DVDs are my sick
hobby. Since I first got a DVD player about six years ago I have systematically sought out
and purchased every movie, television show, or special interest that I could ever have an
interest in watching more than once. It was fun at first. Then it just started limiting my
selection. I started to lose the love of shopping for a movie, and now I just go to Amazon
every couple of weeks and browse through the new and upcoming releases, trying to psyche
myself up for some impotent release I realistically couldn't care less about. Whoa, sweet,
volume six of the fourth season of Dick Van Dyke!
A question I always get (from myself and associates) is "WHY ISN'T THE WONDER YEARS OUT ON DVD YET." I would
really like The Wonder Years on DVD. Problem is, they felt it necessary to start the first
115 episodes with John Fogerty singing "Green River" or some shit, so if they
want to release them on DVD they have to pay the son of a bitch like 20,000 dollars each
time. Assuming the song is used once per episode for a hundred episodes we factor in the
number of episodes on DVD, multiply that by how many copies of the DVD is sold, multiplied
by how many times the average patron watches said episodes, we come to learn that John
Fogerty would be entitled to forty-trillion dollars. So they're just waiting for John
Fogerty to die.
Rest assured, John Fogerty WILL die (if I have anything to say about it),
and we will eventually get to relive one of the few shows in television history about
growing up that actually gets better when you start growing up. I never appreciated the
show when I was a kid. I remember my parents going crazy for it, but my parents went crazy
for thirtysomething, so what did they know? All I knew circa 1989 was that Fred Savage
feared Lucas' ability to finish all his games and that Howie Mandel is only slightly more
creepy in monster makeup. Why was I supposed to care about the Apollo astronauts, or what
first love is all about, or what happens when you're casually cruel to the people you
love? I was nine.
Well, I'm not nine, anymore.
I can't tell somebody who doesn't care that "The Wonder Years" is the best show
in the history of television because, well, it might not be for them. They might love
"My So-Called Life," or "Freaks and Geeks," or the thousands of shows
since 1988 that have taken a little bit of Kevin Arnold and his family and made it their
own. I think that's what you're supposed to do. Take it for your own. Think back to when
YOU did what Kevin just did, because you probably did. That's what I'm doing here. I'm
taking a show that means the world to me, and to a lot of us, and making it my own.
Because it's mine.
These are what I consider the best moments of "The Wonder Years." If you agree
or disagree, let me know. Show this to your friends, see if they remember. They're in
here, somewhere.
25. Savage Does Shatner
 
I remember "The Wonder Years" (as you'll learn when you
read this list) as its countless parodies do. Kevin Arnold sitting at
a booth in a diner, staring off into the distance, while the narrator
pontificates on the nature of the aging as the camera slowly zooms in
on Kevin's face. It's not a bad parody. The show did a lot of that.
A whole lot of that. It made you feel like the real Kevin Arnold spent
his days just sitting, staring silently, as his inner brain used errant
roller-skates and feather-traps to keep Daniel Stern from breaking and
stealing his sanity. It's too bad Kevin never went to New York City.
Watching Tim Curry star down in confusion as Fred Savage just lays there
between his legs, staring up at nothing, would've been hilarious.
In addition to being ominous and somberly reflective, the show was
also really, really funny. It was also prone to pre-Ally McBeal Ally
McBeal hallucinogenic freakouts where the main character twitches and
suddenly, literally gets shot through the chest with an arrow. On McBeal
(who needed to eat a McLunch!!11) the effect was pretty lackluster.
Ally'd go OH MUH GORSH, I'M ON MY PERIOD and a big giant dot would fall
from the sky and crush her, and they'd hold on it for 26 minutes while
the words "it's a joke" scrolled in a
ticker at the bottom of the screen. Kevin Arnold's imagination involved
whatever he'd seen on TV or read, which is how most people work. He
watches a cowboy movie so he imagines he's a cowboy. He watches Star
Trek and sees Captain Kirk being immobilized by STRANGE SPACE CREATURES
KNOWN AS WOMEN, and imagines himself in the role when confronted by
his own strange space creatures.
The scene above is my favorite because it involves two things very important to my budding
interest in women:
1) Kevin gets punched out by Becky Slater.
2) Winnie Cooper
in gogo boots.
24. STFU, Craig Hobson
 
Craig Hobson was harsh. One part realist, one part Fucking Aaron,
Hobson's role in the early show was the provide an antagonistic point
of reference for Kevin's misgivings. By that I mean he would turn
to Kevin/Paul incredulously, go "YOU GOTTA
BE KIDDING ME, THAT'LL NEEEEVER HAPPEN," then wander away to
prepare for the next time he has to drop trou over top of somebody
else's parade. He was great because he looked like he'd been squirted
out full kid-size from his mother's womb, his hair still wet and matted
down from the birthing canal.
In this instance, Hobson is sharing his usual rays of sunshine about how Kevin's father is
too cheap to buy the family a new car. Kevin is embarrassed about this already. All the
families in the neighborhood have gotten new cars, and he can't understand why his dad
keeps clinging to a piece of junk. They trade insults for a while until Hobson hits a real
low blow, and Kevin has to think about how to react. Remember, this is the kid who is
thrown into stasis when an acorn falls out of a tree because he must realize, at that
moment, that things are going to be DIFFERENT NOW.
Kevin goes, "Hey Hobson," and then flicks mashed potatoes
at him.
The look on Hobson's face up there should rationalize why Hobson then stood up at the
table, dove onto Kevin's torso, and stabbed him through the heart. Or at least why he
wanted to. That kid was a great actor, and was written off the show (and out of a
relationship with Becky Slater, who gets her second mention here because she was pretty
great) by being sent to military school. I like to pretend that in the last season, when
Kevin is gangly in blue jeans and Bob Seger at the old lake, Craig Hobson is over in
Vietnam rolling his eyes and telling some Joe that nobody's ever going to mind him taking
out the village with a flame-thrower.
23. Wayne Commits Autocide
 
I hated Wayne. HATED HIM. There's an easy explanation: I am an only child. Therefore I
do not have memories of being beaten up by an older sibling and being picked on and how
much that brought us together and eventually meant to me. Call it the selfishness of
solitude, but most of the times I just wanted to grab Wayne by his pseudo-beehive and
crack his dome against the windshield.
I almost got that in this episode, where Wayne starts driving
and of course uses that privilege to make life Hell for everyone
around him. A battle of wills leaves Kevin and a maniacally laughing
Wayne barreling down a street, swerving, and eventually driving
headfirst toward an oncoming car. Wayne stops saying "butthead" for
the only two seconds in the history of the show when the word was
not coming out or going into his mouth, jerks the car off the road,
and plows through a cornfield.
There's a moment when they stop where Wayne checks to make sure
Kevin (who is screaming at the top of his lungs about what a terrible
person Wayne is, because he's telling the truth, and because Kevin
is kind of a dick) that makes you go "oh, okay, I get
it." Wayne's just a stupid kid who doesn't know any better. He's been sheltered and
never challenged and he just kinda ended up this way, demanding that he's been ready since
first call, and growling "ROLL." So he gets a pass.
22. Karen's Birthday
 
The dynamic between Karen Arnold and her father was always one
of extremes. We rarely got to see them just hanging out. Jack
would grimace and Karen would say something asinine from the sixties
like "picnics are for fascists" and they'd be yelling
at each other, or they would be completely at peace. This is one
of those moments when the two sides come together. Karen is being
asinine and from the sixties, demanding that her family just forget
about her birthday. Jack demands that she has a party and presents.
She doesn't want any presents. So, logically, Jack takes Wayne
and Kevin out to buy Karen presents. At the end of the day, Jack
simply doesn't buy her anything.
Before Karen storms away from her birthday party to catch a ride to somewhere she can be
asinine and from the sixties, Jack stops her, and gives her his present: his old military
jacket. He doesn't agree with what she believes or where she's going or how she's living
her life, but he doesn't want her to get cold, and he knows she likes that old military
stuff. It's just so NICE, and honest, and from a father. Even if he doesn't understand.
That's what was so great about Dan Lauria's performance as Jack. He manages to be a
figment of Kevin's imagination and exaggeration and still put more nuance into every
spoken word and mannerism than 99% of television actors I've ever seen.
Karen didn't seem important to the show until she was gone, and
didn't really seem too important when she did. But sometimes you
find yourself watching the later episodes and going, "where's Karen?" She just sorta fit with them. Like she should've been
there, even if she was just wearing doofy glasses and running outside a la Stevie Nicks to
load into a hippie fan. Karen was played by actress Olivia D'Abo. D'Abo, of course, is
French for "what Dusty Rhodes uses to finish his matches."
21. Base Ball Game
 
Little known fact! We here at Progressive Boink like baseball. Little known fact! And
because of that it has become one of our favorite topics to wax emotional on, whether it
be Sammy Sosa taking the "tearful retirement
challen" or Greg
Maddux just being a nice guy. It's something we (well,
most of us) grew up with, and it's a part of us. We're American.
It's SUPPOSED to be a part of us. It has gotten increasingly
difficult to say "I'm a baseball fan" in public without inviting
some kind of ridicule regarding steroids or how boring it is or how football is the real
American pastime. To those people I say, "a man has the
capacity to watch both Star Wars and The Lord of the Rings and
enjoy them equally and for different reasons because they are
not in competition with one another for your affection, so shut
the fuck up and what the fuck do you know about baseball."
Convinced that he was only making the cuts during baseball tryouts because his dad was war
buddies with the coach, Kevin lets his nerves and constantly speaking inner monologue talk
him out of the basic joys of the game, and he just sucks out loud. Everything is drab and
pointless and stupid. Then he notices his name has been scratched off for final cut. His
dad hadn't been pulling strings. The coach really DID just think he had spirit and heart.
So Kevin steps up to the plate, rears back, and pops the shit out of the ball.
This is another moment like the Trek moment, where reality drops and we're left in Kevin's
imagination. His clothes become a team uniform. His dad and Winnie show up out of nowhere
to show him support as he jogs around the bases, high-fiving his teammates. As he crosses
home he tosses off his helmet and is carried off the field. The best part is that we never
come out of this fantasy. The episode just ends like that. Because, as the narrator says,
sometimes memories SHOULD stay like that, even with a little embellishment.
20. At the Playground. Y'know?
 
I made this one's title an "Another Bad Creation" song
lyric because it's a moment that doesn't allow you to make
a lot of jokes. Nearing the 1/3rd point of the show's run,
Kevin and Paul and the rest (including Doug Porter whose last
name is PORTER so that means HE LIKES TO EAT) graduate from
junior high. Winnie has already moved away by this point and
Paul is planning to go to prep school instead of sticking
around with Kevin, so since he can't hit Winnie (and because
Kevin is prone to fits of incredible violence), Paul gets
decked. Kevin was always punching people. Paul, Eddie Pinetti,
snooty resort Eric, John Corbett in the role of his career,
etc. I don't blame him for punching Paul, though. People online
will tell you that Kevin was an asshole, but Paul was just
ASKING for it. Once he lost the glasses, Paul was a walking
menstrual cramp.
So Kevin, in his graduation suit, takes a walk to think about things. After a while he
stops and sees kids playing on a jungle gym, and remembers through home movie
reverse-o-vision when he and Paul and Winnie were that small. In his last, desperate
tanuki effort Kevin sees himself playing on the gym, sliding on the slide, and just
enjoying himself. He doesn't ever seem to do that. He thinks that a huge chapter of his
life is drawing to a close and THINGS ARE DIFFERENT NOW, but unlike a lot of his other
STUFFS DONE CHANGED moments, this one is for real. The puberty that would kill a thousand
Tiger Beats was underway, and real people just don't hang on to what and who they loved as
kids forever.
Things really were different, now. And he wasn't too far away from having Giovanni Ribisi
and Andy Berman as The Friends Who Make Me Want To Stop Watching The Show.
19. FEMALE REPRODUCTIVE SYSTEM
 
Kevin, Paul, and all the boys in gym class get excited
because they're finally going to learn about the female
reproductive system, because either they're really into
anatomical knowledge or because they're kids and think that
properly knowing what a vagina is means you've had sex.
Coach Cutlip turns his back and draws. When he turns around,
it looks like a cow's head. He points (pictured) and asks
if anyone can tell him what THESE are. The response: "The
ears?"
The best part is when they suggest Cutlip draw the female
body around the reproductive system, to give them a "better idea" of how the apparatus is set up. The picture
on the right is what he draws. I do not need a paragraph of text here to clue you into how
fucking outstanding it is that a mentally and socially repressed gym teacher would create
THAT when asked to express his concept of women in art. Coach Cutlip was the perfect
"remembered" gym teacher: a psychopathic, meandering
gimp who made your life terrible because he couldn't do
anything with his own.
Cutlip was my favorite ancillary character on the show because of stuff like this and the
eventual character development he gains (which comes up in a few numbers), and because that
development does not CHANGE him, it merely EXPLAINS him. Other choice Cutlip moments include
impromptu teacher-student meetings in the janitorial closet, the episode where Paul
ricochets a basketball off of his head, and when he shows Neelix the beauty of human ballroom
dancing or some shit.
18. Corey Matthews: Matchmaker
The Valentine's Day episode is great because we finally get young Kevin and young Winnie
together as well as hooking up Becky Slater with Craig Hobson. However, it becomes TRULY
choice when Kevin stops a seventh grader in the hallway and asks him to deliver a valentine to
Winnie's locker. That seventh grader (who skipped a grade) is, of course, Ben Savage, little
brother to Fred. Fred Savage's little brother is most famous for getting
fifty-thousand on Double Dragon starring on the long-running sitcom "Boy Meets World." You
may also know "Boy Meets World" from its working title, "WHAT
IF THE WONDER YEARS WAS WRITTEN BY THE PEOPLE WHO DID STEP BY STEP."
I'm going to break kayfabe here and ignore that episode
of Boy Meets World where Corey keeps saying UNDA-PANTS and
say Ben Savage was frickin' adorable here as the SLYLY SYMBOLIC
Cupid. He had an almost Ike from South Park feel to him
at this age, where his jew fro was a little too big for
his head and his voice was a little too small for his mouth.
His show ended up getting about thirty-five times as many
seasons as "The Wonder Years," a fact that
we have to chalk up to Topangas and arrows of outrageous
fortune.
unda pants
17. Square Dance
 
I had to square dance in gym class, once. We ended up
square dancing to a cassette tape of
"The Simpsons Sing the Blues." Yeah.
The Margaret Farquhar episode really hit me hard for
two reasons. One, because I started thinking "jeez Kevin, Margaret is a really cute little girl. You should stop being such a
praline and dick." Secondly, because I shut up when
I realized that I'd had my very own Margaret Farquhar in
middle school.
Coach Cutlip (awesomely) decides the class is going to
learn square dancing, and sets everyone up with a girl from
the corresponding gym class. Paul gets a hot girl, Kevin
gets the
"weird" girl, Margaret. She asks too many questions,
has a pet bat, and wears her hair in three pig tails (because
you never know when you're going to need a hair tie). He
doesn't want to dance with her and goes as far as to fake
tying his show and feigning injury to avoid contact. Even
when she shows up at his house and he starts to learn that
she's actually pretty cool, he lets his pride and popularity
get in the way, telling her that sure, they can still be
friends, only they should be SECRET FRIENDS.
You see that look on Margaret's face in the picture on the right? That's exactly right. That's
what an actress should look like when she's a weird girl and gets told something like that. The
acting performance really got to me. It really did, and I can't really place it other than that
Lindsay Fisher, the actress who played Margaret, deserves some serious recognition and I'm going
to try to put her in every movie I make. Poor Margaret. She never shows up again, but Kevin
never forgets her, opening and closing the episode with her picture in the yearbook. We find out
she ended up okay. Successful, and a mother of six. And Kevin was just kind of a dick.
Like most of us were, I guess.
16. San Francisco
 
Before Karen ran off the show (and then came back before
running off to Alaska, of all places), she ran off to San
Francisco, as hippies do. The episode, "Brightwing," is one
of Karen's best, because she manages to get across "I AM ASININE" and "I AM FROM
THE SIXTIES" in a realistic way, trying to fake a connection
with Kevin for her personal gain only to realize that she's
got a REAL one waiting there whenever she wants it.
The real moment I want to share is one that doesn't get
shown in a lot of movies or TV shows. Kevin is up late in
bed worrying about where Karen is, and if she's okay. He
hears the door open, and shut, and the murmuring of voices.
He hears tears. He just stays in bed for a minute, listening.
That's something I used to do a lot as a kid, listening
to the sounds of the house and people moving around before
bed. It's been lost since I've been on my own so long and
always end up going to bed after everyone else, but it's
something that will never leave me. Wondering what the sounds
are saying. Picturing the room from outside of it. Wondering
what the world is like without you.
This episode also uses flashbacks better than most, which is nice. A lot of times they're just
used to have something to show during narration. Most of the time it's just that same clip of Paul
waving really fast from the theme song. Here you get to see little Karen playing with little Kevin
in a way that little kids really do, and it makes me go "oh" in
an inverted Wayne way and make me wonder what it would've
been like to have somebody there with me to grow up and
apart.
15. Any Time Kevin Dances
 
Kevin was shy at times and reserved, afraid to really speak his mind outside of angry outbursts.
He wanted to deliver soliloquies to Miss White Mrs. Heimer about love and life and
the things Daniel Stern might say while waiting for his child to show up and interrupt his wonder.
But when it came to dancing Kevin took the advice of a hundred-thousand female online profiles and
DANCED LIKE NOBODY'S WATCHING.
Including Kevin himself, I guess. Kevin danced with abandon at all times and basically looked like
Kermit the Frog. It was pretty stellar.
14. A Very Cutlip Christmas
 
While at the mall buying clothes with his mother, Kevin makes a startling discovery: the mall
Santa is actually his gym teacher, Coach Cutlip. The discovery and Cutlip's awareness of such leads to
an easier gym class for Kevin, which alienates him from the friends he left stuck doing the
President's Physical Fitness Challenge. In an effort to explain, he lets slip that Cutlip works at the
mall, but doesn't tell them where. This gets them determined to go to the mall, find Cutlip, and make
a fool out of him.
When the special treatment becomes too much, Kevin confronts the coach in his office and makes it
clear that he isn't going to tell anybody about Cutlip's stupid job as Santa. Cutlip, in a completely
out-of-nowhere but welcome moment of sublime humanity, says that he took the job as a mall Santa
because he wanted little kids to like him. That's the saddest thing ever. Cutlip wants the kids to
like him, but the only way he knows how is through Christmas, and by giving them something to believe
in. Kevin rightly feels like shit and promises the secret will be kept, until he realizes that he's
already let the secret slip.
Later, Kevin rushes to the mall to let Cutlip know the guys are coming, but Cutlip (accompanied by a
Christmas choir) stands up and lets Kevin know that he isn't ashamed of what he's doing, and he'll
take whatever he gets. The boys arrive and Kevin tries to herd them away, until they see Cutlip
standing tall in the center of the mall. They each take turns noticing him, looking him in the eyes.
Kevin is sure that they know until he sees them smile, and realizes that when they look they don't see
Coach Cutlip. All they see is Santa.
I think of this, and of Linus, and I hope that my child gets to hold on to that sweetness and
simplicity of Christmas for as long as she can. Even if she's sitting on the lap of a gym teacher.
13. Pottery
 
I don't really think of my parents as being "in love." I don't think anyone does. Even
when we look at old pictures and are old enough to have context and yadda yadda we can rarely think of
them outside of their relation to us, and even more rarely their relation to each other. Kevin (and
Wayne, and Karen) just think of them as "Mom and Dad," because
that's the normal way to think about them.
Norma begins taking pottery classes without any support or encouragement from Jack, and though it hurts
her she continues, because she's proud of what she's doing, and because she NEEDS something to do. Most
Moms do but we don't take the time to ask them about it. Though she has always come to a balance with
Jack before, things get worse and worse until they're screaming at each other, and things look terrible.
Jack is bitching about the lack of Pepsi in the home
(a valid point) when Norma cuts her finger in the sink,
and begins crying. No amount of pride or stubbornness can
prevent a good man from breaking down and just hugging the
woman he loves when she cries. It's a piggish, caveman way
to think, but I like knowing that one of my major purposes
is to put my arms around someone and say "it's okay."
Sometimes people just need that. I need it a lot. Norma needed it here. And Kevin realized that his Mom
and Dad aren't just "Mom and Dad," they're Jack
and Norma, and they've loved each other for a long, long
time.
Kevin's growing appreciation of his Mom as a person is one of the best undercurrents of the show, and
Dan Lauria, as stated, is the fucking best.
12. Paul's Darkest Secret
 
Kevin, Paul, Doug McEaterson, and the rest of the tertiary boys face every hardship known to man on
their journey with beer to an all-girl slumber party, sure that the rain, groundings, and Wayne-beatings
are worth the sexual paradise that awaits. When they finally reach their destination (and Doug Porter
collapses because fat people are often unable to walk), Kevin and Paul take a moment to reflect on what
they've accomplished, and to contemplate the road ahead. Paul takes this time to share with Kevin
something he's never told anyone.
"I'm a virgin."
Fred Savage deserves an Emmy here because he doesn't
say a word for a couple of seconds, and does a double-take
eye roll without ever turning to look at Paul. Check out
his facial expression in the picture on the right. That's "yes because we are fourteen you goon" done
in professional pantomime. Kevin's response is just as funny.
"So? Lots of guys are."
11. Buster
 
The ability of "The Wonder Years" to both hammer
down the YOU ARE GROWING UP YOU CAN'T SURVIVE MAKE YOUR
TIME message and subtly parallel it with the time and environment
around itself is impressive. Sometimes Kevin stares at a
playground and sees little piggie-tailed Winnie, and sometimes
he realizes that he's going to have to chop off his dog's
nards even though he doesn't want to.
Buster gets introduced as a puppy early on in the show
but never, EVER becomes "television dog."
He does not tilt his head and go ARROOO? every time Wayne
says something stupid. He does not have inner monologue
about masturbating to poodles and he doesn't save Debbie
Pfeiffer from a burning well. He just shows up as a cute
puppy, and then becomes kind of a hassle. He's a dog. That's
what they do.
Sometimes it's when the dog grows up that the work begins. He is going to love you unconditionally, and you
owe it to him to do the same, even if it means getting up when you don't want to get up and going out when
you don't want to go out. Kevin's mounting frustration with the dog barking and peeing everywhere combined
with his inability to get Buster fixed ends up in the park, with Buster running away and Kevin just kind
of... letting him. Kevin comes home with this look of complete confusion on his face that masks sadness with
an absolute blankness, and the family sets out to look for Buster. That look hit me close, because I've had
it so many times. Knowing you should do something, but not being able to move, or think, or feel, or speak.
A real sadness. Not the Winnie kind or the Becky Slater punching you kind. The sadness from knowing that you
really let somebody down. Even the dog.
They find Buster without a lot of problems and get him fixed. They love him, and that's pretty much the end
of it. Buster was a great dog (and cute, too), and his lone solo episode ends with Kevin talking about all
the times we never see... Buster waiting at the window when Kevin leaves for his senior prom, and staying
there for hours.
I really do love dogs. But I've got to say, there's one thing I love more.
10. Madeline
 
I hope you didn't think the conclusion to that sentence
was "women." No, I'm talking about
Madeline Adams specifically. LOOK AT HER.
Okay, Madeline shows up one day and wants to get busy with Kevin SO HORD, giving him all these looks and
touches and setups, going as far as to get HALF NAKED and offer for him to LICK BATTER off of her FINGER in
her HOME. Kevin goes DAAAH I DON'T KNOW WINNIE WINNIE WINNIE and bails because he is A GODDAMN INGRATE and
COMPLETELY STUPID. One of Madeline's legs is taller than Winnie. Madeline looked like she was 25 and
completely out of Kevin's league, and frankly the league of anyone else who ever appeared on that show or in
my personal life.
Madeline's storyline culminates with Kevin persuading Paul to throw a party to make Winnie jealous, because
Winnie had just dumped Kevin for no real reason AGAIN, a trend that wraps itself around the reality that
Winnie dated every person who lived in the sixties or seventies. Kevin brings Madeline and spends the whole
time staring at Winnie, and when he is called on it, Kevin tells Madeline to get lost. KEVIN ARNOLD tells THAT
WOMAN to get lost.
100 episodes later Kevin loses his virginity to a tree stump and LIKES IT and DESERVES IT. Hal Sparks was not
lying when he said that Winnie Cooper had an integral role in the puberty of an entire generation. It is a
valid statement. Winnie did help a lot of us move along into puberty. But Madeline made me a man. Madeline
made me uncomfortable. God, I miss Madeline.
Unbelievably (and I mean this in the "Fabio hit in the face with bird" definition),
the actress who played Madeline, Julie Condra, is currently
married to the fake
Chairman Kaga guy from Iron Chef America. I don't even
know what to say about that. Madeline and Jimmy Lee from
the "Double Dragon" movie. Unbelievable.
9. Private Butthead
 
I think Wayne's defining moment was the episode titled "Private Butthead," where I am forced to
choose between a Goldie Hawn joke and a Beavis joke. Given Wayne's limited vocabulary and ridiculous
almost-pompadour helmet-thing, I'll go with the Beavis joke. I don't know why he ALWAYS said
"butthead." His only real backup was "dorkface," which is even worse. I think he called
Kevin a "jerk" one time.
Anyway, Wayne realizes that he is useless and talks himself into joining the Army. His dad, who fought in Korea,
forbids it. He doesn't want Wayne to have to go through what he went through, which may have involved killing
civilians and laughing at Jamie Farr. Wayne resists and goes to sign up anyway. And so it goes.
Jack shows up at the recruitment office and apologizes to Wayne for being a bad father. He apologizes for having
never prepared him for this, or prepared him for ANYTHING. Jack is almost in tears when Wayne lets him know that
he failed the physical (because of psoriasis) and that he can't even do THIS right. Jack just kinda stands there
and hugs him, and you feel bad for all of the wasted times and wasted life, and for the knowledge that it's
going to be a long time before either of them truly realize what they've got in their arms.
Wayne then turned to Kevin and called him "butthead" seventy-seven
times before the end of the episode.
8. Ocean City
 
Kevin's obsession with Winnie usually happened in prolonged
spurts, broken up by moments when he allowed himself to
discover that there were more fish in the sea, and more
things in the sea besides fish. My favorite of those moments
is when the family and Paul pile into the car for their "annual vacation to Ocean City"
(despite the episode before this one where Paul "goes away for the entire summer" and
Kevin bitches about how they never go on vacations). Paul
being Paul gets a rash from the sun and stays in the hotel
room the entire trip, forcing Kevin to wander the beach
and accidentally run into a girl.
He spends his trip with her. They go to the boardwalk, he wins her a stuffed frog, and they take pictures together
in the photobooth. Afterwards they sit under a pier and kiss. She tells him that she cares a lot about him and
will miss him, but she's from New Mexico, and she's got to go. So she does, and Kevin misses her. He thinks about
her a lot, but not seriously. They were a moment for each other. They were a synapse in the brain that will always
fire. You need that sometimes. Something of no consequence that just makes you think. Mine is professional
wrestling. I'm evidently a homosexual.
The best part of the episode (besides it being a great episode of television and moving, and blah blah) is that
Kevin's vacation girlfriend is played by Holly Sampson,
who grew up from a teenage Sarah Polley into a full-blown
porn star. She's most famous for being the softcore star
of the
"Emmanuelle" movies you see on Cinemax if you linger too long after a showing of "The
Patriot." Madeline and a porn star. Yep. WINNIE WAS
TOTALLY WORTH IT GUY.
7. Thanksgiving
 
Jack Arnold worked at NORCOM until the people writing the show had to build to that last episode where we find
out what happened to everybody, and Norma was a SUPER BUSINESS WOMAN and Wayne TOOK OVER THE FAMILY FURNITURE
BUSINESS and Winnie WENT TO PARIS TO STUDY ART. When he got a promotion, he also got the responsibility of traveling
across the country and supervising places like Seattle and Pittsburgh. So Thanksgiving comes, and Jack is out of
town. And he's got to stay there to catch a flight. He won't be home.
Norma prepares far too much food and sets the table perfectly, driving herself insane with loneliness and the
emptiness of not having her partner beside her. The kids notice, and everything is just silent. A table full of food
that hasn't been eaten. People sitting around it, not saying a word. Jack can't come home for just one night,
because the plane ticket would be too expensive. Norma retires to her bedroom to cry.
When Kevin goes in to check he sees her again as a woman, and not his mother. Someone who NEEDS his father there,
not for the chauvinist breadwinner rah-rah reasons but because she loves him, and she doesn't want to do this
without him. Kevin tries to comfort her, but is interrupted by a phone call from Jack. He's going to come home for
Thanksgiving. For an hour. Kevin is happy, but brings up that it's too expensive. Norma smiles, nods, and says yeah,
it is, isn't it?
And things are how they should be. With the money, and in spite of it. I want to remember to be that way.
6. That Thing in the Barn
 
Oh, the barn. Everybody remembers the barn. It's weird,
if you polled everyone who has ever seen "The Wonder
Years" and ask them what two moments they remember,
they remember the kiss from the pilot episode and the sexual
congress in the barn from the last episode. And not that
Winnie and Kevin have sex, because it isn't really explicitly
stated. But they remember that it was in A BARN. Because
I guess there's no better place to finally sleep with your
dream girl?
By the end of the series Kevin and Winnie are completely
different people. He's still a frequently violent, well-meaning
dick and she's still dating the world's living men. They
participate in a Sam and Diane Finding Themselves "Cheers" fan-fiction
prequel where they just want to run off, leave town, avoid
each other, forget their pasts. But they end up in the same
car ride home, and they end up caught in a storm. And, well,
they end up in a barn.
Jokes aside, Winnie speaks a line that pretty much says
it all for the last episode of "The Wonder Years."
"I don't want it to end."
Yeah, me either.
5. Good-bye.
 
Until that "we have to build to a super successful post-show explanation" bit
I was talking about and Kevin got a perfect 1600 on his
SATs (and alienated poor Jessie), Kevin Arnold was always
your average student. He was terrible at math, feeling accomplished
when he could pull a C working under Mr. Collins, the by-the-book
hard-assed teacher. Kevin never understood Collins' motivations,
so much so that he started to cheat to get better grades.
Collins let it slide, and put Kevin into his advanced math
class, where he failed miserably. He knew Kevin had been
cheating, and since Kevin is a good kid at inner monologue,
taught him lessons about effort and honesty by letting Kev
teach himself. It was touching and what a great teacher
should be. I never got that from my math teachers. The best
one I ever had traded hockey cards with me a couple of times.
The worst ones (all of them) mostly just glared.
Kevin settles in for the complacency of a B until
Collins sets the bar higher, offering him private lessons
to try to get the A he feels is in there somewhere. Against
Kevin's initial wishes, the two study after class for a
while and become close, and suddenly the math teacher isn't
a "teacher," but a friend. Again, all I got was a glare and occasionally Manon Rheaume. When Mr. Collins
pulls out shortly before exams, Kevin feels betrayed and fills his test with stuff like "I DON'T KNOW" and
"WHO CARES."
The next Monday, there's a new math teacher. When Kevin tries to find Mr. Collins to talk about the test, the vice
principal takes him aside and tells him that Mr. Collins has passed away. Kevin gets rocked by that guilt of having done
something unnecessary and never having a way to make it up. I can't blame him, I don't know what I would've done. It's
not like losing a pet, or a family member, or anything like that. Mr. Collins wasn't Winnie, but God, he was part of
Kevin's life, you know? The vice principal lets Kevin know that all of the tests were graded except for his, which has
gone missing. Kevin sits down to retake the test, and does the only thing he can: he aces it.
Teachers rarely know the effect they have on a kid's life. That's why so many of them are terrible. Those who do can do
something about it, even if they aren't going to be around for long.
4. At Winnie's Window
Okay, so Kevin was kind of a stalker. Give him a break.
This episode is really the centerpiece of the show. All of the shows before it build to it, and all of the shows afterward
follow downward from it. By this point Winnie has gotten a little bit older, started going to Lincoln instead of R.F.K.,
and decides that with the sixties and seventies down she wants to start dating people who will be born in the eighties.
Kevin is right pissed, because he KNOWS Winnie loves him and he KNOWS he loves Winnie, and he can't figure out why they
just can't be chill about it. To Kevin's credit, Winnie does love him, even though she's kind of a bitch for the entire
series, so he isn't misguided or deluded. He's just frustrated.
Winnie leaves to go on a car ride with her older friends CONDESCENDING HIGH SCHOOL JOCK IN LETTERMANS JACKET and OGRE,
and, as teenagers in the olden times often did, gets into a car accident. Kevin freaks out because Winnie is hurt, but she
doesn't want to see him and won't talk to him. He just kinda hangs around, waiting for something to happen, and nothing
does. He starts to walk home, but realizes he CAN'T, and climbs the side of the house to look into Winnie's window.
When she sees him, they stare for a moment (possibly
allowing for whoever talks during Winnie's thoughts), and
he says, through the window: "I love you."
She smiles, and with as little hesitation as there's
been in the history of Winnie, responds with: "I love
you."
Because they do. And I guess I'm going to be fourteen years old for the rest of my life.
3. Canon in D Major
 
"Coda" is my favorite and my choice for the best episode of "The Wonder Years" ever, so I'm not
going to ramble on incessantly about it, and just say "you should really consider trying to find and watch this."
The basic plot is such: Kevin finds out that he's pretty
good at playing piano, but another kid who takes lesson
before him is way, way better. Kevin's piano teacher assures
him that he has spirit and emotion when he plays, which
makes him BETTER. So Kevin practices and practices to be
better, because he believes in his talent. At their piano
recital, the kid plays Canon in D Major (the song Kevin
had been practicing forever) and plays it PERFECTLY. Kevin
gets up, to play with emotion and spirit, and bombs it.
Completely.
So unlike every other movie or TV show ever made, Kevin gives up piano. He just stops, because he feels bad about it and his
ego, the one deep down, gets bruised. The show ends with him listening to the piano from indoors while he's on his bike. He
just turns and bikes away, saying in voiceover that the funny thing is that he can't even remember how to play anymore.
I'm a writer. At least, I'm trying to be. I'm also flippant
and emotional, so things get to me when they shouldn't,
and I overreact when I shouldn't. If I'm not great at something
I just want to give it up, and if someone is better than
me I think that I shouldn't be wasting time doing what has
already been done better. It's an incredibly jarring kind
of hurt that stays with you forever, and this episode is
the only time I've seen it accurately portrayed without
someone being down on their luck in a motel room with a
bottle of liquor and the word "shit." No episode
speaks to me like this one, and few ever will.
2. When a Man Loves a Woman
 
The first kiss. The lasting iconography of "The Wonder
Years."
This is the moment you see on retrospectives, where DJ
Tanner reminisces about how it seemed to go on forever and
Michael Ian Black stares at the screen and goes "WOND AR YEAR" until
someone laughs. It's from the pilot episode (the one with
all the airplanes) so if anyone has seen the show they've
seen this. Winnie's brother Brian is drafted away from standing
around and looking cool with automobiles and cigarettes
and sent to Vietnam, and dies.
Winnie goes off to think, and Kevin finds her on the
vacant lot that meant so much to them and would eventually
become a strip mall. He comforts her in the only way he
knows how, and they kiss. He even puts that ubiquitous Jets
jacket on her to keep her warm. What else can you say about
it? It's the Wonder Years kiss. If it wasn't at the top
of the list I'd be some kind of bizarre Wonder Years elitist,
and my list would be full of stuff like "sociopolitical commentary of suburban
marriage" and "the time they showt a monkey on
the tee-vee."
1. Our Town
 
Kevin and Winnie were the point of the show. It's inescapable.
To make a list not topped by them would be to make a Honeymooners
list without Jackie Gleason threatening spousal abuse. It's
just what it was all about. They did a lot of endearing
and stupid things in the 115 episodes we knew them, and
though the first kiss and window meeting were so important
to their relationship, nothing shows off Kevin's honest
and pure young, ignorant love for Winnie more than the episode "On the
Spot," where R.F.K. junior high puts on a production of "Our
Town."
The episode has it's funny moments, like Kevin relaxing and making Paul do all the spotlight work only to be jewed (lol) out of
his leisure at the last moment and having no idea how to operate the thing. Winnie goes back and forth about whether or not she
should audition, then on whether or not she should keep rehearsing, and on whether or not she'll remember her lines. She's a
basketcase. Her parents split up a few episodes earlier so she just wandered around in the dark trying to find her way.
So Kevin holds the spotlight as steady as he can for her to find her way, and doesn't let her fall. When she bobbles her lines
he whispers to himself hopes and affirmations, and she makes it through. The kid who has always found an easier and more
complicated way out of any situation stands there and holds the light for someone else, the one person he ever really could hold
the light for, the one person he ever really NEEDED to hold the light for. When a tear runs down his cheek you don't see it as
Fred Savage's tear for once, you really see it as Kevin's, and you remember every fucking tear you've cried for someone you
love, and are proud of.
"The Wonder Years" left us too soon, and we weren't ready in time for what it became. The kids grew up, and like
puppies, sometimes it's when they're grown up that the work begins. Emotions become more than "I hit a home run," and
love becomes more than a kiss on the rock. We don't get
many shows like this these days, and we didn't get many
before it. Maybe it's for the best, because for once a group
of people on a television show really end up becoming a
part of you, and when you look back on them after so long
it feels like looking back at yourself and the life you've
lead. With wonder.
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