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Recap / Family Guy S 5 E 11 The Tan Aquatic With Steve Zissou

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Original air date: February 18, 2007

Stewie gets into tanning after Peter accidentally leaves him in the sun without sunscreen, but the excessive UV exposure leaves him with peeled skin and a mole that may be cancerous. Meanwhile, Chris is being bullied by a kid who is taking over as the neighborhood paper boy, and things get worse when Peter beats up Chris' bully and makes everyone else his target.


This episode contains examples of:

  • Ambiguously Bi: There is another hint at Stewie's homosexuality when Brian teaches him how to ballroom dance, leading him to say "I love you" to Brian, who replies with a shocked "What?"; Stewie, to cover it up, claims he told "Olive juice." Brian responds by saying in confusion, "Olive...juice?" Stewie then says, "Olive juice you too."
  • Asshole Victim: No one shed a tear for Kyle after he got beat up by Peter for insulting him.
  • Big "WHAT?!": When Kyle's parents call Lois to tell her, Peter beats Kyle up.
    Lois: Hello? (Beat) Peter did WHAT?!
  • Bloody Hilarious: One cutaway gag shows Peter inventing an electric shaver by attaching razor blades to a fan. We're thankfully spared the result, but we see blood splattered on the bathroom window.
  • Bowdlerization: The following scene cuts/alterations were made between the FOX/free-TV syndicated version and the [adult swim]/cable syndication/DVD version:
    • Quagmire cursing on the golf course: The words "Goddamn" and "shit" were bleeped out on all of the TV versions (and the censored audio of the DVD), but not on DVD (uncensored audio).
    • The scene of Stewie checking himself out in the mirror after Lois points out that he's tanned was longer on the [adult swim] and DVD version. Brian comes in and compliments Stewie on his tan. Stewie then adds that he's hotter than the Wisconsin nymphomaniac who lived in the attic, followed by a cutaway of Stewie in bed awake while the Wisconsin nymphomaniac has an Immodest Orgasm offscreen.
    • Brian squirting Stewie with lotion: Surprisingly, the scene was allowed to stay on the FOX cut, but Brian's line "It's not what it looks like" was cut when Mr. Furley catches Brian (according to the DVD commentary, that line made the male ejaculation joke too obvious, and, therefore, too much for the TV-14 rating, which is why it was cut).
    • A scene cut for time in which one of Stewie's final requests before he allegedly dies is to star in a body pain commercial.
    • The cutaway of Dick Cheney greeting people at Walmart with "Go fuck yourself" has "fuck" bleeped out on the TV versions and the censored DVD audio.
    • An extra scene before Peter confronts his former bully has Peter re-enacting a defecating butt using a hoodie closed up around his face and a candy bar sliding through the hole of the hoodie. This scene is only on the DVD version.
  • Bullying the Disabled:
    • In one scene, Peter turns Joe into a puppet and forces him to dance around for his amusement.
    • Peter's old bully Randy is revealed to have multple sclerosis in the present day, and needs crutches. This does not discourage Peter from attempting to beat him up as revenge.
  • Country Matters: Alluded to when Brian notices a mole on Stewie. Brian suggests it could be the "c" word.
    Stewie: What the hell does that have to do with anything?
    Brian: No, cancer.
    Stewie: Oh, I, I thought you meant, well, it's not important.
  • Disproportionate Retribution: Peter beats the living hell out of Kyle, all because he called him a "poopnose".
  • Embarrassingly Painful Sunburn: Stewie gets left in a tanning booth for six hours, comes out beet-red, and is in so much pain he can hardly move.
  • Epic Fail: Stewie asks Brian to wake him up in 15 minutes. Brian proceeds to fall asleep for 6 hours.
  • Faceā€“Heel Turn: Peter when he becomes a bully.
  • He Who Fights Monsters: Subverted. Peter only becomes a bully because Kyle tells him how much fun it is, not because Peter wants to beat up bullies. However, he decides to take out his aggression on his former high-school bully Randy, who is no longer a threat due to his multiple sclerosis, because Peter thinks he's the source of his bullying problem. Still, Chris stops him because it proves Peter is no better than his bully.
  • Jerkass: Kyle and Peter. The former relentlessly bullies Chris and mocks Peter when he tries to get him to stop, while Peter later becomes a bully just like Kyle.
  • Laser-Guided Karma: Technically, Randy, now having MS, could be considered this for his childhood torment of Peter.
  • Mood-Swinger: Quagmire while playing golf, who curses up a storm and in the same breath is calm:
    Joe: Hey, Quagmire, you know it's not fun when you're like this.
    Quagmire: You want fun? Go home and buy a monkey!
    Cleveland: What does that even mean?!
    Quagmire: I don't know! Boy, we've got a beautiful day for this.
  • Never My Fault: Peter repeatedly farts in Meg's face while eating, even chasing after her while farting as she tries to escape him. When she inevitably throws up, Peter blames her for vomiting in the kitchen.
  • No-Holds-Barred Beatdown: Peter gives one to Kyle after he is repeatedly mocked.
  • Not What It Looks Like: When Brian applies lotion for Stewie's Embarrassingly Painful Sunburn, Mr. Furley walks in to see a speedo-clad Stewie kneeling in front of Brian while the latter is squirting white stuff all over the former's face, drawing the obvious conclusion and leaving in a hurry before Brian can explain himself.
  • Oh, Crap!: Unusually, Peter immediately realizes that he's in serious trouble for beating up Kyle.
  • Porn Stache: Stewie drew a pencil mustache when he got a tan:
    Stewie: I like it 'cause it's just above my lip. It's the kind of mustache that says, "Yeah, I've been nude on camera. What of it?"
  • Rule of Three: In a flashback, Randy pulls the Pants-Pulling Prank on Peter three times, prompting the latter to say, "Rrrrrandy!" The third time, Peter stands at a urinal, and Randy pulls Peter's pants up.
  • Shout-Out:
    • One of Stewie's final wishes should he die of cancer is to visit the Chicago Museum of Art.
    • In a parody of TaB soft drink commercials in the '80s, after getting off his beach chair during a tan, Stewie drinks a can of TaB, then slowly looks at the camera.
    • When Brian advises Stewie to "wait and see" whether or not he has cancer, Stewie says, "Jim Henson had a wait and see attitude, and look what happened to him. Now we've got wrong-sounding Muppets," a reference to Henson's failure to adequately address a cold he had, which led to pneumonia, and ultimately his death in 1990.
    • After looking at his new tan in the mirror, Stewie says he looks like Eartha Kitt and meows, referring to Kitt's Catwoman from the 1960s Batman television show.
    • Stewie sings "Kokomo" by The Beach Boys in his tanning bed. Similarly, when he is tanning in the garden, the song he listens to is an instrumental version of "I Say a Little Prayer" by Dionne Warwick.
    • The song Brian and Stewie ballroom dance to is an instrumental version of "Cheek to Cheek" by Irving Berlin.
  • Take That!:
    • After Kyle mocks him, Peter says he's making him sound like Michael Stipe, R.E.M.'s frontman.
    • Parodying Gremlins, Peter feeds a mogwai a drumstick after midnight, causing it to turn into Fran Drescher, whose head Peter then microwaves.
    • Britney Spears' parenting skills are questioned in a scene where she is holding her baby while talking on a phone, pushing in his skull and using it as an ashtray, and then dropping him.
    • Brian is given a copy of a movie that "is essentially Brokeback Mountain from the point of view of the horses" where one of the horses peeked inside the tent and learned their relationships the "hard way".
    • One Cutaway Gag depicts Dick Cheney as a Wal-Mart greeter, with him telling every single customer who walks in the store (including a mother with a girl who can't be older than five years old) to "Go fuck yourself".
  • Trivially Obvious:
    Lois: Peter, I think one of us should go over and talk with Kyle's parents.
    Peter: I'll do it, Lois. Right after a healthy breakfast of juice, toast, and store-brand imitation frosted flakes featuring Terry the Tiger.
    Terry the Tiger: Theyyyyyyyy're food!
  • Villain Decay: Killing Lois is not one of Stewie's final wishes. This further adds to Stewie's tolerance of Lois in the later episodes.
  • Villain Protagonist: Peter when he becomes a bully.
  • Vomit Indiscretion Shot: Peter chasing Meg around the kitchen table while farting towards her eventually causes Meg to fall and throw up.
    Peter: (disgusted) Ohhh, in the kitchen, Meg?!

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