Title: Coach in Love, Part 2
Directed by: James Burrows
Written by: David Angell
Air Date: November 15, 1984
Previous: Coach in Love, Part 1
Next: Diane Meets Mom
Guest Starring: Bette Ford, Kelsey Grammer
"Coach in Love, Part 2" is the seventh episode of the third season of Cheers.
At the end of Part 1, Coach asked his girlfriend Irene to marry him, and she accepted, followed just seconds later by a telephone call telling Irene (Bette Ford) she won $2 million in the lottery. As this episode picks up the action, we find out that Coach is still under the impression that he and Irene are engaged, despite the fact that they haven't spoken in over a week since that night and Irene has moved to an undisclosed location.
Finally Irene makes it back to the bar to tell him that money changes people, that she wants to explore new things, and that she's breaking up with him. ("I don't think we're engaged anymore, Ernie."). Coach however still believes in The Power of Love, so he sets a wedding date and on the day puts on a tuxedo, fully expecting Irene to show up.
Tropes:
- The Bore: Cliff, still yammering on about his vacation to Florida.
- Break the Cutie: Diane remains The Pollyanna about Coach's belief Irene will come back to him, making her yell, "COACH WILL YOU WAKE UP AND SMELL THE COFFEE?!" when even she realizes it's a fantasy.
- The Ken Burns Effect: Used sparingly in the opening Previously on… montage, with a couple of slow zooms on the stills of characters' homes.
- Lurid Tales of Doom: Sam disapproves of the sleazy tabloid Carla is reading (apparently a five-headed cow was born in Vermont), but gets interested when the crossword in the newspaper mentions a common household item that is an aphrodisiac. (Oregano.)
- Multi-Part Episode: The story of Coach and Irene is tied up.
- Previously on…: Cheers usually got creative with these and this one is a series of still photos of the characters' homes. Accompanying the still photos are voiceovers in which characters tell loved ones (Cliff's mom, Norm's dog, Carla's kids, Frasier) what happened with Coach and Irene. The sequence ends with Frasier in voiceover trying and failing to engage in phone sex with an uninterested Diane.
- Running Gag: The running gag throughout the third season in which Cliff bores people to death by blathering on about Florida.
- Shout-Out: When Phrase Catcher Norm is asked how things are going as he enters, he says "God's in his heaven and...something something something."
- The Unreveal: After Irene (who by this point has been reported as engaged to another man) doesn't show, Coach despondently says "I thought she'd call." They are on the way out the bar when the phone rings. Coach picks the phone up, says without prologue "Let me do the talking," and goes on a speech where he tells Irene that she'll be better off with her rich fiancée and she has his blessing. He then hangs up the phone and walks out. Sam realizes that they never did find out if it was Irene on the phone. The phone rings again, and Sam is about to pick it up when Diane stops him and says "Sam, it's her." Then Sam and Diane leave too, singing "Isn't It Romantic?".
- The Voice: The single word "Norm?" makes this the episode where Vera Petersen graduates from The Ghost to The Voice. It's unclear whether she was voiced by Bernadette Birkett, George Wendt's wife, who would supply the voice of Vera in later episodes.
- Took a Level in Jerkass: Money goes to Irene's head almost immediately. While her outward personality doesn't change, she treats Coach terribly, so much that her own daughter agrees with Sam when he calls to tell her off.
