11x19 Bridge Over Troubled Rudy

[7.6/10] Louise’s friendship with Rudy has turned into one of the most pleasant undercurrents of Bob’s Burgers. The way she’s so subtly ruthless and sly with most people, but super protective and stealthily friendly with Rudy is great. This episode is a superb link in that chain, and telling about Louise at the same time.

Louise going through the arduous and perilous task to bring Rudy his exploding bridge toy rather than apologize for calling him a weenie feels true to form for our favorite rabbit-hatted little girl. The episode nicely underlines Louise’s care for having hurting Rudy’s feelings when he was stressed and potentially hurting their friendship without her being able to admit it. The episode also does a good job of setting what the bridge means to Rudy and so there’s stakes and potential when the kids are wheeling across sprinklers and bumpy back roads.

It also sets up Tina’s obsession with doing a good job as a plant-sitter, which also feels true to form for her. Her efforts to protect Rudy’s dad’s bonsai plant, and her anxiety over doing it properly, is a good bit of comedy. It’s a small story, but it works well with everything else that’s going on in the episode. Gene is also used well as Louise’s partner in crime and dispenser of amusing one-liners.

The B-story sees Bob and Jimmy Pesto get into a calmness competition after Mort teaches Bob, Linda, and Teddy to meditate. This is a nice low stakes comic subplot. Bob being able to cut through his own thoughts and find a Never ending Story-esque happy place rings true and rings funny. Linda and Teddy falling asleep when trying to meditate (and Linda’s refusal to admit she wasn’t really meditating, was a hoot. Teddy’s barely sublimated anger at Mort earned some weird laughs. And I enjoyed the final competition where Bob proved himself more zen than Jimmy, only to go back to clean the grill because being that calm is “too stressful.” It’s a great lark of a B-story.

The main plot ends nicely too, with Louise completing her mission but also apologizing to Rudy for what she did wrong. It’s a nice way to show her elaborate plan to avoid having to say she’s sorry succeeding thanks to her ingenuity, while also having her realize that it, by itself, didn’t make up for her comment. I could probably have used an extra beat there somewhere, since the resolution feels a little quick. (Frankly, I thought the show was going to have her to botch the bridge transfer but have the apology be the thing Rudy wanted more anyway.) But it still works well as is.

Overall, another episode of Bob’s Burgers that’s sound as a pound, showing how it totally gets these characters even in the show’s eleventh season when most shows start to caricature their main players, and using those traits and character relationships to build fun stories like this one.