This week, we’re doing things just a little differently. We’ve got two fresh, new episodes from our favorite restaurant. “The Hurt Soccer”, which premiered April 1st, and “Cheer up Sleepy Gene”, from April 8th. And as always, SPOILERS AHEAD.
“The Hurt Soccer”
This is the first time in a while that both the main plot and the sub plot have been equally entertaining! That probably sounded a little more negative than I meant it, but what I’m really getting at, is that this is a reat episode.
Bob and Louise are excited for a marathon of their favorite American Warrior=esque show, but a soccer assistant calls and says that Linda signed Louise up six months ago, and she’s never played once. Once again, it was a bad decision made during “Wine Time”. It’s the last game of the season, and a ton of girls are sick or on vacation, so she’s forced to play.
Meanwhile, Linda and Gene, who’ve been left to tend the restaurant, decide to turn it into a piano bar. But their vision is drastically different than the reality. As per usual, Teddy hangs around and makes things weird, but fortunately we have another guest this time. Mrs. Murkin, the piano teacher from school, shows up to tickle the ivories. I was worried we were going to get some of that, “you’re taking my idea!” garbage from Gene, but he turns out to be more than fine with it, which is refreshing. It comes to light that Mrs. Murkin was playing for the community playhouse until she and the lead actress got into a fight and she left. Linda makes a few phone calls, gets the actress and the rest of the company to show up, and it turns out to be her sister.
This ended up being a great twist, as they gave no indication of their relationship prior to the reveal. Things are resolved, and the sisters reunite in song! Too bad the burger Linda forgot she was cooking nearly burned down the whole building and spoiled the mood.
Back on the soccer field, Bob and Louise’s plan to get the game shut=outed goes down the tubes when the team of underdogs tells them they love the game and want to keep playing. And Louise, who can have a good heart when she needs to, decides to take one for the team and act as Goalie.
Bob finally has a good idea and coaches her to use a move they saw on their favorite show, which works and throws the other team into chaos, leaving Bob’s team open to score a couple goals. They don’t win, but they all talk about how much fun they had. In addition, Tina may have found her calling as an assistant coach.
“Cheer Up, Sleepy Gene”
Gene makes a new friend in Gym class named Alex, who invites him to sleep over. But Gene has, what I would personally consider, disturbing separation anxiety regarding Linda. To the point where he takes her unused maxi-pads with him to school as mementos of her. He doesn’t know how he’s going to get through the night without her, but fortunately, worse things happen to distract him from his homesickness.
Alex’s parents have elected to lead a sugar-free, and apparently taste-free, lifestyle. This doesn’t set well with Alex, who can’t help but complain the entire time he and Gene are forced to do family activities with them. This inspires Alex to run away from home that very night. He has apparently been planning the trek for a while, but Gene’s presence gives him the confidence to follow through with it. Despite Gene’s protests, he accompanies Alex to both prove that he isn’t going to rat him out, and keep him out of real trouble.
They end up in “Alex’s Alpine Oasis for Boys”, which is really just a poorly constructed fort in the woods, where Alex insists on trying to sleep in Trashbags. Gene convinces him that they should go to his house, because it’s at least dry.
While there, Gene convinces Alex that, sometimes you have to do things you don’t want to do. Once he has seen the error of his ways, they convince Tina and Louise to help them sneak back into Alex’s house before his parents find out.
On their way back in, they catch Alex’s mom in the kitchen with a pint of ice cream. But rather than busting her, they’re more concerned with making it back up to bed. If I may break the narrative flow here for a minute, I’d like to say that is not a choice I would’ve made. But, they make it, and Gene realizes he can sleep away from home if he’s tired enough. And Linda promises him that he never has to sleep away from home again; not when he leaves for college, not when he graduates, not even after he’s married, and the two just bask in each other’s neediness.
In the secondary plot, Bob and Linda make a bet that one snores louder than the other, only to find that they both snore horribly, and even learn that they can’t sleep without the sound. It brings them closer together, I guess.
The main plot involving Gene and Alex kind of felt like something that could actually happen and didn’t have an absurd quality to it like some of these usually do, and that’s okay. Gene kind of learned something, as did his friend Alex. Louise and Tina weren’t around much, but they got some of the best lines in the entire episode. I don’t think a single thing Louise said was not sarcastic. But the Bob and Linda snore plot was boring enough to make anyone start snoring. Thankfully, it wasn’t heavily focused upon and slid nicely to the side.
There you have it! We’re all caught up through Sunday the 15th. So, tune in next time, same burger time, same burger channel.
