S1E6: One-Trick Pony (2007)

  Having just been fired from her job in New York only now does the permanence of her stay in Hudson become clearer to Lou as she is thrust into working on the range, forced to help Scott deworm geese. The horse Amy helps in this episode opens a plotline that won’t be touched on again at all until season 5, and which won’t really be explored at length until Georgie arrives in season 6.

Carl, whose last name we never learn, arrives in Hudson to visit Lou for the first time since her return to Hudson after Marion’s death, and, presumably, for the first time in the year or so since their relationship began. Though Carl has almost no experience around horses, like Ty a few episodes prior, it was he who provided the crucial insight into how to solve Pirate’s case—albeit by an act of brazen disobedience.

Carl, however, is not in Hudson just to spend a romantic week with his girlfriend, or to finally meet her family. Instead, he is presented as a rather devious boyfriend with ulterior motives, namely that he’s taken a job in Chicago and wants—or rather, needs—Lou to go with him, since he convinced his upper management that he’s a bona fide family man, even though at the time of his hiring, he was not yet engaged, let alone married.

As is often the case, Maggie’s was the site of at least one (two, in fact) important conversations in this episode: one revealing Jack’s birthday, and another debating the merits of alfalfa cubes versus alfalfa pellets. For the record, I agree with Marion: I have always preferred cubes over pellets. Regarding Jack’s birthday, we can perform some simple calculations based on some general assumptions and information that will not be revealed until much later in the show. We can assume that the show is set in the present, so the year 2007 in the show is the year 2007 in reality. It will later be revealed that Jack had a younger sister (but I’ll save a discussion of what happened to er for a much later commentary), and that that younger sister was born in 1947. In season 5, we will learn that his birthday that year (that is, in the calendar year 2011) was a particularly special one. If we assume that the birthday in the fifth season was his 75^th, then he would’ve been born before his sister, in 1941, and the birthday in the first season would be his 71^st.

Having been sent up to the barn loft just to retrieve a cable, ever-inquisitive Mallory does more than just procure the cable, rummaging through Carl’s belongings and inadvertently discovering, then taking, the engagement ring he plans to propose to Lou with. Taking the ring box out of the suitcase, and the ring out of the box, Mallory takes the troubling evidence of Carl’s true motive for the visit to Amy, but the ring is not put back in its place afterward.

Another cinematographic choice that is definitionally integral to the show becomes important in this episode. Very often, during the course of each episode, all the characters involved in the episode are together, but only once during the episode, and nearly always, as here, at the ranch house for a family dinner. Two activities are planned for this family dinner: Jack’s birthday celebration, which traditionally includes a boxed cake, and Carl’s attempted proposal to Lou which goes awry when he opens the box to propose and discovers the ring is missing, thereby ruining any element of a potential romantic surprise. Having lost the element of surprise but having recovered the ring when Mallory returns with it, Carl proposes a second time. Impressed by the ring and because she believes the proposal is motivated by Carl’s love for her, Lou initially accepts, but quickly rejects it and ends their relationship once she discovers the engagement was a ruse set up to solidify both of their chances at jobs in Chicago.

Bear this episode in mind as you watch the following seasons, and in particular, note how similar Lou’s reaction to Carl’s proposal was to the next time she was proposed to, and when and where the next move she will be confronted will be.

The episode ends with the whole family—sans Carl—back at the table having the time of their life celebrating another wonderful year of life for their, and our, beloved Grandpa Jack. The very final shot is of Amy with her arms up, riding Pirate in circles. Remember this as you watch the later seasons; it will become important again later, especially in the season 5 finale.