On her way out, Tommy and David's mother leaves them a set of keys for the new upstairs tenants. Outside on the driveway, David briefly leaves his bike - which is crushed by a newly arrived car. From the passenger’s seat disembarks Candy. Her boyfriend Chuck sees the wreckage - and bemoans his car’s spoiled paint job. He demands payment.
Tommy and David are then greeted by Messrs Primm and Collins, two genial, sharply suited men in cloth caps. Tommy hands them the keys for the upstairs rooms.
As Tommy and David try to fix the bike, they direct upstairs a man in a brightly coloured shirt and bow tie. At the front door of their second floor chambers, Messrs Primm and Collins invite inside their new housekeeper for a cup of their famous pineapple cider.
Next day, Tommy and David carry the bike parts onto the driveway. Before them stands Dotty, a woman in a white polka-dotted shocking pink dress. Tommy and David tell her that a visitor arrived yesterday, and never left, so the housekeeper position has probably been filled. She skips merrily into the building.
Outside, David climbs the fire escape to the second floor balcony. Through the window, he hears a bubbling pot, spies hanging kitchen utensils. At a candlelit table, draped in white polka-dotted, shocking pink napkins, sit the two Gourmets. Looking at the multicoloured striped tablecloth, David sees upon it a white button - and recalls the housekeeper's shirt.
That night, David sneaks into the tenants' empty kitchen. On a bench is a steaming pot. He lifts the lid, and from the bubbling broth, lifts the ladle. Hooked to its bowl is what appears to be a severed finger. David runs into the walk-in freezer. Hanging above the floor are the frozen corpses of the housekeeper and Dotty. As David stares in horror, Dotty’s eyes snap open, and her hands reach for his neck...
In bed, David wakes from his nightmare. Tommy stirs. David hastily dresses. He explains his realisation that the new tenants are cannibals.
Later that day, David leads Tommy into the tenants’ suite. Behind them, Chuck sneaks upstairs, and against the closed door, wedges a chair. David and Tommy explore the kitchen.
David finds a shelf of ominously titled books: How to Serve Six People, Trim the Fat Off Your Man, and The Carnivore’s Guide to Picking the Right Cut of Meat. He opens a hefty tome: inside is a handful of jewelry. They then notice a steaming pot…
Before the lidded pot, Tommy fearfully dons an oven glove. David lifts the ladle, and peers into the concoction within - a tomato-based sauce, which contains... meatballs. In the walk-in freezer, they see a row of hefty meat parcels, labelled "Steak Diane," "Virginia Ham," "Hamburger Patty," and "Head Cheese."
Tommy then finds the colourful shirt of the missing housekeeper. With a yell of fright, they run. In the hallway, from outside, they hear the tenants approach. The boys wedge a chair against the door, and run for the back door - but can’t find it in time...
The suspicious Gourmets force their way in. Downstairs, Candy, having learned of Chuck’s incarceration of her two charges, goes upstairs, and approaches the tenants’ door. They cordially invite her in, and offer a cup of their famous pineapple cider.
Meanwhile, David and Tommy hide in a cupboard. Tommy realises the offer of pineapple cider to be fatal. Just as Candy lifts the mug, Tommy and David burst in, with a yelled warning.
While Messrs Prim and Collins yell in horror, Candy screams and runs. From a handy jar, Tommy hurls peppercorns at the aghast Gourmets. Brothers and babysitter run.
Downstairs, Messrs Primm and Collins explain things to a policeman.
The Gourmets explain the housekeeper’s scream and sudden absence to have been from shock at the filthy stove, followed by a hasty retreat from the job offer. Tommy asks about the napkins apparently made from Dotty’s dress. Just then, arrives Dotty, in jolly acceptance of a second dinner invitation, and has brought the Gourmets, to match their napkins, a pair of polka dot aprons.
David and Tommy apologise for their suspicions. The Gourmets bring a hefty parcel. Still a trifle nervous, David opens it. It’s a shiny new bike! He beams. The Gourmets then invite them all round for dinner, while also taking out a brand new placemat that looks suspiciously like the shirt Chuck was wearing when he was seen last, - for Chuck Steak!
Megan raises her glass, and announces the end. Tucker wonders what she brought to eat. From her picnic basket, Megan takes a sandwich, generously laden with wafers of... tongue! The others groan in distaste, and leave Megan to her sandwich.
This episode provides examples of:
- Affably Evil: A possible subversion. While it’s implied, however comically, that the Gourmets may indeed be cannibals after all, David’s initial suspicions are disproved. In any case, Mr Primm and Mr Collins are cordial, jovial and generous. At worst, it's ambiguously implied that they ate Chuck. ...And he's a bully, so no tears shed there.
- Ambiguously Gay: With their easily affectionate rapport, the Gourmets’ cohabitation seems to be romantic.
- Big Fun: With their self-professed large appetites and playful geniality, the Gourmets’ apparent fondness for human flesh sits ominously.
- The Bully: Chuck crushes David’s bike, and for marred paintwork, tries to coerce payment.
- Cannibal Larder: David sneaks into the Gourmets’ suite, and finds, in a boiling pot, what appears to be a human finger. In the walk-in freezer, he then finds two frozen corpses - however, it’s all just a Nightmare Sequence.
- Comedy Horror: While the subject matter is indeed scarily gruesome, its spectacle is staged alongside such playful whimsy as the Gourmets’ and Dotty’s flamboyance, and Chuck’s buffoonish antagonism.
- Damsel in Distress: In search of David and Tommy, babysitter Candy is invited into the Gourmet’s kitchen, and, for all everyone knows, is at the mercy of two murderous cannibals.
- Evil Chef: A possible subversion: While David’s initial suspicions are disproven, it’s implied, however comically, that the Gourmets may indeed be cannibals after all.
- Food Porn:
- Mmm, meatballs…
- Megan’s sandwich. Although the rest of the Midnight Society aren’t in much of a mood for meat...
- Friend to All Children: Kindly Messrs Primm and Collins, on learning of David’s wrecked bike, buy him a new one.
- Genki Girl: Dotty is flamboyantly jovial.
- I'm a Humanitarian: The Gourmets... might be.
- Jump Scare: In the walk-in freezer, Dotty’s corpse suddenly springs to life, and, with a rather more sinister yell of her catchphrase “yummy,” grabs David.
- Just Desserts: In a mix of Black Comedy and Played for Horror, bullying Chuck is implied, more evidentially than previous alleged victims, to have provided tonight’s meal.
- Nice Job Breaking It, Hero: If the Gourmets (and Dotty) actually are cannibals, then David and Tommy's antics actually benefited them because they're now above suspicion.
- Product Placement: Jovially parodied; the boys’ mother, on having bought some of the Gourmet’s famous pineapple cider, faces the camera with an approving smile, and poses with a bottle labelled with a print of each Gourmet’s face."It’s delicious!"
- Properly Paranoid: The final scene implies that the boys were right all along. Though, even then, it's implied they only go after Asshole Victims
