The Mick Review: The Fire (Season 1 Episode 5)

Another day, another subverted sitcom lesson.  This week, kids, we learn that smoking is bad.

In The Mick Season 1 Episode 5, “The Fire,” Ben is acting out by doing favors for his “imaginary friend” Omicron, a man from Jupiter who talks like a robot.  

When Sabrina and Mickey try to lecture Ben, who claimed Omicron made him spy on Liz in the shower, he attempts to steal their cigarettes, and the family assumes he’s taken up smoking.

Alba and Chip blame Mickey and Sabrina for setting a bad example – unlike Alba who started smoking at the age of four and now gets by using nicotine patches that she hides in her first-aid kit.

This is when the show sets out, in its own way, to discourage smoking.

Sabrina and Mickey plan to quit in the usual way, by vowing to smoke the last of their cigarettes before making a half-assed attempt to break the habit.  The discarded butts from their “final” pack burn down Liz’s guest house.

Perhaps the fire is supposed to make smoking seem terrible.  Or maybe Mickey and Sabrina are supposed to seem pathetic for their desperate attempts to sneak cigarettes.  But watching the pair attempt to quit actually highlights one of the addiction’s greatest benefits.

The duo has been at odds since they first met – when Sabrina declined to let Mickey bum a smoke – but their shared vice finally brings them together.  And isn’t that one of the few good things about being a smoker?  Everyone ostracizes you, forcing you to gather outside in little groups where you bond while sharing lighters and telling stories.

Meanwhile, Chip is trying to be a good brother by teaching Ben how to ride a bike, but his plan backfires when his little brother goes flying into a gate. 

Chip patches him up using the “bandages” in Alba’s first-aid kit.  Ben is instantly mellowed by the nicotine patches and starts behaving in increasingly strange ways. 

We’re only five episodes into the season, but it feels like we’ve already seen this gag before.  

A misunderstanding has already caused Ben to expose himself to a drug, altering his behavior. It happened in “The Buffer“ when he started taking Mickey’s birth control pills.

However, Jack Stanton plays the part of a deranged child really well. Watching him sit alone in his room, intently bashing his stuffed unicorn with a hammer, is one of the strangest and funniest scenes in this episode.

The family finally goes out to the woods to see what’s going on with Ben and Omicron, only to discover that he’s a real person – Chester Omicron from Jupiter, Florida.

Chester seems creepy as hell at first glance, but he’s competent enough to realize that Ben is not thriving under Mickey’s supervision.  He’s the one who pulls the nicotine patches off of the kid and claims to have taught him how to tell time, do long division and whistle.

He also serves as the drifter that Alba previously suggested that they blame the fire on.  

He does it to save Ben from taking the fall because the boy taught him how to love again and because he’s about to die from lung cancer.  

But he’ll come back and kill them all if he ever finds out Ben’s started smoking.

Stray Observations:

• From describing how she started smoking cigarettes (“In Guatemala, they would just hand them to the children like candy.”) to finding a way to blame the fire on a vagabandito – Alba’s scenes are consistently hilarious.
• If you’ve ever smoked, or known a smoker who was under pressure to quit, the bathroom scene was so spot on from the towel under the door to the shower cap and robes used to keep the smell at bay.
• Mickey on using The Patch while smoking; “I slapped it under the pit! Oh, direct line right to the bloodstream.”
• Chip on Mickey: “You’re a freakin chimney in a blonde wig!”
• FYI: Cat morphine is morphine for cats.

What did you think of this episode of The Mick?

Where is Jimmy this week? Would Ben be better off if he was being raised in the woods by a drifter? Any other non-smokers out there run about as well as Mickey and Sabrina?

Most importantly: What are smells made of?

Share your thoughts in the comments below!

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The Mick airs Tuesdays at 8:30/7:30c on FOX.

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