One Day at a Time Review: One Halloween at a Time (Season 4 Episode 4)
One Day at a Time brings a little extra joy with an over-the-top Halloween episode that lets the cast have some fun with elaborate costumes.
On One Day at a Time Season 4 Episode 4, “One Halloween at a Time,” Penelope and Max enjoy the holiday by dressing up as classic couple Sandy and Danny from Grease (they’re adorable) and handing out candy, while Schneider and Avery are focused on winning a country club costume contest.
They manage to try out three elaborate costumes, including “Goat Yoga,” and “Drag Race,” and Schneider laments that he never wins anything. He really wants to win that iPad mini.
Elena and Syd have an unsurprising goal with their costumes. They dress as Greta Thunberg and a melting iceberg, but not participate in Halloween — to spread the word about climate change. Because of course they do.
That doesn’t go as planned, but they get some full-sized candy bars out of it, and they even run into a special guest star: Marla Gibbs, who’s living in apartment number 227.
I love how smart One Day at a Time is with meta moments like this.
Even Lydia and Leslie take part in some costume fun with an accidental couples costume — Beauty and the Beast (Lydia never read it!).
Alex and Nora, however, aren’t dressing up at all. That is, unless you count Alex’s new look with his silver hair. The fact that Alex doesn’t want to dress up this year hits Penelope hard, because it’s just one more example of her children growing up.
It’s all fun and cute. Much of what makes it all enjoyable are the costumes themselves. Penelope and Max are just enjoying being together again and their costume reflects a simpler kind of love. It’s sweet, and it’s nice to watch them as a couple again.
At the same time, it feels a bit too easy considering the fact that they did have a reason for breaking up in the first place. I assume that discussion is coming, but as serious as they seem to be again already, it’s worrisome that we haven’t seen it happen. But when Lydia finds a pregnancy test in the trash, it does offer a moment of pause.
Lydia assumes at first that the test, which is positive, is Penelope’s. It’s not only the most obvious explanation, but just at the moment, she hears Penelope on the phone talking about how she’s positive and how she’s been through this before.
She even makes the comment “that’s not how I was raised.” We know she’s talking about Halloween candy, but of course, Lydia misinterprets.
And when she takes a glass a wine from Penelope and proclaims it, Penelope has to deny it — and quickly, since a shocked Max is sitting next to her.
There’s nuance there that suggests it gets his hopes up for that brief moment, and panic for Penelope because of it.
The next guess is clearly that it’s Nora who is pregnant, but Alex says that’s “impossible” and at least Penelope gets to know that her son hasn’t grown up too much yet. And no, it’s not Elena, obviously.
That doesn’t leave much in the way of other options, and I honestly, I feel silly for how long it took me to figure it out when I was watching. It struck me just before the moment when Schneider and Avery come through the door in their third and final costume, which is Game of Thrones-themed.
Avery had ditched the test in their trash because she wasn’t sure how Schneider would react.
It’s perfectly quirky and within the spirit of the show that this news would be announced in an apartment full of people. Schneider finds out surrounded by his found family, and the joy that comes across his face is entirely genuine and joyful.
Of course Schneider would be happy about this news, and let’s be honest, we know he’ll make a wonderful dad.
As joyful as that is, this should be what sparks a more serious conversation for Penelope and Max. I’m curious to see how that might go.
What did you think of this episode of One Day at a Time? Share your thoughts in the comments below!
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One Day at a Time airs Tuesdays at 9:30/8:30c on Pop TV.
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Ashley Bissette Sumerel
Ashley Bissette Sumerel is a television and film critic living in Wilmington, North Carolina. She is editor-in-chief of Tell-Tale TV as well as Eulalie Magazine. Ashley has also written for outlets such as Rolling Stone, Paste Magazine, and Insider. Ashley has been a member of the Critics Choice Association since 2017 and is a Rotten Tomatoes-approved critic. In addition to her work as an editor and critic, Ashley teaches Entertainment Journalism, Composition, and Literature at the University of North Carolina Wilmington.