No Ordinary Family: Stephanie Is Awful

Seriously, she’s just the worst.

So this week our boy Jim is asleep when Steph wakes him up because she hears something downstairs. If I had superpowers, I would not display this level of concern about random burglars. But they have a house and a family and I just have this laptop and an unending supply of heartache that I channel into mockery, so I guess I’ll shut up about that. Jim sneaks downstairs and puts his intruder in a headlock.

But this is no wanton thief! It’s Jim’s brother Mike, the next in a seemingly never-ending line of relatives and friends that the writers are determined to use to keep the show from sinking under the weight of its four mostly tiresome protagonists. Within thirty seconds we learn that Mike just broke up with his girlfriend or wife and lost a bunch of money in the “energy drink business.” But he has another plan for success!

“It’s a show about superheroes, but they’re actually really whining and indecisive. The audience will go nuts.”

Actually, his plan is to sell shoes that manufacturers have rejected for minor defects which Steph bitchily describes as “shoes from the garbage.” Man, and we wonder where Daphne gets it from. He continues to establish himself as Steph’s arch-nemesis by using their shower and telling Jim he wants to get a beer later. THE HORROR.

Sure, but did Batman have to share a bathroom with him?

Meanwhile, Katie has just decided to confront creepy guy Josh as soon as he wakes up with the journal she found. But Josh is a cut above the average possibly-on-the-road-to-redemption villain and he uses his powers to move the writing around so that it appears to be his own journal when Katie checks again. Katie just accepts that she somehow SAW COMPLETELY DIFFERENT THINGS THAN SHE’S SEEING NOW and apologizes. Oh, and now she’s being promoted!

Daphne is going to serve on the Peer Disciplinary Committee now that she’s Student Body President, which is overseen by that dick teacher that almost died earlier in the season. She uses her powers to tell if the students are guilty or not, but she’s troubled when they rule a boy guilty and she hears him think he’s happy that he fooled them.

Steph is bitching to Dr. King about how she should have been consulted, so he calls in the new VP of Human Resources. And it’s none other than Rebecca Mader, Lost’s Charlotte Lewis, here to briefly make us ecstatic and then very very sad as we realize not even she can work Lost levels of magic here.

GET OUT WHILE YOU STILL CAN!

Charlotte and Dr. King both talk about how great Katie is, and Steph realizes she can’t get Katie back without jeopardizing Katie’s reputation. I’m having a hard time feeling for Steph on any of these issues tonight.

The guys are having beer and Mike says that monogamy is silly anyway, so he’s happy to be single. When he leaves because of an urgent call from his accountant, which is interesting because I can’t picture an accountant doing ANYTHING urgently, Jim and George immediately suspect that he’s up to something. Also, Jim calling George “bro” is the most awkward thing I’ve ever heard.

So out in the parking lot Mike is having the crap kicked out of him until Jim shows up and does his superhero thing. And then the bad guys throw him off the building, which really isn’t suspenseful to us viewers anymore. But I guess it’s time for awkward brotherly interaction?

After the break, Mike is just weirded out and oddly not happy to see Jim alive. He starts yelling about “calling the news or Oprah” but Jim would rather talk about why he was getting a beatdown in the first place. Finally Mike gets Jim to break down and admit that he has super powers, but Mike doesn’t believe him until Jim asks to get by a shovel.

Man, would I like to take him up on that.

Steph chooses that time to run right up to Jim, so even if Jim hadn’t told Mike Steph just totally ruined everything. Wow, she really is the worst this evening. AND THEN she berates Jim for trusting Mike. Hey, maybe if you’re worried about keeping your powers a secret you should GET DRUNK AND TELL RANDOM WOMEN THAT YOU MET LAST WEEK.

Charlotte (and I’m definitely gonna keep using that name until we get the real one, and maybe even after that) stirs the pot by telling Katie that Steph was saying she didn’t have enough experience to be on her own. I’m SO hoping that she’s on Team Evil with Dr. King.

So now Jim is showing Mike his crimefighting headquarters because why not at this point, and George is awesome by telling Jim what an idiot he is. And then Mike leaves and George says he doesn’t trust Mike but Jim defends him. I’m sensing a pattern this evening. Also, the guys that attacked Mike are loan sharks.

Steph is bitching to Katie about Mike knowing their powers, which, again, is ridiculous because Steph ALSO blew their cover and she did it in a completely careless way.

So Katie tells Steph that she’s awful for trying to get her promotion taken away, especially after everything Katie has done. Sing it, sister.

In vengeance, I will use this really awful picture of her.

Mike is taking JJ horseracing. FINALLY a character situation I can identify with.

Oh, remember that Daphne subplot? Me neither, but now she’s confronting Chris, the guy who took the drug fall. And then in some super blatant plot exposition, Chris’s brother shows up and says something about a trig test while Chris thinks that he has to protect his brother’s scholarship. So there you go.

Steph found out about Mike taking JJ out of school and continues bitching and stuff. Was she always this awful? Even standard Mom stuff is seeming annoying now.

So then when they get home Mike tries to defend himself but it doesn’t go too well. And hey, can you really use those kinds of powers to win all the time at horseracing? It’s still an odds game, right? Anyways, Mike comes clean and says he owes fifteen grand in gambling debts. I can’t believe it’s still the first season and we’re already devoting episodes to the vices of the main character’s distant family members. What is this, 7th Heaven?

And speaking of 7th Heaven, Josh tells Dr. King that he’s done with evil and Katie doesn’t need to move away. Dr. King reminds him that without the serum he’s going to be in intense mental and physical pain, but Josh is still determined to go to Miami with Katie. Awww.

So Jim goes to see the loan shark and he finds out it’s actually $150,000. Jesus Christ. Oh, and it looks like Mike stole all the computer stuff and the motorcycle from their Lair.

Now Jim is fighting with Mike, who denies robbing them. And there’s lots of talk about him letting everyone down, etc. Man, more character situations that I identify with and no longer in a fun way. They start talking about their dad’s heart attack or something and it’s all a lot of backstory that I’m sure we’ll never see again.

Ok, back to superhero stuff. Dr. King and Charlotte are plotting and it’s awesome. King orders that Josh is NOT to leave the city.

These two are definitely the poor man’s King/Charlotte.

Daphne and JJ are breaking into Chris’s brother’s locker using MATH. And hey, lots of illegal pills.

Mike is leaving and when Daphne hugs him she sees a memory of looking at an ultrasound.

Katie and Steph have made up because Katie is a million times better than I am. And then some GIANT STEEL BEAMS COME CRASHING DOWN and Steph uses her powers to superspeed Katie out of the way. But the crane operator said he was sorry, so I guess everything is OK.

Daphne realizes that he was at the ultrasound appointment while the Lair was being robbed and so that clears him, which she takes to Jim. But now the scary loan sharks have abducted Mike and they tell Jim they want their money in 24 hours. Ok, let’s see some superheroing NOT involving pushing someone out of the way of something now.

Jim and Steph are trying to figure out how to actually raise the money, and George is AGAIN being awesome and suggesting that they just go kick some ass. Viewers to Powells: Listen to George more often, damnit! But JJ says he can raise the money at the track. Which for some reason Steph is totally OK with now. I HATE this woman.

Josh thinks the crane thing wasn’t an accident and accuses Dr. King of trying to kill Katie, then basically threatens him. As much as I love Katie, I totally want to see what the King/Charlotte Axis of Evil can do with this punk.

Even when he’s being threatened I still find him menacing.

And then there’s some horseracing. It’s just as random as when they put all that football in. Oh, and they fail.

So, with no money in hand, Jim shows up at the warehouse and offers to trade himself for Mike. It seems odd that they would agree to that because they have a specific problem with Mike, but I guess they’re more the loan sharks that just love violence and put the financial thing aside every once in awhile.

Jim and Mike catch them off-guard and there’s lots of punching, after which Jim and Mike hug triumphantly. Wait, that’s it? You know that if anything this will make the scary loan sharks MORE likely to murder you both, right?

Chris tells Daphne that now his brother is suspended, but then randomly is all heartfelt about how much Daphne cares and then Daphne says something about perceptions or whatever and maybe there’s a moral but not really. More Charlotte/King, please?

Katie goes back to Steph and says she wants to stay and work with her. Not the choice I would make, that’s for sure.

So it turns out they arrested the scary loan sharks and there was a reward in it and now everything is going to be fine for Mike. Then they get all sappy about being a good father and more connections to their dad’s heart attack and Mike always felt inferior to Jim. So long, Mike. I’ll miss fake urgent calls from your accountant.

Oh, and George had full insurance coverage on the theft and so now he has a way better Lair. Definitely a happy ending.

AND THEN WE FIND OUT CHARLOTTE IS A SHAPESHIFTER AND SHE WAS ALSO THE CRANE OPERATOR AND SHE WAS TRYING TO KILL KATIE FOR DR. KING! Why oh why do these things get ten seconds at the end while the gambling problems of single-episode characters take up forty minutes? I just don’t understand.

No new episode next week, and actually from here on out they alternate one every other week for quite a while. Any thoughts on tonight?