Slightly Surreal Moment Overexplicated

Sometimes when we pop an episode of "Battlestar Galactica" or "Friday Night Lights" into the DVD player and the whole "Previously On..." montage launches, I imagine what it would be like if someone were to take certain moments in my life and try to provide a 30-second onslaught of background information that would allow viewers new to the story to understand (and possibly enjoy) the current installment.

It seems like in some cases the "Previously On..." segment would go on so long and get tangled up in so many subterranean narratives that it would take up most of the episode, and the targeted moment would only make a brief appearance at the very end. (Now that I think about it, I'm pretty sure I've seen an "ER" episode with exactly this structure.)

For example:



The "Previously On..." medley for this particular moment might include any or all of the following hints & reminders:

• How a pair of red size 6 faux patent-leather slingbacks with 3" heels came to be at our house (references to Marilyn Monroe, Jane Siberry, and a giddy mother-daughter afternoon at Payless, among other things)... how one of the pair met its demise after spending the winter under a rosemary bush in the garden... and how the other one emerged from the basement six weeks later to star in this little drama.

• The several ingenious but uncooperative fishhooks that were pioneered prior to this one (including one made from fragments of wicker that have been falling out of the laundry hamper since the day I kicked it down the hall... Oh, nevermind why.). The wails of frustration that accompanied these failed attempts, which we have come to recognize as signs of an intractable determination to succeed. Plus the Nancy Drew movie that inspired this fishing expedition in the first place, which I didn't even know about until I started conducting interviews for this post.

• Some token explanation of Josie's urgent need for a copy of the Good Book, which would draw us into a tale of kidnappery & coerced oath-taking too sinister to go into here. It might also be illuminating to review Josie's previously expressed feelings about the Bible, which have mostly been so scornful as to make this sudden request something of a shock.

• And then there's the question of how the red Oxford Bible, a relic from a Peace Studies class with Professor Jerry Frost that had been gathering dust on a bedroom shelf for at least a decade, wound up in the dining room -- which I suspect would involve a flashback to a certain wedding...

But maybe you don't need all that backstory. Maybe the thing stands on its own as a simple, classic tale of parallel quests: A boy is after a shoe. A girl is after a Bible. They must overcome difficulties and false starts, but they find time to encourage each other along the way, and both acquire their respective Grails in the end.

Do we really need to know any more than that?

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