30 Rock Watch: Season 7, Episode 4 - Unwindulax

30 Rock gets political this week and hits far more than it misses as it has a lot of fun with both political parties.

Jack is running a fundraiser and he “invites” Liz to fill in for his Mexican sideline reporter girlfriend who is on pelvic rest. Liz, blinded by the free shrimp, doesn’t realize she was a liberal prop for Jack to encourage higher donations to his super PAC and they end up making a bet over who can influence the most voters; Liz through words, Jack through money. The best stuff comes from the scheming of Jack’s PAC, who’s trying to win over the black vote, the highlight being a Romney ad staring Don Cheadle and Jazz the black Transformer. If that description isn’t funny enough, Don Cheadle almost vomiting or “Sponsored by the Americans for an American America, Dy-no-mite!” should get you over the hump. Lemon’s plan is far less fun and funny, but seeing Kellan Lutz dumb it up as Lutz’s grand-nephew was randomly hilarious. Liz finds that no one cares about the words and Jack can’t buy his way into a win, but they both realize Jenna could win it for them.

Jenna apparently launched a Jimmy Buffet rip-off music career between episodes and she has a following of fans (Crabheads?) that come from the one part of Florida that can actually be persuaded to affect the election. That is the episodes big cliffhanger, as this will apparently be a two parter, but Jenna’s plot didn’t have a lot going for it before that. Jenna’s new laid back persona in front of her fans leaves her vulnerable to a potential return of Lutz, Twofer and Frank’s pranking group, but it really goes nowhere. It’s also disappointing the episode doesn’t do anything with Gary Cole and Amy Sedaris as a couple of laid back Crabheads, but luckily they have another episode to give them something to do.

The rest of the cast is relegated to the sidelines for the most part with Tracy getting some good material to work with as Liz’s campaign strategist. One of the highlights of the episode is actually a wonderfully put together cross cutting scene between Jack and Tracy in their respective offices breaking down the maps and they get some great humor when the two’s rationales overlap. Kenneth is sadly barely around for almost the entire episode, but he does get one of the best moments in the background as he absolutely flips out over Kellan Lutz’s TGS appearance; GIF worthy.

30 Rock is sharp enough to comment on politics and tackles the absurdity of it all on both sides particularly well. The two part structure of the episode will hopefully payoff the Crabheads and the excellent guest stars playing them, but I really have a hard time figuring out how much further they can take this storyline in next week’s second half of the episode. Regardless if they are going to be able to take it any further, the creation of Jack’s Super PAC is something that character was made for. If we get more shenanigans from Jack and his team next week it will be more than worth the storyline they sent us down.

Random Notes:
-Gary Cole and Amy Sedaris, that's a good start.
-"Mall fires."
-"She's been put on pelvic rest."
-"Shrimp," that run away celebration is amazing.
-"Maybe, who's more, who is she?"
-"We should go to a pumpkin patch."
-I don't know what he said, but that inbred Wasp was quite funny.
-"Damnit; second meaning."
-That's a hideous headshot.
-"Or fly on Delta."
-Americans for an American America.
-The otter is uncanny.
-Hair mentor, brother dad, brilliant.
-"Let's change some black minds.”
-"The voting machines have gone sentient."