History Awesome / TheGoldenGirls

* Rose gets another one in "Mary Has a Little Lamb." The girls take in their sixteen-year-old neighbor Mary, who has been impregnated by her boyfriend and kicked out of her house by her father. Dorothy, who has been through the exact same scenario, spends an afternoon trying to reason with Mary's father, but can't get through to him. Finally, she plays a trump card that the audience never sees coming--she tells him a story about a teenage couple from "a little town called St. Olaf." And it ''works.'' This would ordinarily be an OffScreenMomentOfAwesome for Rose, but at the end of the episode, Mary's father comes to pick her up and mentions, in full view of the other girls, what a difference the St. Olaf story made, and how he wants to hear more about the city, as it sounds like a great place to raise a family. Rose's eyes grow wide as she realizes just what this means: Dorothy Zbornak ''told a St. Olaf story''.

-->'''Blanche''': All right, just what in Hell are all of you staring at? Haven't you ever seen three vibrant, healthy, sexually active women before? Now, we are embarking on a little weekend cruise with some longtime gentlemen friends, and if we decide to be intimate, then we'll be prepared! We are ''not'' embarrassed, we're not uncomfortable, we are not humiliated. We're gonna walk out of here today with our heads held high, secure in the knowledge that what we have done is morally and socially responsible.

--> '''Dorothy:''' Fine, we'll get the basic system.\\

'''Barbara:''' ...to a bad guy. It's okay to lie to a bad guy.\\

** Rose manipulated Dorothy's cheating boyfriend into admitting that he made a pass at Blanche, [[EngineeredPublicConfession while Dorothy was in earshot.]]

* Rose gets another one in "Mary Has a Little Lamb." The girls take in their sixteen-year-old neighbor Mary, who has been impregnated by her boyfriend and kicked out of her house by her father. Dorothy, who has been through the exact same scenario, spends an afternoon trying to reason with Mary's father, but can't get through to him. Finally, she plays a trump card that the audience never sees coming--she tells him a story about a teenage couple from "a little town called St. Olaf." And it ''works.'' This would ordinarily be an OffScreenMomentOfAwesome for Rose, but at the end of the episode, Mary's father comes to pick her up and mentions, in full view of the other girls, what a difference the St. Olaf story made, and how he wants to hear more about the city, as it sounds like a great place to raise a family. Rose's eyes grow wide as she realizes just what this means: Dorothy Zbornak ''told a St. Olaf story.''

-->'''Blanche:''' Oh, you lost the [[UsefulNotes/AmericanCivilWar war]], get over it!

* In "Big Daddy," a storm knocks over a neighbor's tree onto the lanai, and said neighbor refuses to do anything about it even when the girls show him the legal documents which prove it's his responsibility. Sophia responds by placing a "curse" on him, and the guy laughs it off. Several days later, he comes back and begs Sophia to undo whatever she did, because it's working: his car won't start, his alarm hasn't been going off, his golf clubs are missing, he can't sleep, and he's developed an enormous boil on his behind. After he agrees to remove the tree, Sophia removes said curse. When the guy leaves, his wife stays behind and reveals that ''she'' was the one messing with his belongings to get him to apologize (the boil was just a lucky coincidence).

'''Rose''': I ''know,'' Dorothy.\\

'''Rose''': But I was hoping you'd have a hard time taking advantage of [[TrueCompanions somebody who cares about you as much as I do.]]

** Later, the cops ask the girls to place a transmitter in the [=McDowell=] home during the dinner party; Dorothy volunteers to be the plant. She manages to keep her cool and succeed, with the other girls not revealing anything either, and the bug ends up being the key to breaking the case and getting the [=McDowells=] behind bars. For a substitute teacher, a grief counselor, a museum worker, and a retired old woman, the group is [[NeverMessWithGranny undeniably badass.]]

* In "Long Day's Journey into Marinara," Sophia's sister Angela decides to move to Miami at Dorothy's insistence. Throughout the episode, Sophia is furious, as she feels that Angela is trying to "steal" her life and new boyfriend Tony. It all culminates when Sophia discovers that Angela has moved into Tony's apartment as a roommate (though she genuinely didn't know, when she answered the ad, that this was Sophia's boyfriend); Sophia marches over to his place to accuse him and Angela of fooling around. Tony assures her that that's not the case and tells Sophia that she's the only one for him... just as ''another'' woman (to whom Tony told the same thing) appears from the bedroom. (Sophia: "Oh, Tony... oh, Angela... oh, boy, who is that woman?") Despite spending the whole episode sniping each other and swapping insults, Angela ''immediately'' flies to Sophia's defense, and the two women start attacking Tony with their purses for his two-timing.

'''Rose:''' ''(cheerily)'' Believe whatever you want, I don't care. [[PrecisionFStrike Hypersexual bitch.]]

* In “Love Under the Big Top,” a fisherman roughly manhandles Rose at a “Save the Dolphins” protest. Blanche, [[SouthernBelle of all people]], responds by punching him in the face. Do ''not'' mess with Blanche’s friends.

** In the same episode, Rose gets one for drawing on her grief counseling experience to cut through Sophia's defenses and identify why she's been mad at Angela for decades, correctly intuiting that Sophia was ashamed of Phil's cross-dressing and blamed herself for what she considered a "problem." Rose then explains that Phil being different didn't make him any less of a person, and that Sophia shouldn't be upset for loving him.

* In "Valentine's Day," the girls reminisce about various dates they've had in the past, including a Valentine's cruise they once planned to take with their steady boyfriends. While at the drugstore, Blanche suggests that they buy some condoms (itself an awesome moment, as it proves that she is an EthicalSlut who cares about safe sex), which eventually leads to a MegaphoneGag--the clerk does a price check on the condoms ''over the loudspeaker,'' explicitly pointing out the women buying them, and his coworker responds over the P.A. as well. As the crowd points and laughs at the girls, Blanche grabs the microphone and delivers an ''epic'' [[ShamingTheMob mob-shaming speech]] about how they're doing the right thing:

* In "Where’s Charlie?", Sophia pretends to channel Rose’s late husband Charlie for cheap laughs and a few quick bucks, but it nearly results in Rose’s relationship with her boyfriend Miles being ruined. When Dorothy finds out what her mother has been doing, [[EveryoneHasStandards she doesn’t find it funny at all]]. She [[CallingTheOldManOut calls out Sophia]] for her behavior, and intimidates her into telling Rose the truth.

-->'''Dorothy:''' What happened?\\

* In the episode "Joust Between Friends", Blanche gets Dorothy a job at the museum she works at. Unfortunately, in one of Blanche's more intense ItsAllAboutMe moments, she gets very jealous and hostile toward Dorothy when the boss starts giving her more responsibilities and counting on her more than on Blanche. Things reach their head when their boss asks Dorothy to handle the preparations of an important banquet that Blanche wanted to work on; Dorothy refuses to show Blanche a set of papers about it, and an enraged Blanche quits. It turns out that the boss decided to make the banquet a tribute to all of Blanche's work, and Dorothy was only given the responsibility--and sworn to secrecy about it--because letting Blanche doing would ruin the surprise of her being the guest of honor. When Blanche comes into the house and insults Dorothy, Sophia is present, and for as much grief as she gives Dorothy, in this instance she goes into full MamaBear mode, getting genuinely furious and standing up for Dorothy by firmly and awesomely putting Blanche in her place:

-->'''Blanche''': All right, just what in Hell are all of you staring at? Haven't you ever seen three vibrant, healthy, sexually active women before? Now, we are embarking on a little weekend cruise with some longtime gentlemen friends, and if we decide to be intimate, then we'll be prepared! We are ''not'' embarrassed, we're not uncomfortable, we are not humiliated. We're gonna walk out of here today with our heads held high, secure in the knowledge that what we have done is morally and socially responsible.
** This also counts as a meta-awesome moment, as ''The Golden Girls'' was one of the first sitcoms to actively discuss and encourage using condoms when having sex, even with longtime partners. Remember that the show aired during the height of the AIDS crisis, and fears of sexually-transmitted infections were high. That it was able to do so while still being riotously funny ("CONDOMS, Rose! CONDOMS, CONDOMS, CONDOMS!") is a credit to the writers.

* Blanche's [[SpoiledBrat troubled]] grandson comes to visit. He misbehaves and treats everyone horribly. This all culminates with him blowing up and [[ArmorPiercingSlap Sophia slapping him.]]

** This episode's place here and on the Funny Moments page is an awesome moment for Susan Harris, for showing that the WriterOnBoard VerySpecialEpisode [[SturgeonsLaw CAN be done well]].

* The episode "The Case of the Libertine Belle" has the ladies all go to a Murder Mystery Weekend at a hotel thanks to Blanche setting it up as a museum activity in hopes of impressing her boss, with Dorothy in particular being thrilled at going. Upon the murder mystery being set up, Dorothy demonstrates what a keen amateur sleuth she is when she solves it in minutes. But the awesomeness comes when Blanche's boss is found stabbed in her room, signaling her as a murderer and about to be arrested; Dorothy comes through big-time when she recalls certain details on things she both saw and heard, and deduces who the real murderer is, proving Blanche's innocence. Blanche's boss is actually alive, the whole thing being a second murder mystery, so nobody was hurt, but had the situation been real, Dorothy would have been the reason the real murderer would face justice and her actions would've saved Blanche from being falsely accused and arrested.

* In the episode "Joust Between Friends", Blanche gets Dorothy a job at the museum she works at, but in one of Blanche's more intense ItsAllAboutMe moments, she gets very jealous and hostile toward Dorothy when the boss starts giving her more responsibilities and counting on her more than on Blanche, which eventually explodes when the boss asks Dorothy to handle the preparations of an important banquet that Blanche wanted to handle, and Dorothy refuses to show Blanche a set of papers about it, and an enraged Blanche quits. Turns out Dorothy's handling the banquet because it's a surprise for Blanche, as it's being held in her honor, and Dorothy was sworn to secrecy. When Blanche comes into the house and insults Dorothy, Sophia is present, and for as much grief as she gives Dorothy, in this instance Sophia goes into full MamaBear mode, getting genuinely pissed off and standing up for Dorothy by firmly and awesomely putting Blanche in her place:

'''Sophia:''' Your secret, not mine.\\
'''Blanche:''' (shocked) Is this true?\\

'''Sophia:''' And now that you feel like the dirt you wanted my daughter to eat, I think I'll go into the kitchen and have a nice hard candy.\\

-->'''Dorothy:''' Hi, Blanche.
'''Blanche:''' Eat dirt and die, trash.
'''Sophia:''' Just hold it right there, Blanche!
'''Dorothy:''' Look, you stay out of this, Ma.
'''Sophia:''' That banquet you're so mad about, they're throwing it in your honor!
'''Blanche:''' What?
'''Dorothy:''' Ma, I told you it was a secret.
'''Sophia:''' Your secret, not mine.
'''Blanche:''' (shocked) Is this true?
'''Dorothy:''' Yes, it is.
'''Sophia:''' And now that you feel like the dirt you wanted my daughter to eat, I think I'll go into the kitchen and have a nice hard candy.

* "Ebbtide's Revenge" revealed that Dorothy's sister-in-law Angela was probably the only person in their family who supported Phil's crossdressing. She not only brags about Phil's good taste, but she honored his final wishes to have him buried in a teddy he picked out himself and refuses to be cowed by Sophia's attitude problem. After all the unfortunate jokes the show made about Phil's habits, it goes to show he had a wife who stood by him and supported his passion.

* In “Love Under the Big Top,” a fisherman roughly manhandles Rose at a “Save the Dolphins” protest. Blanche, [[SouthernBelle of all people], responds by punching him in the face. Do ''not'' mess with Blanche’s friends.