Recap / Bob's Burgers S5E12 "The Millie-churian Candidate"

When a madcap race for class president begins at the school, Louise tries sinking her mortal enemy Millie's chances. Meanwhile, Bob enjoys his new knife and challenges Teddy to a competition.

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The Trope-churian Candidate:

• Actor Allusion: Likely not an intentional one, but hearing Louise say Abby's real name, Mabel, out loud, probably made at least a few people's brains go brrrrrrr.
• Arson, Murder, and Admiration: After Henry reveals to the Belcher siblings how he manipulated everyone to ensure he'd win unopposed, Louise has this to say:
  Louise: How can you play with people's lives like that?! Who the hell do you think you are, Henry Haber?! You're gonna be an amazing president.
• Attack of the Political Ad: One of Louise's attempts to keep Millie from winning was to launch an attack ad against Millie. Everyone thinks it's mean and feels sorry for Millie.
• Bait-and-Switch: At the beginning of the episode, it at first looks like Louise was helping Tina hang a "Jimmy Jr for Class President" poster. Turns out she was tricking her into throwing it into the trash can.
• Beware the Nice Ones: Rudy agrees with Ms. LaBonz when she expresses her desire to slap Jimmy Jr. after Louise's disastrous ad.
• Chained Heat: In her Catapult Nightmare, Louise dreamed that Millie would have the Home Ec class sew their clothes together after winning the election.
• Chekhov's Gunman:
  • Abby, who was only seen briefly during an interview, turned out to have a very important role in Henry's plan.
  • When Louise's class was deciding on a name for the class chinchilla, among her classmates is a boy who looks similar to Henry. This classmate is Hogarth Haber, Henry's younger brother—he ended up telling Henry about Louise's irrational behavior around Millie, which Henry exploits to secure his election.
• The Chessmaster: Bland, boring Henry Haber plays the entire school like a set of spoons, getting Louise to tank Jimmy Jr's campaign and getting both her and Millie disqualified, leaving him the winner. For added points, he even used a chess motif throughout his campaigning.
• Complexity Addiction: All Henry had to do to become the only candidate was let Jimmy Jr. pick the songs for the school dance. That's it. Instead, he created an awesome but elaborate plan that required predicting the actions of several students in such a way that he couldn't directly get involved without either exposing his plan or getting disqualified for rule-breaking. It still works out for him and it's possible he didn't know that Jimmy Jr. would back out at this compromise; furthermore, considering how Jimmy Junior and Zeke talked down to him in the opening, it's not too hard to consider he'd want to get back at them for it.
• Dark Horse Victory: Henry Haber was the only one in the running that everyone believed had no chance of winning, but thanks to his elaborate Batman Gambit with Louise and Millie, he ends up winning.
• Decided by One Vote: Henry was naturally the only vote for himself. It pays off, although it might not actually be the case since Frond declared him the winner anyway due to default.
• Devil in Plain Sight: Most of the students don't see anything wrong with Millie and think Louise is the crazy one, up until Millie snaps and tries to strangle Abby with her own braid.
• Didn't Think This Through: To test which tool was better, Bob's knife or Teddy's hammer, Linda has them compete. Her first challenge was to have Bob chop 10 tomatoes and Teddy use his hammer on 10 nails. When they finish at the same time, she has them switch stations; Bob free the nails with his knife and Teddy hammer the tomatoes back together. Teddy questions her on how he's supposed to hammer tomatoes, and Bob asks how it took her an entire day to think of the challenge.
• Distinction Without a Difference: Tina accuses Louise of not being interested in helping Jimmy Jr. win. Louise clarifies that she's definitely not interested.
  • Later when Henry points out his plan succeeded because Louise becomes irrational whenever the topic of Millie comes up, Louise tries to deny it.
  Henry: Millie makes you completely irrational.
  Louise: I'm not irrational, she just drives me TOTALLY INSANE!
• Easily Forgiven: Gene and Tina seriously consider voting for Millie over their own sister, even after their first meeting with her ended with Millie leaving them for dead in a box fort. Yes, Louise is going a little nuts, but that's nothing compared to what Millie has done to them.
• Entitled Bastard: Even though Louise took Tina's role as campaign management out of the blue and idiotically tanked it, she still says Tina should help her as a member of the Belcher family.
• Epic Fail: Every single thing Louise does to get support for Jimmy Jr. only makes Millie more popular.
• Everyone Has Standards: The first video ad for Jimmy Jr. was so bad even a nice kid like Regular-Sized Rudy felt he deserves to get slapped.
• Failed a Spot Check: When Millie suggested they name the class chinchilla "Princess Little Piddles", Louise immediately called out how stupid that name was. While she was dumping on Millie's suggestion, she failed to notice her classmates glaring at her for being so mean to Millie and they decided to vote for Millie's suggestion because they felt sorry for her.
• Foreshadowing:
  • In Jimmy Jr.'s campaign room, on the chalkboard is the poll result of the candidates. Because of where Tina is sitting at, she's blocking the view of Henry's result while Jimmy Jr. and Millie's result can be visually seen. The number itself isn't relevant, but this foreshadows how everyone keeps forgetting that Henry is still in the race and the main focus is on Jimmy Jr. and Millie. Similarly, Henry is at the debate (on the far right of the stage), but the camera remains largely focused on Louise and Millie and Henry doesn't even say anything until the debate is over.
  • In general, Henry's plan can be pieced together from the beginning—he's the one who convinces Millie to enter the race at the start of the episode and he's also the one who later tells Louise to do the same, hinting at how he's playing both sides. The only new piece of information revealed by his ending monologue is that one of Louise's classmates is his brother Hogarth, who told Henry about the chinchilla incident and gave Henry the idea to get Louise involved in the race.
• Freudian Slip:
  Linda: Here is how it works. The knife and the hammer will perform a series of parallel tasks designed to determine the biggest tool.
  Bob: Better tool.
• Fun with Acronyms: Millie's proposed B.E.S.T.I.E.S. program stands for Buddying up Everyone with Someone To Improve the Experience of School. Tina comments that Millie's really good at acronyms.
• Honor Before Reason: Bob and Teddy get into a duel over which of their tools are better. They give it up when Linda suggests using them on each other, until Teddy cockily but rightfully points out his hammer would destroy his knife, after which an offended Bob agrees and the obvious happens.
• Identical Twin Mistake: The Pesto twins, even after turning their backs on their older brother, are willing to vote for Louise... at least, until she calls Ollie "Andy".
• Imagine Spot: Louise has a dream where Millie wins the election and uses her power to force them to be best friends. It's what drives Louise to try and stop her.
• Improv Comedy Is Inane: Millie freaks out over Louise potentially not being her bestie, but tries to save her campaign by claiming it was just practice for when she starts an improv club. Tina remarks, "I think Millie just lost," but Gene insists the only losers in improv are the audience.
• Instantly Proven Wrong: After her first Jimmy Jr. campaign ad fails, Louise tries to claim that most of the students probably liked it, only for a news bulletin to report that Millie gained 30 points on Jimmy Jr.
• Jerkass Has a Point: As completely batshit insane as Millie is, even she notes that Louise is unhealthily obsessed with taking her down.
• Narm: In-universe, the pro-Jimmy Jr. video is considered this to the school. This was the very first reaction:
  Regular-Sized Rudy: Oh barf.
  Ms. LaBonze: I wanna slap that kid.
  Regular-Sized Rudy: I know, right?
• Nice Job Breaking It, Hero:
  • Louise completely derails Jimmy Jr.'s campaign within minutes. Worth noting is that Jimmy Jr. was ahead by a landslide (his lead was originally 95% before shrinking by a measly 1%), meaning that even with Millie joining the race Jimmy Jr. was a shoo-in for president before Louise intervened. All Louise had to do to defeat Millie was nothing.
    Tina: You turned Jimmy Jr. from hero to zero! It's not supposed to work that way!
  • Back when Louise's class was deciding on a name for the class chinchilla and Millie suggested a terrible name for it, none of their classmates were going to vote for it until Louise started dumping on Millie's suggestion, making them all feel sorry for her and voting for her suggestion.
• Once More, with Clarity:
  • When her class chose Princess Little Piddles for the class chinchilla's name, Louise believed it meant that Millie always got her way. At the end of the episode, we get more details. Turns out the name originally had no chance of winning, but Louise bagged on it so much that the class felt sorry for Millie and decided to vote for it out of pity.
  • When Henry reveals his involvement in the episode's events, several events (such as him goading Millie to join the race and later goading Louise to do the same) are revisited, now with the knowledge that he orchestrated the entire thing. It's also revealed that he was the one who threw the paper airplane at Louise that told her to search Mr. Frond's files for Abby.
• Only Known by Their Nickname: A key plot twist of the episode is that Abby's real name is Mabel, meaning that if Millie did implement her buddy system Louise would be paired with Abby, not Millie. Abby lampshades how nobody knows her actual name.
• O.O.C. Is Serious Business: Deconstructed. Louise is usually very savvy with a very witty head on her shoulders but as Henry points out, she becomes totally irrational when Millie is involved, overreacting when there is (sometimes) no need and thinking of her as the devil herself. This made it incredibly easy for Henry to turn her into an Unwitting Pawn by exploiting this emotional derailment so that Louise would tank herself, his rival and Millie in the campaign.
• The Reveal: Henry manipulated events from the beginning so that he would be the only candidate left for school president.
• Revenge Before Reason: Louise loses her mind trying to thwart Millie, which Henry Haber bets on.
• Secret Handshake: At the beginning of the episode, Millie shows Louise one she invented for them, which includes what Millie calls a hugshake.
  Louise: Stop hugshaking me!
• Screw This, I'm Outta Here: Jimmy Jr. quits the campaign after Louise completely ruins his chances, and because Millie offers to let him pick the songs at the homecoming dance (which is all he wanted to do in the first place).
• Shout-Out:
  • The Store Next Door is "You Can't Handle the Ruth: Baseball Cards".
  • The exterminator van is "Ant Misbehavin'".
• Signs of Disrepair: Millie removes the "I" and "U" from Louise's name on her campaign ad, making it spell "Lose".
  Gene: That was in Louise's name all along, and we never saw it!
• Skewed Priorities: Even as Millie tries to strangle her, Abby's only worry is that her braid isn't undone because it took her all morning.
• Slow and Steady Wins the Race: Through determination and more than a little manipulation, Henry goes from a pitiful 5% in the polls to (technically) winning with 100% of the vote.
• Sorry to Interrupt: When Mort enters the restaurant and sees Bob and Teddy damaging the counter for their competition, he leaves and says he'll come back later.
• Springtime for Hitler: Louise tries to invoke this trope by posting an attack ad against Jimmy Jr., believing that everyone will blame Millie for it and boost Jimmy Jr.'s popularity like the attack ad on Millie boosted her popularity. All it does is tank his poll numbers so badly Jimmy Jr. quits.
• Unwitting Pawn: It turns out Millie, Louise, and even Abby were all pawns of Henry Haber in his scheme to get rid of Jimmy Jr. in the election. Bonus points because Louise even lampshades this trope when she cries "We were pawns?!" plus the chess motif Henry used for his campaign.
  Louise: You can't be this smart!
  Henry: Chess I can.
• Would Hurt a Child: Ms. LaBonz's first response to the first Jimmy Jr. ad video is to express her desire to slap him.

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