Another episode that only features a portion of the main cast, although it also offers up copious guest stars. The detours into Scrooge’s endlessly implausible past are always entertaining. (It suddenly occurs to me that there’s an extra layer of humor when the old billionaire whose anecdotes stretch back well over 100 years is voiced by a former Time Lord.)
Scrooge, irritated that Louie is giving up his entrepreneurial aspirations at the first sign of difficulty, tells him a story about his adventures as a prospector out west. It’s a tale full of old western hallmarks, familiar faces/voices, and a moral from Scrooge about the value of hard work.
Unsurprisingly for an episode about Scrooge’s past, we get a major appearance from Allison Janney’s Goldie, as she and Scrooge compete over the same claim but are forced to team up when the gold is swindled by a wealthy muckety-muck who rolls into town. But while we know Goldie is Scrooge’s age and is likely to show up in a story about his younger years, Lin-Manuel Miranda and Jim Rash pop up as well, and their presence throws in references to the present day while still finding valid excuses for them to be voicing these characters in the old west.
Given the storyline, this is a great episode for David Tennant. As always, he plays well off Janney in Scrooge and Goldie’s old love/hate relationship, and he has some terrific line readings in the flashback scenes. When Miranda’s inept sheriff asks if he needs help, I love how Scrooge growls, “Yes. Could you find me someone who is not you?” And we get some fun fourth-wall-breaking as Louie repeatedly interrupts the story and occasionally demands changes, like a reduction in “old prospector slang.” This results, delightfully, in flashback Scrooge uttering the words, “Get lost, dude! You’re killing my vibe, man!”
Speaking of Louie, I’m really enjoying the growing relationship with him and Scrooge, even if they still butt heads a lot of the time. As such, Scrooge has some fantastic bits in the framing-device scenes. Here are my favorite Tennant line readings from these scenes:
- After
speculating various obstacles that might have made Louie abandon his business
venture, Scrooge finally says, with a crushing air of disappointment, “Was
there a line in the patent office?”
- When Louie refers to one of his actions as being “classic Louie,” Scrooge very awesomely snaps, “I will not be third-person-speechified to!”
- As soon as Goldie arrives on the scene in the flashbacks, Louie is wary about possible kissy moments. At one point, he laments, “Nope! Gross, old people romance!”, and I just love the exasperation in Scrooge’s voice as he retorts, “We’re weren’t old back then!”
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