"The Episode Where Maia Goes Crazy"

I have to admit, out of all the contributors to this blog, I have probably contributed the least. Well actually, with zero posts, I have definitely contributed the least. This is because I am currently about 9000 kilometers away from New Zealand; I would love to do a write up about one of my favourite characters or something, but if I'm anything to go by, Shortland Street generally leaves such a diffuse impression on its viewers that pretty much you just forget everyone within about a month of ceasing to watch the show.

However, due to the technological marvel that is YouTube, I no longer have to be so useless! wahaha. Lucky for me, there are like-minded* people out there who have done us all the favour of immortalizing one of Shortland Street's, and perhaps even just television itself's finest hours.

* the other day I was told by a complete stranger that my fascination with Brooke Freeman is, AND I QUOTE, "unhealthy". There is no such thing as too much love for Brooke Freeman. What I burn into my lawn every night while chanting Beth Allen's name is MY BUSINESS goddamnit!
um anyway,
Without further ado, I give you the aptly-titled Episode Where Maia Goes Crazy*

* this is not the actual episode name, just the name of the video on YouTube. Also, should you want to watch the entire episode in all its glory, you have to watch it in the order of "Shortland Street episode where Maia goes crazy part 1", then "Shortland Street episode where Maia goes crazy part 2", and then "Shortland Street episode where Maia goes crazy" - I have no idea why this is the case. Oh also worth checking out are the 30-odd twilight tribute videos the same user has uploaded.
The episode commences with the usual flashback to the previous episode(s). What we can glean from this is that the following things happened last time on Shortland Street:

-Sarah Potts and Brooke Freeman (i.e. the two hottest female characters on the show) exchanged HEATED WORDS -reowr! Unfortunately this does not result in any Dynasty-esque bitch slapping. Clearly the writers are saving this for a special occasion.

-Callum is orange, and also intent on thrusting his way into Brooke's pants in the least subtle way possible. This is because his horse-faced wife is probably already in Australia. Or maybe she isn't, to be honest it doesn't really matter because we all know they will end up having a gross affair anyway.

-Chris and some elephantine bow-tied socialite talk words for a bit, then Kip turns up, demolishing the ceiling with his forehead and possibly also knocking some low-flying aircraft out of the sky.
-Maia talks into a microphone, followed by shots of the other Jeffries sisters. Tania looks toward Libby as if to say "wait a minute, why aren't you two also Maori?". Unfortunately their gremlin mother is not present to answer this question that has been playing on the audiences' minds for LITERALLY YEARS.
Then the actual episode begins.

Okay so as the title would suggest, the premise of this episode is that Maia has turned into a rabid psychopath. It's lucky that this is clearly spelled out in the title as otherwise I doubt anyone would actually notice any difference in her behaviour. There is a long and surprisingly boring talk between the Jeffries sisters and not-yet-dead Shanti before the action shifts to Callum and the goddess that is Sarah Potts. Sarah then proceeds to put her clumsy hoof right into it by mentioning that her studly son Daniel is sticking it big time to Callum's shrieky midget daughter Sophie. She doesn't have multiple sclerosis yet I think, also T.K. is there but he is not shrieking about loyalty and values in a broad New Zealand accent or taking his top off so essentially he does not contribute to the scene other than to stand next to Sarah looking broody and not shaving his sideburns short enough.They'll totally never break up.

The scene then shifts to Kip and Alice's house, where they are showing around Kip's hoity-toity father. The less said about this scene, the better; I think the combination of Alice's air raid siren of a voice and the fact that Kip's forehead can be seen from the International Space Station distract me so much that- oh god Kip just said "No worries", I think one of the lesser-used annexes of my brain just imploded in protest. In response to this, Alice lets out a low-frequency purr that only dogs can hear.

NEXT SCENE.

oh god it's Daniel and Sophie in a state of semi-sexy. This is the last thing anyone needs. Unaware of Sarah Pott's blunder, they are gently cooing and caressing eachother in a manner akin to canaries of some kind of marsupial. Luckily the increasingly icky physicalities are interrupted by Yvonne's voice yelping "SOPHIE". Then Callum walks in. Why his voice was temporarily that of a 70 year old (in the immortal words of Tania) "OLD TART" is not explained.

The action then shifts to that house that may or may not belong to all of the Jeffries sisters. Man, do you guys remember when Libby was Eve on Being Eve, the greatest show ever? THAT WAS SO GODDAMN RAD, I LOVED THAT SHOW. She always plays the best characters.

gone but not forgotten :'(

Back at the whatever Callum's last name is household, Callum is somehow even more orange and Sophie looks like a 37 year old murderous Slovenian midget intent on seducing Peter Sarsgard.

um, yikes.

things head back over to the den of horror that is Kip and Alice's - hoity-toity has turned up again, only to find that Alice is sitting at the kitchen table emitting white noise and Kip's forehead is doing his best impression of trying to outstage the establishing shot of the Skytower immediately preceeding it.

BACK TO THE JEFFRIESES

Maia is off her goddamn nut - thankfully we have the spooky background music to explain that this is not normal.

ADBREAK.

Oh Jesus fucking Christ we're back to forehead and his fancy father. Kip says the words "Eggs Benny", triggering an enzyme reaction in my spinal fluid that starts to eat away at my brain stem. Also, Kip is sitting backward on a chair like he is the long-lost second funky uncle from Full House. His father then makes disparaging comments on his facial hair, despite the fact that he has about 1/16th the amount of facial hair his father does.

Thankfully we are then taken to the hospital, where Maia is wigging the fuck out.


powerin' up her lazerz

Tania comes in, Maia then laughs hysterically for a while. WHO CAN BLAME HER?

HOORAH TRACEY! Inexplicably Tracey is also a perturbing shade of purple-brown; upon seeing the Tower of Babel that is Kip's forehead she pulls this face:

then Alice approaches with a metallic grinding noise that is apparently supposed to be talking. Kip says the word "bozo". The scene concludes with some ~REAL MEDICAL DRAMA~ which involves a whole lot of people being wheeled into the room in no particular order.

Meanwhile in the car park, Tania tries valiantly to out-crazy Maia and fails miserably:

Scotty is also there, unaware that his weird Indian wife will be haunting the opening credits as a ghost extremely soon.

Back to the upper stratosphere, where Kip's forehead* is meandering about vomiting out vaguely medical-sounding words such as "HDU" and "rolling".

*forehead jokes will never be not funny, okay?

We are granted another brief reprieve from the hell that is looking at Kip as things are taken back to the Potts/T.K. Samuels house, where Sarah Potts is clumsily fishing for information about her brother-turned-son's sex life.

babies come from what?

Daniel then bounces off the handle, thus proving Sarah Pott's inherent failure as a mother. I guess maybe she should just go back to being his sister?

Kip happens again. Like a car accident or a deadly virus.

after the ad break we are STILL with Kip, who thankfully keeps things really attractive

every woman's dream.

Alice greets him by letting loose the howl of the a betrayed wife's vengeful spirit extinguishing the life of her husband from beyond the grave. Then both are killed in a house fire. Well, not actually, but we can all dream, can't we? The end shot of this scene goes on for faaaar too long, as if the producers realise that there is comedic value in the idea that these kind of people actually exist and want to milk it for all its worth.

Back to Jeffries-town, the three sisters are, respectively, awesome, batshit insane, and inexplicably ethnic.

Woooo great, now we are forced back into the sticky realm of underage sex courtesy of Sophie and Daniel; there is talking which is concluded by some partial nudity on Sophie's part, revealing her bizarre, half-developed breasts and inducing projectile vomiting in roughly 50% of the viewing audience.

Kip is for some reason brought to our attention AGAIN; Alice is in the background melting small plastic soldiers with her vocal cords when Kip's rhino father turns up with a small Asian man, who Kip then utilizes to engage in some casual homophobia. Throughout the scene, Alice is standing at a 45 degree angle and shrieking at pitches above human hearing capability. I then skip to the end of the scene because I hate everyone in it with an undying passion except maybe the Asian man because he doesn't talk.

Meanwhile, in E.D., Tania is assisting her bonkers sister in her time of need by being a total bitch. Maia then loses the plot completely, pulling a series of amazing faces and then proceeding to pull out her "emotionally involving" imitation of a crazy person, which in the usual Shortland Street fashion is kind of hilarious. The episode, and this blog post, therefore ends on what I feel is an extremely high note:

THIS PICTURE

And thus concludes this wrap-up. I don't know if you guys feel any richer from sharing this with me, I know that I certainly don't.