So growing up in the suburbs of Chattanooga, Tennessee, I didn’t have access to telenovelas, those Spanish-language soaps that apparently blend comedy, drama, camp, and fantasy in a manner that inspires Pedro Almodovar and “Ugly Betty.”

I bring this up because I am about to praise “Ugly Betty,” and the things I’m going to point out may be true of every Spanish-language soap on Telemundo. I don’t know. But whatever it’s copying, I am endlessly impressed by how “Ugly Betty” bounces so easily between so many genres, winking at us the entire time. There’s an audacity to the messy way it tells a story that I find kind of thrilling.

Whereas a show like “24″ trades on the cool sophistication of its fillmmaking and writing–always convincing you that the series itself knows better than you do–there’s an air of manic uncertainty over at “UB.” Plot arcs get hurled at us one week, only to disappear the next. Wilhemina Slater (the diva-harpy played by Vanessa Williams) is just about to fall in love with a Texas oilman, but then by the end of the next episode, she’s dumped him, fixed her hair, and turned back into an ice queen. Oh, and meanwhile? Rebecca Romijn has shown up as a post-operative transsexual. Yep, just like that! And remember Betty first boyfriend? Me neither!

The creators of the series pretty much admit in this Entertainment Weekly story that they’re making a lot of it up as they go along, but so what? Obviously, the folks over at “Lost” are too. The “Ugly Betty” people just have the decency to fess up right away, rather than wearing hairshirts for the press after their ratings drop and people notice that the episode about Jack’s tattoo really, really sucked. (PoP has considered this fly-by-night writing before.)

But I digress. To me, the chaotic sensibility on “UB” makes me accept its dramaturgical risk-taking. If I know that anything goes–and nobody’s confusing the show for Masterpiece Theater–I can better appreciate the stylistic overkill that sometimes creates the show’s best moments. One of those moments came in last night’s episode. Spoilers past the jump!

For those who didn’t see it, last night’s episode features Betty and Henry (sigh) almost hooking up (double sigh) at a Medieval-themed restaurant. This leads to manic brilliance.

Because you see… This restaurant has various Medieval games… like a Dave and Buster’s of the chain mail era. And Betty’s going to try to ride this bucking mechanical horse so she can win all this money to help her dad fly to Mexico (don’t ask). But Henry comes in and says, “No, I’ll be chivalrous, and I’ll do it for you.”

And he’s totally serious. He’s unironically used the word “chivalry” eariler in the episode, which is how the writers let us know he’s not being sarcastic later on.

The some complications happen, and Henry has to have a jousting match to defend Betty’s honor. As she watches, Betty has a dream sequence about being a princess, with Henry as her knight in armor coming to save her.

I cannot stress enough how important this level of fantasy is. You see, Henry has already been positioned on the series as Betty’s perfect, unattainable man: all dorky cute and sensitive, but with a girlfriend he’s too gallant to leave, despite his obvious feeling for Betty. There was bound to be an episode where he got to express his true love for her, as he does at the end of the jousting scene.

I mean, come on! We’ve all been waiting for it.

But chances were also good that this moment was going to get awfully maudlin. When you create this much viewer desire to see a romantic scene of epic proportions, it’s hard not to botch it by going too sappy, too sweet, too gross. I give you the last 6 seasons of “Friends” as proof.

The “UB” episode flaunts the danger of going over the top by going insanely over it. The series admits that it has created a ridiculously perfect proto-couple and then chooses to laugh at how storybook sweet they are. How? By actually turning them into Lancelot and Guinevere.

The entire setting of the Medieval restaurant is a way of acknowledging just how archetypal Betty and Henry have become.

But by pointing to their own purple excesses, the creators are saying, “Hey, it’s cool. We know, too. So let’s just enjoy it, shall we?”

And that’s the best kind of self-awareness. The technique isn’t smugly announcing that the artists think they’re too good for their populist art. Instead, it’s inviting us to revel in the fantasy of it all. Even if we get all the fashion world references and jokes about drugs, can’t we also shiven when we see the cute boy say he loves the awkward girl?

Better still, the episode pulls back at just the right moment. When Henry gets up after being knocked down by his jousting opponent, he looks longingly at Betty. He reaches up for his glasses… and instead of whipping them off like a stud, he just pushes them back on his nose. And it’s not a gesture that’s intended to mock Henry, pointing him out as a dweeb. It’s just a sweet, simple sign that we’re back to reality now.

Sigh.

Later, when Betty gets a girl-power moment to defend Henry’s honor and her own, I’m much more inclined to embrace it as a genuine development.

That’s becasue the show has already let her go all googly-eyed. To my experience, that’s what love is like. Sometimes you want to be rescued, and sometimes you want to defend your partner’s honor. How satisfying that “Ugly Betty” can show us both, while acknowledging the silliness that this kind of thinking can bring out in all of us.