Freaks and Geeks Episode 4
"Kim Kelly Is My Friend"
Original Airdate: Sep. 5, 2000
Writer: Mike White
Director: Lesli Linka Glatter
Cast: Linda Cardellini, John Francis Daley, James Franco, Samm Levine, Seth Rogen, Jason Segal, Martin Starr, Busy Philipps, Becky Ann Baker, Joe Flaherty
Freaks and Geeks came from the mind of Paul Feig, was championed by executive producer Judd Apatow, and its spec script was shopped around to various networks, who all turned it down. The only one to show interest, and even enthusiasm, was NBC. From there, the show was able to put together a lightning-in-a-bottle creative team — a cast of actors who were the characters they played, and a writing staff who pulled from the darkest moments of their childhoods to create something special. Unfortunately, the show was burdened with being ahead of its time. Moreover, it was doomed by joining a network that was constantly changing executives, and whose new president, Garth Ancier, was confused by the ways the show went against convention.
"Kim Kelly is My Friend" is the first capital-G Great episode of Freaks and Geeks. It's also the biggest example of NBC's lack of faith in the boldness of their greatest show. See, initially, "Kim Kelly is My Friend" didn't make it to air and "Tests and Breasts" (Episode 5) took its place. Along with two other unaired episodes, "Dead Dogs and Gym Teachers" and "Noshing and Moshing," it didn't see the light of day until Fox Family began running the series following its cancellation. What these three episodes all have in common is that they're incredible, and incredibly painful. It's not a surprise that they were the ones shelved, but imagining watching later Freaks and Geeks episodes without "Kim Kelly is My Friend" is unfathomable to me.
In the first three episodes, Kim Kelly is an adversary to Lindsay. The first thing she does upon meeting her is insult her and dump the contents of her purse onto the ground. In "Beers and Weirs" and "Tricks and Treats," Kim spends most of her screen time berating Lindsay for being a lame, prudish, middle-class wannabe infiltrating her friend group. By "Tests and Breasts," she and Lindsay are best friends. "Kim Kelly is My Friend" might be the most integral episode in terms of narrative progression. It's also an audacious, brave, and devastating portrait of an abusive homelife.
"Kim Kelly is My Friend" also features the only appearance from Karen Scarfolli, played by a young Rashida Jones. A friend of Kim, she goes on "the warpath" following a breakup — and Sam finds himself in Karen's crosshairs.
This conflict leads to Karen writing GEEK on his locker in lipstick — and, after he wipes it off, PYGMY GEEK in magic marker. Sam's attempts at getting this message off of his locker is mistaken by the (consistently unlikable) math teacher Mr. Kowchevski (Steve Bannos) as vandalism, and he's forced to write a 500-word essay as punishment.
Meanwhile, Nick encourages Kim to be nicer to Lindsay, so Kim invites Lindsay to dinner. What Lindsay doesn't realize is that this is a strategy on Kim's part to get on her parents' good side so she can keep her car. Lindsay soon finds herself observing a toxic family dynamic that puts Kim's behavior and attitude into perspective.
Kim's mother Cookie (played by Ann Dowd) has clear animosity for her daughter as soon as she appears on screen. She asks Kim if she picked up soda and when Kim says she forgot, Cookie responds, "Then I forgot to make you dinner. How do you like that?" The reveal that the family is actually having KFC for dinner — and therefore could have gotten soda themselves — makes this jab all the crueler, like Cookie is just always looking for reasons to treat her daughter as a foe.
Comparatively, she shows reverence for Lindsay based off the lies that Kim has told her about the affluence of her new friend's family — particularly, that they own a vacation home in Benton Harbor.
But when Cookie catches Lindsay in a lie ("Benton Harbor… Street"), a fight breaks out, with the whole family screaming at each other across the dinner table. Kim is verbally abused by her mother — dismissed as stupid, a whore, a bum — and the two girls find themselves fleeing, Kim's stepdad becoming terrifyingly aggressive in his attempts to stop them from leaving. Suddenly, Lindsay's previous, reductive view of Kim goes out the window.
Later, when she talks to her own mother about Kim, she shoots down the characterization of her as a bad influence. She's seen too much now, and points out that Kim comes from a broken home, that not all families can be as lucky as the Weirs. Freaks and Geeks is a show largely about how people aren't as simple as it appears on the outside, and "Kim Kelly is My Friend" is a miraculous bit of re-contextualizing.
Kim's relationship with Daniel is also reexamined here. Lindsay's crush on Daniel has left her blind to his faults (something that will take center focus in the next episode). Early on, Lindsay hears Kim screaming at her mom on the phone and — not yet knowing what she'll know later — makes a jab about how hard it must be to date someone like Kim. But when she and Kim spot Daniel having his thumb sucked on by none other than Karen, it's hard to think of Kim as the problem in that relationship — even after she hilariously, dementedly drives her car onto the grass, almost running Daniel, Nick, and Karen over. (There's also a deeper element of Kim being a girl in 1980 with a mostly male friend group, underlined with the multiple times Daniel and Nick dismiss her as being on her period in this episode alone.)
Kim breaks down, expressing to Lindsay how much she hates her life, how much she fears losing Daniel, and how she has no friends except Lindsay ("And you're a total loser!"). Lindsay invites Kim inside, and we get into the second dinner scene.
The way the two dinner scenes contrast each other is notable. Lindsay finds herself utterly deflated in the face of true familial toxicity, while the Weirs have their night taken over by Kim's drama. What Jean identifies as Kim's bad influence is really a lack of privilege she can't comprehend — the burden of your problems becoming everyone else's. It's easy for the well-off to keep their heads down, to mind their business, to not involve others in their personal issues. Kim doesn't have that luxury, and the Weirs find themselves thrown headfirst into her life.
When Daniel and Nick show up, the Weirs' house is fully invaded by strife, the tension heating up measurably. Kim slaps Daniel, screams that she saw him and Karen. It's shocking that his defense — essentially, "It wasn't me" — works, showing how badly Kim feels she needs this connection and how much she's willing to hurt herself in order to maintain it.
As the group leaves (after Nick raids the house of all its fruit roll-ups), Kim makes plans with Lindsay to hang out the next day, having finally made a companion who she can trust to be there for her. Being thrown into the darkest part of Kim's world has made Lindsay closer to her than she ever thought she could be, and has given her true empathy for a girl she previously viewed with unknowing contempt. Too bad her parents can't see in Kim what she does. But their time for growth will come later.
The next day, Kim gets her revenge on Karen, painting SLUT on her locker, solving both her and Sam's plots in one swoop. That's about as clean a solution as we can hope for in this world.
Removing this episode from the lineup may be the most absurd decision NBC made in its handling of this nearly perfect series, which is saying a lot. The bridge between the simplistic characterization of Kim in the first three episodes and the more human portrayal from here on in was completely absent for those who watched the show as it aired. I'm sure the airing of this episode wouldn't have saved Freaks and Geeks, and may have even ended it earlier — maybe the mainstream TV-viewing public wasn't ready for something this blunt yet. But it is the show it is, and maybe all it needed to thrive was the support of people who understood it.
Grade: A
