Big Bob is coming to dinner so that Tina can interview him for a school project. While the family waits for Pop Pop to arrive, they take turns coming up with their own versions of an infamous tree incident that happened to him in his younger years.
Interview With a Trope-pire:
- Anachronism Stew: Louise's story takes place "before cars, computers or even juice boxes", but Big Bob gets a call on his cell phone at one point. When called out on it, she amends it to a land line phone with a really long cord.
- Art Shift: Linda's story (which is quickly cut off by Big Bob arriving) is depicted in a more simplistic style, in contrast to Louise and Gene using the standard art style. Justified given it's a Whole-Plot Reference to The Giving Tree, which uses a similar art style.
- Beanstalk Parody: Louise's story is one, with cops!
- Blatant Lies: The three stories about the tree incident include fantastical elements (such as aliens) despite being hyped up as what really happened, and further inconsistencies are also shown (for instance, Louise portrays Big Bob as a cop even though Bob claims he never was one).
- Bread, Eggs, Breaded Eggs: Louise describes the fight scene with Pop Pop and the Giant vs the Beanstalk's henchmen as having flips, kicks and kickflips.
- The Bus Came Back: Big Bob returns for the first time since "Father of the Bob". At 159 episodes, Big Bob now holds the record for the longest gap between appearances.
- The Cloudcuckoolander Was Right: It turns out that Gene got the closest to the actual tree incident, in that it happened while Big Bob was camping.
- Cool Old Guy: Just like his last appearance, the kids all love Big Bob, a sharp contrast to their maternal grandparents.
- Cryptid Episode: Gene's story is about aliens disguised as trees.
- Did You Die?: After the interview, Tina can't read her own notes and wants to double-check with Big Bob that he survived the tree incident.
- Disney Villain Death: The beanstalk's henchmen in Louise's story fall from the clouds all the way to the ground. Then it turns out they survived.
- The Dog Was the Mastermind: The villain in Louise's story turns out to be not the giant, but the beanstalk itself.
- Entertainment Above Their Age: For once it's not Louise's story, but Gene's. Bob realizes that Gene's story is very similar to the R-rated They Live!. Unlike Louise, who usually just plays dumb, Gene freely admits that while Bob was watching it he snuck out to watch it as well.
- The Faceless: Although Bob's late mother was a very important part of the actual tree incident, the most that gets seen of her is her leg as she leaves the tent.
- Gasshole: In Louise's story, the bread that the giant sells to the villagers causes them to emit horrendous "mega-farts".
- Halfway Plot Switch: Linda's story gets cut off early from Big Bob's arrival, and from there the episode switches from the standard "anthology" plot to a more grounded story focusing on Bob and Big Bob.
- Lost Food Grievance: In Gene's story, Big Bob gets startled by a falling pinecone and drops his ice cream float, which he (and Gene) sees as a big deal because it had the "perfect ice-cream-to-soda ratio."
- My Eyes Are Up Here: Not seen but alluded to via the Store Next Door, "My Knives Are Up Here".
- Near-Death Experience: The tree incident was when Big Bob nearly got crushed by a tree. Bob's mother was also there, and had she not gotten up to use the bathroom she would have been crushed. The whole thing made Big Bob consider how lucky he was to have her, and was what convinced him that he wanted to marry her.
- Pop-Culture Pun Episode Title: To Interview with the Vampire.
- Pragmatic Villainy: The giant in Louise's story stopped using villager bones to make bread because it was too impractical to actually obtain them.
- The Quisling: Tina helps out the alien invaders in Gene's story because she was promised a sweet gig in space.
- The Reveal: The tree incident itself was actually very mundane, but it helped bring Bob's parents together. It also turns out that the reason Big Bob doesn't like talking about it is because he assumed mentioning Bob's now-deceased mother would dampen the mood.
- Secret Other Family: Subverted; when Bob asks his father if there's anything else he can ask about, Big Bob seems like he's about to confess to this, before quickly clarifying it was a joke.
- Serendipitous Survival: Before the tree fell on the tent, Bob’s mother got out to go to the bathroom and the main part of the tree fell where she was sleeping. Big Bob realizing that she would have been crushed if she was still in the tent made him realize how lucky he was to have her.
- Shout-Out:
- Gene assumed the Big Bad of Louise's story was Mr. Bean.
- When Gene admits to sneaking out of his room and watching They Live! from the hallway, Linda calls him a "rowdy, rowdy peeper," a shout-out to the movie's star, "Rowdy" Roddy Piper.
- Strong Family Resemblance: The two already had an extremely strong resemblance, but the depiction of young Big Bob looks almost identical to his son.
- Suspiciously Specific Denial: The giant in Louise's story has a pick that he insists is not made of human bone.
- This Banana is Armed: When Tina turns out to be on the side of the tree aliens in Gene's story, she's pulls out a branch and points it at Big Bob and Louise: naturally, neither of them is initially very threathened and Big Bob tells her that it's hard to take someone seriously when they're pointing a branch at you, to which she insists that it's actually an alien gun which they would be able to see with Louise's special binoculars, not that she's giving them an opportunity to do so.
- Voodoo Shark: In Louise's story, Big Bob gets a call from the station while talking to the giant atop the beanstalk. Gene points out that Big Bob shouldn't have a cell phone because the story takes place centuries ago. Louise amends this with a more ridiculous image of a landline with a very long cord.
- When Trees Attack: While the entire plot revolves around an incident where Big Bob nearly got hit by a falling tree, Gene's story plays the trope more straight as it depicts alien trees attacking him.
- Whole-Plot Reference:
- Louise's story is a reference to Jack and the Beanstalk.
- Gene's story is a reference to They Live!.
- Linda's story is a reference to The Giving Tree.
