Episode Review: "World Meets Girl" (#3.19)

I'm just gonna fire off the cuff as we go here, I don't think we need any overall analysis. 47 minutes seems like an eternity.

Okay we're out here and all these people are about to meet Rowan and Sabrina and I had to pause it immediately out of overwhelming pre-cringe. I don't want to see this, they're not even KIDS, everyone here is older than Rowan, this is gonna be so bad. Lemme get a couple shots real quick.

Speaking of shots, I've starting streaming on Twitch again. Sometimes it's art, sometimes it's games, just hit follow here and you'll get an email when the stream starts. That sounds fun RIGHT? Please clap.

It's an odd thing, you know, if any of these people were here alone, I imagine they wouldn't be acting so ridiculous, something like "hey it's really great to meet you, I'm a huge fan". But this mobbing of celebrities is something people get programmed to do. To be honest I'd rather discuss the psychology of celebrity culture than "review" this "episode" but I have to get it done eventually. Oh shit, this girl runs out of the crowd to hug Sabrina.

SECURITY! WHERE IS SECURITY!

But no, it's fine, they take it in stride. Try doing that shit to Rider, that's not gonna go well. 

No comment.

Michael Jacobs gets some screen time, which in pretty much any other circumstance I would make fun of, but after this fucking journey, after everything he's given us, I'm actually really happy about it. 

Okay, apparently the same guy, "Wesley," did the academic teaching for the actors on both Meets World shows. Thanks for your work Wesley. There's something poetic about having that role when the Meets World shows have so much to say about teachers. 

Peyton is apparently one of those guys who wears gym shorts outside the gym, which I think should be a crime, but otherwise the guys all seem pretty cool. A few people explain why Farkle is their favorite. Apparently he is both smart and funny. Hoo boy. They nailed it.

They had to work an Ava montage in somehow, so they just take the cue from someone talking about Riley loving her brother. That's about as close as you're gonna get I guess.

If nothing else, I'm glad we can all start calling her Cece Balagot instead of Cecilia. That's good to know, I'm going to feel better about that going forward. Some guy wearing an old Boy Meets World shirt managed to get on tv for a few seconds, so that's cool, I respect the hustle. 

How is there 30 more minutes of this, I'm ready to die. Someone's favorite moment is Triangle drama. It makes me wonder why I even bother writing this blog. How can I reach these people? There will always be people whose favorite thing about BMW was the Cory-Topanga relationship. I'm just a man. I'll never reach these people who need it the most.

Peyton finds a surprisingly eloquent audience member to talk to, so that's one bullet dodged. But there's like a hundred more bullets coming. 

Yeah it's that thing.

Riley's pick is less eloquent, this is gonna be that embarrassing moment that keeps her from falling asleep when she's 25. I've got those. Lemme tell you. Most of them involve improv, and if Christian doesn't agree he's lying.

This is how you know we're dealing with the casual fans. Corey asks this girl if a moment on the show impacted her life and she's pretty vague about it. I show up to that question like WHEN ERIC TRIES TO HELP JACK IN SEMI FORMAL. Oh true, the next girl fucking nails it talking about Jexica. Honestly that justifies this whole thing for me, that's really great. Jexica was a great episode, and if I were this girl's age I like to think it would have helped me too. Someone else was inspired by Girl Meets Rileytown. That's genuinely nice to hear.

They interview some best friends and do a montage of Riley and Maya. I'm starting to realize this is a waste of time. One of the kids talking about Lucas manages to point out that Lucas always protects everyone, that's good. See, this show isn't lost on people. That Triangle person was a fluke, I think most of these people see what's important about the show. Even if they're too nervous to explain it very well.

The bloopers are actually pretty fun. Obviously the best one is with Shawn.

They're pulling pairs of "best friends" to come sit in the bay window, and while that personally doesn't appeal to me, I think it's extremely sweet for age-appropriate fans. It's a huge gamble honestly, this is a big segment to just choose people at random. There's gotta be something we're not seeing about it. It's probably the most annoying montage though. The bay window holds nearly all of the least realistic moments. People don't act like this. And I know what you're gonna say, so let's start a new paragraph.

Shawn and Eric act unrealistically all the time. You're right. But when Shawn is hopelessly overdramatic or Eric does something unreasonably insane, it's for the sake of the character, right, it's showing us something unique to that character. The bay window moments are just needlessly saccharine for the sake of the power of friendship. And look, I appreciate the role friendship plays in the Meets World shows, but only as far as it relates to people's real lives. 

The guests are about to start talking but then they hug, come on, I want to see something real here. Aw okay, that was nice. Honestly I think I've rehearsed all of these kinds of speeches to my best friends. I'd be ready for this shit. 

But yeah, some of these are really nice. I'm glad that happened.

I've never been more acutely aware of the fact that we are two men in our 20's watching this show, but whatever.

So okay, the big takeaways: People really do appreciate the show outside of god damn shipping, and she goes by Cece.

 Literally zero uses of the word "Eric." 

All in all I wouldn't even call it a waste of time. I enjoyed seeing how this show impacts people outside of RUCAYA. RUCAS. RIMAYERKLE. MANY episodes of this show made me miserable and bored from start to finish, and made me wish the show didn't exist. This episode, despite being way too long, at the very least made me happy the show exists. That's worth something.

I'm going to add some more thoughts. World did not meet girl. I was really expecting a Q&A and getting some real thoughts from the actors about the show and the stories. That is to say, we learned nothing from this experience. So it is a disappointment and it sucks, but I stand by the fact that it didn't make me hate the show the way that, say, Meets Fish did.