Jersey Shore - Pauly Helps Vinny Pack
We’re two episodes into the new season of Jersey Shore, and the show is really surprising me. The gang has just returned from Italy, and is going directly back to the Shore. For those of you who don’t want, this is an unusual move. The tradition of the show has been: summer on Jersey Shore, then winter in warmer climes, then summer back, etc. They usually have about two months between each season’s filming. Here, though, they return to America, have a party with their families, and go directly back to the Shore.
This is hardest for Vinny, who is very close to his large, loving family. For him, seeing his family briefly but not getting to spend much time with them seems triggering, and he begins a series of panic attacks. The cast of the Jersey Shore is not known for their sensitivity (I still cringe when I recall their reactions to the possibility that Mike may have hooked up with a trans*woman), but they handle Vinny’s confession of suffering from anxiety problems with grace. I was watching with Lauren and Sarah, who suggested the cast’s attitudes suggested that Vinny had had attacks in the past, but they never made it on the show.
Vinny decides he needs to go home for a while, because he can’t juggle his anxiety along with the usual drama of the Jersey Shore, and the cast agrees that he is very strong and brave to face his set of challenges and do what he needs to for his health. It is incredibly moving and heartening.
Now, I often comment (not exactly joke) that Vinny and Pauly are sleeping together. They have an extremely close friendship that includes cuddling and some casual, gossip-baiting jokes about sharing a bed and one another’s sexual habits. If pressed, I would say that I sincerely think they do sleep together from time to time, though it may not be a part of what they’d each consider their main sexual interests.
In this clip, the last few minutes of this week’s episode, Pauly gets really upset about Vinny leaving. He knows Vinny needs to do it for his mental health, but he will also miss Vinny tremendously. His emotion is very real, and some of the most affecting moments of the series to date.
