In this essay I will be going over an episode of that 70’s show. Explaining their use of
rhetoric to convey an overall meaning that they set for the episode other than to entertain. The
episode is titled Join together and is focused around certain interaction between the couples
Eric and donna, steve and jackie as well as eric and his parents. The theme of the episode that
they show with all the interactions is that you should be honest with you feelings tell them to the
people closest to you.
First off very early on in the episode it is shown to us that the character eric has decided
to stall going to college to help around the house while his father can't work because of his heart
attack. As we see that his mother is very happy about this and very openly appreciates what her
son is doing for them his father is not so openly showing his appreciation making jokes like “I
waited 18 years for you to get out of the house and now your staying”. This scene sets up for a
moment later in the episode where the father and his son have a conversation where he says
that his mother really appreciates what he is doing for them. He then hands his son a piece of
paper saying that his doctor told him to write down his feelings after it is shown that it isn't a
letter and is just a list of yard work the son laughs it off and says “is this your way of thanking
me” to which he replied “the lawn is going to thank you for all the mowing your going to do” as
the son knows how his father is he sees that this is his way of showing him his feelings and
says ‘’your welcome dad’’ and walks away. This was a good way of showing us the theme of the
episode with the interaction between the father and son and how they ended up showing their
feelings to each other.
Later on in the episode we see that the couple jackie and steve are having problems in
their relationship and neither one of them wants to apologize. We see through the whole
episode that jackie is trying to get steves attention by doing things she thinks he would like, But
steve is mad so he decides to be petty and ignore her but he is noticing everything that she is
doing and it is drawing his attention. Their mutual friend is constantly trying to bring them
together so that they can apologize and eventually gets them in one place and tells them that
they have to talk about it. They eventually “apologize” to each other by saying that they both still
want to be in a relationship and they make up. This portrays the theme in an effective way
because using comedy is built up how the two characters are very stubborn and don't want to
admit that they were both wrong and at the end it shows how they get over themselves and
reconcile.
The last situation is with the couple eric and donna. In the beginning of the episode they
show us that donna is sad that sad that she will be going to college on her own as she becomes
sad the couple engages in “going away sex”. This happens multiple times in the episode as she
gets sad about multiple things that she says that she is going to miss while she is at college.
While this one isn't as sweet or heartfelt as the other two this situation also showed the
characters feelings about going away and how she was sad even though all the situations were
comedical the characters true feelings still reached the audience effectively.
The episode used rhetoric in an effective way. It made use of comedy and heartfelt
moments to get the theme of characters feelings to the audience in an entertaining and quick
way. Portraying all the situations at the same time while not making it confusing or losing the
overall message of the episode in the comedy or story of the show itself.