The Big Bang Theory 2.2: “The Codpiece Topology”

The Wife:

After last week’s community college pamphlet incident, Leonard and Penny have decided to move on. Penny, evidently, has moved on a lot more quickly than Leonard, as the boys discover when they run into Penny and her new beau in the hall on their way home from The Word’s Most Historically Inaccurate Renaissance Faire, so proclaimeth Friar Sheldon.

I have several things to say, as a sometime enjoyer of Renaissance Faire and lover of Renaissance drama, regarding Sheldon’s remarks about the historical in/accuracy of the Faire he and his friends attended. To begin with, the Renaissance Pleasure Faire, hosted in Southern California at an old army base in Irwindale, CA (20 miles East of L.A.), does indeed adhere to a particular period of time. The company that produces this fair and the NorCal Faire construct their faire around the Elizabethan period, a time when England was flourishing and was open to global exploration. That is why, at Faire, participants are encouraged to dress in the traditional garb of any country that would have been in contact with England at the time. That’s why you will see people in Irish garb as well as English, in high Italian court garb and, yes, you will even see Arabian traders, gypsies and Asian merchants. How else would one be able to have tea, coffee or spices without them? Sheldon complains that participants were decked out in more medieval garb than Renaissance, which frankly seemed to be an offense perpetrated by Sheldon and Company, with Leonard in chain mail and a crushed velvet jerkin clearly purchased from a Halloween Store along with Sheldon’s own monastic garb. People who love Renaissance Faire and go in costume do so accurately, or at least more accurately than the costume shop crap each of our geeks were wearing. Only Raj had on something vaguely historically accurate, except for the fact that inside that suit was an Indian man. Good job, Chuck Lorre. Way to make a fucking point.

Furthermore, if Sheldon is really as smart as he thinks he is, then he would know that “ye olde” anything is pronounced “the old,” as “y” is the runic symbol for the phoneme “th.” I’m sure a lot of the physics mentioned on this show is wildly inaccurate, but I’m not a physicist so I certainly wouldn’t have noticed. I am, however, a linguist and if you’re gonna talk shit in my town, you better know what’s waiting for you. You and me, Sheldon, we’re gonna have an Old English/Middle English/Early Modern English smackdown.

Anyway, my defense of Renaissance Faires aside, Penny’s new boyfriend means that I get to see Sarah Gilbert again! Hooray!

Leslie Winkle, Leonard’s one-time fuck buddy, decides that she’s tired of waking up in a bed full of strangers and wants to begin having real relationships with people. She suggests that she and Leonard have a real date, ending in “light petting, no coitus.” Leonard agrees, which means that Sheldon, Leslie’s arch-nemesis, must go somewhere else while Leonard hosts his date in their mutual apartment. This drives Sheldon to mope on the staircase with vintage Super Mario Brothers games on his lap top (a laptop I have, mind you).

Penny somehow gets Sheldon to realize that he’s enabling his friend to do something that makes him very unhappy and that if Leonard were really Sheldon’s friend, Leonard would consider how his relationship with Penny impacts Sheldon, which ultimately leads to the two mortal enemies embroiled in an argument about loop theory vs. string theory.

Leslie and Leonard’s relationship dissipates the minute Leonard refuses to adhere to Leslie’s loop theory argument, noting that, like Sheldon, he prefers his space a little more stringy. Leslie breaks up with him over this, as believing in string theory over loop theory is her relationship deal breaker. To her credit, I’m glad her dealbreaker is something important, rather than, say, wearing socks to bed or liking ABBA.

The Husband:

I must point out that Sheldon was not, in fact, playing a vintage Super Mario Brothers game, as I don’t think that the N64 is technically vintage yet. (I know my wife. She meant old Nintendo. So she is wrong I say! Wrong!) What he was playing was “Super Mario 64,” the one game that everybody loves and I happen to despise. Believe me, I’ve given it multiple chances, and I just don’t like it. I prefer my Mario games to be side-scrolling, and if a game designer is to advance that platform (a platform of a platform game), they do something like Nintendo’s “Super Mario Brothers 3” or the Super Nintendo’s “Super Mario World” (a personal favorite). Props to the sound designer who grabbed the actual “game paused” sound effect for this episode.

On a less geeky note, I know this is a major stretch, but does anyone want to take bets that Sheldon and Penny may overcome their differences and might indulge in a little romancing by season’s end? I know creator Chuck Lorre doesn’t really care for overarching stories (curse you, Two and a Half Men!), but something tells me that I may not be far off. I can’t be the only person to consider this plot twist, can I?