Brian's TV pilot for a drama about a single father who goes back to college gets turned into a crass comedy about a hot coed whose father enrolls in college with her. Meanwhile, Chris and Meg try to cover up Stewie's brain injury, a la Weekend at Bernie's.
Tropes:
- Abusive Parents: Peter casually mentions to Meg and Chris that he assaulted them as infants, sometimes on purpose.Peter: When you were babies, I used to knock you kids out every month or so. Sometimes by accident, sometimes when the Patriots lost.
- Bumbling Dad: James Woods' character in Classholes! is a textbook example, befitting for the cliched comedy sitcom Brian's show was meddled into being.
- Disproportionate Retribution: Joe hired a sitter so he could watch the episode at the Griffins'. After seeing how awful it is, Joe tries to give Brian a No-Holds-Barred Beatdown and the others barely manage to restrain him.
- Enemy Mine: In Peter's movie (Big Jaws), the hunters and the shark have to team up against an even bigger shark.
- Executive Meddling: An In-Universe example. The executives at CBS are really adamant about the changes in the show.
- Frame-Up: Peter tries to have Lois framed for injuring Stewie's head, and Lois then decides to frame the injuries on someone else herself.
- Hate Sink: The producers at CBS are meant to be despised for not taking Brian’s beautiful drama into account, and turning it into a painfully unfunny sitcom for the sake of ratings. You really root for Brian when he decides to quit and not deal with them anymore.
- Hope Spot: Following the pilots poor reception, Brian meets with James Woods and the executives, who state that they need to make some changes to make it more relatable. Brian is relieved about this and they should return to the original material. These hopes are then dashed by James Woods, who suggests an even more outlandish and preposterous idea, that he plays a cop and the chimp is his reincarnated partner who can't pay the rent. The executives agree with this, but for Brian, it's the last straw and he quits.
- Incoming Ham: "Hey, what's up, douchebags? I'm here to audition for this stupid pilot."
- Instantly Proven Wrong: When it's all over, Brian tries to take comfort in how he at least got something on the air and says not everyone can say that. The TV then returns to Peter's movie idea, Big Jaws.
- Italian-American Caricature: Brian cracks an ill-timed World War II joke to some NBC executives. He awkwardly asks if anyone's Jewish, causing the execs to look at each other and reveal comically large, hooked noses. Brian hastily apologizes, but the execs laugh and admit they're just Italian-Americans.
- Let's See YOU Do Better!: The leads from Two and a Half Men are on hand to see Brian's meddled, awful pilot. The real Charlie Sheen even does the line.Charlie Sheen: You're always saying our show sucks. Let's see yours.
- Rage Breaking Point: When James Woods and the TV executives decide to make even more ludicrous changes to the storyline, Brian (seeing that Lois was right) puts his foot down, tells them that enough is enough and then quits on the spot.
- "The Reason You Suck" Speech:
- Lois does this to Brian for letting the executives walk all over him and turn what she had previously described as a really good story into garbage for the sake of ratings.
- In the next sequence, Brian does this to James Woods and the executives. He tries and fails to convince them to return to the original material. When they ignore him and decide to go along with another of James Wood's ridiculous ideas, Brian tells them that he doesn't want to be involved in the project anymore. Before storming out, he chews the group out for destroying his dream, by taking something that he worked really hard on and was really precious to him and destroying it for the sake of money and ratings.
- Retool: Brian's pilot started as a dignified story about a single father going back to college to do right by his daughter and became a forced, zany comedy. After the initial ratings prove low, James Woods proposes changing his character to a cop, while the chimp is his reincarnated partner and can't pay the rent.
- Stealth Insult: While complimenting the script, Lois remarks she was certain Brian had ripped off something, so she spent 18 hours checking to see if he did. Brian prefers to focus on how she liked the script.
- Stylistic Suck: There is absolutely nothing funny about "Classholes," and just about every single person watching the pilot episode can only glare at the TV in what could only be described as "bored loathing." To wit, literally, every time someone finishes speaking is punctuated by the Laugh Track even if they weren't attempting to make a joke. Not to mention that the theme song is an extremely dull Expository Theme Tune.There was a man! He dropped out! Now he's back! He has a daughter... now she's in college with him!
- They Changed It, Now It Sucks!: Another in-universe example. Brian's script was the heartwarming story of a single father trying to do right by his only daughter and help her get the best life. James Woods and the TV executives insisted upon changing it, to make it more "relatable" and turned it into another cheap comedy show that everyone hated. Despite the poor ratings, they don't learn their lesson and Brian quits before they can do any more damage.
- Time Skip: An indeterminable amount of time passes between Peter and Lois taking Stewie to the hospital and the final scene of the episode with Peter's Jaws pitch being shown on TV, since Stewie (having fully recovered) walks in, mentions that it's now November and demands to know what happened to him.
- Would Hurt a Child: Peter has no problems against having Stewie get run over by Lois.
