Dennis: Jesus Christ, Frank! Who the hell is this man?
Frank: My goddamn brother!
Frank: My goddamn brother!
Frank's long-lost brother Gino pays a visit to the bar and tells the gang the story of how he and Frank have been fighting over the same woman — a jazz singer named Sha'Dynasty — since the 1960s.
This episode provides examples of the following tropes:
- '70s Hair: Worn by both Frank and Gino in the 70s flashbacks.
- Acoustic License: Subverted for laughs. Frank's confrontation with Gino and Sha'Dynasty in a discotheque has them constantly repeating themselves and shouting "WHAT?!" because they can barely hear each other over all the noise.
- Artistic License – Law: At the end, the Gang and Gino go to the airport to meet Sha'Dynasty at the gate, and see Reggie there as well. In reality, they wouldn't be able to. Ever since 9/11, anyone attempting to get past the check in must have a ticket for a flight to somewhere (unless they work at the airport, which the Gang and Gino don't), and they do not have a flight booked. Also, even if they had tickets, they would still have had to check in. If someone is on the no-fly list, like Reggie, they would have been caught at this point instead of at the gate.
- They could have bought tickets they didn't intend to use, all offscreen, but this still doesn't explain how Reggie made it to the gate despite being on the no-fly list.
- Attention Deficit... Ooh, Shiny!: Lampshaded:Mac: I'm gonna jump in for a second, 'cause it sounds like you're about to launch into a whole thing. Is it gonna take a long time? My attention span is very short.
- Bait-and-Switch Comment: When Reggie confronts Frank and Sha'Dynasty at Frank's new club.Reggie: Oh, you're with her now, huh?
Frank: Yeah.
Reggie: I guess that don't leave me with no choice... but to be a mature-ass adult about this shit. I'm working on my temper. - Batter Up!: Gino beats Reggie with a bat at one point when he thinks that the latter is about to attack Frank.
- Binge Montage: Frank goes on a cocaine binge while he's in hiding in Colombia.
- Cain and Abel: Gino is the Cain to Frank's Abel.
- The Chanteuse: Sha'Dynasty is a singer in a jazz club who wins the hearts of both Frank and Gino.
- Cock Fight: Frank and Gino have been fighting over the same woman for around forty years.
- Continuity Nod: Dennis and Dee are both quick to point out that Gino isn't really their uncle, since Frank isn't their real father.
- Cruel and Unusual Death: Frank had apparently told Dennis and Dee that Gino "got his guts sucked out of his asshole through a hot tub drain".
- A Day in the Limelight: The episode largely focuses on Frank's backstory, with little input from the rest of the gang.
- Deliberate Values Dissonance: Frank's casual racism towards Asians and Reggie's mistreatment at the hands of police, including getting six years in prison despite being the victim of an assault, while Gino only got two. Frank also calls Sha'Dynasty a "negress", and implies he misses being able to be more openly racist.
- Even Evil Has Standards: Relating to the above point, the four younger members of the gang continually call Frank and Gino out on their casual racism.
- Grievous Bottley Harm: Frank wins his brief fight with Gino at the beginning of the episode by smashing a bottle over his head.
- Here We Go Again!: The episode ends with Gino asking if the Gang has ever heard another story about Frank and himself, with the Gang protesting that they do not want to hear another story.
- History Repeats: Reggie is forcibly dragged away when he resists coming with airport security after his name appears on a no-fly list.Reggie: Times have changed! It can't still be like this!
- Hypocritical Humor: In the '60s, Frank wants to open an integrated club "where blacks and whites can get along. No Orientals, though".
- Jabba Table Manners: The opening scene has Frank eating a "hoagie" by cramming various meats and cheeses into his mouth and spraying crumbs everywhere as he eats, which is apparently something Gino taught him to do. He's also repeatedly shown messily gnawing on leftovers in the flashbacks.
- Long-Lost Relative: Gino is this for Frank, to the extent that Frank apparently told Dennis and Dee he was dead.
- Older Than They Look: Played for laughs; Reggie states that a nineteen-year-old Frank doesn't look a day over twelve in one of the flashbacks, despite the fact that he's played by Danny DeVito in a wig and looks exactly the same as present day Frank. However, it's unclear whether this is really what Frank looked like back then or just the Gang imagining it as Frank tells the story, based on what they know Frank looks like now.
- Pretentious Pronunciation: When Sha'Dynasty's name is written on a billboard, people started asking who "Shady-Nasty" is.
- Race for Your Love: Charlie encourages Frank to run to the airport to try and win back Sha'Dynasty at the end of the episode.
- "Rashomon"-Style: Certain details in the flashbacks change depending on whether Frank or Gino is telling the story.
- Seinfeldian Conversation: The episode opens with the gang in the middle of a heated argument about what kind of gun they'd use if they were on the police force.
- Series Continuity Error: The timeline Frank gives for this episode is impossible given what we know about his past from earlier episodes. For starters, Dennis, Dee, and Charlie must have been born around 1976; all three are stated to been conceived thirty years prior at the end of season two. The song that plays when Frank returns from an extended exile abroad to the nightclub in the 1970s is "I Love the Nightlife (Disco 'Round)," which was released in 1978. Moreover, it's explicitly stated that Frank was already rich when Dennis and Dee were conceived, which is why their mother pretended Frank was the biological father. Here, Frank has spent the better part of the 1970s working for his brother while in Columbia, and there's no indication he's had any more success than co-owning a single nightclub as of 1978. It IS important to remember that this story is full of Unreliable Narrator cues (a deleted scene has the cops that arrest Reggie played by the rest of the gang), so it's questionable to rely on Frank or Gino to accurately recall the song that was playing as they confronted each other. Additionally, Frank has at this point already previously misremembered the plot of First Blood as his own life. It's possible that everything after Frank fleeing the country is just a jumbled version of numerous drug movies like Blow, and Frank actually spent the bulk of the Seventies amassing his wealth and business empire and meeting Barbara (all while still in a cocaine-fueled haze). The only things Gino can independently corroborate are the letters to Shadynasty and Frank's reappearance years later.
- Shoot Him, He Has a Wallet!: Frank shoots Reggie at one point when he thinks that the latter is about to pull a gun on Gino since he's now a Black Panther. Turns out it was a petition.
- Take a Third Option: When Frank and Gino try to make Sha'Dynasty choose between them at the end of the episode she reveals it was Reggie she was in love with all along, but she could never be with him as he was always in jail thanks to the interference of the other two.
- Vomit Indiscretion Shot: Frank when he returns to America and sees Gino and Sha'Dynasty together.
- Whole Episode Flashback: Most of the episode takes place in the 60s and 70s as Frank and Gino tell their story to the gang.
