Loveday Writing

This episode, which marks the halfway point of the season, is all about Taya’s ninth birthday.

The episode kicks off with Lauren and Ned getting ready for Taya’s birthday party, with Ned having stayed up all night to bake her three-tier birthday cake and make healthy snacks for her friends to eat. Ned tells Lauren that his mother, Annie, is visiting.

Later, when Leroy arrives with Taya’s friends, he brings junk food for the kids to eat, which Lauren and Ned immediately ban. Meanwhile, Trevor wants to intervene, but Daffy tells him not to, as Lauren and Ned have to learn as parents on their own. Trevor later meets Leroy in the laundry, with Leroy agreeing with Trevor that the kids should have junk food at the party, as Rochelle, in contrast, use to keep parties casual. Trevor shows Leroy the junk food being stored in his washing machine, and Leroy tells him he’ll help distribute it to the kids.

Meanwhile, Dana rescues Lauren from a boring mum chat with one of the other school mums, and Lauren tells her that Cowboy found Taya’s dad. Dana tells Lauren that Taya needs her real father. Back in the kitchen, Annie tells Ned that his efforts to make Taya’s birthday party perfect, especially his cooking, are not being appreciated.

Later, Cowboy shows up in the backyard and Lauren talks to him by the campervan, whilst Ned realises the kids are eating junk food and tries to find where it came from. During his search, he finds Lauren talking with Cowboy and mistakenly believes that he is here to perform a Cowboy act for the birthday party. Cowboy agrees and tells a tale that mirrors Ned search for Trevor and Leroy, after he catches them in the laundry.

Meanwhile, in the kitchen, Annie tells Lauren that whilst Ned is naturally paternal, that they are similar in that they don’t like kids, and emphasises that nothing is wrong with her for feeling that way. After the party, which is ruined once the cake is accidentally destroyed when Taya runs into Lauren on the stairs as she’s trying to run away, Cowboy tells Lauren that Taya’s father’s name is Jarad Kirilima, a Tiwi Islands man.

When Lauren tells Dana about her last interaction with Cowboy, Dana tells her that Jarad was popular in high school and that the Kirilima’s are a good family, and whilst Ned is a good father figure, he’s not her father and she is not his daughter, and she needs her paternal side of the family.

Later, Lauren goes to Taya’s room to apologise for the birthday party chaos, Taya tells her that she and Ronelle would go to Nightcliff Beach at sunset and drink a Paul’s Ice Coffee milk together, as she doesn’t like people looking at her. Meanwhile, as the party mess is being cleaned up, Daffy is playing the guitar and singing, and Dana tells Daffy that she would love to sing with her.

The episode ends with Lauren, Ned and Taya at Nightcliff Beach drinking Paul’s Ice Coffees at sunset like Taya wanted. Taya tells them that Ronelle told her that her dad likes Paul’s Ice Coffee. The final moments of the episode show Lauren thinking about whether to tell Ned and Taya that she has found Taya’s biological father.

Overall, I felt that this was a good but not great episode. It showed the ongoing conflict between Ned and Lauren’s differing views and desires on parenthood, which is bound to blow up later on, and whilst I enjoyed the chase between Ned, Leroy and Trevor, I did feel it was a little over dramatic. There also seemed to be a continuity error with Leroy mentioning Ronelle kept it casual with birthday parties, yet Taya says later on that she didn’t have a party for her birthday. I’m not sure how I feel about Annie’s appearance, she adds to the above mentioned conflict by providing Ned’s perspective on it all that he is not expressing, however I felt she was underused a little.

It will be interesting to see where we go from here, now that we know the identity of Taya’s biological father.

Stray Observations:

Episode title origin – Lauren’s intention for Taya’s birthday party, and Ned repeating it to Taya at the birthday party.

-Apparently a school mum by the name of Vivian is not allowed in the fun mum group chat that the other school mums have going.

Best one liners and interactions:

• “Get on board or get in the bin.” (Lauren to Leroy on serving Ned’s healthy food to the kids at the birthday party)