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I think the "Day 5" installment, with John's seemingly off-the-wall soliloquy, will turn out to be Milch's throwing down the gauntlet episode of this series: "Either you're with me in this or you're not." It's certainly separating the fanatics from the less committed viewers, that's for sure. I'm in the fanatics crowd but I can also understand how Heather would be turned off - who really wants to have to work that hard to figure out what is going on in a television series? To make sense of what has taken place in JFC so far (especially the Day 5 episode), I was compelled to read Steve Hawk's "Behind The Episode" column on the HBO web site, along with JFC forum posts on both the HBO and Television Without Pity sites. While this took some time from my day, the effort paid off for me; I have a much better appreciation of what Milch is after with this series, and I can't wait to see what happens next. I also have an appreciation of how, with JFC, Milch is really flying without a net: a lot of the details and side trips in this series are the result of chance and improvisation on the set. JFC may aggravate Heather but it fascinates the hell out of this viewer.
