From 13-Year-Old Anne's Journal — "January 3, 1983 – POOR. Jenny is paralyzed from lack of oxygen. This old doctor helps her get better by physical therapy. Boring.”

From Anne —

Reading this blurb, I’m so impressed by my hard little ‘tween heart. But to be fair, by this time, LHOP’s final season, like many, I was numb to the traumas Landon had layered onto every character. This time, raven pig-tailed Jenny (Shannen Doherty, who would succumb to cancer 40 years later) is taking a dip in the ole’ swimming hole and loses the locket her dead dad gave her. She stays under too long trying to fish it out: punished for having a dead dad. Classic Landon sadism.

This episode is more gentle on its distinguished codger guest star, Ralph Bellamy (Oscar-nominated for 1937’s The Awful Truth with Cary Grant—which we need to see, Tracy—and also popping up in stuff like Rosemary’s Baby (‘68) and Pretty Woman (‘90). Landon loves a distinguished codger guest star, and I do, too.

Bellamy does a pretty nice prairie doctor, slowly going blind, who’s keen on nature therapy for his patients, involving planting seeds and rehabbing wounded birds. His bond with Jenny is sweet but can’t help but feel creepy today.

A few points about this episode:

Jenny and her senior citizen doctor pal take walks in the meadow in the shadow of a mountain. The mountains of Minnesota are amazing, LOL.

Willie is fun to look at here. He looks to be about 20 and is still attending school but at least is no longer wearing knickers.
There’s a scene when Laura is hanging out laundry. As someone who hangs out my laundry whenever I can, she’s doing it all wrong, leaving it in clumps so it will probably never dry.
Also, Laura is also uncharacteristically whiny and neurotic about Jenny’s medical issues. Again, the LHOP show itself was lacking oxygen at this point. But I’ll always love Laura’s fancy dress: the pumpkin and royal blue calico number. She wears it when taking Jenny to get a second opinion in the city.
In this episode, Nancy Oleson is like an AI chat bot, urging Jenny toward suicide with “Do you really think you’ll get better?” (from the halted speech and the limp induced by lack of oxygen). Lovely.

Tracy, can you remind me how the Jenny character even came on to the scene? By this time, LHOP was one big orphanage.

From Tracy —

This will disappoint you, Anne, but I too actually had to look up WTAF Jenny came from. Jenny was Laura and Almonzo’s niece they adopted after the death of Royal Wilder, Almanzo’s much older brother.

Here is an incredibly useful site for us fans.

Now, can we talk about how shitty the New Beginnings series intro was? It still makes me cringe.

Can we also talk about how much it bugged the ever living shit out of me that no one even tried to retrieve the locket? She was SO close! I remember that bit bugged the bejusus out of me when I first saw this episode. Honestly, I wanted to punch Justin Bateman in the face for that faux pas. And I have always had a bit of a crush on him. I also had to look him up as well. Who was his character? Yet another orphan! Due to a horrific carriage accident.

But this little bit will BLOW YOUR MINDS. After her father dies, Jenny actually tried to commit suicide by drowning herself in her introductory episodes! Ooooooh! That’s like some major creepy kismet shit right there. Or did the writers just forget that and used the ol’ drowning trope again? They had to be close to running out of ideas.

Dammit, the whole last season of LHOP seems like a fever dream in a way. I don’t remember it as intently as I do the first few seasons where every episode was seared into my cerebellum with a hot poker. Like how the hell did Walnut Grove suddenly get two doctors when they had been overworking poor Dr. Baker for all those years? He came out of nowhere! And seemed like a really decent doctor. I would have gone to him!

Besides the neato cameo by “Doc” Richard Bellamy, it is interesting to note that teacher Etta Plum is played by Landon’s daughter Leslie.

RIP Shannon Doherty. You were only 53 when you left us. I never watched 90210 or much of Charmed, but I thought you kicked ass in this episode.

Post 64: "Marvin's Garden"

Post 43: "The Blizzard"

Post 42: "The Gift"