317 - Mr. Ed

This week’s Failure to Launch sees the return of a horse of course. Of course, if you’re making a show about a talking horse, of course that horse will be a family-friendly lovable horse, unless of course that horse is Mr. Ed.

Fearing that the concept may be a bit dated for modern audiences, Fox cast George Jefferson himself (or at least Sherman Hemsley), to transform Mr. Ed from a talking horse into a straight-talking horse. Apparently in 2004, we really wanted Mr. Ed to be edgy.

If you’ve ever thought; “If only Mr. Ed was a misogynistic homophobe that spoke endlessly about his sex-life and fifteen year-old girls”, then you have some serious issues that need resolving, but this is also the perfect show for you. Because for the next 19 minutes, this is exactly what we get.

Meanwhile, Wilbur Pope, has a problem (well he has many problems but we’ll get to those later); his fifteen year-old daughter has gone to a club and vomited, so naturally, he upends his entire family from New York and moves them to the kidnapping capital of the world, Granite Falls, where he plans to run a legal practice out of his barn.

But if you think this sounds like the actions of a desperate father spiraling out of control, you would be wrong! Because apparently that horse that’s just wandered into his law-barn is talking to him, and he’s going to stop Wilbur from getting pushed around.

Within minutes of meeting Wilbur, Ed becomes obsessed with preventing Wilbur’s daughter from having sex. While we may never know why he is so heavily invested in this, we do know that he is definitely willing to maim a teenage boy over it.

It’s probably fair to say this version of Mr. Ed isn’t the horse we all know and love, but you have to understand it was 2004, and audiences just expected horses to hate teenagers, hippies, and women.

Reviewers: James Ferris, Harry Brimage, David Shaw
Soundboard: Lisa Dib