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Californication – Get some pride Kali!

There’s nothing wrong with romancing Scott Michael Foster, but how many guys can Kali possibly rotate through in a twelve episode television season?

- Season 5, Episode 10 - "Perverts & Whores"

Oh what a tangled web we weave…. No matter if you’re a Charlie Runkle fan or not, I think we can all appreciate how pained Charlie feels now that Hank has moved on from him and is actively searching for new representation. In some sort of crazy way, Hank and Charlie are actually soul mates. The idea that they might be done for is kind of sad.

What was lacking was any kind of sincere gesture from Charlie to woo Hank back. Granted he’s still in the mourning period — and I don’t think Charlie’s relationship with Lizzie (Camilla Luddington) is doing him any favors in general, and specifically not here because it’s distracting Charlie from Hank — but if Charlie doesn’t act fast he’s going to find that Hank is signed, sealed, and delivered to somebody else.

Of course that’s easier said than done. Hank’s always going to be the guy who ended up punching one of his favorite directors in the nose, so it’s going to be an uphill battle for him to find new representation. Still, at some point a guy as talented as Hank is bound to find someone. He won’t stay unsigned for long, so Charlie’s got to make the grand gesture.

That’s kind of the only action on the show right now. As much as I like Scott Michael Foster, seeing Tyler being slowly evolved into a mirror image of Hank is kind of unimaginative. And it would be one thing for him to be like a young Hank, but Tyler’s experiencing exactly what Hank did just a few weeks back: a metaphoric embrace from Samurai, and a literal embrace from Kali. Tyler seems to be moving even faster than Hank … no offense, but no one moves faster than Hank. So I just don’t get it.

Really, what is the grand arc going to be this season? Because I don’t even see life lesson for Hank in the works, as generic a label as that is in the first place. Karen and Hank seemed destined to reunite, but how many seasons of the show haven’t ended there? I’ve said it before this season: the show is no worse for age. Still awesome. But every other season had a more discernible direction than this one appears to. So what’s in the works for the final two weeks? Will all become clear to us before the season takes a final bow? Who knows.

What I do know is that everyone — except for maybe Charlie — seems destined to end the season not even where they began it, but rather at an even earlier stage in their character evolution. If Karen ends the season with Hank she’ll have morphed backwards a few seasons, and Becca’s heart shattering over Tyler is really just a recreation of the experiences she’s had with her father. This is a different kind of heart break, but really, is it all that different?

I just want to know where we’re going! And will Batesy get there with us, or will he disappear into the ether like so many other “pivotal” characters on the show before him?

Photo Credit: Showtime

One Response to “Californication – Get some pride Kali!”

March 20, 2012 at 7:41 PM

“but how many guys can Kali possibly rotate through in a twelve episode television season?”

Sorry but this is probably the most ridiculous subheading I have seen in a review! So it’s OK for this show to be about the remarkable womanising adventures of a male, but when a woman strays from monogamy it’s a shock subheading in a review of the same TV show? Little bit of double standards here!

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