Review: The Casagrandes “Copy Can’t”

Overview (Spoilers Below)

While preparing for a big go-kart race with her best friend Sid, Ronnie Anne notices something strange about her infant cousin, Carlitos. That baby likes to imitate the actions of everyone in the house—everyone except for Ronnie Anne. Jealous over not getting the attention her middle school ego needs, she takes the baby on a day out, completely shirking her go-kart duties.

Later—after Ronnie Anne unintentionally gets hurt a few times—she finally imprints on Carlitos. Only problem is, the exercise worked too well. The baby’s so smitten he doesn’t want to leave her side. So now, she has to feed and bathe him, and even sleep next to him. This new affection sort of cramps Ronnie Anne’s style and even takes her attention away from the big race. Meanwhile, Sid has made super pointy unicorn-themed helmets that  are bound to kill anybody who gets in their way.

In order to join the race, the girls have Bobby dress up as Ronnie Anne while they spirit away. Unfortunately, the race is on local TV, and the baby catches them. Carlitos then rides the family dog to the race and hops onto the girls’ go-kart just in time for them to crash.

The baby eventually tires of Ronnie Anne, with a little help to expedite the process. After all, babies get tired of things rather quickly. Lesson learned.

Our Take

I’m going to go out on a limb and say that many of The Casagrandes episodes are going to be capers. In that, I mean, a specific character is going to be faced with a problem which they must solve through trial and error-with an emphasis on the error. When that problem is worked out, a secondary problem might arise—like in this case—which also must be tackled through trial and error with amusing, often slapsticky results.

This type of structure is going to get you through the eleven-minute program, and it’s going to give a handful of featured characters something to do. But it’s not going to showcase the best traits our characters have to offer. Instead of acting because a character wants something, under these circumstances the characters tend to react to an uncontrollable force. And in most cases, a passive protagonist is far less interesting than an active one.

Ronnie Anne is a pretty good character when given a vested motivation; however, when faced with a pair of reactive scenarios like in “Copy Can’t,” she might as well be a faceless, paint-by-number participant in whatever wackiness the writers decide to throw at her. Even though Sid had a much smaller part, she was focused on creating superior helmets for the race. Since she actively wanted something, the payoff where their go-kart crashed because she spent too much time working on headwear was far more rewarding that any of the baby-related garbage Ronnie Anne was dealing with.