There Has Never Been A More Realistic And Honest Scene In TV History Than A Pissed Off Dave And Elz Playing 1-on-1
Forgive me for being a week late on this but I was just catching up on the episode last night when I saw this. I was in awe. We've talked a lot about 'Dave' on this site but this scene stuck out to me more than perhaps any other scene in TV history. Two best friends playing a pissed off 1-on-1 game. If you play basketball, you've been in this scene before at some point in your life. You and your buddy are at each other's throats so you play a physical pissed off 1-on-1 game that only escalates the tension and then you get over it. It's truly one of the greatest gifts I own and really how I chose some friends growing up. If you could throw an elbow at me and then shake it off a couple hours later, you were a friend for life. I'm not going to break down the show or anything like that because I'm just a simple man who watches TV, but this scene, this scene I can break down. It's laugh out loud funny when Dave angrily chucks the ball off Elz's leg and then says rules are rules. It really shows there are specific type of pick up players and that's proven even more when Dave calls a foul.
He's a foul call guy. You may not like it, but you have to respect the call. The key here for any pick up game is to have established rules. If there's a clear disagreement on a 50/50 call, the person shoots it to determine if the call was correct. The old definition of ball don't lie comes right from there. It doesn't matter if you are playing 1-on-1, 2v2, 3v3 or 5v5 foul call guy will do it in any setting. You just have to accept you're playing with someone like that.
And just like in this episode and scene, if you and your buddy are playing a pissed off game it's a GUARANTEE (Charles Barkley voice) that the underlying reason will come out. In this case it's Elz wanting to be featured on all of Dave's songs and the credit line sends him off the deep end. There's also a 100% chance both people know why they are angry with each other and push the boundary with saying something to trigger it. It's how we act, we can't control it. Guys are morons. But this scene felt like the most realistic scene for me strictly because of that. The physical play, the aggressive checking of the ball, all of it.
Doesn't matter if you're 13 or 40 if you have some anger towards a friends I suggest finding a hoop and playing passive aggressive 1-on-1. It fixes all.
PS: Standard rules better be make it take it and play to 11, win by 2 and then play to 15 straight.