[7.4/10] This is an episode that took a fair amount of setup to get going, but once things kicked into gear in the second act, there were a lot of laughs and some good family and character moments.
The A-story worked well for me. Tina heads to Joshua’s (her dairy aisle/dancer former paramour) tap recital, wanting to let him down easy after things have been going well with Jimmy Jr. (in the form of a joke that he sort of laughed at and thus made their souls touch). The actual setup is a little stock, but once Tina decides to investigate who tried to sabotage Josh in order to make him so happy he won’t be crushed when she preemptively dumps him, it becomes a lot of fun.
For one thing, there’s just a lot of great gags about Tina overzealously (and semi-incompetently) playing detective. Her shakedowns of the various Sawyers, and the bewildered reactions of Douglas and Josh’s dance teacher are hilarious. I particularly enjoyed Tina getting stuck behind a gate with one of the wrong Sawyers who’s scared out of his wits. At the same time, the show has fun both poking fun at the world of middle school dance recitals and all the red herrings. Plus the solution is reasonably clever. The episode ties things off nicely with Tina and Josh, leaving them with the same feelings and putting them on an even keel, which is a good way to leave things.
I was more on board with the B-story from the get-go, but even that really escalated in terms of humor one it got going. Gene and Louise competing to see whose burger will be the best and thus get a hallowed place on the “burger of the day” board is a good premise, and Bob gushing and daydreaming over this development is very sweet and amusing. The fact that it turns into a competition, replete with a side bet between Bob and Linda is the right kind of Bob’s Burgers weirdness.
But the payoff -- that the parents agree to declare it a tie so that nobody’s feelings are hurt, only to realize that both burgers are absolutely terrible -- is a winner. And Teddy being forced to be the tiebreaker, seeming oblivious to Bob and Linda’s efforts to hurt the kids’ feelings, and then being forced into pretending the burgers aren’t awful is an even funnier escalation.
Overall, this episode struggles a little bit out of the gate, but gets better and funnier as things progress.
Review by Andrew BloomVIP 9BlockedParentSpoilers2020-04-30T19:46:58Z
[7.4/10] This is an episode that took a fair amount of setup to get going, but once things kicked into gear in the second act, there were a lot of laughs and some good family and character moments.
The A-story worked well for me. Tina heads to Joshua’s (her dairy aisle/dancer former paramour) tap recital, wanting to let him down easy after things have been going well with Jimmy Jr. (in the form of a joke that he sort of laughed at and thus made their souls touch). The actual setup is a little stock, but once Tina decides to investigate who tried to sabotage Josh in order to make him so happy he won’t be crushed when she preemptively dumps him, it becomes a lot of fun.
For one thing, there’s just a lot of great gags about Tina overzealously (and semi-incompetently) playing detective. Her shakedowns of the various Sawyers, and the bewildered reactions of Douglas and Josh’s dance teacher are hilarious. I particularly enjoyed Tina getting stuck behind a gate with one of the wrong Sawyers who’s scared out of his wits. At the same time, the show has fun both poking fun at the world of middle school dance recitals and all the red herrings. Plus the solution is reasonably clever. The episode ties things off nicely with Tina and Josh, leaving them with the same feelings and putting them on an even keel, which is a good way to leave things.
I was more on board with the B-story from the get-go, but even that really escalated in terms of humor one it got going. Gene and Louise competing to see whose burger will be the best and thus get a hallowed place on the “burger of the day” board is a good premise, and Bob gushing and daydreaming over this development is very sweet and amusing. The fact that it turns into a competition, replete with a side bet between Bob and Linda is the right kind of Bob’s Burgers weirdness.
But the payoff -- that the parents agree to declare it a tie so that nobody’s feelings are hurt, only to realize that both burgers are absolutely terrible -- is a winner. And Teddy being forced to be the tiebreaker, seeming oblivious to Bob and Linda’s efforts to hurt the kids’ feelings, and then being forced into pretending the burgers aren’t awful is an even funnier escalation.
Overall, this episode struggles a little bit out of the gate, but gets better and funnier as things progress.