In the Season 2 premiere of Somebody Somewhere, the storylines were fictional, but the emotions were true to life, as we finally learned how the show would handle the death of actor Mike Hagerty.
Sisters Trisha and Sam reveal that their father Ed (Hagerty’s character) is very much alive and currently hanging out on a boat in Texas drinking beers with his brother. Sam is happy her dad is doing something for himself, but Trisha is annoyed because “the timing sucks.” Their mother Mary Jo has suffered a stroke and is living in a nursing home. Despite promising their dad they’d visit MJ daily, dealing with their alcoholic and now-sick mother has been a royal pain in the you-know-what for them both.
But those aren’t the only changes in store for the Millers. When the family decides to rent out the farm land to monetize the property, Ed leaves the women a to-do list which includes cleaning out the barn and getting things ready for the transition. But dealing with all of her father’s belongings — his entire life is seemingly inside that barn — proves difficult for Sam for process. She calls Joel and says that she’s glad her dad wasn’t there because if he had to do it himself, it would’ve broken his heart. “But I didn’t know it’d break mine,” she confesses.
All of these heavy feelings bring Sam to tears, but the emotions were also palpable for its star Bridget Everett, who was still processing the permanent absence of her costar.
“It’s all very real. I missed him,” Everett tells TVLine. “We had a scene in the barn by the workbench in Season 1 that was really meaningful to me. And so being there without him felt… I knew that when we were in the barn would be when I really kind of processed his loss. So it was all happening in real time oddly. So Sam’s just missing her father and then I’m thinking about Mike. It all came to a head there.” (Read what else Everett and Jeff Hiller had to say about their late costar here.)
Here are some other highlights from the episode titled “NNP”:
* It was a blast getting reacquainted with Sam and Joel (#FriendshipGoals) as they walked in the park and played Pound It or Pass (a game they created where they joke about which strangers they’d gladly sex up). In addition, I loved watching Joel freak Sam out by telling her that he loves her, which made her playfully flee the scene. “You know I don’t have the infrastructure to go this fast!” she joked. And in just a couple short minutes, I realized how much I missed these two.
* Trisha’s daughter is heading off to college, which means the newly single mom is preparing to be an empty nester. I’m sure she’ll handle that life change in a totally calm and extremely rational manner, right?
* Didn’t Sam’s “teeny ‘tini” jingle make you want to slam some cocktails with Sam and Joel?
So what’d you think of Somebody Somewhere‘s premiere? Grade the episode below, then light up the comments!
