Califunya: Episode 4 - The Key to My Happiness

Is it me or is Califunya — Becky Stark’s cooky new ‘thing’ — starting to gain some sort of dark, Lynchian significance? In this episode Becky finds a key to her happiness in the trash(!) but quickly forgets what it is or what it does and ultimately rejoices in the fact that it is big and beautiful. It opens nothing she states before knowingly looking at the viewer. Do we ourselves tend to pride in that which is without function yet superficially desirable? Does our potential happiness diminish the more we adhere to such a paradigm?

In the following episode she ushers in Colin Meloy who, carrying a heavy suitcase filled with “Despair”, sings ‘The Kingdom of Spain’, a sad song about golden ages long lost. I could also write paragraphs about how Episode 1 is allegory for the biblical apocalypse & how Episode 2, entitled ‘Bluebird’, might as well be called ‘Blue Velvet’, but you can’t deny that something is going on here.