But the thing is, I don't think the "dead wife" sex is presented as OK. I think it is intended to be skeevy. (Echo's wanting to "finish" is the reaction of a very damaged person.) I don't think it is analogous to some of the earlier stuff, cause I don't think it is made appealing.

I thought they made it appealing. They spent a lot of time letting Patton Oswalt plead his case, and then they had a happy-smiley ending. Echo wanted to "finish" the happy-smiley home.

I read the end as "We're playing this as good and wholesome, can you maintain your outrage?"

I was rewatching and I forgot about the guy who wanted to be wwith another guy. that cracked me up.

I was also kind of creeped out by Topher asking Echo "ready to play?" particularly after the whole "game" thing with Hearn. I'm sure that it was deliberate, but ew.

I think the intention was to say "look, sometimes we help people" but I'm not sure.

The skeeviest thing for me in the whole episode was defintely Sierra's abuse. It was intentionally set up to feel like child abuse and I thought they took it much farther than they needed to get the point across.

They're not helping that guy. They may think they are, and he may think they are, but I don't see how having him relive this moment every year is helping him.

His impulse is understandable. It's turning it into action that's a problem -- hiring a fake wife, getting an emotional reaction from her, and then sleeping with her.

I understand how he feels, that no woman will ever feel the same way about him. I don't think it's good what he's doing, but I understand.

I don't know that we're supposed to think that was a healthy thing for Patton Oswalt's character to do. Just understandable.

I don't think Joss is interested in advocating for the nobility of the enterprise. Rather (as explicitly set out by the man in the street interviews) he's pursuing the narrative implications of: What If You Got What You Most Wanted.

Which is really an old trope, and not so much about wish fulfillment as it is the Monkey's Paw and tricky genies who grant your wishes but they're unsatisfying.

And of course there are a little of interesting things to pursue about identity and coercion and agency/volition.

I loved the guy on the street talking about sleeping with another guy, and the slowly changing expression of the woman who was with him. Comedy gold.

Dude, I forgot about that! I hulu'd it and it was REALLY late when I watched; I may have to re-watch.

I think, maybe, that it might be a further sign of Caroline's basic personality coming through -- not in a healthy way, but isn't she supposed to be a save-the-world type? Or maybe a desire for something "normal" (even tho it's not.) I mean, it's a different scenario than she usually goes out on -- she's implanted with a....hmm. I'm trying to justify it, even though I don't like it.

I DO like the show better now. It's more complicated and I am trying to figure the angles and argue with some stuff and agree with others. It got more interesting. Wrong, but interesting.