Board Thread:General Discussion/@comment-25297799-20141107004500/@comment-24141773-20141107091922

GonkhNation wrote: To be honest I had mixed feelings about this episode. I liked it overall but there was something that bugged me and at first I couldn't quite put my finger on what that was. After thinking over it and reading through other people's insights, I believe I now have a better idea;

The episode brought to light a very real point of conflict in Mordecai and Rigby's friendship and there was a clear lesson/message to be learned. The problem I see is that this lesson is and has always been for Mordecai, NOT Rigby. It wasn't up to Rigby to prove anything in this episode. Fact of the matter is he has been there for his friend and (even though it was unintentional) Mordecai has begun to take that for granted. It is Mordecai that needed to wake up to himself here, but this crucial character transition is never really shown. Instead the episode focused on Rigby busting his chops to drive home a point that both he and the audience really already knows by now and Mordecai just sort of shows up at the end to acknowledge this (again; no mental process from Mordecai shown, so who knows how he came to that conclusion when he couldn't all those weeks/months before).

If they just showed something from him, like maybe whatever off-screen conversation he had with Eileen to convince him to go to his friend, it would have been more meaningful that one line of closure he gave at the end. I don't know, I just think this part could have had more imput. But again, other wise good episode. Some nice moments for Rigby and Eileen too. Maybe Mordecai really should have gotten more screen time. Maybe to realize his actions with a flashback, or something similar..and maybe they were gonna add something like that in, but the 11-minute rule didn't allow them to.

I get why they were showing Rigby working so hard though. It's not just Mordecai that thought he was pretty much 'good for nothing', it was also the fans.

Go back to the 'Lift With Your Back' forum and just take a look at the stuff we wrote. Most people were basically agreeing with Mordecai, that Rigby is indeed useless. (Maybe not in this word setting, but it's still pretty clear what was written.)

Showing that Rigby had a BACKBONE, just needed to be done.