Larry has to deal with orgasm car seats, baseball flops and the dreaded Mr. Softee.
There’s a little something for everyone in this edition of Curb Your Enthusiasm. If you like baseball, softball, therapy, anti-racism glasses or orgasms, Larry and company have you covered in this excellent offering.
In the episode’s open, Larry and his new girlfriend (Ana Gasteyer) are sharing lunch with the Garlin’s. She excuses herself for a piano lesson and while Jeff goes to the men’s room, Susie asks Larry to get a baseball signed by Mookie Wilson for Jeff’s birthday at the upcoming baseball expo. He agrees but as they talk, a Mr. Softee ice cream truck pulls up across the street, music blaring, and Larry goes into a trance-like state.
After lunch in therapy with Dr Thurgood, Larry admits to having a very traumatic incident involving a Mr. Softee truck in his teens. In the back of said truck, Larry played strip poker with the daughter of the local ice cream truck driver. Losing terribly, Larry had to strip naked just when her dad jumped into the truck. Little Larry ran like hell outside and was laughed at by the neighborhood kids and adults.
Larry thinks if he had won more poker hands and she had to take off her shirt, his entire life might have been different. The doctor doesn’t get too deep into the diagnosing Larry’s issues before David has to run to his championship softball game.
The team is led by Larry’s over-excited mechanic Yari (Robert Smigel, who doesn’t even try not to sound like Triumph the Insult Dog. I kept waiting for Smigel to say their team was going to poop on the heads of the other team). Pre-game, Yari gives the team an increasingly violent pep talk that leaves everyone a little on edge. But favor is on their side and the game is looking won by Team Yari until a Mister Softee truck pulls up and totally distracts Larry from catching an easy grounder that costs them the game.
The next day at the garage, Yari is livid and doesn’t end up fixing Larry’s car which is in his shop. Instead he makes the passenger car seat even more broken and lays Larry out in a screaming fit that ends their friendship.
Now not only is Larry plagued by the Mister Softee song, but he’s also a game loser with a broken car. He tells his woes to J.B., who is having his own trouble in New York getting into buildings because he’s black. Larry tells him to wear glasses because white people don’t question people with glasses. At the baseball expo, J.B. tries a pair out and, sure enough, the duo is allowed into the sold-out event.
In line for Mookie Wilson, Larry runs into his therapist and starts telling him about his awful game. Thurgood tells Larry about his client who was guitarist for Grand Funk Railroad and has a similar problem. The name-dropping spooks Larry and his own fears of client-doctor privileges being revealed. Distracted, Larry looks to the next table where famed World Series Red Sox ball dropper Bill Bucknell is signing. Larry engages him about his own failure the day before and Bill helps him take it in stride. Larry offers to take him to lunch and Bill gets Mookie to sign Larry’s ball.
On the street, Buckner is ridiculed by everyone much to Larry’s own narcissistic dismay. He takes Bill to the Garlin’s for some peace and reveals to Jeff the Mookie ball. He throws it to Bill to catch, but he misses it and they all watch it fly out the window lost to the NYC streets.
The story culminates in the last minutes with a fire at an apartment building. Larry and Bill run into one another on the street and they look up to see a woman and her infant screaming for help at a smoke-filled window. The mother drops her baby for the fireman below to catch, but the tike bounces and seems ready to splat on the street until Buckner leaps into action to make the catch. He’s a hero once again! Ridiculous and hysterical all at once, it’s a sports fan’s inside joke come true.
Some of the other highlights include J.B. exploring his new anti-racist glasses power and then his discovery of Larry’s passenger seat’s new lady pleasuring powers. The discovery that Larry’s car seat is now a mechanical orgasm machine is over-the-top but works. It not only gets Larry’s new lady hot and satisfied, but it also gives Susie a ride of a lifetime to his horror. You don’t know whether to wince or laugh at the pan back-and-forth between Susie’s “O-face” and Larry’s “Make it Stop” face on their ride midtown. It also leads to an episode end pay-off you can see coming a mile away but still works nicely to help tie up the great story threads.
Some stats and info about Curb Your Enthusiasm, “Mister Softee”
TV SHOW – Curb Your Enthusiasm
SEASON/EPISODE – Season 8, Episode 9
AIRED ON – March 4th, 2011
NETWORK/STREAMING SERVICE – HBO, Max
GENRE – Comedy
CREATED BY – Larry David
CAST – Larry David, Cheryl Hines, Jeff Garlin, Susie Essman, J.B. Smoove, Richard Lewis, Ted Danson
This review originally appeared on TV Geek Army.