Recap / Corner Gas S 3 E 14 Friend Of A Friend

"You feel sorry for me?"

A Plot: Lacey's old friend Connie comes to visit, and everyone in town gets a close encounter with Connie's rudeness. Lacey seems oblivious to it, until she reveals that she knew all along about Connie's rudeness, but stays friends because she feels sorry for Connie. Meanwhile, everyone wants to see a showdown between Connie and Wanda.

B Plot: After Oscar complains, Wanda and Brent start a customer loyalty card program at the gas station. Everything ends up spiraling out of control when the cards get increasingly more "exclusive".

C Plot: Karen is out to prove that she would be good at undercover work, but Davis isn't buying it.

Tropes Referenced:

• Accidental Public Confession: When Lacey finally reveals that she stays friends with rude Connie because she feels sorry for her, Connie just happens to be in the booth behind her to overhear.
• Brutal Honesty:
  Karen: I could do undercover work.
  Davis: I know you could. It's just that you'd be really bad at it, that's all.
• Cassandra Truth: This is what the plot with Connie's rudeness seems to be, with Lacey being totally ignorant of it and refusing to even entertain the possibility. Turns out she knew all along.
• Comically Missing the Point: When Connie demands that Davis arrest Oscar and Davis doesn't, Connie calls him fat and lazy, saying "I bet if [Oscar] were a piece of ham, you'd go right after him!" Later, when Davis and Oscar mention Connie's rudeness, Oscar complains "She called me a piece of ham!"
• Damned by Faint Praise:
  Hank: Hey, Karen. I heard what Davis was saying, and I want you to know, I think you'd be great at undercover work.
  Karen: Uh thanks?
  Hank: I mean you're so emotionless and cold, you'd be perfect.
  Karen: Thanks.
  Hank: In fact, you have such a flat personality, you could easily slip into other people's skin.
  Karen: Appreciate that.
  Hank: The way you drift in and out of people's lives without leaving any permanent roots, you'd make a perfect undercover agent.
  Karen: Why all the compliments?
• Discount Card: Wanda and Brent keep making up new ones to get people off their back as they keep demanding better cards.
  Brent: Platinum now?!
  Wanda: I slipped it in between Gold Elite and VIP Titanium.
• Hidden Wire: Hank tries to talk Karen into wearing one to prove that Connie is rude. When Karen refuses, he wears one himself. He actually manages to successfully record her being rude... but accidentally records over it later with himself singing.
• Hypocritical Humor:
  Hank: You know what I hate?
  Brent: When people just out of the blue say, "You know what I hate?"
  Hank: No, but that is annoying.
• I Take Offense to That Last One:
  Connie: Okay, I want to help the crazy homeless as much as the next guy, but that man is harassing me.
  Oscar: I'm not homeless!
• Jerkass: Connie's natural personality.
• Literal Metaphor:
  Brent: Hey, Wanda, are my hands dirty?
  Wanda: Well, we're none of us innocent.
  Brent: No, I mean literally are they dirty?
• Malaproper: Through a rapid-fire sequence of flashbacks, we find out that Oscar misconstrues the Platinum card as "Plutonium", "Platypus", and "Geranium".
• No Longer with Us:
  Hank: Emma, can I ask you for some advice?
  Emma: Can't you ask your own mother?
  Hank: [sadly] Emma, you know she's gone to a better place...
  Emma: They have phones in Saskatoon.
• Not Me This Time: Oscar is usually an abrasive Grumpy Old Man who gets mad about insignificant things, but for once, he's not the one being rude. He genuinely just tried to ask Connie to pass him ketchup at the Ruby and she treats him like that somehow qualifies as harassment.
• Parenthetical Swearing:
  Connie: That's hilarious.
  Wanda: Yeah, well I'm full of wit.
  Lacey: Rhymes with wit.
• Precision F-Strike:
  Lacey: This is classic transference. You can't stand Oscar's rudeness, so you're projecting it onto Connie.
  Emma: No.You're embarrassed by Connie's rudeness and you're transferring it onto Oscar.
  Lacey: Not transferring, projecting.
  Emma: On Oscar?
  Lacey: To Connie. Oh, wait. Who's transferring and who's projecting?
  Emma: All I know is your friend's a bitch.
• Serious Business: The card system at Corner Gas becomes this for the town as everyone starts using their card level as a status symbol, to the point that they take someone else having a better card than them (or someone they don't like having the same card as them) as a personal attack against them.
• Shout-Out:
  • Connie while making fun of Davis:
    Connie: I thought CHiPs was cancelled, Ponch.
  • Brent refers to Wanda as Horshack.
• Snark-to-Snark Combat: This is what everybody hopes to see between Connie and Wanda. Averted when they finally meet: they end up enjoying each other's rudeness and instantly become friends, then gang up on Lacey.
• Staging an Intervention: All of Lacey's friends sit her down to tell her that Connie is rude. As it turns out, she already knew.
• Unwitting Instigator of Doom: The entire rewards card plot would never have happened if Emma had not demanded to have a better card than Oscar.
• You Are Fat: Most of Connie's insults towards Davis.