( continues...)

And yet - a secret cmputer persona, practically not related to the everyday one - um, don't all of us who post online do that, at least partially? I mean, if any of my students had known what I'd been doing for the last half hour, instead of finishing writing their exam, I'd rather hide behind some gloves and goggles and boots in order to avoid the need to detail an explanation.

So when Penny says "I know you" on the street, he actually stops for a brief second (and maybe even changes his manner of standing and talking) and wonders if she knows him from the blog, his main avenue of connection to the world, because why would a pretty girl remember somebody like him from a place like the laundromat, where he didn't even dare to talk to her? The shift between the personas, the mixing of them, the "which me am I now to this person?".

So Billy's and Horrible's two personalities clash when he wants to both rob the wonderfluoniom (what a great name!) as well as talk to Penny. When he can combine them (cut the head of the fish or humanity), he's in his element, but then he's again about the van and the heist. He wonders about that choice for a second, and then - again, with a song, chooses the "Horrible" over the "Billy" (OK, typing those names makes me realize how many letters they share. Fun).

And then my falling-in-love with this is complete, with NF having such a wonderful time in being such a cheesy villain-hero-good-guy bad-guy, believing his very presence stopped the van, all about the day needing him, not him doing anything good for anybody, all big hands movements and going so precisely over the top with it - I couldn't stop laughing all throughout the time he was onscreen (maybe because I already knew that he can be Mal, with all that tortured past and love and loss, so just letting go and having a good time was even more priceless. And, frankly, if Mal could sometimes let himself pass with these gestures, I'm sure he wouldn't want to give them up, himself, you know?). And I loved it that the villain is in white and there's nothing horrible about him, and Captain Hammer is in all black, and he needs that little hammer picture and Penny asks captain of what he is when he rescues her, and he can't see anybody and anything other than his own thoughts about his own wonderfulness. At least Horrible sees the people in front of him, even if only as strangers-writing-mail and blog audience. Hammer doesn't even have even that. I love how the good guy is such a bad guy (and how much fun it is to watch him at it). I loved how the connection and difference between them was emphasized, for me, by them singing the same tune, sharing several of the lyrics, but so differently. What a lovely way to do this!

At least, Billy's Freeze-ray is all about being able to find the right thing in the right time to tell Penny. He wants to do nothing else with her. He takes all the practiced-laughter and knowledge and mails and attempts, in order to do what she did in a blink of an eye - start talking to a person. Captain Hammer, of course, is all about the breeze in his hair and the loving him to death. He wouldn't even notice if there are any kids next to cars he's demolishing, and if he does, he'll probably throw them to the garbage as well, just in order to show how quickly and with what a graceful arch he can toss them.

Billy actually does the stuff for Penny, rather than for his ego. She even shares - to some degree - his ideas about changing the current hierarchy of power. He signs her petition for her (even though he is internet savvy enough to know how tiny is the effect of such stuff), not just in order to convince her to date him (as the second part showed Hammer to do. And he's even worse - he doesn't just lie to her into dating her, he also does it just in order to hurt Billy). (continued...)

( continues...)

But, wait, that's the second part. First, in the first - I loved the little touches of attention: pronouncing the letters "BTW"; the names of the e-mails writers (I laughed out loud at "Jonnie Snow" because I just recently started reading "Song of Ice and Fire"); the little break in his voice when he sings "mumbling" (I mentioned already how much I liked the actor? Less than seventeen thousand times?); the laundromat song ending when he says "stop"; iron hoof (and how naturally it's said); Moist's willingness to help him any way he could, even though that's not much (and me writing each and every name of these characters seriously, especially "Moist"); Billy's constant blinking when he's nervous, both in trying to get into the league as well as when Penny does the simple act of speaking to him; the puns ("all that matters, taking matters into my command" was all kinds of "if nothing that we do matters, all that matters is what we do", with that turn of the "matters"), "my wish is your command", Hammer's curtain - oh, and Billy's expression regarding the curtains (yeah, I love the actor); the drumming of Billy's head on the van as marking the lines in the final song (I'm not going to write "poor kid", again. I'll write it enough when I babble, in a few minutes, about the second part.

[Edited to gasp at even myself for the length - why here and not in my dissertation? Also, it's probably way longer than the whole show itself, how embarrassing. And I still have some large paragraphs to throw at the second part. Oops. But no oops in the world will stop me. In the meantime, anyway.]

waiting impatiently for Nilly to write more

NILLY NILLY NILLY NILLY.

Oh how I have missed Nilly's reports. LOVE LOVE LOVE.

SPICY BRAINS FTW.

::sets up camp to wait::

Oh bless. I haven't read a Nilly review in Too Damn Long.

::settles beside Ailleann. Pokes up fire. Roasts marshmallows::

If there were a superhero who could save the world by being sappy, they'd have to choose me for he role

Wait, you AREN'T a superhero who can save the world by being sappy (though I think you misspelled "awesome")?

Love the return of Nilly analysis. Love. It's been too long.

why here and not in my dissertation?

Nilly definitely deserves a PhD. in Sappy. Then she'd be Dr. Sappy.

Randomly, before shabbat:

He's so broken he can't even blog, the poor baby.

Where was I? Oh, yeah.

Penny didn't have much of a personality other than being sweet and pretty before the first song of the second part, but in that, I just loved her - so sweet and open to the people around her (especially when compared to NF's perfect recoiling away from every person or gesture - or duck! - which wasn't about him. And the lyrics, about trusting the goodness in the world, painted the whole volunteering thing in a light that was lovely, in my eyes - not as a person who wants to change the world, like Billy - or, rather, Horrible - but as one for whom the world is already different, and she just wants to implement that difference, that goodness she found, in a way. So her innocence and simple-mindedness in going with the whole petition thing wasn't so far fetched for her, after all, you know?

That first song was amazing. How both Billy and Penny sang about the exact same thing and the exact opposite, at the exact same time, and it wasn't just in the words that combined in the song, but actually in its subject, too - finding your place among people versus feeling so detached from it and betrayed by it. Even the lyrics, overlapping and playing with each other: "turning a life around" - from the inside - compared with "the world filled with filth and lies", from the outside. "Everybody has good inside" on he one hand, and "the human race has gone insane", on the other. They both speak of hearts - finding good in them, or being broken (and again, against being "safe and sound"). Taking a part in something, and that similar word, apart, with "falling apart". I need to hear it again. Like seventeen times in a row.

Oh, and then, "I'm a fan of laundry". Hey, *I* am a fan of laundry! From just the reason she stated! OK, I love her.

I liked Billy bringing Penny something he knows she likes - yes, lying about it, and knowing it because he stalked her on her date, but at least he dared to try something on his own, the poor dear (the Jewish grandmommies will call me any minute now to ask me for a membership card, I'm sure. Oy vey).

And she's not just some idiot who fell for a pretty face (And, well, it *is* pretty) and big, um, gloves - she thought he was cheesy at first, she actually didn't "love him to death" on first glance. Go Penny! I like her more at every minute.

Oh, and the layers thing - it's true for Billy himself! With his "Billy" and "Horrible" personas, the confidence and lack of it, the ability and lack of ability to believe in it. And at the first part he chose the Horrible part of the pie (can you have pie with frozen yogurt?), but that's the same Horrible who wouldn't do anything to harm little kids, so.

Captain Hammer has just the one personality - no hero and regular man. He's always wearing his marked-t-shirt and gloves. That's the one thing he has - no wonder it's the world to him. Even though Penny says he has layers. Maybe because he has just the two - the egotistical look-at-me that he is, and the I'm-a-good-guy he tries to show in order to win her? Which cake will work best here? Just one with some nice topping that can't hold on its own, and without a cherry on top? Food metaphors made me hungry.

(OK, sorry, I have to make sure I got this right: a spork is that little plastic spoon that has the separate edges so it's also like a fork, right? That's why it's called that way? English is so flexible. I love it. Not as much as laundry, because there's no scent and warmness involved, but still. Thanks.)

Again, Billy's actor is wonderful - how he wanders, inside his Horrible persona, into Billy ("sweet?"), changes even his voice, let alone his whole body language, and pulls himself back again. His expressions just keep getting richer and more fun and more actually emotional (and therefore even more fun!) each time. Just the way he looks at Penny when she's singing to him at the laundromat alone! He's so serious, after wanting to join a bad horse with a, um, evil winnie? (I'm sure there's a pun somewhere in there that I've lost, and I'm pretty sure I'll be embarrassed when it's explained to me). I keep wanting to hug him and give him soup and promise him all will be well. I don't think that this is what I was supposed to feel, maybe it's because it's shabbat in a few minutes, or the lack of sleep, I don't know. Oh, well. (continued...)

( continues...)

I love the messages from "bad horse". It's just a fun way to make a plot-forwarding device more, well, fun. Again, there's probably a world of background and jokes I'm missing, with the horse and the westerns and all, but still - it was so fun, in and of itself.

And I loved how Billy goes to Penny for understanding instead of his former not-so-super-villain friend. That's so sweet - how their relationship is based on trying to understand each other and really getting to know each other, almost the exact opposite of all the "love at first sight"great romances. Fun.

And she's even better with the "everything happens" line, because it's true. Forget the reasons (unless you're really into getting into a deep everlasting theological debate) , just deal with the situation at hand. She's great! By the time she called him "Billy Buddy" I was willing to look for vans to save her from, myself (not that she needs that). I love how she has all that personality of her own, other than being pretty and a damsel and in distress and adorable.

Oh, and did you notice how the actor's hands are almost always in his pockets when he's Billy, all trying to protect him and not bother the world around them. And then when Penny's singing to him, and reaches out to him, and her hand touches his leg, and it takes him a couple of verses to even realize that it actually happened to him - yeah, hugging and soup and Jewishmommying unite, all over again.

NF is hilarious. "I'm just naturally like this"! (and his expression!), how he got confused with phrasing his fist inside the "sign the house" sentence - NF must have had the time of his life , and I can't stop laughing each time he's on my screen. I love how he doesn't have any other sides (OK, so no cake. Maybe *he* is the frozen yogurt?).

I had to go back a few seconds to make sure I heard correctly the "the hammer is my penis", and then I had to stop again until I finished laughing. I mean, he insinuated a line earlier (the sort of vague hints that are always lost on the more-vanilla-than-any-yogurt me), and usually he had to stop at that. And then, with that deadpan delivery (did I mention already how much I enjoy NF in this?), he came back to explain. Because he could. What a great way to say "we're in the internet, not a tv station, so we can say such things!".

And then, meeting Hammer for the first time as *Billy*, not Horrible, made that change - the apparent physical change (did I mention already that the actor is great?) in Billy, to get Horrible's face, and singing about a "new me". And now there's a whole shabbat before I can find out what that means. And even the anticipation is fun.

And, again, the little things: "lost and found" (I'm not sure why, but I just loved that line, and not just because it rhymes!); Billy in the homeless shelter, spying the date, wearing a silly little mustache and so into what going in from of him with Penny that he doesn't seem to put the soup into the plates of the homeless in line; Penny saying "glow" and showing her in the sun right afterwards; "crazy random happenstance", "trust your instincts", "peace - but not literally" (goodness, so many great lines!); Hammer watching the blog, Moist being unable to open the can because of his hands; "Do I even know you?", Billy calling Hammer "cheesy on the outside"; "look at my wrist", "I don't love these" (man, that was a fun scene!), "I get what you want"; the change in Hammer's expression, in a matter of a blink of an eye, when Penny turned to him; how Billy didn't hit with all the darts at Hammer's face, but then collected them all and stuck them there; the home videos of hitting Horrible (complete with Santa); "a shiny new Australia" (I heard it right? I hope I did!); Hammer's expression when he was squashed. (continued...)