‘Parks and Recreation’ Recap (Season 4, Episode 19): “Live Ammo”

After a month away, Leslie and the gang are back in NBC’s Parks and Recreation

Parks and Recreation is back! A month without this show is a dark month indeed and at some points I started questioning my sanity. Had this show actually existed or had I made it up? Was it really my favourite sitcom? Was Ron Swanson really the greatest character EVER? Fortunately, “Live Ammo” answered all of those questions and more: yes, Parks and Recreation is back and yes, it’s just as good as ever.

“Live Ammo” continues Leslie’s campaign story and guest stars Bradley Whitford (The West Wing) as a councilman who gives Leslie a tough decision, the first of many if she is to win the election. If she doesn’t cut the parks department budget, then either an animal shelter is being closed down or Ann is losing her government job.

Leslie is just one of the characters who has to pull out all the stops in this episode; April, who is quickly becoming a second Leslie, is the other. April struggles to find anything in her job that she actually likes until she comes across all of the animals from the shelter and decides to set up a pet adoption thing. Even though she ends up with more animals than she had at the start, Tom cheers her up by showing how much joy she brought to a little girl. April smiles and it’s possibly the most adorable thing ever.

Meanwhile, Ron goes to yoga with Chris in an attempt to convince him to give him Ben’s old job. He stands still for a number of hours, completely clear of thought, which impresses Chris. Unfortunately, Chris finds out that if Bobby Newport wins the election instead of Leslie, Chris will be out of a job for supporting Leslie’s campaign. Uh oh.

And what of Bobby Newport? He still hasn’t returned from wherever he was overseas but his “avatar,” Jennifer is still around and Leslie is forced to turn to her and Newport’s rather large amount of money to solve her problem. Leslie tells Jennifer that Newport should put some of his money towards the animal shelter, giving him some good publicity. However, Leslie has a bigger plan: there’s a debate coming up and Leslie plans to destroy him. I can only hope.

“Live Ammo” was one of those episodes of Parks and Recreation where literally everything worked. All three plots were great, a lot of the characters shined and it even had a guest star that added but didn’t distract from the rest of the episode. This episode reminded me why I miss Parks and Recreation so much: it’s funny, it’s sweet and it’s consistently amazing. Now don’t leave me again!

Image credit: FX

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