This Is Us (5×08) In The Room Review

For our review of the last episode of This Is Us, click here.

Synopsis: The Pearsons navigate huge family milestones together but from a distance. (IMDB)

It is safe to say that this latest episode of This Is Us is hands down one of the best, ever. Every moment of it oozes brilliance, but it’s the message and story behind the episode that truly pulls everything together. In this past year of COVID, we have been away from our loved ones during the best and worst of times. We’ve missed important milestones, had to communicate with our elderly relatives through the phone, social distancing, or otherwise, and so many other things.

It’s been a difficult year, to say the least, and This Is Us finds a way to pay homage to the man that made it possible for us to stay in touch the way we do in modern times. It was brilliant, genius, and every moment was incredibly written, and it’s hard to find the words to describe how it made me feel.

This week’s episode starts off with Madison on FaceTime with Randall and Beth as she waits for Kevin to possibly show up in time for her delivery. As we saw last week, Kevin was frantically trying to make his way to Madison and even quit his big Hollywood film to do so. Luckily for Madison, Beth and Randall made sure to stay on the phone with her for hours as she tried to pass the time and then when she was about to get her epidural. Luckily, Kevin does show up in time and manages to defeat all odds to be there for his kids’ birth, just like he was hoping to do.

Also eager for the arrival of a new baby are Kate and Toby! The baby they are going to adopt is ready to enter the world alongside her cousins, thereby forming the new Big Three. Given COVID, only Kate was allowed to be inside the hospital room while Toby waited outside in the parking lot. While out there, he meets an elderly man who is waiting to find out whether or not his wife, Rose, is going to survive. She is on a ventilator and hasn’t been doing so well. While both are hoping for good news, Toby and this man strike up a friendship and unexpectedly bond. The man shares stories of his wife, their superstitions, and good luck charms, and even gives Toby one of the charms as good luck. As fate would have it, both received good news before the end of the night!

Rebecca and Miguel spent the episode holed up in the Pearson family cabin given all the travel restrictions COVID has imposed. Naturally, Rebecca was incredibly uneasy being so far away from her kids and feels guilty that she’s not living up to a promise she had made Jack years before. A promise that they would always be there for their kids–for the small and big things. Of course, circumstances are different here and at the end of the day, technology is what helps her stay connected to the kids.

This entire episode is tied with a beautiful bow as we see flashbacks to 1963 of a couple meeting, falling in love, having a child, and then living their lives together. The wife is upset with the husband because he comes home late every night, and asks if he can explain what he is working on so then she can understand why he’s always gone. As it turns out, the husband, Nasir Ahmed (Abhi Sinha), was working on an algorithm that could potentially create technology that allows people to send pictures instantaneously. As viewers, we have no idea that this random story is in this particular episode not because of a connection to the Pearsons, but to the concept of technology, especially how much we used it this past year. The end of the episode explains that the flashbacks are connected to real-life couple Nasir and Esther Ahmed (Katie Sarife), who recently celebrated their 56th wedding anniversary.

In the early 1970s, Nasir Ahmed led a team of researchers who developed the Discrete Cosine Transform. This technique is still used by companies as part of their image and video sharing technology. You don’t know his name, but Nasir and his team are responsible for keeping us connected today. He and his wife Esther recently celebrated their 56^th anniversary.

It was a brilliant and beautiful way to weave Nasir’s story into this particular episode of This Is Us. The timing was perfect given the year we’ve had and it all flowed together so beautifully. Honestly, it’s one of their strongest episodes in a long time–and hopefully we’ll get more of it in the episodes to come!

Thank you Nasir Ahmed for your contributions which have allowed us to stay connected through a very difficult and painful year.

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