Young Sheldon – A Swedish Science Thing and the Equation for Toast

By starrymag | May 23, 2019

By: Ujjyani Banerjee

 

 

Mary (Zoe Perry) comes home from a grocery run and finds Sheldon (Iain Armitage) and Dr. Sturgis (Wallace Shawn) turning her house into a makeshift radio station. Keen to listen to the announcement of Nobel prize winners in Sweden, in real time, the duo are arranging a shortwave radio that’d pickup broadcasts from all around the globe. Connie (Annie Potts) brought the duo here after they set it all up at her place. There’s an antenna kept in the living room and Sheldon needs it to go up on the roof. Mary bans him from climbing up there and Connie bans John on the same. In his defense, John references his 6 years experience in Tai Chi and how he’s got balance like a jungle cat. Connie mimics his “hula dance” and sticks to her decision.

 

Sheldon goes to dad for the roof work. George (Lance Barber) isn’t interested as it’s just a science prize thing that’d come in the newspaper next day. Sheldon corrects that it’s the Nobel prize and, even though the same holds true for the Superbowl, people still watch it. Missy (Raegan Revord), who’s on the swing, concurs. Sheldon adds that he might thank him when he wins one in the future. George agrees to help, but soon realizes the climb isn’t his cup of tea. He assigns it to Georgie (Montana Jordan).

 

Sheldon and John can now hear Radio Sweden International clear as a bell. They start discussing on who should win. While John has no favorite, Sheldon roots for Frederick Reines for the detection of neutrino. John guesses he may have a shot and sighs how so many talented people never get recognized.

 

Georgie is watching TV and is pissed that they don’t have cable and only 7 boring channels. George asks him to earn and pay for it himself.

 

At night, Connie finds John weeding out goosegrass from her lawn. She asks him to come home as it’s pretty dark outside. He doesn’t want to and asks if she’s got a headlamp. Connie goes in to get it and lets him be.

 

The next day at school Sheldon mass-invites everyone to his garage to listen to the “Nobel prize winner in physics” announcement live at five in the morning. Coach Wilkins (Doc Farrow) asks George if he is worried about it. It turns out he isn’t; as if anybody would show up at 5:00am?

 

Connie receives a call from John’s colleague, Dr. Linkletter (Ed Begley Jr.), who informs her about an incident wherein John broke into the mainframe computer lab, tripped off an alarm, got involved in a short chase and now is in the dean’s office. Linkletter says he’s there if she needs anything and asks her out for coffee. Disgusted, Connie hangs up and goes straight to John’s to get clarity. He admits to have used the university mainframe and upon being asked to leave his first human instinct of escaping kicked in, i.e. he climbed out a windows and ran like the Dickens! Connie is left puzzled.

 

At lunch Sheldon wonders what he should serve at the Nobel gathering. Tam (Ryan Phuong) suggests Swedish meatballs, but according to Sheldon it’s a no-no for a 5am gathering. He decides on offering an assortment of breakfast cereals to all and later goes over to the store to buy Cheerios. He invites the staff to his live Nobel listening party but they couldn’t care less. At home Missy feels for Sheldon who’s prepping for the gathering. She’s sure that no one would show up and it’d be nothing but an early morning dud yet Sheldon’s optimism doesn’t tarnish.

 

Connie urgently calls Mary over to show how John has been writing jargon and equations on the bathroom walls and trash-bin lids. Mary is shocked while Connie is worried.

 

George finds Georgie watching cable and he repeats that he won’t pay, but as it turns out Georgie did using his saved money. Pleased, George later goes to watch the newly minted channels but finds them pin-protected. Georgie won’t budge as he paid for cable. George is pissed and he later hands over a bill to Georgie that covers food, electricity, laundry and a “PIMA” charge – i.e. Pain in my ass charges. Georgie is left there staring at the bill. In no time George ends up watching the unlocked channels and Missy catches him viewing PG-13 stuff. She scurries over to inform Mary. George changes the channel momentarily, but gets back to the good stuff soon.

 

Later that night Connie is even more worried when John doesn’t show up for dinner and has been AWOL at school, according to Dr. Linkletter. He shares that John has had previous episodes wherein he lost connections to reality and had to be hospitalized. Unaware about any of this Connie hurries over to John’s only to find him at the roof, peacefully practicing Tai-Chi in a trance-like state. She is scared. John says he’s trying to feel the subatomic particles pass by him. He wonders about how someone will be winning the Nobel prize the next day unlike him but maybe experiencing these particles graze by his hands would be an even more stellar affair. Connie asks him to join her for tea and they’d discuss his thoughts. She manages to get him to climb down and accompany her back indoors. Connie realizes that John is deeply hurt about not winning a Nobel prize despite having dedicated his life to physics and is trying to cope with it.

 

The next day, minutes before 5am, Sheldon is prepping the Cheerio platter and tuning the radio. Mary comes over but realizes that he’s hurt by the empty seats and that even his best friend Tam didn’t show up. Sheldon is expecting Dr. Sturgis to come, but Mary reveals that he’s unwell. She asks if he needs her to stay around. Sheldon says it’s okay and allows her to go to her room. He stares at the void and takes a seat, rooting for neutrinos. The announcement begins and it’s revealed that they’ve awarded the Nobel Prize in Physics to Henry Kendall, Jerome Friedman and Richard Taylor for the discovery of quarks. Sheldon breaks down in tears realizing the loss of his neutrino hero and accepting the bitter side of loneliness. At this point, adult Sheldon (Jim Parsons) recollects how unlike quarks whose primary feature is to remain bonded, he felt like a neutrino, destined to be alone forever.

 

But destiny had its own plans as somewhere around the globe, at that very moment, were six other kids: 8-years old Leonard (Isaac Harger), a 9-years old Koothrapali (Rishabh Prabhat), a 9-years old Howard (Ethan Reed Stern), a 5-years old Bernadette (Aj Coggeshall), a 4-years old Penny (Quinn Aune) and an 11-years old Amy (Lily Sanfelippo) inching their way up to be the best of friends together, as we know them today.

 

Today, Dr. Sheldon Cooper is grateful that he didn’t have to remain a neutrino forever.