"Curb" Opened Up

I don't have mixed feelings about the season of "Curb Your Enthusiasm" that wrapped last weekend. Not only was it an excellent stretch of episodes, it opened up new perspectives on the character of "Larry David." Usually aging shows looking to freshen themselves will bring on a marriage or a baby or new castmembers (see "House"), but "Curb" went the separation route and it paid off beautifully. When the hurricane family the Blacks showed up in episode 1, it looked like they would be the big new source of energy -- but it was Cheryl's bolt that was the jolt, with the Blacks as more of a bonus add-on.

Cheryl's departure from Larry's life put him in an entirely new context. He was always impossible and neurotic, but, like Cheryl, we generally assumed there was more to him. When she split, we could no longer assume that. Suddenly, Larry seemed like more of a sad, lonely case than an eccentric rich guy -- pathetic, almost, especially after most of his friends decided to "go with Cheryl." I began to form more of an emotional attachment to Larry than I had during any of the previous five seasons. He started to look like a lost boy with an attachment disorder, and I even found myself a little worried about him. The scene in which he eats alone at a restaurant after Cheryl leaves him, and he proceeds to have a shout-off with the Cell Phone Guy, had an unexpected strain of poignancy.

Of course, pairing him with Loretta Black, and enabling the Blacks to stay, was both comic brilliance and a nice vote of confidence in Larry's psychological future. It was brilliant because, like a number of episodes this season, it teased and upended years of talk that "Seinfeld" was racist, and it was consoling because we knew that Larry was now in good hands. I cherish the image of Loretta out-Susie-ing Susie Greene.