S2E12: Ryan finally wrestles with the notion that his relationship with Jenna is unhealthy on this week’s Wilfred. He seems to make some significant progress, we even see some major flaws in Jenna’s character (she’s selfish, helpless, and a little vapid) and he finds a gorgeous Italian woman to replace her with, but ultimately he finds he can’t quit his blonde neighbor. This wouldn’t be so upsetting if she was just a little more likable.
“I was going to get a Kindle but then people couldn’t see how deep I was.” –Ryan
Ryan meets this beautiful Italian woman at the beach and she invites him to go rollerblading. He’s supposed to pick up Jenna’s dry cleaning, so he ditches the beautiful woman. Wilfred says they’re a team – he protects Jenna and Ryan serves her. Ryan says it’s not true, but then he goes home and Jenna immediately asks him to wait for her cable guy to show up. Yep, he’s whipped.
He finally realizes how ridiculous this is – and perhaps what we’ve noticed about Jenna’s obliviousness and shallow lack of understanding that her neighbor is willingly helping her with everything all the time – and he runs to the beach to find the Italian woman. He finds her and they spend an adorably perfect day together and he finally says he’s having the best day of his life. She points out that everything he does is for other people, says he needs to do something for himself and asks him to come with her to Italy. He can’t, but she says they can make the most of their time together.
Suddenly, they’re back at his place and she’s in his bed. This can’t end well as long as Wilfred is around, so he comes in asking Ryan why he ditched the cable guy and saying Jenna’s name over and over again while the beautiful Italian woman is basically doing whatever Ryan wants. When Ryan can’t take it anymore, he screams “no” which doesn’t seem to bother her all that much and then he says he’ll go to Italy with her to escape the Jenna burden.
“There is symbolism in that poop, Ryan, and some grass.” –Wilfred
Jenna seems to be really upset that Ryan is leaving and Wilfred is doubly upset. This only leads to Ryan trying to justify his decision to Wilfred, saying he can’t wait hand and foot on a girl he’ll never have. Wilfred parlays this into an invite to Italy, which obviously will never happen. How do you ask a normal person to let you take their dog to Italy? You don’t.
The next day, Ryan is packing and Jenna comes over flipping out and needing help to get to the news station because her car broke down. She grabs a pot edible tootsie roll sitting on Ryan’s boxes – which is a bit presumptuous and rude – and eats it not knowing it’s laced with drugs. Naturally, we find the typical sitcom zany incident we expect: her news cast is completely ruined and she’s grabbing her own breasts by 30 seconds in. She’s fired, Drew flies in to take care of her, but she wants to sue the station. They’re continuing to push what an awful person Drew is – this time by having him ask her to marry him the day she gets fired – but since Jenna’s not that likable, it’s hard to hate Drew for being that way.
I do, however, particularly enjoy Wilfred running around doing all the cute things dogs somehow know to do when you’re upset, “My ear’s inside out and I can’t fix it. Silly dog!” The writers really have the whole doggy inner monologue thing down pat. Better yet, when Wilfred starts blaming himself, he drinks from the toilet like he’s drinking cheap whiskey. He says Jenna needs both of them, and that since Ryan is a lawyer he should represent her. Ryan’s fed up and says Jenna will get someone else to do something for her. He’s still leaving. (Minus him actually leaving, this is all very true.)
He goes to his room to sleep with his beautiful Italian woman and ends up following a red balloon down to the basement where he imagines a trial conducted by Wilfred with charges against him for ditching Jenna. His whole psyche is working against him, bringing up his past unethical law practices and the fact that he loves Jenna more than his Italian lover. Of course, that’s all it takes to convince him to stay. Once again, the plot just drops us into a solution that brings everything right back to square one, but at least the series is consistent. I’m coming to accept this little formula, however annoying it can be.
