30 Rock Recap: The Fighting Irish

Title: “The Fighting Irish”
Original airdate: March 8, 2007
GMMR Recapper: Brian

For the second straight week I felt a little underwhelmed by 30 Rock. I don’t know, maybe it’s The Office hiatus that has me off-kilter, or the run of great episodes Tina Fey and Co. put up the last two months that raised the bar unfairly.

That said, there was a lot to laugh at and rave about in “The Fighting Irish.”

The premise is that Jack (Alec Baldwin) tries to help out his down-and-out brother Eddie (Nathan Lane. Why not an actual Baldwin brother?). At the same time, Jack tells Liz to cut staff. Does she have the heart for it? And Tracy seeks finds religion, a couple of times.

We open in the gym with some serious awkwardness between the two Liz’s. Our heroine gets tongue-tied at the sight of Other Liz (played by Anna Chlumsky, aka Vada from My Girl. I thought that was cool, anyway.)

Cut to Liz’s office. Who doesn’t love a video of a baby panda sneezing?

Liz: That is the cutest thing I’ve ever seen.
Jack: Isn’t that adorable? You have to fire 10 percent of your staff.
Liz: What?
Jack: We have to synergize backward overflow. I don’t write the policy Lemon. I only enforce it.

She doesn’t think she could do that to her staff, who at that moment back up her efforts to defend them with a game of office Marco Polo.

Pete thinks he can go her one better as far as problems go. Seems his wife found out he lied about that vasectomy. How could that backfire, right?

Tracy’s looking for religion. Juries get suspicious when you start looking after you get in trouble. Practicology turned him down after a hilarious testament of personal faith. Liz suggests Oprah, but that’s not for everyone.

Enter Nathan Lane! Can two Donaghys (or is it Donahees?) fit in one TV screen? Seems Papa Donaghy has died, and Eddie comes with the watch he wanted Jack to have. That’s touching. It won’t last. Last time Jack saw Eddie, he was bailing him out of Disney jail. And he hadn’t seen his dad since 1990.

Kenneth brings Tracy to his church, the Eighth Day Resurrected Covenant of the Holy Trinity. Wednesday services suffer from American Idol. Tracy just gets plain scared off.

Outside, the cast is kissing Liz’s butt in a stampede of job insecurity. Frank’s got a “Liz Rocks” hat on.

Jack tracks down Eddie at the YMCA. He went broke taking care of dad. The experience changed him. Now he talks the homeless into enlisting. And he won’t take Jack’s help.

Meanwhile, Liz catches Flower Guy smooching Other Liz on the elevator. That hurts. But she laughs it off, especially when she finds out she can fire the competition.

Liz has absolute power. She’s the Decider! It’s gone to her head, despite Pete’s protests. Things are lining up for old Liz Lemon.

Jack and Eddie are making up for lost time. Jack looked 10 years younger a few weeks ago. Now he looks 10 years older than usual. What’s up with that? Anyway, instead of taking Jack’s charity, he tells him to write a check to the nuns who cared for dad at Chicago All Saints Hospital. The moment inspires a family reunion.

Tracy talks to Jenna about Kaballah. It sounds expensive and gay, though. Nathan Lane makes the case for being Irish Catholic. After all, all is forgiven. Tracy likes this.

At the reunion (which includes ex-SNLers Molly Shannon and Siobhan Fallon as Donaghy sisters), the booze flows freely.

Katherine: I would like to make a toast to pop.
Jack: Well, we’ve been toasting pop for over an hour now. Maybe we should pace ourselves.
Katherine: Yeah, well why don’t you stop trying to control everything Jack.
Patricia: He was a wonderful father. He was always ready with a joke or rum balls in his pockets for the kids.
Katherine: Eddie? Come here you magnificent douchebag!

Down in accounting, Liz stops by for Other Liz’s performance review, which reveals she has plans for the future: kids. She’s fired.

Drunken Donaghys are an ugly site. So is Liz is firing everything that moves. She’s in a tizzy when the accounting department shows up in her office to protest Other Liz’s firing. Bye bye accounting department. Jack isn’t happy, so Liz reveals her problem with Other Liz and Flower Guy.

Jack: Lemon, is this about a boy?
Liz: Mmm hmm.
Jack: Good God in heaven. Who is he? What’s his name?
Liz: Flower Guy?
Jack: Lemon, you’ve gone chicken killer on me over a guy whose name you don’t know? And you still think our next president should be a woman?

Cerie reminds Liz to make her donation to Eddie’s charity and says she can just abbreviate it. Yup, all the checks are made out to C.A.S.H. Son of a bitch is right

Papa Donaghy enters Jack’s office and says Eddie’s dead but he wanted Jack to have his watch. Turns out he and Eddie mixed up who got to scam Jack. Fisticuffs fly, and Tip O’Neill and Bobby Sands got nothing on Bono and Sandra Day O’Connor. When the girls find out Pops is not dead, it’s a Donaghy rumble. And Liz goes down first.

Jack gave Eddie and Pops a three-day head start out of sportsmanship and love. He had to hire Other Liz back and give her a promotion – in Connecticut. Once again, he’s got Lemon’s back. Too bad Pete doesn’t. Just as she settles in for a romantic elevator ride with Flower Guy, Pete dives in.

Pete: Liz you forgot to give me the key to your place, and I need it. My wife knows about our little secret. I don’t know how she found out. God, I should have just gotten a vasectomy.
Liz: Let me explain.

In the closing, Jack sets Tracy straight about being Irish Catholic. Confession is no free pass. It comes with guilt, crushing guilt.

Tracy: I don’t think I want that. I want out.
Jack: Somehow I feel oddly guilty about that.

Brian is a new dad and a writer who used to spend his free time obsessing on The Office and the Mets and his oversized mutt Riley. Now instead of free time, he has a 9-lb. future Mets fan to watch TV with. Check out http://remote.lohudblogs.com/author/bhoward/ to catch his daily musings on 30 Rock and The Office.

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