Ringer Review – Yea, This Show is Not Improving

Holding out hope that Ringer‘s going to get better while you’re not paying attention? Dream on.

The least offensive thing about this episode: the ugly leopard coat with what is hopefully faux fur. Bridget's use of a blue dress tied into a shirt is a close second.

This week I focused more on doodling the way the N’s are in the graphic logo for “Ringer” than feeling compelled to take notes on the episode which was titled “What Are You Doing Here, Ho-Bag?” (I can’t even begin to share my feelings on this. This episode title is crap.)

We start the episode out with huge mistakes, like having Bridget walk into the building she lives in while pretending to be Siobhan, while saying into the phone, “Hey, it’s Bridget.” And by now, people know that Siobhan has a twin named Bridget. She follows this up by talking about Siobhan in the third person. It’s like she’s begging to be caught. This is bad soap opera stuff. And that’s when I start getting annoyed that Sarah Michelle Gellar wanted to leave her role of Buffy the Vampire Slayer because it was so much work, it had been such a long time, etc etc… only to come back and do another one hour TV show where she plays not one, but two characters. I realize I have no ground to really be mad at an actress for what they decide to do, but it does sting a little bit.

Another soap opera moment involved Siobhan being shocked when Henry mentioned her (Bridget’s fake) miscarriage. Did Siobhan think Bridget would magically get pregnant? Of course not. Naturally the pregnancy would come up, and Bridget had to fake her way out of it. If Siobhan is such a mastermind, why doesn’t she realize that?

Later in the show Siobhan is arrested for being Bridget, but luckily they did not do us the dishonor of pretending this was Arrested Development (a far superior show, but a comedy) and two twins could be mistaken so easily. Siobhan is revealed not to be Bridget and let free.

The Juliet storyline gave us a moments pause this week, wondering if she was lying about being raped. We learned that her Mom is a total bitch, and that Mr. Carpenter allegedly raped another girl. In the meantime, there was (first) a fun moment where Juliet’s Mom said all her daughter needed (for that day) was her Mom, a garden omelet (why do I always type “omelette” like I want my food to be French and fancy? Oh, I answered my own question.), and the three B’s (Bergdorf, Barneys and Bendals.) My note here was that it sounded like a pretty great date, aside from Juliet’s trauma.

The big revealed at the end of this episode was Siobhan proving to Henry that Bridget is pretending to be her. That’s like, in the evil twin handbook. And this already almost happened with Sutton and Emma on The Lying Game, but Sutton was almost drowned on her way to doing it. Meanwhile, The Lying Game (ABC Family) is about to deploy a plot device that Ringer used much earlier on, wherein the fake twin tells the fake best friend (Gemma/Mads) everything. It’s … interesting to see how two similar shows handle such similar plot devices.

Let me be clear. The Lying Game is doing better.

Ringer airs Tuesdays on The CW.