"Helmut Weekend"

"Helmut Weekend"
March 2, 1982
B-

This Roger-Garrett-written story is better than the Joey Heatherton episode, although similar in that much of it is set in the boys' apartment and focuses on them.  It is also more serious than usual, especially for Season Seven, and gives Lander more to work with than usual.  However, I don't think Laverne and Shirley, or for that matter Rhonda, are integrated well into the episode, although we do get Rhonda giving Lenny a huge kiss (Lenda?) to prove she's not "cold."

Squiggy's father, Helmut, shows up after abandoning him twenty years ago, when Squiggy was nine.  I don't know if this has been addressed before (in the way that we've heard more than once about Lenny's mother's abandonment), but I do recall that Squiggy was living with his mother and stepfather in the early episodes, before getting a place with Lenny.  I think I had assumed that Squiggy's dad was dead.  It turns out that he looks, and dresses, much like Squiggy, but he's a con artist, without Squiggy's conscience.  Lenny tells us that Squiggy's grandfather was a bootlegger and his great-grandfather a pirate, so I guess each generation of Squigman is an improvement.

Squiggy hopes to finally do something with his father, but he's torn when his father wants to kick Lenny out of the talent agency and team up with him instead.  It turns out that his dad just wants to "borrow" money from the latest client.  Squiggy, as painful as it is, says goodbye to his father.  McKean, by the way, has less to do, but he has some dramatic moments as well.  I don't think the tonal mix is as good as it is on some of the more serious episodes, like "Why Did the Fireman?", but this is certainly one of the better episodes of Season Seven.

Mailman Paul Barselou would be a Eulogist later in the season.