Entertainment
Dani Loses Job, Finds Stamos
Losing your job sucks, no matter the economic climate. You feel judged. You're left scrambling for a new source of income, to say nothing of self-esteem. Only certain flavors of Ben & Jerry's even assuage the mounting depression. Your worldview changes in an instant and all you can do is toughen up; try to face this new reality head-on.
...so it's really sort of nice when instead of any of that crap you've got a limo waiting in your driveway to take you to a mysterious meeting with John Stamos, who in all likelihood will hire you by episode's end and be your boyfriend by the mid-season finale. Who says we can't have it all? AMC?
As with all the other shows I'm covering for Bustle, I'd never seen an episode of Necessary Roughness before last night. First: It's not bad! I redact whatever judgey thoughts I'd thrown USA Network's way, especially with regard to the hotness of their actors. No one should be looked down on for being too good-looking. (They should be celebrated.) Nor should a show be criticized for being "too easy to follow." It's officially summer and we spent all winter using our brains too hard on stuff like Mad Men; now it's time for a break, brimming with lines like "I happen to know two things: mental health and Sicilian cooking."
What in the hell happened on the show?! Calm down, I'll tell you!
Five minutes after being canned by the New York Hawks new coach, Dani magically found herself whisked to the Manhattan offices of Connor McClane (John Stamos) for a meeting. While he didn't explain what TV writer gave him his perfect TV name, he did ask her help in treating a star client: Hutch, an MLB pitching prospect terrified of flying. And THEN Dani found out who got her the meeting in the first place: Nico, that bastard. Dani slapped him for being such a bastard.
But no time for relationship drama right now, in this season premiere — we've got a kid's psychosomatic problem to solve! Dani immediately got to work, forcing Hutch on a plane and giving him meds to calm him down. They worked. Then the questions: "Was she... ?" "Were they... ?" NO, dummy — they were Skittles, placebos, a lesson in mind over matter. But Dani received a lesson of her own when suddenly Hutch's pitching arm fell numb. Could this be a bigger problem than she'd predicted?
I mean, not really? One thing I truly enjoyed about this, the first episode of Roughness I've ever seen, is the utter smoothness of Dani's problem-solving. Kid's got a numb arm? GOOGLE IT. And boom — a lead emerged in the form of a news report linking Hutch to another pitcher who'd struggled with mental issues the year before. Turns out Hutch didn't have a fear of flying; he had PTSD.
Before you can say "DSM-V" McClane had (charmingly, we assume) gotten Hutch signed with the Yankees and kept his sports management firm alive for at least another week. It's a testament to the integrity of the show's creative team that no one freeze-frame high-fived to close out the episode.
...Oh, and there was some stuff with Dani's colleague/ex Matt and her (now former) football-playing patient, Terrence, but that's just white noise obscuring a story about psychiatric professionalism. Dani gets. Shit. DONE.
I think I really like USA Network.
