The coolest cousin of Cricket's... but does she seem familiar?
Cousin Jilly
Wanting to revive childhood memories with Cricket, Tilly pretends to be his made-up cousin "Jilly" but can't bring herself to reveal her true identity. Meanwhile, Nancy forces Gramma to pamper to her.
"Cousin Jilly" contains examples of:
- Bottle Episode: The whole episode is set at the Greens' house, with occasional flashbacks to the country farm.
- Broken Record: Young Cricket walking in a circle and repeatedly saying "I'm bored" over and over.
- Big "SHUT UP!": Cricket yells "STOP!" to shut up the mirrored fight between Tilly and her alter ego and attempts to butt in.
- Big "YES!": Cricket screams one when "Jilly" suggests they play their favorite country games.
- Clark Kenting: ...maybe? Jilly never interacts with anyone other than Cricket here, but Bill at least would have to have been playing along in the past for Tilly to keep the act going. Also lampshaded when Tilly asks how Cricket never realized she was Jilly.
- Failed a Spot Check: Cricket apparently had no idea Tilly and Jilly were the same person for years.
- Holding Both Sides of the Conversation:
- Tilly does this towards the end, including putting Jilly's sunglasses on a mirror.
- Unusually, she doesn't do this with Saxon this episode, at one point resorting to Parrot Exposition to fill in the silence.
- Invented Individual: To cheer up baby Cricket back at the farm, Tilly invented Cousin Jilly as someone cool he could hang out with.
- It's the Best Whatever, Ever!: Cricket shouts, "This is the best day ever!" as he is enjoying the country activities of Jilly.
- Jerkass Ball: Nancy grabs it hard in this episode, starting things off by eating all the chips, drinking all the soda, and throwing her boots everywhere, including at the TV. When Alice rightly calls her out for her disrespectful behavior, she responds by latching onto Alice’s claim that she’s not family and saying that that means she’s a guest, and Alice should pamper her and let her get away with being an EVEN BIGGER JERK. By the time she finally gives it a rest, you kinda wish Alice would have thrown her out of the house already.
- Minimalist Cast: The only characters present are the Green family.
- Out of Focus: Bill only appears in two scenes and has no relation to the main story.
- Paper-Thin Disguise: All Tilly does to become Jilly is wear pink sunglasses, and yet Cricket never caught on until a few moments after she told him.
- Sacred Hospitality: The B-plot has Alice upset that Nancy keeps dropping in unannounced and tossing her boots anywhere, as she doesn't consider Nancy family. Nancy figures that, since she's not family, therefore she's a guest, and thus Alice should serve her every need. Eventually, Alice is fed up with acting as Nancy's maid and tells her that she's not a guest; this was Nancy's plan all along, to make her ex-mother-in-law admit she considered her family.
- Shout-Out: When Nancy first comes in, Alice is watching a parody of Seinfeld.
- Totally Radical: Jilly speaks with more cool slang than anyone Cricket knows, apparently.
- Transformation Sequence: Parodied when Tilly becomes Jilly in a Sailor Moon-like sequence, which is completely unnecessary as all she really does is put on sunglasses. Lampshaded by a whispering voice saying "Same" as her arms and legs "transform".
- The Unmasking: Tilly when she reveals she was Jilly the whole time.
- Vocal Dissonance: During the flashbacks, younger Cricket and Tilly sound the same as they do now, when their voice actors should modulate their voices up a bit when they should.
Technically she's about halfway to owning this herself.
Gloria's Café
Gloria hopes to open her own café, but when her loan doesn't go through, she and the Greens open a secret café that once housed Big Coffee without permission.
"Gloria's Café" contains examples of:
- Bedsheet Ghost: In order to stop Officer Keys from finding out about her illegal café, Gloria has all the customers don bedsheets so he thinks the place is haunted. Funny enough, it works on Keys, Don, and Dawn (although the latter two are the only ones terrified). However, he sees through the trick after realizing none of the "ghosts" said "boo", which according to Keys, is what a real ghost should do.
- Berate and Switch: Alice points out to Gloria all the ridiculous and illegal things she did to run her café… and then congratulates her on finally showing the gumption needed to start and run a proper business, offering to invest on her café.
- Bottle Episode: The majority of the episode is set at Elkins Street, aside from a brief scene at the police department.
- Earn Your Happy Ending: For Gloria, at least.
- Family of Choice: The episode solidifies Gloria as a member of the Green family, and just to really hammer it home a man walking by misreads the new "Gloria + Green Café" sign and asks Gloria if she is Gloria Green.
- 555: The number to call Don & Dawn Realtors is 555-0192.
- Paper-Thin Disguise: Officer Keys infiltrates the café disguised as a Hipster. Played with in that as he takes off his disguise, no one recognizes him until he puts on his police hat.
- Police Are Useless: Zigzagged, Officer Keys still maintains his bumbling attitude. However, he also keeps his competence in this episode as shown where he, despite using some Insane Troll Logic, manage to figure out a way on how to bust Gloria for using the abandoned building as an unlicensed café by doing his own investigation, disguising himself as a hipster, and catching Gloria off-guard.
- Secret Shop: Gloria decides to run a café in the old Big Coffee location in secret until she can pay the rent. She enlists Cricket to lure people in without letting the authorities know, while Tilly mans the back door and only lets in people who know the secret password. Unfortunately, no one clued in the adult Greens, who made a sign for her and installed it, which then attracts the unsuspecting attention of Officer Keys.
- Series Continuity Error: The mailbox Bill built in "The Van" is strangely nowhere to be seen whenever the front lawn of the house is shown.
- Sequel Hook: The final scene of Gloria and the Greens constructing the new café sets up what's to come in Season 3.
- Spanner in the Works: Bill, Alice, and Nancy unwittingly exposed Gloria's café since the kids didn't tell the truth about her business, and got her arrested by bringing a disguised Officer Keys into the building.
- String Theory: Keys has one, which he uses to solve the mystery behind the ghost café ruse.
- Title Drop: On the sign Bill puts up over the café door.
- The Bus Came Back: Don and Dawn appear again as Keys asks for them to come over to the empty Big Coffee building to investigate the noises seeing as they own the space and haven't rented it to anybody. They, along with Keys fall for the ghost trick, although unlike Keys they end up so terrified of the customers dressed as ghosts they have to have Keys carry them home.
- Throw the Dog a Bone: After all the hardships and bittersweet endings she went through throughout the series, Gloria finally has a job that sticks by opening her own café.
- Wham Episode: The retail space that once held Big Coffee is now under the management of Gramma and Gloria, and will reopen as the Gloria + Green Café.
- You Meddling Kids: When Keys exposes Gloria's illegal cafe, he shouts, "You would've gotten away with it too, Gloria, if it hadn't been for a meddling Keys and his partner, Officer Cuffy!"
