Title: Norm, Is That You?
Directed by: James Burrows
Written by: Phoef Sutton
Air Date: December 15, 1988
Previous: Norm, Is That You?
Next: Jumping Jerks
Guest Starring: Bebe Neuwirth, Robert Benedetti, Al Rosen
"How to Win Friends and Electrocute People" is the seventh episode of the seventh season of Cheers.
A somber Cliff enters Cheers one day to bid the gang a possible farewell. He's going to the hospital, and he's concerned he might not return from his life-changing... appendicitis operation. Needless to say, nobody's exactly concerned for ol' Cliff Clavin.
Some days pass while Cliff's in hospital, and nobody bothers going to visit him, until Frasier notices a shocking decline in the inane conversation at the bar, especially in the meaningless statistics department, and goes (very reluctantly) to visit Cliff on his rounds.
Cliff's a little hurt by the fact that no-one came to see him, and wonders if maybe, maybe the possibility exists he could be unlikable in some way. Frasier tells him he doesn't need to resort to drastic measures to fix that, but Cliff decides he does. So he gets a doctor to sign him up for an experimental electroshock therapy.
Meanwhile, Lilith asks Sam to help her learn how to drive. Sam comes to regret this decision.
Tropes:
- Brutal Honesty: Lilith tells Sam the reason she's asking him to help her learn how to drive is because she has no emotional attachment to him whatsoever. Ouch.
- Drama Queen: Cliff's only going in for appendicitis, but since it's Cliff, he acts like there's a very good possibility he won't be coming back at all.
- Drives Like Crazy: Lilith. When Sam takes her out on a driving lesson, she rams another driver (an eight-wheeler with a bumper sticker saying "insured by Smith & Wesson") off the road, then insults him.
- Dr. Jerk: The doctor Cliff gets to help cure his obnoxiousness is only meant to zap him whenever Cliff is obnoxious, but within a few minutes starts zapping him for the hell of it.
- Failed a Spot Check: The gang are so utterly uninterested in Cliff it actually takes Frasier several days to realize he's not there, and only after he notices the conversations are somehow less stupid than usual.
- The Friend Nobody Likes: Cliff, quelle surprise. No-one at the bar, not even Norm, the closest thing he has to a friend, bothers to go see him while he's recuperating.Cliff: They don't like me, they don't really care.
- Hypocritical Humor: Frasier chides the others for not going to see Cliff, but when asked why he didn't either, defensively responds "what, I don't have a life?"
- Idiot Ball: Having wrested the zapper from the doctor (who's never named, although the credits called him "Dave"), Cliff says "Let's see how you like it, pal!", presses the button, and, obviously, shocks himself again.
- Intimate Telecommunications: The cold open has Woody sweeping up the bar, listening to a commercial for what's plainly a phone sex line, although the lady with the sexy voice on the TV only calls it a "party line." Naive Woody dials the number—and gets Cliff.
- I Resemble That Remark!: Wondering if he really is insensitive to everyone else's feelings, Cliff thoughtlessly sits on a fellow patient.
- Laser-Guided Karma: Al steals the electro-zapper while no-one's looking, and when Cliff returns to being his obnoxious self, starts using it on him.Dance, mailman!
- Never My Fault: At the end, Cliff sulks out of the bar, only to hang around by the door, waiting for everyone else to apologize to him.
- O.O.C. Is Serious Business: Everyone at the bar is alarmed when Cliff comes back from the hospital and does not regale them with some inane piece of bull.
- Reports of My Death Were Greatly Exaggerated: Rebecca gets a photo taken for a newspaper profile of Boston businesswomen, and then is horrified to see that it's accidentally put in the obituaries. Lillian Corp. sends over a wreath with condolences.
- Sarcasm Mode: When a humiliated Cliff walks out of the bar, the gang briefly wonders who should go after him, until Cliff cracks the door open and says "I want Norm!". As Norm gets up he says "I'll have to see if I can go catch him, huh?"
- The Scrooge: Cliff orders champagne for everyone at the bar! ... then tells Sam to make it the cheap stuff.
- Serious Business: An argument over whether The Addams Family or The Munsters is better nearly comes to blows.
- String-on-Finger Reminder: Woody ties a string around his finger to remind himself to go visit Cliff in the hospital—and he still forgets. (What the second string is for is a mystery.)
- This Is Gonna Suck: After having seen Sam angrily ranting at Lilith about how dangerous she is on the roads, this look is all over Frasier's face when she offers to take him out for a drive.
- We Want Our Jerk Back!: The gang's reaction when they discover Cliff resorted to shock therapy to be less obnoxious.
