Parks and Rec Recap: ā€˜Iā€™m Leslie Knopeā€™

In last seasonā€™s finale, Parks and Rec left us hanging at the edge of three different cliffs, with Leslie deciding between her relationship with Ben and a City Council run, Tom leaving the Parks Department to start up an entertainment conglomerate with lunkhead crony Jean-Ralphio, and Ron Swansonā€™s unseen ex-wife Tammy #1 making a surprise visit. The new episode picked up right where we left off, still on the night of Liā€™l Sebastianā€™s memorial, with Leslie emerging from the discussion about her candidacy to find Ron Swanson fleeing to avoid Tammy #1, his eyebrows and trademark moustache freshly singed by a fireball. Ron tells Leslie he has 228 personal days saved up and that heā€™ll be using them all now. In exactly the kind of superb bit of physical comedy weā€™ve come to expect from Nick Offerman, he climbs up to an air duct to fetch an emergency backpack heā€™s stowed away for such occasions before making a frantic run for the hills.

We were left wondering all summer whether Leslie would choose her relationship with Ben or the political career sheā€™s dreamed of since childhood, and Leslie still hadnā€™t decided by the time ā€œIā€™m Leslie Knopeā€ began. In fact, she spends much of the episode waffling back and forth, procrastinating on this life-changing choice. After several failed attempts by Leslie to get up the nerve to explain the situation to Ben, he becomes aware of her candidacy on his own by episodeā€™s end and tells her he understands that she has to put her career first. Maybe at some point in the future, Leslie and Ben will be able to get back together, but, for now, theyā€™ve called things off. At least they broke up before things became Jim and Pam boring.

Tom Haverford drops by the Parks Department to fill his former co-workersā€™ arms with tacky merchandise promoting his new start-up, Entertainment 720. Iā€™m looking forward to seeing this Tom and Jean-Ralphio arc play out over several episodes, even though we didnā€™t get a glimpse of Jean-Ralphio tonight (outside of his emblazoned image on the right cup of the free Entertainment 720 bra that Tom gives to Donna). Jean-Ralphio, played by Ben Schwartz, is one of the showā€™s best recurring characters and the promise of further Entertainment 720 developments means we should see him pop up again soon. Ben Schwartz is a busy actor and writer, who will be starring alongside Don Cheadle in next yearā€™s Showtime series House of Lies, but Parks and Rec creator/showrunner Michael Schur has said Schwartz should appear in ā€œat least a couple episodes.ā€

Tom uses his time at City Hall to try to recruit Andy to join Entertainment 720, causing Andy to contemplate his future. He looks to guidance from his wife/band manager April, who has taken on a frightening amount of power in Ronā€™s absence as the acting manager of the Parks Department. April helps secure Andy a new job as Leslieā€™s assistant, which means the shoeshine stand will probably be shutting down. Itā€™s surprising but believable how age is slowly turning both April and Andy from aspiration-less slackers into young, upwardly-mobile professionals. The writers have put a lot of care into slowly developing these two (and the other characters) over the years, and I look forward to seeing whatā€™s next.

The City of Pawneeā€™s higher-ups find themselves dealing with a sexting (God, I hate that word) scandal akin to this summerā€™s Anthony Weiner debacle when a male government worker e-mails a picture of his genitalia to every woman on staff. After some sleuthing (a.k.a. checking the name of the e-mailā€™s sender), Ben and Chris determine the culprit to be Joe from the Sewage Department and promptly fire him. Newly-installed Health Department employee Ann Perkins diagnoses Joe with mumps based on the swelling of his testicles in the photo, inadvertently becoming the go-to consul for crotch health amongst the governmentā€™s male employees. Stand-up comedian Kirk Fox, who has played Joe from Sewage in a recurring capacity since Season 2, is always funny on Parks, and Iā€™m hoping the writers figure out a way to keep using him, even though heā€™s lost his job at the Sewage Department. Maybe that position at Entertainment 720 is still available? Or did we just find City Hallā€™s new shoeshine stand proprietor?

It was an episode with a lot of characters seeking advice from the respective authorities in their lives, with Andy coming to April over his career woes, Ann becoming a reluctant sex organ guru, and Leslie seeking out Ron Swanson, whoā€™s been hiding out in a cabin in the woods with a full-on Grizzly Adams beard. Ronā€™s talk with Leslie inspires him to return to City Hall, where we finally get the glimpse of Tammy #1 weā€™ve been waiting all summer for. Patricia Clarkson only gets a little bit of screentime at the tail-end of the episode, but her portrayal of cold IRS agent Tammy #1 definitely left me wanting more. Ron Swanson (and his love life) can often be counted on for some of the showā€™s best moments, but, as he spends most of last nightā€™s episode in hiding, we didnā€™t get to see a whole lot of him this week. That should change in the next episode when Tammy #1 returns along with a couple of other women from Ronā€™s past in what should be another hilarious look at the Mustachioed Oneā€™s romantic past.

Miscellanea:

If youā€™ve often caught yourself seeking more info about the appendages of the various Parks staffers, this was the episode for you. We learned that Ron Swanson has only had nine toes ever since a childhood nail gun incident and that Jerry has a shockingly-large penis, which gives the showā€™s (and arguably televisionā€™s) most pathetic character the reason to keep going that he deserves.

Nice callback to Leslieā€™s nervousness causing her to call bathrooms ā€œwhiz palacesā€ in the scene where sheā€™s at dinner with Ben. She last used this term in the Season Two episode ā€œPractice Date.ā€

What did everybody think about Leslie choosing her political career over Ben? For more info on how the writers came to decide her fate, check out TV critic extraordinaire Alan Sepinwallā€™s interview with Michael Schur on the subject of Leslie and Benā€™s break-up over at Hitfix.com.

Bradford Evans is a writer living in Los Angeles.