Long-term strategy on The L Word? There is none. Characters wholly change personalities one season to the next, defining characteristics totally disappear (where are Helena’s kids, anyway?), and the only balustrade seems to be Kit’s minstrelsy shriek of “Girl!”

This leads us to this week’s episode, “Least Likely,” which unfortunately is quite appropriately named. Least likely to entertain, least likely to titillate, least likely to surprise…and it’s all topped off with a ripped-from-the-headlines story arc that leaves us muttering, “Least likely to require anything more than stealing from Oprah transcripts.”

Processing:

• Max is preggers! Yes, The L Word has its very own pregnant man to exploit and love. Max, despite being on testosterone, has a brioche bun in his oven, placed there by his gay lover Tom. Miserable Max is none too pleased to find this out when finalizing his top surgery, and he is even unhappier to discover that he can’t get an abortion because he’s four months along. Ruh-row! His flat stomach will likely inspire blue-state moms to peck “testosterone” into Google to see if it will help them stay thin during their next pregnancy.

• Tina finds out in a marketing meeting that Lez Girls is now being called The Girls, and the new hetero-normative ending has been audience-tested without her knowledge. When she complains, the skanky studio executive, Aaron, says, “Get on board, Tina — the train’s not going to lezzie town.” We imagine that line provided the show’s writers with enough glee to get them through the rest of this episode’s tepid dialogue.

• It still must be Old Home Week in West Hollywood, because yet another long-lost character is back. Remember Dylan from season 3? The one who seduced Helena and then charged her with sexual harassment? You don’t? Well, no matter, because when she shows up at Helena’s club Hit, Alice offers a quick recap for both Tasha and the audience watching at home. Expect some Dylan and Helena tangling in the near future.

• Tasha and Alice go to a shrink, and this is almost as boring as going to our own shrink, but maybe a little better because we don’t have to talk about our mother. After Alice commandeers every question and the two do commitment exercises, this clearly client-rich therapist tells them they shouldn’t come back because he doesn’t think they should be together in the first place. Harrumph! The nerve of that man! They’ll show him…

Hookups:

…by going at it in Alice’s Mini Cooper convertible stationed in the therapist’s parking lot. Good thing those L.A. girls are so skinny.

Bette and Tina rip each other’s clothes off after going to a gallery opening to find that it’s owned by—surprise! — Bette’s old college pal Kelly Wentworth (enter Elizabeth Berkley). Know what can get you and your girlfriend hot and bothered? When the girl you kissed and freaked out at Yale comes back fifteen years later and openly letches over you.

There seemed to be nothing Shane could do to get Jenny to forgive her for her dalliance with Nikki. She made her waffles. No go. She washed her car. Uh-uh. So Shane starts packing her things with toothbrush in mouth (have you ever seen a TV character who has a toothbrush in her mouth as often as Shane?) to leave Jenny’s life forever. Bingo! The key to any fucked-up girl’s heart is acting like you don’t give a shit. So Jenny confesses her true love to Shane and, well, since Shane has already brushed her teeth, they make out.

By the way, we might have really gotten into this whole Who Killed Jenny? murder mystery stitching the final season of The L Word together if Ilene Chaiken hadn’t inadvertently let the pussy out of the Whole Foods bag. Now even a semi-literate like Shane can figure out whodunit.

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