“Black As Night, Black As Coal”

As you can probably tell from the title, I'm still not in the best of moods going into tonight's “A Moving Day”.  Or the rest of the month, for that matter.  Until the 28th, at least (wink, wink).

Anticipation Level: Low. It's not just that there's no sign of Alex yet (if at all) that doesn't exactly leave me excited even after three weeks of re-runs.  Historically, the first episodes coming back from holiday hiatus have been less than stellar (except for the first one “Up All Night”).

Emotional Moment Potential: Very Low. At least as far as Alex is concerned, anyway. Haley's continuing story may have some.

Game Changing Potential: Almost None.

Chance Of An Alex-less Episode: High. By “high”, nowadays I mean about a 50/50 chance – that's the new reality from now until whenever the series ends¹.  Anytime there is no mention of Alex from now on this will be the default level, but I might put it higher if I feel even more strongly (I almost did that for tonight as it is).  Barring something unforseen this probably will be true for the next two weeks as well.

By the way, it would not be unprecedented for Alex to miss the first episode coming back from holiday – she wasn't in “Slow Down Your Neighbors” when Season 2 resumed.

In Which Story Do I Want To See Alex Be A Part?  At some point I think we'll see Alex get involved with Haley's story again.  I just don't think it will be tonight.

Are There Any Other Questions?  Other than a comment in the footnotes about the show's future, I have nothing.

There probably won't be much to say tonight after the show, but I'll say something.
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¹ It's looking more and more like there will be one more season next year after all, but it's not etched in stone yet.  Apparently there were stories on several websites earlier this week that said it was a done deal but they've since been retracted (according to comments in this SpoilerTV article about the renewal which has not been retracted).