be in touch.

*(There is one more future episode title known, for the 15th(???) episode: “The Cover-Up”. If that one does involve Alex it scares me (for obvious reasons) – the problem with constantly dodging bullets (“Spring Break”, “Crying Out Loud, “The More You Ignore Me”) is eventually you do not miss one.)