Previously on Freaks and Geeks: Pilot, Beers and Weirs, Tricks and Treats, Kim Kelly is My Friend, Tests and Breasts, I'm with the Band, Carded and Discarded, Girlfriends and Boyfriends, We've Got Spirit, The Diary, Looks and Books, The Garage Door, Chokin' and Tokin', Dead Dogs and Gym Teachers, Noshing and Moshing, Smooching and Mooching. 

The Little Things was directed by Jake Kasdan and was written by Jake Kasdan, Judd Apatow, and Paul Feig.

Plot Summary: Sam discovers that life as Cindy's boyfriend is not nearly as exciting as he had imagined. Ken's girlfriend, Amy, confesses a shocking secret, putting Ken in an awkward situation. Lindsay struggles with asking Vice President George Bush a question during an assembly.

My Thoughts: This is the episode that launched the comedy career of Seth Rogen.  Judd Apatow so huge potential in his portrayal of a guy who is pondering whether or not he is homosexual because of a secret his girlfriend revealed to him.  After this episode Apatow gave Rogen a part in his series called "Undeclared" and while in production Rogen showed Apatow a script he wrote that became "Superbad".  The roles in "Freaks and Geeks", "Undeclared", and the script of "Superbad" led to his inclusion in the cast of "The 40 Year Old Virgin" etc. etc. etc.  I wonder if Rogen wasn't cast in Freaks and Geeks if he and Apatow would be the Comedy Kings of Hollywood.

You sort of get that a long period of time has passed since the last episode since we hear Bill bring up the past episode in which he had seven minutes in heaven.  Also I like to think that they skipped the winter months since winters in the Midwest are pretty uneventful and colorless and the cast of this show was very colorful.  Also Cindy must have been going out with Sam for some time since she is dining with the Weirs family and bragging up being a young Republican and talking about Vice President Bush.  Yes the show takes place in 1980 remember so in the fall would have been the election so this is possibly the spring of 1981.  Oh and that dinner scene makes me squirm especially when Cindy talks politics. 

OK I have rambled enough,  Sam and Cindy are having problems.  Sam decides to give her a precious family heirloom necklace.  It seems they are going steady, as the kids say, and Sam is making the transition to being a cool kid.  Well he doesn't quite like it because they only do things that she wants to do.  Sam decides to give her the necklace when he takes her to see a movie, not just any movie, but the funniest movie at the time, The Jerk.  I love that movie and if I ever had a girlfriend that didn't laugh at it I would dump her on the spot.  I am quite serious about that so be forewarned.  The funniest part is that Sam asks permission to design the date on his own.  I always made the plans for my high school girlfriends.  It was rather annoying because I always wanted the girl to take the reigns and show some initiative which probably explains why I like the cowgirl positions so much.

Sam gives Cindy the necklace while in the theater and she looks at it like a turd in the punch bowl.  She is somewhat pissed because it isn't her style, it isn't gold, and Sam didn't spend any money on it.  Well she is a Republican so we have to stimulate the economy by buying our high school girlfriends gold jewelry.  I did once and that blew up in my face.  I determined that the only jewelry I would buy in a relationship before marriage was an engagement ring.  Gold is expensive.  Apparently the thought doesn't count with Cindy.  She also hates the movie which is funny because she laughed at Sam's imitations of the movie in the previous episode.  She asks the question that would make me break up..."Will popcorn make this movie funnier?"  OH MY GOD!  HOW DARE SHE SAY THAT ABOUT THE JERK!  So because Cindy is bored and she must see Sam seething in his chair, she decides to give him a hickey.  Nothing says "I love you" more than giving someone a bruise.  Sam loathes Cindy.  Because of the hickey Sam wears a turtleneck and this annoys Cindy because she wants the school to see her handiwork and when she sees the turtleneck she screams "WHAT THE HELL IS THAT?".  GOD!  I wish I had a girlfriend like that in high school.  Some of the things my girlfriend did for me, well I would have loved to show that off to the entire school.  "Oh daily church service you must be put on hold while my girlfriend displays how much she loves me."  Cindy once again takes a dump on Sam's necklace.  I am glad that Sam had the backbone to break up with her when she tried to wiggle her way out to introduce VP Bush, which was hilarious because of her tears.  I'd cry to if I had to ever introduce a member of that family.

Bill asks if their break up means that Sam would resume sitting with the geeks at lunch and when Sam answers positively Bill says, "Thank God." 

The Ken storyline...ok I am going to give away a major spoiler so be warned.  Ken and his girlfriend, Amy the Tuba Girl(not Tub Girl...eww), have gotten pretty serious and she lets him in on a major secret.  It turns out that when Amy was born she was born with both male and female genetalia.  Her parents and doctors determined she had more "potential" to be a female so that is what they went with.  Ken immediately has questions and withdraws from Amy.  Would I?  Yes, probably.  That is a huge secret to share with a 18 year old guy and Ken has some major thinking to do.  He questions whether or not he is gay because obviously by kissing Amy that means he is kissing a guy because she was born with male genetalia, right?  During a freak sleepover Ken shares this secret with the guys.  Daniel says that Ken should break up with Amy because a surgery doesn't change her from being a guy.  Ken says that he thinks he loves her and Daniel questions if that makes Ken gay and then he wonders.

There is a hilarious montage in which Ken puts himself through a series of tests but first he goes the the school guidance counselor Mr. Rosso because Ken thinks he is gay.  Oh that scene is so awkward!  Rosso basically interrogates Ken into finding out why Ken thinks Rosso is gay.  Ken leaves to do his own testing.  He puts on a David Bowie album, then a heavy metal album and then a disco album to see which he responds to best.  Shockingly that didn't give him an answer so he then pulls out the big guns or should I say bigg'uns.  He then looks at a girlie nudie mag and then at a gay porno mag.  I think that scene is where the lightbulb lit inside Apatows head that Rogen could be a star.

Daniel makes a crack at a gathering and Ken takes it personally and Amy finds out that Ken told their secret.  Amy splits and Ken walks down the road alone.  Daniel pulls up in his Trans-Am.  No words are spoken and they leave it at that.  The next day Amy finds out that Ken didn't tell the secret to everyone.  Ken has a heart to heart with Sam in the school bathroom and Sam questions what the hell is wrong with Ken.  I love how all these storylines collide.  Ken and Amy make up and it is so sweet when he yells "Hail to the Chief!  Yeah, this song rocks!"

This episode was nominated for an award from GLAAD, the Gay and Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation, and it is easy to see why.  The writers poke fun at Ken's perdicament but it is taken seriously and not at one time is Amy a butt of a joke.  This topic was walking through a potential minefield and they avoided being blown to bits.  Of course they didn't win, that year the award went to another NBC series called Ed.

Damn, I have said a lot and I'm not even to the Lindsay storyline.  Republican censors...open-minded questions...dad's store shirt...sticking it to the man.

Things to Watch For:  The t-shirt Lindsay wears...Oh I should have downloaded it a long time ago.  The Freaks and Geeks website had jpeg images of it so that you could print them onto iron-on pages so you could make your own t-shirt of the Weirs' Sporting Goods Store.

Ben Stiller makes a guest appearance as a secret service agent.  When I first saw the episode I thought it was Tom Cruise but it is Stiller and he does a great job with Rosso.

Two of the deleted scenes for this one are amazing, but one got cut for time and the other got cut because it was mortifying and creepy even by the standards of a show that had Nick stalking Lindsay for the better part of a season. The first scene is a sequel to Ken's failed visit to Mr. Rosso, in which we discover that while Rosso's not gay,  another teacher is and Rosso sends Ken to that teacher and it is none other than Mr. Kowchevski, which creeps me out not that he's gay but that he says Daniel has bedroom eyes in the eipsode Tests and Breasts. The other scene features Cindy forcing Sam to recreate their slow dance from the pilot, and to sing "Come Sail Away" and it is absolutely, wonderfully horrible. I think the title of the deleted scene is "The Most Painful Scene We Ever Shot". If you've got the DVDs, you have to view these scenes. They may be the two best cut scenes in the entire package.

Speaking of Kowchevski, his one scene in this episode is when he tells the freaks that the Secret Service wants their hangout area of the school cleared.  Daniel asks "How are we going to plan our coup?" Kowchevski then makes some comments about how he'd like to see Daniel in jail which in perspective of the deleted scene may be a tad much.

Guns versus holsters?  HILARIOUS!

Music: "If My Friends Could See Me Now" by Linda Clifford; "Hail to the Chief," performed by McKinley High Band; "Fashion" by David Bowie; "The Road" by Jackson Browne

Trivia: In this episode, set in 1981, Harris quotes Yoda as saying "Once you start down the dark path, forever will it dominate your destiny." The quotation is from Return of the Jedi, which would not be released until 1983.

During the scene where Bill, Sam, and Neil are playing "Mouse Trap" behind Sam is a stack of games. The bottom game is the original Trivial Pursuit "Genus Game - Master Edition." The show is set in the 1980-1981 school year. Trivial Pursuit was not sold until 1982.

"Hail to the Chief" is not the correct song to play for a Vice President. The correct song, or entrance march, for the Vice President is "Hail Columbia".

In the cafeteria scene, Todd is holding a corn dog, then a french fry, then a corn dog again, within a matter of seconds.  Then maybe he is just practicing to be a competitive eater.

Quotes:
Neal: Laughter is the ultimate aphrodisiac. Get a woman laughing, you get a woman loving.

Cindy: No, Sam, you can't break up with me. You're supposed to be nice. That's the only reason I'm going out with you in the first place!

Sam: It's Cindy. She's kind of boring. It's weird hanging out with her friends. And, I mean, all she wants to do is make out and stuff.
Neal: I'd kill to be that bored.

Harold: Everyone's a Democrat until they get a little money. Then they come to their senses!

Here's the episode.  Enjoy!

I seriously wonder if people read my review closely.  I included something personal in there.  Anyway...I'd sort of like a break down of guns versus holsters as to who has seen The Jerk and who has not and if you have seen it did you enjoy it.