Dharma & Greg

A new path in life opens suddenly at the newlyweds’ feet when Donna, the express checkout girl at their local supermarket, reveals that she has been dumped by her boyfriend just as she is about to have his child. When Dharma brings her home for the night, Donna gets a bright idea: why doesn’t she give the baby to Dharma and Greg? Greg is dead against the idea but.... you can guess the rest except maybe the fact that the baby turns out to be black.

Abby and Larry assemble a village, which includes an African spiritual adviser, a troubadour, a storyteller who has taken a vow of silence, a lesbian lactation expert, and Jane to help Dharma and Greg with the baby. Greg is pleased, sort of, until he realizes that this entails everyone living with them during the baby’s first formative years. Meanwhile, Kitty takes to her bed, convinced that her life is over now that she has become a grandmother overnight. Dharma promises to help Kitty fulfill her matriarchal ambitions by having "a whole buttload of kids," but is taken aback by Kitty’s first dynastic decision: to name the baby after Edward’s wealthy uncle Fergus.

Experimenting to see if her parents can be trusted to mind the baby, Dharma and Greg take the baby to the movies with them, but the incessant crying annoys the patrons around them, Dharma’s crying. Abby approached Kitty to see if they can agree on a compromise between their family traditions for the baby’s naming ceremony, which results in a huge gathering and a minister, a rabbi, and a shaman. (Yes, they tell jokes.) Even Kitty, with the help of Larry’s special cookies, gets into the swing of things; and all is happiness until a telegram arrives: Donna has changed her mind and wants the baby back.

It’s traditional to fight on your first anniversary (even if Hallmark doesn’t have a card for it): Dharma and Greg stage an argument to escape their parents’ planned celebration, but in concocting the excuse Greg says Dharma was being "flighty," and the gloves come off. While they drive out of the city, Dharma retaliates by calling Greg a "stick in the mud," and soon their car is stuck in the mud when he tries to demonstrate how impetuous he can be. (Not very.) They hike to a diner, but find it closed because of a death in the owner’s family; just as Greg breaks a pane in the door in order to use the phone, a highway patrolman happens by and the young couple get caught in a charade of being the replacement cook and waitress. There’s a nice unspoken continuity with the first season episode in which Greg really did become a short order cook, and it’s nice to see him sharing Dharma’s role-playing game, even if unwillingly. But Dharma looks tense and unhappy even before Greg accidentally insults her. Are we to infer a further continuity with the stress from the loss of the baby?

In the middle of a typical in-law squabble, Dharma and Greg answer an emergency call and rush to hospital. There they find a partially immobilized Pete, who has dislocated both shoulders in a bizarre car accident. Greg is not too pleased at Dharma’s offer to nurse Pete back to health, and after a traumatic visit to Pete’s apartment to pick up his cat gives her far too much insight into Pete’s life (or lack thereof) Dharma finds herself committed to cleansing her house guest both physically and spiritually.

Dharma and Greg are haunted by a prankster spirit living in a newly discovered hidden closet.

Greg is forced to make a very embarrassing public admission when he sees the first girl he claims to have slept with and her jealous husband makes some serious threats. Meanwhile, Dharma and Greg attend the wedding of Kitty’s housekeeper and offer to park cars as a wedding gift.

Dharma discovers Greg is really the only man for her when she agrees to attend a dance with a nerdy high school kid, but meets with some serious competition from the younger crowd. Meanwhile, Larry sings his "You guys are okay" song to Edward and Kitty, causing Kitty to fall and hurt herself; this prompts Kitty to sue Larry after she is embarrassed by her donut-cushion in front of the mayor. Larry represents himself, while Pete arbitrates.

Dharma is surprised when both Jane and her parents accuse her of having changed because she is busy attending a society fundraiser with Kitty then alarmed when Kitty congratulates her on having changed to the extent that young socialites thinks she’s "a hoot and a half." Her identity crisis is confirmed by a visit from the spirit of her Indian friend, George, who directs her to retreat to the Redwoods to find herself and conveys a cryptic message to "save the young one." An uncomprehending Greg reluctantly lets her go, persuading her to take Jane with her; then, upon seeing George in a dream, rushes to the woods in Larry’s van to save Dharma and Jane, who have adopted a bear cub while remaining oblivious to the nearby presence of its angered mother. Best lines: George to Dharma: "You might have mentioned that you moved. I scared some skinny guy in the shower half to death!"; Larry, fleeing from the mother bear, slips on something in the woods and mutters, "That answers that question!"

A gently surreal episode whose humor derives from escalating skewed logic in the Preston Sturges mode: Greg’s hostile secretary Marlene (at last the wonderful Yeardley Smith returns!) is offended by her annual staff evaluation as "Satisfactory," while Greg is overjoyed by his "Superior" rating until he learns Pete got the same rating. When Greg confronts his boss, he is driven to desperation by the man’s apparent complete inability to discriminate between similar items (Tahiti vs. Buffalo as a honeymoon destination, freshly baked bread vs. moldy supermarket bread), and almost unhinged by the boss’s decision to put Pete in charge while he is in medical leave. At the same time Greg must deal with Dharma’s impulse decision to open a store without first deciding what she will sell, and the fact that the place quickly becomes packed with people who find Dharma’s environment strangely soothing and establish a barter economy amongst themselves. There is of course only one "logical" conclusion: despite the fact that Dharma is losing money, she makes a profit when she is bought out by Starbucks. (We leave her contemplating a "drive-through" version of her non-store.) Meanwhile, Larry tries to persuade Edward to buy a drug-running friend’s power yacht, and the four-in laws find themselves held prisoner by an aggressive sea lion who climbs on board and won’t leave.

A friendly game of strip poker between the newlyweds is interrupted by an emergency visit from Larry and Abby (who are willing to wait a half hour until the sex is finished, an offer Greg can’t accept). It turns out that their property is under siege by an unscrupulous developer who happens to be a former, and hated, classmate of Greg’s. After Dharma invites the developer and his wife to dinner, then has to fight off his sexual advances, she is forced to accept Greg’s viewpoint -- that he is evil -- and to seek a flattered Kitty’s advice on how to get rid of him and save her parents’ beloved home. The solution involves Jane, Pete, a trampoline, some garbage cans, and the IRS... and a wonderful coda using the trampoline.

When Greg convinces Dharma to accompany him and Pete to a football game, despite her lifelong aversion to competitive sports, he is unprepared for her sudden and total conversion into a fanatical San Francisco 49ers fan--and the term "fanatical" is not used lightly. When Dharma sneaks out to a game in the middle of dinner with her parents, Greg decides she needs help, and arranges an intervention involving quarterback Steve Young.

Edward’s mother Beatrice is dying and knows it, despite the efforts of everyone around her to deny the fact except Dharma, who argues for honesty and gets a priceless Stradivarius as a keepsake, much to the horror of Kitty who believes it belongs in a museum -- especially after everyone has heard Dharma trying to learn "Three Blind Mice" on the instrument. Then Dharma learns something very surprising: Edward and Kitty’s marriage was a whirlwind courtship bitterly opposed by Beatrice, who has never forgiven her "free-thinking" daughter-in-law and refuses to pass on the family heirloom engagement ring to her. Dharma tries to help mend fences before it’s too late -- then tries to respect Beatrice’s dying wish to pass on the ring when it is much, much too late. In a coda, Greg is more than happy to let Dharma’s violin teacher borrow the Strad for a recital, then learns Dharma has taken up the trombone instead.

Role playing at a golf shop, the couple put on fake Southern accents and wind up endearing themselves to a genuine Southerner -- who turns out to be the federal judge before whom Greg must argue a cast the next day. After an evening’s panic, he decides to tough it out and wins the case hands down (while mystifying Pete). But he discovers he has succeeded only too well: Judge Harper becomes the couple’s best friend and constant companion, and Greg despairs at having to keep up the pretence forever -- especially when the judge comes to meet the entire extended family.

It’s Dharma’s birthday, but the surprise she gets isn’t what Greg was planning. First his parents take them on a mock foxhunt, and the uncontrollably wild stallion at the stables becomes meek as a lamb as soon as he meets Dharma. Groom Joaquin swears it’s because the horse has fallen madly in love with Dharma, and sure enough Steve starts showing up unexpectedly at the apartment. Meanwhile, Greg’s old flame Barbara is assigned to work with him on a case with an overnight deadline.

After a dehumanizing experience with bureaucratic red tape, Dharma is inspired to run for office, and thanks to a pair of wacky opponents and a hefty campaign contribution from Edward, she may have a real shot. Meanwhile, Pete and Jane find a shocking way to fight the alone-on-Valentine’s-Day blues.

As Election Day approaches, Dharma and Greg’s relationship hits stormy seas due to clashes over her campaign strategy. Meanwhile, an aggressive opponent may really rain on Dharma’s parade.

Election day is here, and Dharma has finally mastered the art of politics. But it’s her own body that teaches her that lying can lead to flu, rashes, eye sties, oozing sores and even a bout of the gout.

Dharma and Greg join their parents, and even Pete and Jane, on a couples’ retreat. But when they repeatedly fail tests designed to demonstrate the strength of their relationship (while Pete and Jane score tops), they resort to covert measures. Meanwhile, Kitty and Edward find a weekend in the wild to be just that.

When Greg rather reluctantly gives Dharma half of his on-line investment account, she becomes obsessed with profit (even borrowing from her parents), but unwisely follows a tip from a friend of Larry’s and sinks everything into a San Francisco company that promptly sinks even further. When she appeals to a recently retired Edward for help, he quickly rejuvenates the business, which happens to merchandize women’s fashions for men: edrag.com; but Kitty objects that Edward’s golden years were reserved for her.

Dharma pushes her mother-in-law’s fortitude to the absolute limit when she presents Kitty with an award at a country-club luncheon -- and later wrecks her car.

Greg is forced to go with the flow when Larry makes a few improvements in the loft and lets in more than just a spring shower; and Dick Clark pays a visit during Edward’s surreal flashback sequence.

Greg discovers he should pay more attention to his wife’s intuition when Dharma has a nightmare and begs him not to go away on a business trip.

When Dharma and Greg decide to go on a first date to get reacquainted the old-fashioned way, their courtship doesn’t go as well as planned: a furious Dharma moves back in with her parents and refuses to speak to a penitent Greg.