Matt Smith reviews the second episode of Veep season two…
When the table’s laid, whether at the White House or in your own house, there’s always that introductory small talk you go through with people if you haven’t seen them in a while. Before the dinner gets put out, before festivities begin, everyone plays catch up with each other.
It felt like that’s what happened between viewer and show in last week’s episode of Veep. It all started a bit slow but thankfully, now the party can really begin. The choice of whether it’s a political party or a party at a hog roast, as in this week’s episode, is made null by the pacing and farce reintroduced to the writing. A bit of everything is put out, and you don’t have to worry about getting bored or getting too much of the good thing.
Selina Meyer, our ‘hero’ incumbent, is set up by the White House to visit said hog roast and press the flesh. Meanwhile, her daughter writes a paper concerning the Middle East that could land her and her mother in hot water. Also meanwhile, every other character must deal with their own problems, be it family in hospital, debt or the struggle to further their own career.
And that’s what last week’s episode was missing. The sense of chaos and quicker pacing to proceedings. That old farce, found in the previous series and in The Thick of It, has been bought back and with it come the laughs, thick and fast. New characters that had to be introduced can now grow into their own, such as Gary Cole’s Kent Davison. His deadpan deliveries, along with his dead eyes, provide almost as many laughs as seconds on the screen.
To help bring along the chaos is the reckless Meyer, an energetic force for idiocy so focused on self interests and self promotion that she can’t actually figure out how to better herself or her career. But it’s not like she’s completely lost, or grown into nothing more than a stock comedy archetype, to be used like a tool. And that’s where a large amount of the humour comes from, in concerns to every character. They can all change at will of the story, and they’ve all got that little bit of horrible in them that makes them good for the Washington that’s been painted. Good, but nowhere near perfect.
And so the second episode in the second series shows us that, like any dinner party, everyone brings their own thing to the table. The question of whether the show’s accurate, getting Washington to a tee, or whether the situations are more aligned to comedy caricatures, can only be answered by those who are actually involved in this line of work in reality. But the important thing about TV shows, and indeed all stories (even those told at the dinner table), is that taking liberties with the real life details can make things a lot more entertaining. That’s where this episode fits into the series so far, and hopefully it keeps going in that direction.
Matt Smith – follow me on Twitter.
Originally published October 31, 2013. Updated April 11, 2018.
