Late Night Retro Television Review: Check it Out! 2.1 “Getting To Know You”

Posted on April 6, 2024 by Lisa Marie Bowman

Welcome to Late Night Retro Television Reviews, a feature where we review some of our favorite and least favorite shows of the past! On Saturdays, I will be reviewing the Canadian sitcom, Check it Out, which ran in syndication from 1985 to 1988. The entire show is currently streaming on Tubi!

Today, we start a new season of Check It Out!

Episode 2.1 “Getting to Know You”

(Dir by Alan Erlich, originally aired on October 3rd, 1986)

The second season of Check It Out! opens with some changes at Cobb’s Grocery store.

Howard now has a mustache. Tonya Williams and Henry Beckman are no longer listed in the opening credits so I guess Jennifer and Alf have moved on from working at the store. Gordon Clapp, however, is now listed in the opening credits so Viker, who was one of more consistently funny characters during the first season, is now a series regular.

The episode opens with zero customers in the store. Due to a broken waterline, the store’s parking lot has been taken over by a bunch of construction workers. Howard calls them “apes.” Marlene is sick of them hitting on her whenever she comes to work. Christian thinks he could take them on. And Mrs. Cobb is demanding that Howard lay off two employees to help offset costs.

Howard could always point out that, with Jennifer and Alf gone, the store now only has seven employees but he doesn’t. Instead, he follows Edna’s advice and sits down for one-and-one interviews with his employees and gets to know them. Howard thinks that he’ll be able to find an employee who doesn’t really need the job but instead, he discovers that all of his employees are wonderful people. Marlene cries about how difficult her life has been lately. Murray talks about how both of his parents are out of work. Leslie volunteers to give up his job and Howard is so touched that there’s no way he can possibly accept Leslie’s offer. Jack Christian, who is usually pretty self-centered and obnoxious, seems like an easy choice but then he gets beaten up defending Marlene from the construction workers.

Finally, Howard realizes that there’s only one thing he can do. He lays off Edna and then he lays himself off. He announces that he and Edna are going on vacation and they’ll be back in four months. Ummm …. look, I’ll be honest. I’ve never been through the experience of being fired or laid off so I don’t really fully understand how it all works. Isn’t Howard kind of taking a risk here? I mean, I guess Howard is assuming that Christian will just fill in for four months and then Howard and Edna will return and everything will go back to normal. But what if Mrs. Cobb hires a new manager? What if she doesn’t want to take back Howard and Edna? I mean, to me, it sounds like Howard basically just quit his job and forced Edna to quit her’s as well. But everyone in the store seems to be convinced that Howard will be back in just a few months.

I guess my point is that Check it Out! doesn’t seem like it was always 100% realistic.

Anyway, this episode was okay. It reintroduced all the characters and gave us a chance to get reacquainted with them, as any season premiere should. Gordon Clapp, Jeff Pustil, and Kathleen Laskey all had moments that made me smile. Those three have the ability to make even the simplest of lines funny. During the first season, Don Adams could occasionally be a bit overly frantic as Howard. For the second season premiere, though, his performance felt a bit toned down and it no longer felt as if he and the show were begging for laughs. Still, I just can’t get over that ending. Edna was so excited that her boyfriend essentially put her future employment at risk.

Next week, we’ll see if Howard still has a job.

Late Night Retro Television Review: Check It Out! 1.22 “Sex Appeal”

Posted on March 30, 2024 by Lisa Marie Bowman

This week, the first season comes to an end! Will Howard be promoted and, if he is, will there be a season 2? Let’s try to find out.

Episode 1.22 “Sex Appeal”

(Dir by Alan Erlich, originally aired on March 12th, 1986)

Who will be the new vice president of the Cobb Corporation? Will it be Howard or will it be another store manager? Mrs. Cobb has sent her daughter, Tiffany (Ruth Buzzi), to interview and test both men. When Tiffany arrives at Howard’s store, she takes one look at him and decides that she’ll promote him but first, she wants to seduce him. Soon, Tiffany is forcing Howard to identify all of the items in the produce section with his eyes closed. When she places his hands on her face, Howard says, “Uhmmm …. pineapple! Moldy peaches!”

When Edna comes to the office late and discovers Howard and Tiffany in what appears to be a compromising position, she is scandalized. Howard insists that nothing happened and that Tiffany came onto him. He announces that he is charging Tiffany with sexual harrassment….

….and this somehow leads to a mock trial that is held in the breakroom, with all of the employees watching and Mrs. Cobb acting as judge. Is Mrs. Cobb really the best person to judge an accusation made against her daughter? Is this how they do things in Canada?

Howard is, of course, cleared of any wrong-doing. We all knew that was going to happen, largely because Tiffany is portrayed as being insane from the minute she shows up at the store. So, we get a resolution as far as the harassment is concerned but the whole storyline about Howard wanting a promotion is forgotten about and left unresolved.

And so, the first season ends with a bit of whimper. The first season was uneven. At its best, season one of Check It Out! had some episodes that were enjoyably weird. Any episode in which Gordon Clapp, Kathleen Laskey or Jeff Pustil were allowed to take center stage was guaranteed to be memorable. But there were also plenty of episodes like this one, where the show couldn’t seem to figure out whether or not Howard was a competent, well-meaning professional or a total and complete moron. Regardless of the individual content of each episode, there was never anything particularly subtle about Don Adams’s performance as Howard. For some episodes that worked. And, in episodes like this one, it definitely did not.

Next week, we start season 2! Two cast members say goodbye while Gordon Clapp’s Viker becomes a regular. Since season 2 is still taking place in the supermarket and Howard is still the manager, I’m going to assume that the other guy got the promotion.

Late Night Retro Television Reviews: Check It Out! 2.21 “Jack Be Numbskull”

Posted on March 23, 2024 by Lisa Marie Bowman

This week’s episode defies description. Read on.

Episode 2.21 “Jack Be Numbskull”

(Dir by Alan Erlich, originally aired on March 5th, 1986)

Awwww, look how cute these two are!

After an office party, Marlene and Christian go home together. The next morning, Christian has decided that he is totally in love with Marlene while Marlene will do just about anything to get Christian to stop bothering her with his romantic declarations. (In real life, Kathleen Laskey and Jeff Pustil have been married since 1990.)

Marlene’s solution to her Christian problem is to invite her ex-boyfriend, the brutish Bruno (Eric Keenleyside), to the store and to tell him to threaten to beat up Christian, just to scare him off. Marlene doesn’t want Bruno to actually hurt anyone, of course.

Bruno, however, mistakes Howard for Christian and threatens him. When Howard makes a sarcastic comment about how he is going to fight Bruno in the alley, a visiting Mrs. Cobb (Barbara Hamilton) overhears and decides that sponsoring a boxing match between Bruno and an employee will be the perfect way to advertise Ka-Blam, a vitamin supplement that is so powerful that it’s sold in a container that looks like a hand grenade. Mrs. Cobb also decides that Bruno will be Mr. Ka-Blam.

So, to make clear:

Mrs. Cobb thinks it will be a good idea to have a fight in one of her stores
Mrs. Cobb thinks hiring a violent criminal to be a store mascot is a good idea
Mrs. Cobb wants to have Bruno beat up one of her store managers
Mrs. Cobb wants the manager to get beaten up while the customers watch.

Yeah, it doesn’t make much sense to me, either.

A few hours before the boxing match, Howard breaks his hand so he has to find a replacement to fight Bruno. Christian volunteers.

Christian is not much of a fighter but he impresses everyone with his refusal to surrender or throw in the towel. However, after an illegal blow sends Christian to the canvas, Howard rushes into the ring and punches Bruno in the stomach and then knocks him out with an uppercut. Wait a minute, I thought Howard’s hand was broken….

This episode was just silly. It was so silly that it almost worked, just on the basis of weirdness alone. The action played out like a fever dream and logic was abandoned early on and perhaps that was for the best. This episode was so strange that it defies a traditional review but I will say that Christian and Marlene did make for a cute couple so I hope this is something that the show continued to explore.

Next week, the first season comes to a close!

Late Night Retro Television Review: Check It Out! 1.20 “Edna’s New Friend”

Posted on March 16, 2024 by Lisa Marie Bowman

This week, Edna and Leslie discover they have a lot in common!

Episode 1.20 “Edna’s New Friend”

(Dir by Alan Erlich, originally aired on February 26th, 1986)

Brace yourself. We are once again about to explore Howard and Edna’s relationship.

Check It Out!, at least during its first season, was never particularly consistent when it came to the details of Howard and Edna’s relationship. Sometimes, Howard was the most romantic man on the planet and then, other times, he was an insensitive jerk who was incapable of understanding why Edna wouldn’t want to spend all of her time watching television at his apartment. Sometimes, Edna was down-to-Earth and realistic and, other times, she was flighty and seemingly living in a world of her own. In this episode, we’re back to Howard being a jerk and Edna wanting to experience life outside of going to work and then over to Howard’s apartment.

Edna has tickets to the ballet. As she explains, they cost her a lot of money and she’s superexcited about having managed to get them. However, Howard doesn’t care about the ballet (“I don’t like Russian ballerinas,” he explains) and he’s already made plans to watch television that night. Edna asks Jennifer if she wants to go but Jennifer has an appointment at a tanning salon. Marlene has a date and is planning on taking him to a “slam dance, so if I don’t like him, at least I’ll get to hurt him.” Finally, Edna asks Leslie, who once lived in Paris and who is a ballet fanatic!

Leslie is also a guy but he’s gay so Howard isn’t concerned about him going out with Edna. Or, at least, Howard isn’t worried until Christian suggests that Edna might try to “convert” Leslie because “women love a challenge.” Howard starts to panic….

Of course, what Howard should be panicking about is the super cheap beef that Christian has been buying and re-selling in the store. It’s not beef, at all. It’s horse meat! When the truth comes out, the customers form an angry mob. Marlene even joins them because “it was either be destroyed or become their leader.”

The character of Leslie has been one of the more interesting parts of the first season of Check It Out! Today, of course, it doesn’t seem like a big deal for a show to feature a regular character who is gay. But, by the standards of most 1980s sitcoms that I’ve seen, Check It Out! was often downright progressive in its portrayal of Leslie as being an openly gay, angst-free, and happy man who was a friend to and respected by all of his co-workers, even the stupid ones. And while this episode does feature some humor centered around Leslie’s sexuality, the target of the joke is always Howard’s insecurity and Christian’s ignorance. Again, this might not sound like much but you have to keep in mind that this is a nearly 40 year-old show. When Check it Out! aired, most gay characters were either over-the-top caricatures that audiences were invited to laugh at or special guest stars who only existed to teach a lesson to the show’s regulars and who certainly didn’t return for a second appearance. As corny and old-fashioned as Check it Out! could be, it was ahead-of-its-time when it came to Leslie.

As for the episode itself, it’s okay. This is one of those episodes that leaves you wondering why Edna puts up with Howard but the stuff with the horsemeat was funny. Marlene deciding to join the angry mob made me laugh. Marlene is a force of chaos! That’s something that this uneven but often funny show really needed.

Late Night Retro Television Review: Check it Out! 1.19 “My Darling Serpentine”

Posted on February 24, 2024 by Lisa Marie Bowman

This week, Cobb’s descends into chaos!

Episode 1.19 “My Darling Serpentine”

(Dir by John Bell, originally aired on February 19th, 1986)

Last week, Edna left Howard after an argument and Howard had an affair with her replacement. It was implied that Edna leaving Howard was a frequent occurrence and that Howard was the least romantic man alive.

This episode, Edna and Howard are once again totally in love and Howard is so romantic that Edna can even brag about all of the presents that he’s given her over the years.

Continuity, what is it?

This year, Howard is busy at the store so he makes the mistake of sending Alf the security guard out to pick up a piece of jewelry for Edna. Alf, however, gets distracted while walking by a pet store and instead, he returns to the store with a hamster. Edna freaks out about the idea of owning a rodent and instead, she gives it to Murray. The hamster then escapes into the store, which isn’t good since there’s a health inspector in the neighborhood.

Meanwhile, it’s prom night for Murray and he needs a date. Not surprisingly, he asks supercool Marlene to be his date. Also not surprisingly, Marlene laughs in his face. However, after thinking about how she never got to go to her prom because she dropped out of school, Marlene changes her mind. Murray is super-excited until Christian and Alf suggest that Marlene is going to take his virginity. When Marlene shows up in the break room in her prom dress and a blue wig, Murray freaks out.

Murray runs away and disappears into the store. Now, everyone not only has to look for the hamster but also for Murray.

This episode is a bit frantic but it made me laugh. A lot of that was because Gordon Clapp made his third appearance on the show, playing the cheerfully dumb Viker. Previously, Viker was the store’s electrician. In this episode, he’s suddenly a pest control expert. In order to track down the hamster, he released a snake into the store. In order to track down the snake, he releases a mongoose. “I’m glad I don’t shop here,” Viker says. Gordon Clapp delivers all of Viker’s lines with such sincerity that his brief appearance elevates the entire episode.

In the end, thinks work out. The snake is caught when it attacks Howard. Marlene forgives Murray and they head off to prom. The hamster runs off with Marlene’s blue wig. And Edna is surprisingly forgiving about Howard telling the security guard to buy her an anniversary present. As for the mongoose …. well, I’m sure it found a good place to live. The important thing is that this episode made me laugh more than the typical episode of Check It Out! I enjoyed it.

Late Night Retro Television Reviews: Check It Out 1.18 “Store Wars”

Posted on February 17, 2024 by Lisa Marie Bowman

This week, both Cobb’s and Edna get some competition!

Episode 1.18 “Store Wars”

(Dir by John Bell, originally aired on February 12th, 1986)

Odd episode, this week.

After having a fight with Howard, Edna abruptly leaves town for Florida. Apparently, this is something that she does frequently. (We are 18 episodes in and this show has yet to come up with a consistent portrayal of Howard and Edna’s relationship.) I have to admit that I’ve never worked retail so I’m not totally sure how these things work but can you just stop going to work whenever you feel like it and still have a job? It seems like this is the sort of thing that would get most people fired. Maybe it’s different when you’re sleeping with the boss.

Anyway, Howard gets a new secretary and he is shocked to discover that Irene (Cynthia Belliveau) is young and attractive and totally into him. Soon, Howard is wearing an earring, sunglasses, and dressing like Bruce Springsteen. Irene even teaches Howard how to do yoga.

All of this leads to Howard getting distracted from the latest work crisis. A new store has opened up across the street. Just Food sells …. well, just food. There are no bag boys or special displays or anything else that would cost any extra money so Just Food can lower their prices. Soon, all of Cobb’s customers are going to Just Food! Even when Christian lowers the prices at Cobb’s, Just Food lowers their prices even more. Is it possible that Just Food could have a spy in the store?

Yes, there is a spy and, as you probably already guessed, the spy is Irene. (How did Irene get the job? Didn’t she have to go through a background check? Do they not do that in Canada?) Howard eventually figures it all out but he feels a little better when Irene tells him that, even though she was a spy, she truly did fall for him. They share a passionate kiss and the audience applauds. Then Irene leaves and Howard calls Edna to ask her to come back home. “Awwwww!” the audience says.

Uhmmm …. yeah. Thanks for the mixed signals, studio audience. Howard basically cheated on Edna while she was gone but apparently that’s okay because, afterwards, Howard asked her to come back home. Is Howard ever going to tell Edna about Irene? She’s going to find out as soon as she asks either Marlene or Jennifer about what happened at the store while she was gone. Unless Edna was hooking up with a 21 year-old life guard in Florida, Howard’s screwed either way.

This episode just felt off. Howard can be a jerk but he’s always been loyal to Edna, even when they’ve fought in the past. The “Store Wars” storyline had potential but it was pretty much overshadowed by Howard trying to be Springsteen. This episode just didn’t work.

Love on the Lens: Amy Fisher: My Story (dir by Bradford May)

Posted on February 14, 2024 by Lisa Marie Bowman

Poor Amy Fisher!

In the 1993 made-for-TV movie, Amy Fisher: My Story, Amy Fisher (played by Noelle Parker) is an insecure teenager growing up on Long Island. She goes to high school. She has a boyfriend. She has lots of girl friends. She has a part-time job. She has a car. Everything should be perfect but it’s not. For one thing, her creepy father (played by veteran Canadian character actor Lawrence Dane) likes to come into her room while she’s trying to sleep and sit on the edge of her bed. Her mother (Kate Lynch) refuses to believe that there’s anything strange about the way her husband treats their daughter.

When Amy and her father take her car to the local auto body shop, she meets the handsome and slick Joey Buttafuoco (Ed Marinaro). Amy is polite to Joey but Joey takes one look at Amy and he smiles in a way that immediately lets us know that he’s not to be trusted. Soon, he’s going out of his way to spend time with Amy and eventually, he seduces her in the house that he shares with his wife, Mary Jo (played by Check It Out‘s Kathleen Laskey). Soon, Joey and Amy are checking into cheap motels together. Amy think that she’s in love with Joey and Joey says that he loves her (though only when he wants her to do something).

Joey eventually coerces Amy into becoming an escort, enjoying the stories of her spending time with other older men. And yet, when Amy follows his orders and gets a gym membership, Joey freaks out when she attracts the attention of a man who is close to her own age. For her part, Amy starts to wonder whether she and Joey will ever truly be together. Joey insinuates that his wife would have to die before he could even think of marrying Amy Fisher. Amy happens to have a friend who has a gun….

Amy Fisher: My Story largely plays out in flashbacks and is narrated by Amy as she sits in her jail cell. It’s based on the same true story that inspired Casualties of Love, with the main difference being that this is Amy’s version of the story. And it must be said that Amy’s version, with Amy as an insecure and abused teenager being groomed by a manipulative sociopath, feels considerably more plausible than Casualties of Love‘s portrayal of Joey Buttafuoco as being the misunderstood Saint of Long Island. Working to Amy Fisher: My Story‘s advantage is that it doesn’t let Amy off the hook. Ultimately, she’s the one who decides to knock on Mary Jo’s front door and then shoot her when she answers. Amy is not portrayed as being a saint but she’s not a one-dimensional psycho either. Instead, she’s a naive and emotionally damaged girl who is so desperate to feel loved that she allows Joey to push her over the edge.

Amy Fisher: My Story is a well-done look at a sordid story. Ed Marinaro is appropriately sleazy and macho as Joey. Noelle Parker gives a quiet but strong performance as Amy Fisher, playing her as someone who knows that she’s being manipulated but who still finds herself clinging to the smallest shred of hope that she’s not. While the film never quite transcends its tabloid origins, it still provides a worthy reminder that there’s always a human behind the headlines.

Late Night Retro Television Reviews: Check It Out! 1.17 “Banzai”

Posted on February 10, 2024 by Lisa Marie Bowman

This week, I finally get a chance to review the episode that I should have reviewed last week. Nature is healing.

Episode 1.17 “Banzai”

(Dir by John Bell, originally aired on February 8th, 1986)

Mrs. Cobb (Barbara Hamilton) has decided that it would be a good idea to send someone over to Japan to study how the Japanese have become such efficient employers and employees. That is an idea that actually isn’t bad and totally makes sense. Give some points to the show for having a good idea for once.

However, for some reason, Mrs. Cobb wants to send over not an executive and not a store manager but an assistant store manager. That makes no sense. If you want to make changes, why wouldn’t you send someone over who has the authority to do so? As usual, Mrs. Cobb wants it to be someone from Howard’s store. The show has always implied that Mrs. Cobb is the richest woman in Canada and that she actually owns several businesses across the North American continent. It’s odd that the only one she ever seems to care about is Howard’s store.

Assistant Store Manager Jack Christian is on vacation in Fiji so Howard has to pick a temporary replacement who can go to Japan. Mrs. Cobb tells him to pick a woman and since Marlene has a criminal record and Jennifer is not in this episode, the job falls to Edna.

Edna goes to Japan and then returns with a lot of ideas for how to make Cobb’s better. Cue Howard’s comic exasperation as Edna demands informality in the workplace, a lack of walls, and a mandatory exercise period. Also cue the two Japanese workers that Edna brought back with her, who proceed to tear down the walls of Howard’s office.

Watching all of this, I had to wonder just how long Christian’s Fiji vacation lasted. This episode seemed to take place over the course of a month, maybe even longer. It lasted long enough for the staff to rebel against Edna and for Mrs. Cobb to change her mind about using Japanese methods in her business. And it lasted long enough for Edna to decide that she would rather go back to being Howard’s administrative assistant. Jack Christian did return by the end of the episode, which is good since Jeff Pustil (who played Christian) and Kathleen Laskey (who played Marlene) were the show’s two most consistent comedic performers. (Interestingly enough, they’re married in real life.)

This was actually not a bad episode. I always cringe a bit whenever I see any 80s or 90s sitcom attempting to deal with cultural differences, especially when the other culture is Japanese. Just judging from a lot of the shows that I’ve seen, it would appear that many Americans (and I guess Canadians) in the 80s felt like the only way to deal with Japan’s competitive economy was to make often juvenile jokes about Japanese tourists with cameras and the poor dubbing that most Japanese films suffered on their way to American screens. This episode of Check It Out! is actually respectful of Japanese business culture, even if the show’s message seems to be that it ultimately isn’t right for the more laid back culture of Canada.

As for what happens in next week’s episode — who knows? We’ll find out.

Retro Television Reviews: T and T 2.15 “Jump Start”

Posted on February 3, 2024 by Lisa Marie Bowman

Welcome to Retro Television Reviews, a new feature where we review some of our favorite and least favorite shows of the past! On Fridays, I will be reviewing T. and T., a Canadian show which ran in syndication from 1987 to 1990. The show can be found on Tubi!

Wait a minute! This isn’t Friday afternoon! This is Saturday morning! Why am I posting my review of this show now?

I’m only human. After a long week, I was so exhausted on Friday that I couldn’t even find the strength to former coherent thoughts about a show as simple as T and T. So, I put off the review until this morning. Of course, I’m still tired. All of this thinking is exhausting. Roll the opening credits so I can take a 90 second nap.

Episode 2.15 “Jump Start”

(Dir by Don McCutcheon, originally aired on February 20th, 1989)

In a rare nod to maintaining some sort of continuity from episode to episode, this week’s episode of T and T opens with a flashback to a previous story. We once again witness how two hapless crooks — Fritz (Dominic Cuzzocrea) and Finn (Ron Gabriel) — tried to pull a gun on T.S. and Decker, just for the clip to fall out of the weapon. At the time, my feeling was that the two crooks were both too incompetent to be viewed as a legitimate threat and this follow-up episode proved me right.

Fritz and Finn are back on the streets, having had their criminal charges dismissed on a technicality. They want revenge on Turner for sending them to jail so they decide to steal his car. However, because they’re both incredibly incompetent, they have to ask Max (Kathleen Laskey, who also played Marlene on Check It Out!) to steal it for them. Just as with so many episodes of Check It Out!, Laskey was this episode’s saving grace. She brought so much badass attitude to the character that you couldn’t help but cheer Max on as she stole Turner’s car.

Unfortunately, Laskey really isn’t in much of this episode. For that matter, Alex, Decker, and even Turner have reduced roles. The majority of the episode is devoted to Fritz and Finn and their total and complete incompetence. I get that it was meant to be comedic but these two characters were so stupid and so foolish and so obviously doomed to failure that there was absolutely no tension as to whether or not Turner would be able to get his car back. As far as I could tell, Turner didn’t even bother to report that his car had been stolen. He just tracked the two guys down and took it back. That’s the power of T and T!

Anyway, this was a throw away episode. I’m not sure why, out of all the villains that have been on this show, T and T decided to bring back the least impressive of them. Episodes like this leave little doubt that all of the serious criminals left Toronto as soon as Mr. T showed up.

Late Night Retro Television Reviews: Check it Out 1.16 “Dog Day After Dark”

Posted on January 27, 2024 by Lisa Marie Bowman

I’ve had a busy day and I’m running behind because I’ve been doing totally responsible stuff and not because I’ve been watching trashy talk shows. Definitely not! Anyway, this review is a little late. That said, when you’re reviewing an obscure Canadian sitcom from the 80s, you can probably be as late as you want.

Episode 1.16 “Dog Day After Dark”

(Dir by John Bell, originally aired on February 1st, 1986)

Howard is super excited because not only is his birthday coming up but he’s also got a side hustle. He’s appearing in commercials for Cobb’s, dressed in a giant cheeseball costume and encourage everyone to buy the store brand cheese. When a group of protestors shows up at the store to protest just how unhealthy the Cobb’s cheeseballs are, Howard orders them kicked out. Their leader, wealthy hamburger restaurant heiress Sonja (Sheila McCarthy), vows to return and to make sure that all of Canada knows how unhealthy their diet truly is.

(Violent and wealthy vegans who want to control everyone’s lives? Check It Out! may be a silly sitcom but it still managed to predict our silly sitcom future.)

Meanwhile, Edna is busy trying to put together an after-hours surprise party for Howard in the breakroom. (Check It Out! has never been that consistent when it comes to portraying the staff’s feelings towards Howard. There are some episodes where Howard is a jerk and everyone dislikes him. However, in this episode, they all love him and can’t wait to celebrate with him.) Edna tells security guard Alf to distract Howard while she gets things set up. Unfortunately, Alf is so busy telling Howard about his cat that he’s not at his post when Sonja and her followers show up and take everyone hostage.

In some scenarios, this could lead to a Die Hard situation, with Howard taking on the role for John McClane. And, indeed, that would be kind of fun. But this is Check It Out!, one of the most Canadian sitcoms of all time. So, everyone decides to celebrate Howard’s birthday even though they’re being held hostage, the terrorists are more goofy than dangerous, and, as the police and media rush into the store, Howard ends up eating one of the cheeseballs and getting sick on Canadian television.

(Despite being a very Canadian show, Check It Out! usually tried to obscure what country the show was actually set in so that it would have a better chance of finding an audience in the U.S.A. That said, it’s hard not to notice that all of the vegan terrorists have French names.)

This was a pretty silly episode bit it was hard not to appreciate the goofiness of it all. It was dumb but it was also light-hearted and good-natured, as the better episodes of this show tend to be.