Happy’s Place Season 2, Episode 8, “The Name Game” Spoilers Ahead
This week’s Happy’s Place is a perfect mix between heartbreak and humor, delivering one of the most well-written episodes in its sophomore season so far. It’s a true whiplash, though not in a way that feels jarring, but rather in a manner that feels inherently human, allowing us to once again sit with how this found family is the best company in the face of tragedy.
It’s always the best people who face the biggest heartaches, and that much is true with the majority of characters on the show. “The Name Game” may center around Gabby and Takoda, but in a number of ways, it’s an episode that impacts all of them.
Happy’s Place Season 2, Episode 8 Brings Heartbreaking News for Gabby
As someone with OCD and way too much anxiety constantly whirling inside of her, I’m fully with Bobbie on the matter of celebrating too quickly. Celebrating early just doesn’t work. No, it doesn’t make the bad news any easier when you’re expecting it, but it’s still tough when the joy is fleeting, and the excitement starts to feel tainted. After all the episodes we spent with Gabby looking into a donor, it turns out that she can’t get pregnant at all because she’s infertile. What’s strange is that her doctor didn’t run these tests beforehand, but it also very much feels like drama that’s constructed for a TV show.
On that front, we can also be certain that the show won’t leave her fully in the dark because I imagine that just because this route is closed, it doesn’t mean that this is the end of Gabby’s motherhood journey. She clearly wants to be a mom, and there are more ways to become one than through pregnancy. How we’ll get here is the question, but a woman with as much determination and desire as Gabby shouldn’t be left without hope. Still, at least she knows that her found family is beside her and they’ll be here through the end.
It won’t be easy for her to move past this, but with the people around her, I hope that we’ll get to watch her explore all her feelings and understand how to properly cope. I don’t want the show to brush it under the rug, but I’d rather thoroughly explore all her avenues and give her character journey the arc she deserves.
We’re Finally Introduced to Takoda’s Band
One of the things I said after last week’s “An Accountant Prepares…” was that I wanted to see more of Takoda, and thankfully, Happy’s Place Season 2, Episode 8, “The Name Game” delivers. Hilariously, we not only get insight into his band, which is death metal, but we get to watch them perform, allowing for a scene that’s so perfectly balanced with the heartache from Gabby’s arc. The joy on his face. The head banging. The hair. It’s so clear that Tokala Black Elk is having a blast, and so is the entire cast, which effectively contributes to the episode’s charm.
It’s also incredible that they went through with it when Steve was trying to get Isabella to cancel the booking because their typical crowd at Happy’s wouldn’t jive with them. And now, here’s to hoping that his fifteen subscribers and viewers quadruple because name a character who deserves more than Takoda. I’ll wait. Because really, there isn’t anyone on Happy’s Place, and the joy he consistently delivers even amid darkness is so riveting.
A lot of this season has been bleak because of how we’re approaching the secret looming over Emmett and Bobbie’s relationship, but these small moments where the tavern gets to be a found family continue to ease the uncertainties. The admiration they each have for one another and the lengths they’ll go to ensure they never hurt one another continues to be the one thing that continues to make TV so delightful week after week, and an episode like this cements it gorgeously.
Stray Thoughts
- Those croissants are so tiny!
- Takoda’s band! Takoda’s band! Takoda’s band!
- “Talking baby names. Uncovering childhood traumas. Typical Wednesday.”
- “I don’t want the hive to hear me.” She’s so real for this.
- “What’s gotten into you.” “Emmett.” OH MY GOD.
- TAKODA’S HAIR OMG!!!!
Now streaming on NBC and Peacock: What are your thoughts on Happy’s Place Season 2, Episode 8, “The Name Game?” Let us know in the comments below.
First Featured Image Credit: (Photo by: Casey Durkin/NBC)