While Home Movies has always been billed as a sort of animated sitcom, I've always felt it is a show that is primarily driven by the characters first, and the wacky scenarios second.
Focus Grill is a darling conclusion to the series that perfectly encapsulates this writing philosophy, and manages to give a sense of conclusion and finality to a show that never really had a progressing story arc in the first place. A wonderful piece of writing, Focus Grill gives most of the main characters one final chance to shine, and sends the show off into the sunset with a beautiful portrayal of their relationships without ever veering into sappy or overly sentimental writing.
The episode loosely follows and AB plot line structure, with the A line watching along as Jason, Brendon, and Melissa discover their first movie was never finished, and draft three separate endings to the film. Walter, Perry, Fenton, and Junior Addleburg form a highly critical focus group that the filmmakers recruit to help pick out an ending for the film. The B story follows John McGuirk as he attempts to build a grill for Paula Small in her backyard. This takes an extraordinarily long time, and of course, since McGuirk is involved, ends in disaster.
***Spoilers Ahead***
The two plotlines converge as the kids. McGuirk, and Paula all gather in the backyard for burgers after John has "finished" the grill. John, the eternal drunken screw up, has of course not built the grill correctly, and it explodes. The final scene of the show follows the group as they are driving down the road looking for something to eat. Brendon drops his camera out the car window, a passing vehicle runs it over, and just like that, their movies are done. A few witty lines of dialogue later, and the show is done. We have to say goodbye to Brendon and his ragtag family.
I suppose on one hand it's possible to look at the ending as strangely anticlimactic, but I think it is a perfect representation of the show, and encapsulates so much of why I like the show. Home Movies, from its humble beginnings in which the actors literally improvised their scenes, all the way through the end, celebrates the mundane. It celebrates the weird people, the misfits, and the off-kilter. The normal. Normal people have bad ideas, say things they regret, dance like an idiot when nobody is watching, and Home Movies never forgets that. It has never been a show about grand political intrigue or some major sci-fi epic. It's always been a show about 5 main characters and their circle of friends navigating everyday life. It is very appropriate that in the end, it goes out watching those 5 characters talking on the car while getting dinner. The closure we get is simply the satisfaction that their lives will continue as normal as we stop watching. The kids are still best friends. Despite his flaws, McGuirk is still fond of Brendon and Paula to the point that he is making efforts to be a more significant part of their lives. Paula is still just an exhausted, overworked single mom who has no energy to do anything but just roll with the punches.
During the main body of the episode, we also get to see the individual characters show their colors one last time, and in doing so, they remind me why I love each and every one of them so much.
As the kids draft their endings to their first movie, each one of them picks an ending to write and film that perfectly portrays them. Jason ends his version of the film with a scene about a throw up monster who, yup. Throws up a lot. In her ending, Melissa lives out her fantasy and becomes a fairy princess who flies away (or at least tries to. Jason and Brendon can't quite make it happen and her cut of the film fails spectacularly). And Brendon, true to himself, writes the most pretentious and hack ending imaginable.
As the trio screens each of their endings to their friends, their friends also get a chance to shine one final time. Walter, Perry, and Fenton are brutal and ruthless in their critique, with Fenton in particular saying "I just wrote Boo on the card." at one point. Fenton has always been a bit of a selfish, mean character, though not wholly unlikable. His antics are still funny from our point of view if only because they are so shockingly blunt. Perry and Walter continue to be scene stealers as their feedback is delivered with their signature unified, homoerotic, slightly unhinged, and sociopathic rambling. These focus group scenes tend to be the best parts of the episodes, descending into mayhem quickly as the personalities of the 7 kids clash over 3 very bad film endings.
The B storyline is quite a bit less funny, but is no less enjoyable. As McGuirk spends the weekend building Paula's grill, it slowly becomes clear that he's essentially turning himself into a backyard hobo, camping in the Small's yard at night. While Brendon is the one who catches him on this, Paula is the one who catches McGuirk having Brendon buy beer for him. John tries to cover his tracks with a pathetic attempt to blame Brendon, and Paula ends up being completely unfettered by the whole thing. That woman has the most even keel of any character ever imagined. In its own way, it's actually kind of sweet. While having Brendon buy him alcohol is clearly inappropriate, John's deception was ultimately harmless, doomed to fail, and if anything, the episode really shows just how close to the Small family McGuirk has become. How much he wants to be a part of their family, their life, despite all his character flaws. And in the end, the show leaves hope for him.
One of the other nice features of the episode is a large amount of really subtle gags that are hard to catch until a rewatch. Even after its first ultra low budget season, Home Movies always felt like a show that was produced on a relatively low budget. Backgrounds are filled in extremely sparsely, and characters not directly involved in a scene tend not to move or react a whole lot. Often faces are drawn in very flatly or with blank expressions because the focus of scenes is always the dialogue and the characters having that dialogue. Yet in this episode, if you're watching closely, you can see all sorts of small details and gags are drawn in that really enhance the experience. As Melissa's disaster of an ending scene is being filmed, you can see the utter disgust and boredom on Brendon and Jason's faces. While Brendon's ending scene is being filmed, McGuirk gets caught on camera. Slinking behind a newspaper, he hides his face with an expression that betrays his understanding of just how cringeworthy the dialogue is. These details are definitely small, but in such a character driven show, it's really nice to see every last bit of humor being squeezed out of these personalities.
While the episode doesn't have the same chaotic energy as some other fan favorites such as Camp or Bye Bye Greasy, it winds up being an episode that has just as much impact and importance to the series. On truth, my only realy complaint is that there are other characters I would have liked to see get one last day in the sun. Ronald Lynch and Duane come to mind in particular, though Shannon, Andrew Small, and Arnold Lindenson wpuld all have been nice to see make cameos as well.
In fact, I think it's downright weird that Addleburg Junior got a spot in the finale while some of the other ancillary characters were left out. Addleburg was always a bit character who filled the role of "weird side friend who we give important lines and funny jokes that don't fit Fenton, Walter, or Perry". I really wish his lines were cut in favor of one of the other side characters, as his story was not one I was looking for a conclusion to.
Overall, I feel that Focus Grill is a rousing success of a finale. It's not my favorite episode, but it's a really good one. And it might just be the most appropriate finale the series could have given. After all, as I said at the start, Home Movies isn't a particularly situation based comedy. It's always been about the characters living their lives the best they can. And sometimes your grill catches fire and your day is ruined. Sometimes your movie gets panned by critics. Sometimes your kid drops an expensive piece of equipment and destroys it. For all its boring moments, the stupid decisions we make, life really does manage to be beautiful.
Home Movies has always encapsulated that beauty, and in a very poigniant final episode reminds us of that on its way out.
9/10.
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