The Big Bang Theory

The Big Bang Theory

Episode 15: The Friendship Contraction

By: Carlos Uribe

The Big Bang Theory is about a group of nerds and the girl next door.

Spoilers Ahoy!

Leonard and Sheldon have been the best of friends since the beginning of the series. Leonard does a lot of favors for Sheldon and in return he gets the blessing of having Sheldon be his friend. Oh wait, that doesn't sound like a good deal. Leonard doesn't get a lot out of this relationship other than cheap living arrangements. One day Leonard is simply too tired to drive Sheldon to the dentist. Sheldon needs him to drive him back since he will be doing under. When Leonard refuses, Sheldon brings up that darned roommate agreement. He still refuses and Sheldon then reveals that there's a section of the roommate agreement that allows them to live together but not be friends. This means that Leonard would only have to pay for his share of the apartment and utilities and merely be friendly towards Sheldon. This also means that Leonard won't have Sheldon as a friend.

At this point, most shows would try to show why Leonard needs Sheldon as a friend. It becomes rather obvious that he doesn't need Sheldon at all. He can live perfectly happy without being Sheldon's friend. Sheldon does need Leonard. He can't get anyone else to be essentially his chauffeur or to do any other errands for him. Sheldon tries his best to get Leonard to sign back into the roommate agreement but he keeps on failing. Leonard eventually does agree to sign back on but only because he realizes that while Sheldon can't exactly express it, he needs him to survive. He agrees to sign back into the roommate agreement, which has been transferred over to an iPad, but he does get something in return. He gets a whole day that is dedicated to celebrating Leonard's use to Sheldon. A day that Leonard seems to like although it doesn't seem like such a good deal to me.

Throughout the episode Howard has a small plot. His friends realize that since Howard is going to go to space, he needs a cool nickname. Howard doesn't get to pick it as it has to be given to him by the other astronauts. This doesn't stop his friends, primarily Raj, from trying to find the perfect nickname for Howard. They eventually settle on “Rocket Man.” They then try to find a way to manipulate the other astronauts into giving him that nickname. That includes giving Howard the “Rocket Man” ring tone on his cell phone. This ends up failing because Howard's mom interrupts a Skype meeting with a NASA man to tell him that his fruit loops are getting soggy. His new astronaut nickname is now going to be “fruit loops.” Which is worse than the name they would have surely chosen if the conversation had began just minutes before with “Mr. Big Shot Astronaut.”

Overall, this was a funny episode. What made this episode work so well was it's concentration on the friendship between the two main male characters. It gave this episode a core that it wouldn't have had otherwise. It also kept the episode true to the characters. The sub-plot wasn't as funny, but it worked as filler between the main plot scenes. Here's hoping we get an episode that does celebrate Leonard's Day since that would be rather funny.