‘Kevin Can F**k Himself’ Recap: ‘Ghost’

Written by John Edward Betancourt

Caution: This article contains spoilers for Episode 203 of ‘Kevin Can F**k Himself’. To revisit the previous episode, click here.
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Anyone that is eager to start over in life, hopes with every fiber of their being that their transition into a new phase into their lives will be smooth and clean. Simply because what they are looking to leave behind is anything but, and that can sometimes force folks to just go for it and hit that reset button and enjoy the silence and purity of a new life, in a hurry, only to learn… that such a move is never smooth and clean. Because the past always finds a way to haunt us when it is unresolved and also because… the person looking to escape their woes with a clean break, is still the same person. One that still harbors the bad habits and ill wills that infected their old life through and through.
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Which means, that the same problems and quirks that person endured in their own life are still there, just hidden under the guise of temporary happiness and waiting to emerge. So, in order to truly enjoy a fresh start in life, everything has to be dealt with in the current life, first. That means finding closure with the issues that one wishes to escape from in the first place and it also means… dealing with our messes be them psychological or financial or habitual in nature. For only then we can we truly reinvent ourselves and come to understand what this new opportunity presents us. If anything, this particularly difficult truth about starting over is top of mind today, simply because it served as the focus of this week’s episode of Kevin Can F**k Himself on AMC and AMC+.

A feat that ‘Ghost’ accomplished, by having Allison McRoberts begin the next big step in starting over away from Kevin via faking her own death. Which entailed having Allison, and Patty of course, swing by the local funeral home to meet with the intrepid detective that figured out quite the way to help her escape the pain of this life. In that, in the basement of said funeral home, were a bevy of unclaimed bodies and if she and Patty could find one that matched the age range of Allison, and had a low social media presence, Allison could choose to assume that person’s identity. Allowing for her to use that to gain her fresh start far away from Kevin and his ridiculous shenanigans and well… this turned out to be a far more difficult venture than she was prepared for.

In large part because, there were A LOT of bodies to choose from in the basement of this place. For coffin upon coffin were stacked down there, giving rise to a moment of pause from both Allison and Patty, since such an end seemed almost meaningless in a way, to the point where they both briefly pondered their own journey and accomplishments thus far. But also, because… Allison hadn’t been back to this place since her father's wake was hosted here on the exact same day that she met Kevin and well, being back within the walls of a place that was filled with sorrow and led to incredible sorrow, allowed for a bevy of memories to come flooding back for Allison. Of the sorrow she felt that day of course, but more importantly… it forced her for the first time… to really look within and ponder upon her flaws and her past.  

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In fact, this is the really the first time in the course of her life, that Allison has ever bothered to face the pain surrounding her and come to understand that she is someone who uses the sitcom mentality to cope with any particular problem in her life, and latch onto it to find happiness over anything else. A move that obviously has led to all kinds of dark times for Allison. But it was huge to learn this about her and discover how she copes and how long she’s lived within this fog. But more importantly, this is a plot that sticks closely to the particular theme of this episode, simply because this walk down memory lane, and pseudo-failed venture… since the only qualifying person there was named Gertrude… allowed for Allison to have an important epiphany.
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In that, somehow, someway… she would need to deal with her flaws and her past if she ever wanted to this to work. Because this struggle to truly deal with the pain of the world and the dark parts of her life, was no longer sustainable. Granted, that’s of course… a journey unto itself, one that is never resolved easy. But the biggest step we will ever take in life, is acknowledging the hardest truth we will ever have to face. Because once it is there it cannot be put back in the box and has to be dealt with accordingly, at our own pace of course, and truly… this show deserves a serious round of applause for acknowledging this fact about growth and starting over and for giving Allison something deep and meaningful to work toward in this final season of the show.

However, all hope aside… we would be foolish to not talk about the fact that some serious complications might be awaiting Allison’s plan to escape this life as is. For Tammy has… a lot of questions about a lot of things. Such as what went down in Vermont that fateful day, to the point where she has requested surveillance footage from the police up that way, inching her closer and closer to the truth about Allison and Patty’s plans and this episode also revealed that Neil’s struggles are less about Kevin’s toxic behavior and instead relate to his own co-dependency on the man. Since he could not reconcile what Patty and Allison attempted to do and made a point to call Tammy multiple times. To the point where she hung out with Kevin, Neil, and Pete during their Spooky Movie Marathon… to likely get a statement.

Which means that Allison is going to have to hustle to get this done and undoubtedly work on herself on the fly, as is often the case in this world, if she wants any chance at having that fresh start in question. But while we wait to see what comes out of this potential trouble, in the meantime, we can offer up a round of applause for one brilliant episode. Because self-help and self-care, and self-work are topics that are uncomfortable for so many because of what it requires of us. But it is essential if we want true happiness and freedom and any show that is willing to point out that we often create our own problems because of our own negative agency, deserves our awe, and now that Allison knows what must be done internally and externally, there’s a good chance this show is about to become quite intense in nature as Allison McRoberts makes a grand push to finally change her life for the better. Until next time.

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