High School Hallway: Riley is excited about all the new people walking the halls but Maya is less than thrilled–her philosophy is that they’re only supposed to be pretend interested in everyone they already know. “I’m still learning Zay! It’s Zay, isn’t it?” Maya asks, upset that she’ll have to learn new names. They compromise on Riley finding one new friend. She chooses the girl closest to them opening her locker. Riley comes on too strong, causing the girl to say that she doesn’t like her.
Still In The High School Hallway: Maya comforts Riley from the hallway floor, as Riley has melted into a puddle of Riley sadness over not being liked. “You can only control your own reaction to what goes on,” Maya explains, trying to convince Riley there’s nothing she can do. Lucas, Zay, Farkle, and Smackle arrive and get the rundown from Maya, who is upset that they’re about to miss health class. Lucas carries Riley, Zay carries Maya, and Smackle drags Farkle to class.
Health Class: Today’s topic is “Our bodies, our friends.” The teacher is a burly gym teacher named Mr. Fanucci, which upsets Riley–she wants the subject matter to be gently presented to her. “You’ll all pass no matter what. You know why? Because if I fail you, I have to meet your parents. I don’t want to meet your parents. I don’t want to meet you,” he says, going against Riley’s expectations immediately but making me laugh.
The Apartment Matthews: Riley complains about Mr. Fanucci’s teaching style. Maya reiterates her point–Riley can’t control everything around her, sometimes her viewpoint has to be adjusted instead. “When you try to control life, life does its best to teach you not to,” Topanga says in support of Maya’s point. She changes her tune when she finds out that one of Riley’s classmates doesn’t like her, threatening to sic her tax attorney on the classmate’s family.
Health Class: Same subject, different day, different teacher. Cory’s request about being gentler with the kids caused Mr. Fanucci to put him in charge of the class, so now Riley and the gang has to learn all this from Cory. He begs the class to take it easy on him and allows Smackle to declare Smackle time. She explains page 73 to the kids, which turns into a lot of censored beeping.
The Apartment Matthews: Auggie received an F on his paper because his teacher could tell “a fifth grader” wrote it. Riley is offended at the age mistake, but also at the world for proving that she couldn’t control the outcome of Auggie’s grade. Topanga reiterates that you can’t control everyone around you. He redoes his essay, explaining that his life is easy since nothing is in his control.
Health Class: Cory is struggling and decides to discuss the human foot. Fanucci returns to save the kids. He explains that what he’s going to tell him isn’t graceful, but it’s important. “You get this one mind and this one body–that’s what you get to control,” he says. Cory runs from the room.
Topanga’s Cafe: Riley has gathered everyone before school to hold balloons outside of the cafe. She explains that the balloons represent everything they think they can control, and they’re there to let them all go. Riley asserts that we can only control our reactions. At school, that girl repeats that she doesn’t like Riley, but Riley just responds, “Well I like you.”
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The Apartment Matthews: The Matthews family (Maya included) is watching TV that night. The news reports that a local family has been arrested for tax evasion, all because their daughter disliked the wrong girl. Not a great lesson to teach your child, Topanga, but I give you credit for your vengeance style.
Finally, after a few weeks of maudlin life advice and absolute nonsense, a normal episode. “Girl Meets She Don’t Like Me” handled an important lesson with humor instead of making it a ~life lesson~ shown through saccharine, weird moments. The new teacher they introduced was hilarious, as was Maya (this episode saw the return of her ‘50s narrator voice, which is always a good time). All in all, this episode was slightly repetitive, but a vast improvement from what we’ve seen recently.
Boy Meets World Throwback Factor: low. At some point Cory talked about soup and Topanga being a control freak back in the day, but that’s about it.
Rating: 8/10
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