After Penny's realization last week that Leonard is perfectly suitable as a boyfriend and that they broke up for no good reason, "The Boyfriend Complexity" heads towards Leonard taking initiative of his own to get back together with Penny. That's the writers' intent, for what its worth.
However, Leonard comes off a creep, taking advantage of Penny's situation to get all over her, even though she tells him specifically not to. Sure, Penny used Leonard to make her father feel better, but if Leonard were a good friend, he'd play along without trying to touch her constantly and make her feel uncomfortable. The fact is, Leonard jumps over women regardless of their non-physical qualities and his behavior in the episode seems to only entail carnal lust for Penny, and not Leonard liking her other qualities.
Speaking of touching... Howard and Raj kiss inadvertently after Raj tries to kiss Bernadette, and over 100 slash fics will pop up over web tommorrow. No one else knows at the end of the episode, so the revelation is hanging over the rest of the episodes like an anvil.
From a comedy standpoint, the whole ruse was pretty funny with Keith Carradine as Penny's father, drinking up Leonard as if he were the greatest guy in the world (and compared to Penny's previous boyfriends, he kind of is). His final reaction, after Penny tells him the truth, is both unexpected, since he appears to be lunging to destroy Leonard, and serves an important plot purpose, to tell Leonard not to give up on his daughter.
One thing the writers haven't been able to get over is how sad Raj is, and "The Boyfriend Complexity" is no exception. After all this time, Raj still is kept in his shell unless he's drunk. Because Bernadette is around in the episode, the writers have to make him drunk to interact. When will the writers get rid of the on-off switch and turn him into a normal person?
Score: 8.5/10
Thursday, November 18, 2010
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