This Is Us 5.15: “Jerry 2.0”

“Some love stories are written in he starts. But some others are written together. Two people the universe had no plans for, writing their story in the stars together.”
- Miguel

Because of COVID, we are two episodes short this season, which makes this episode the penultimate episode of season 5. It looks like, much like when Kate got married, we’ll be ending the season with a wedding. We hope, anyway. Because it is Kevin, and you sometimes never know.

But this week find the Person clan gathering to share in Kevin and Madison’s bachelor/bachelorette parties. And admittedly, I have to say on the whole, the ladies had more fun than the guys but both parties were interesting and moved the story forward. And in a way, so did the flashback. So, let’s start there. In the past, we see Kevin come home from pilot seasons, not having landed anything. Sophie is happy to have him back because their time apart was really hard for her. Randall and Beth are dealing with the possibility of being apart for the summer if she takes an internship in Boston, but Kevin keeps saying it will be “no big deal”. Man, he can be clueless sometimes. They all head up to the cabin for the weekend (I’m guessing it’s the first time Kate’s been back there since what went down with Marc) and she’s off brooding. As Rebecca ends up giving Beth some great motherly advice, Kevin and Randall watch jerry McGuire. It is apparently Kevin’s favorite movie and he saw it with Jack in theaters when it first released. This becomes important later on. But, after watching again, Kevin writes a mission statement to Sophie about where he sees their lives. Clearly none of that happened. At least not with Sophie.

In the present, Kevin and the guys (Toby, Randall, Nicky and Miguel) head to the cabin and it’s kind of a sad affair. They’re sitting around and Kevin is kind of mopey because he had a call from Sophie earlier in the day and it’s just put him in a weird mood. Toby is oddly quiet, and Miguel is obsessing over Rebecca. And then there’s Nicky who just flat out tells it like it is and that’s kind of awesome. They end up watching Jerry McGuire again and Nicky points out that Kevin is basically Jerry. Nicky thinks Kevin is marrying Madison because he thinks it’s the right thing to do but Kevin finds his uncle’s assessment rude and mean. Randall comes through though and drags everyone outside for a campfire and some real talk. They air their worries and life stuff, and Toby admits that he really needs a job and there’s one prospect in San Francisco but that would be nearly impossible. Obviously he’s not told Kate any of this and this just adds fuel to the fire that makes me think they are headed for a break-up before we get to the old Rebecca flash forward. Nicky admits that he only had one relationship half a century ago and it failed, and he’s been scared to try again and so anything romantic just puts him in a bad mood. And then there’s Miguel who spent a lot of time worrying about how he and Rebecca came together because, we all know that Rebecca and Jack had one of those “written in the stars” romances. But Miguel points out that some people get written together. Two people who you wouldn’t think would end up together, do. And I think that helps put Kevin in a better mindset. That night, he deletes Sophie’s number from his phone. So, maybe he’s ready for the big day.

Over with the ladies, things get a little awkward when the male model Kate hired to come so they could paint him naked. He and Madison used to date. Oops! But, hey, he’s handsome and still down to let them paint him. Admittedly, I thought they were actually going to physically pain ton him when he first said it but them painting his portrait made a ton more sense. As they do, we learn that he ghosted Madison and then they turn to her relationship with Kevin. Kate thinks that Kevin would have fallen for Madison eventually, even without the babies, but Madison isn’t so sure. He didn’t exactly ghost her, but he wasn’t exactly responding to her flirty texts. Then, later when they ae playing a game where Nicky asked Kevin questions about Maidson and Madison had to guess the answer, things seem to be going great because they get the first question right. Then when Madison explains what she expects they’ll be doing once they are empty nesters (lots of travel), Kevin replies that it’s a trick question because he never wants to get old. This triggers Kate to remember his mission statement from the cabin where he tells Sophie that they’ll grow old together. She worries that her brother doesn’t make Madison happy. Maidson assures her friend and future sister-in-law that she is happy, and that Kevin has shown up for in ways she never would have expected from the pretty-boy famous actor. But that night as she watches the video over, the look on her face doesn’t reflect that happiness. You can tell she’s unsure of what she’s walking into.

So, that tees us up for yet another Pearson wedding. It seems that Kevin will get what he wanted: a wife and kids by the time he’s forty. But there’s still a lot of answers we’re missing to fill in some of the gaps to get from where we are now to that future trip to the cabin where Rebecca is dying. Where’s Kate? Is Madison still around? And will we see any more of adult Jack and Haley. IF we do, does that mean we might see Nick and Franny, too? What about Tess, Annie and Deja? They’re only going to have 18 more episodes to fit in so much story and we won’t be getting it until 2022.