We're
almost at the end of the POP CULTURE ADDICT'S ADVENT
CALENDAR! Day #23 is here, and it happens to
be a Jem Reviewed kind of day!
I
only wish the subject matter was appropriate for the holidays...but it is a
very special episode. Come to think of
it, all these episodes lately have been special as we learned that Roxy couldn't read last week.
This
week, we have a Misfits free show! Say
what?
This
is Episode 40: Alone Again. And the star of this show is the newest girl to join the
Starlight Home for Foster Girls!
The
thirteenth girl to become one of Jerrica's kids is Laura Holloway. Her parents died in a car
accident a month earlier, and Laura's been feeling depressed ever since. Laura's social worker seems to believe that
all she needs to do is be around other girls her age and she can start to
heal. But Laura's not exactly in the
right mood to be friends with anybody.
We
see how depressed Laura is when she is taken into the rehearsal studio at
Starlight Mansion where Jem and the Holograms are practicing. Most 14-year-old girls would be over the
moon to be staying at the same house that Jem and the Holograms seemingly live
in, but Laura's too sad to even think about it.
Jem
also notices that Laura is holding a guitar and suggests that Laura have a jam
session with them, but Laura tells them that she isn't very good and would
rather just be by herself. I guess
losing her entire family four weeks earlier has made Laura very self-conscious. Jem suggests that Laura go to the rec room
to meet the other girls while she changes into finds Jerrica for her. Laura reluctantly agrees, but she's still
feeling down about herself. Wow, this
is turning into a great Christmas episode, huh?
Laura
enters the rec room where Ba Nee force feeds Ashley a ping pong ball. Well, okay, Ashley and Ba Nee are playing
ping pong and Ba Nee accidentally hits the ball into Ashley's mouth. Ashley tries to convince Laura to play a
game or two with her, but Laura isn't in the mood. Mrs. Bailey calls the girls to the dining room for lunch which
gives Jerrica the opportunity to introduce herself to Laura.
But
when Jerrica tries to get Laura to open up, Laura bursts into tears, tells
Jerrica that she's feeling afraid and inferior. To Jerrica's credit, she does try to make her feel better but
Laura just wants to be alone.
Later
on, she grabs her guitar and starts singing a song about how alone she is. My goodness, Laura is melancholic today.
That
said, the song she sings - "Alone Again" is incredibly touching. It's weird hearing someone else sing a song
that isn't a Hologram, Misfit, or named Ba Nee, Krissie, or Ashley. It's also the first time we hear an acoustic
song performed in the show. Whatever
the case, Laura can play the guitar and sing very well. And as she sings, the Holograms listen in
and are happy with what they hear.
In
fact, Jem loves Laura's music so much that she offers Laura the chance to sing
a song with them on stage at their next concert. Considering that Laura herself has told them that she thinks she
sucks, does Jem really think that putting Laura on stage with the lack of
confidence she has is a great idea? It
also doesn't help matters much that Kimber basically guilt trips and tricks
Laura into saying yes.
At
Laura's school - which apparently has a teeter-totter in the yard - she is
stressing out about singing at the concert, and she actually wishes that an
earthquake or tidal wave or sharknado will strike and the concert will be
cancelled. Wow, that escalated! At this point, a teenage boy sits on the other side of the teeter-totter and
engages conversation with Laura. He
introduces himself as Bobby Braddock, and he has something that
will calm Laura down at the concert.
It's
here that he pulls out...THE PILLS!
Uh-oh! Laura, remember what they
told you in school? Drugs are bad,
m'kay? You better not take those! But because Laura is genuinely afraid to
perform at the concert, she decides they can't hurt and takes the packet of
pills from Bobby. Oh, Laura, what have
you done?
As soon as Laura gets back to Starlight Mansion, she opens up her lunch box, takes a pill, and at first deduces that they are merely a placebo and that they didn't work.
As soon as Laura gets back to Starlight Mansion, she opens up her lunch box, takes a pill, and at first deduces that they are merely a placebo and that they didn't work.
But
then Laura sees her lunch box turn into a tropical bird, and she decides that
she wants to be a bird too. It's clear
that the drugs that Bobby gave her were laced with some sort of hallucinogen
which causes Laura to believe that she sees things that aren't there.
And
because Laura believes that she's a bird, she opens up the window to her THIRD
STORY BEDROOM, walks out on the ledge, and prepares to take off! It's a good thing she accidentally kicks a
potted plant off the ledge because the crash is enough to alert Jerrica to the
danger.
A shocked Jerrica yells at Laura to get off the roof and not to jump, but all Laura can do is tell Jerrica to shut up because she knows that she thinks that she is prettier and more talented than she is. Man, just what sort of stuff is in those pills anyway?
Jerrica
rushes upstairs and charges into Laura's bedroom and tries to pull her back
inside, but just as Jerrica reaches the window, the ledge starts to give way,
and Laura falls to her death. The end.
No,
wait. Jerrica grabs Laura as she falls,
and manages to pull her back up to safety.
With ONE ARM. I wonder if
Jerrica's been taking some of those pills too!
Once
Laura is safe and sound, Jerrica demands to know what happened, and she
believes that Laura seemed to not be herself as if she was on something. But an angry Laura tells Jerrica that she is
fine and that she needs to leave her alone.
But we all know that Laura is anything but fine.
Sure
enough, Laura immediately confronts Bobby about the pills that she was given,
saying that they made her feel weird.
Bobby apologizes and gives her another packet of pills, telling her that
these ones will be much better. Yeah,
because the Bobby Braddock Guarantee is written in gold. Stupidly, Laura gives Bobby another chance
after he promises to see her play at the concert, and because Laura has developed
a crush on him. Why is it that
depressed young girls always fall for the bad boys?
So,
we watch a montage of Laura high on drugs, and she's exhibiting all of the
classic signs of a drug abuser. She's
irritable and nervous. She breaks every
dish in the house because she's not able to concentrate. And she can't sleep very well at all. In fact, because the drugs that Bobby gave
her are distorting her common sense, Laura decides that it will be a wonderful
idea to practice her guitar at four in the morning.
Needless
to say, when Laura is high as a kite, her playing skills are about the same as
they would be if a sober Laura tried playing the guitar after she chopped her
hands off with an axe. Her playing is
so bad that it wakes up about half of the Starlight Girls.
Ashley
is extremely furious at Laura because she has a history test coming up and she
needs her rest. But when Laura refuses
to stop playing, Ashley jumps on top of her and starts beating her up! Holy hell, is this Jem and the Holograms or
a CBS After School Special?!?
Ba Nee starts crying, telling them to stop fighting which awakens Jerrica who breaks up the fight. Both Ashley and Laura are told to knock it off.
Ba Nee starts crying, telling them to stop fighting which awakens Jerrica who breaks up the fight. Both Ashley and Laura are told to knock it off.
The
next morning at breakfast, Laura tries to pass a pitcher of orange juice to Ba
Nee, but the drugs have made her a bit shaky and she accidentally drenches Ba
Nee in a Tropicana bath! And when Ba
Nee screams at Laura, Laura has a full on meltdown at the breakfast table,
telling everyone to stop looking at her.
She
runs to her room crying and hysterical and practically tears her room apart
looking for more pills. When she finds
the bag underneath a table lamp, she is horrified to learn that she has used
all the pills up.
By
this time, Jerrica has put two and two together and realizes that Laura has a
vurry serious problem and that if Laura lets her, she can help her. But all Laura does is push Jerrica out of
the way and runs out of the house. All
she cares about is getting another hit of drugs from Bobby Braddock.
Too
bad Bobby's prices have just gone up.
Laura's first two doses were free of charge. But now that Bobby sees that she's hooked, he now charges her
thirty bucks for another dose of drugs.
And until Laura crosses his palms with the cash, he won't have anything to
do with her. So, basically Bobby's a
big jerk, and Laura's a drug addict because of him. What are we going to do now?
Why, sing a song, of course!
"Nightmare" is a song that we've heard before in Episode 32,
but I find this to be a much more effective use of the song. It packs a bigger punch by showing Laura's
dependency on drugs becoming a personal nightmare for her rather than Jem being
driven crazy by a bunch of doppelgangers.
And
Laura's nightmare continues to worsen when she actually resorts to stealing
money out of Jerrica's purse to pay for the drugs! Jerrica manages to catch her in the act, and this prompts Laura
to shove Jerrica against the wall and run away from the mansion.
You
can definitely see the toll the drugs have done on Laura's face in this
screenshot. And while I would probably
argue that this storyline is being sped up for convenience, I think that for a
cartoon it's been telling this story very effectively.
So,
Laura is back at school, and she's practically harassing students in the
hallways looking for Bobby so that she can give him the stolen cash for some
more pills. On her way to find Bobby,
she runs into Ashley who is still pretty sore with her. Ashley tells Laura that she's a real jerk
and to leave her alone before storming off.
Ashley
is walking down the stairs when she stumbles and drops her history notebook on
the floor, scattering her notes all over the place. Well, look at that!
Bobby's now hanging around Ashley and is now offering her pills
too! Oh, I get what the sleaze is
doing. He's preying on the insecurities
of young people (Laura performing in public, Ashley worrying about her history
exam) so that he can bait them into buying his drugs. What a pig!
At
least Laura overheard the whole conversation between Ashley and Bobby, and
Laura bursts into tears - not because she was completely wrong about Bobby, but
because she was too weak to resist him and his drugs.
Fortunately,
Laura still has one ally on her side.
Jerrica comes to the school in search of Laura, and Laura immediately
apologizes for taking the money and being a real jerk to everyone. Jerrica offers to take her for a ride so
that they can finally talk about it.
At
first, Laura won't say too much - at least until they talk about Bobby Braddock,
and Jerrica suggests that Laura enroll in a group session where she can get
help for her drug addiction. Laura
seems to think that she doesn't need it, but Jerrica seems to think that it is
a good idea. But Jerrica tells Laura
not to do it for Jerrica. Rather, she
should do it because Laura thinks it's the right decision.
Naturally,
Laura is defiant when she sits down for her first group session, and she
doesn't seem to think that she has a problem.
But one woman in the group won't let her take that attitude and
basically coerces Laura to take the first step in admitting that she has a drug
problem. Once she does this, everyone
in the group vows to help her overcome it and tell her that they're all been
where she is. It's a short, but
effective scene.
Later
on at a video arcade, Ashley and Laura are playing a video game when Bobby
Braddock the drug kingpin arrives to sell both girls drugs! Oh, great, so Laura's relapsed and is taking
Ashley down with her.
No,
wait. The whole thing is a set-up. A pair of undercover cops come out and
arrest Bobby for selling drugs to minors.
Of course, with Bobby being a minor himself, I guess he'll be back on
the streets in no time thanks to things like the Young Offenders Act. But for now, thanks to Ashley alerting the
cops about Bobby selling drugs and Laura agreeing to wear a wiretap, it looks
like Bobby won't be back to hurt anyone else.
Sure enough, this is Bobby's last appearance. Truth be told, this is Laura's only appearance on the show as
well. But at least she patches things
up with Ashley before she goes.
And
Laura's recovered enough from her drug treatment program to perform with Jem
and the Holograms at their concert - which Laura promised to do before she got
hooked up with Bobby Braddock. The
difference is that now that she's got friends and is sober, she's really
developed this great inner confidence which radiates within her.
Jem
announces that the song that they are about to sing was written by Laura, and
that song is "Look Inside Yourself", a great song about self-esteem
and loving yourself. It's Jem's version
of Whitney Houston's "Greatest Love of All".
And
that wraps up our very special episode of Jem.
I gotta tell you, when I found out that I'd be reviewing this episode
two days before Christmas, I was left trying to figure out how I was going to
do it. In the end, I decided to just go
with it because the gift of helping someone find sobriety again can be the
greatest gift one can give somebody else.
And, well...finding the self-esteem that you thought was gone forever
can be the best gift you can give yourself.
Believe me...it's something that I have struggled with practically my
whole life. At least I can proudly say
that I never resorted to drug abuse to get through it...not everyone can make
that claim. And in this edition of Jem Trivia, a hotline number was posted at the end of this episode in its original run, which urged teens to seek help if they were under the influence of drugs or knew someone who was.
Laura Holloway was Depressed after her parent's death Not wanting to have a normal life She was Embroiled by a drug dealer who wanted to kill her
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