Catherine: What's your take on the financial crisis?
Gary: Oh, I think they just ran out of money. They should probably just print more, I don't know why it's been such a big issue.
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10
Do you remember that time I declared ‘Mother’ was my favourite episode? ‘Kissing Your Sister’ has taken over that position.
In one of the most impressive turns Veep has undertaken, ‘Kissing Your Sister’ isn’t your usual episode. Instead, writer Erik Kenward turns the spotlight onto Catherine (Sarah Sutherland) and her pet project for the majority of this season – her film.
“My name is Catherine Meyer, and I’ve spent my entire life in the public eye. While the public will always remember me as the little girl who fell off the stage twice in one evening, I am a grown woman now with my own passions and interests. One of the biggest things that ever happened in my life, and my family’s life, happened when the House of Representatives voted to decide the Presidency of the United States for the first time in 140 years. Almost two months to the day earlier, the American people voted for the President. But that night ended in a historic electoral college tie, between Senator Bill O’Brien and the sitting President Selina Meyer, my mom. It meant that the House of Representatives needed to vote to break the tie, and choose a president.”
The documentary, entitled Kissing Your Sister: The Story of a Tie depicts all the footage that Catherine has been hilariously trying to film throughout this season. Her film takes up the entirety of the episode, and acts more so like a recap of the season thus far, rather than what a typical episode of Veep consists of. This difference, however, gives the opportunity to see how Selina (Julia Louis-Dreyfus) and her team act in front of a camera like this. Especially when they know they’re being filmed, as opposed to when Catherine is hiding in the shadows of the White House; capturing them in all sorts of questionable situations.
Not only does ‘Kissing Your Sister’ give an extra insight into the Meyer administration, but also into Catherine. This is the first episode where Catherine is the focal point. It may be her documentary, but it also gives perspective to us as to how she perceives her mother. She doesn’t tarnish Selina as you’d expect her to; she actually paints her in a different light, given their strained relationship. Whenever she interviews her mother, the interviews are so obviously cut and edited to death, because of Selina’s inability to talk about her Presidency without shit-talking opposing candidates or even co-workers within her administration.
‘Kissing Your Sister’ doesn’t just focus on the past events that we’ve already seen, but gives glimpses to Selina’s demise in the House of Representatives. And also suggests that as the NRA were to Jonah (Timothy Simons), Jonah is going to end up being Selina’s saving grace – if he can actually get over to the White House without nearly killing a group of school children, due to Richard (Sam Richardson) being Catherine’s second-unit.
For Catherine’s sake, she deserves an Oscar for managing to capture all this calamity on camera.
Veep airs on Sky Atlantic on Tuesdays at 11:10pm.
