The Parks and Rec Open Thread

"See you tomorrow!"
(Spoilers are municipal bonding herein.)

Hello, Vice President Joe Biden! Fancy meeting you on MY FAVORITE SHOW! Is it your favorite show, too? I bet it's not. I bet your favorite show is, like, Swamp Trains, or The Real Doctor Wives of D.C., but I'm going to pretend it's Parks and Rec, just for the duration of this thread!

I also want to say this about Parks and Recreation: For whatever its other flaws may be, it will always have a special place in my heart, FOREVER, for giving us the character of Ben Wyatt—a man who loves unabashedly; who prioritizes his life with his partner over career ambition, because that is what fulfills him. Men like that exist, but they are rarely shown onscreen.

There have been male characters who sacrifice careers for partners (especially female partners), but it is always played for laughs, and/or he is shown to reluctantly come to appreciate his life in spite of his resentment at losing the career that defined him. Ben Wyatt is a man who is capable and competent with seemingly limitless potential, but he is also a man who doesn't want to spend his life at work at the expense of building the happy family he wasn't given. He has to build his own, and he wants to.

I love Parks and Rec for giving us Ben Wyatt, and I love Adam Scott for playing him with such fondness and humanity.

Here are other things!

"He is precious cargo!"

"Just call me Bond. Municipal bond." (OMG SO MUCH LOL.)

"Well, well, well. If it isn't Mr. Looks and Professor Books!"

"Can you say per capita again? I want to take a picture of you saying per capita. I am so proud of you. Now stand next to the screen and think about all the strong female role models in your life."

"Okay, something is different about my computer. A-ha! It's gone! A game is the foot!"

"Ricky Jordache. He's new. He used to be a slacker, but now he's realizing his full potential—but at what cost? He's smart and he's beautiful, and I think of him in many ways as a daughter, but that would be crazy because he's a man. His name's Ricky."

"You hate this show." "I love this show!" "What's your favorite part?" "The heavy-handedness."

"You just got Jammed." "Uggghhh I hate when he says that."

"Maybe we should find the person who stole his positive attitude."

"And! I get a gun, and I can point it at people's faces." "Incorrect."

"I just said, 'Let's get to work.' How else do people enjoy things?"

Also? Andy's interrogation of Jerry was AMAZING. "I can never tell when people are lying to me. Hopefully that doesn't come up in my police work." Pow.

Discuss!