Original air date: May 8, 2022
Written by: Charlie Kelly
Directed by: Paul Scarlata
Directed by: Paul Scarlata
Ham tries to re-create a more theatrical version of his coming out and he and his family, along with Crispin, visit Beef's cousin, Danica. But when they visit her, they discover Danica is a criminal and she takes them hostage when the police arrives to arrest her. Meanwhile, Wolf and Honeybee start a true crime podcast and investigate a serial killer called the "Orca Bay Slicer" and thinks Danica is the killer.
Tropes:
- Call-Back: Back in "Sexi Moose Adventure", Ham came out as gay to his family and they tell him they already know and he already came out to them a bunch of times, and now we're seeing those moments when he came out.
- Casual Danger Dialogue: Despite the fact that Chief Edna and Elba confront Danica unarmed and they're forced to surrender, they're both rather calm and treat the situation as an inconvenience.
- Comically Missing the Point: When brainstorming who Ham can come out to for a more dramatic reaction, Beef brings up overly-critical Cousin Danica and offers to drive to her place. Wolf even mentions she would hate him for being gay. Ham denies the offer at first because he wants to keep searching for someone who'll react dramatically to him coming out. Crispin has to spell it out that he should come out to Danica.
- Coming-Out Story:
- Ham and Crispin are watching a movie called Danny Vroom: Gay in the Fast Lane, where a NASCAR driver, Danny Vroom, comes out as gay during a race so he can stop living a lie, and his boyfriend, Businessman Greg, proposes to him and he happily accepts.
- Ham already came out to his family several times. While he appreciates how supportive they all are, he's a little disappointed that they're not the least bit shocked by his reveal. Crispin, along with the other Tobins, help re-create his coming out by pretending to be shocked like how he anticipated.
- Couch Gag: The boat in the opening is Death of a Salmon.
- Crazy Memory: When searching for a serial killer to investigate, Wolf suggest the "Moose Mixologist", a killer who would get moose drunk and release them on people to trample them. Honeybee refuses because of her fear of stampedes and she questions how Jumanji got a PG-13 rating after thousands of elephants smashed explorers into human jelly with their feet. Wolf points out that she may have misremembered some parts of the movie.
- Didn't Think This Through: When Chief Edna and Elba comes to stop Cousin Danica when they have Wolf and Honeybee at gunpoint, they see that she has a gun and they immediately surrender to her because they purposely left their gun back in their car despite knowing they're dealing with a hostage situation.
- Distract and Disarm: Chief Edna and Elba are able to disarm Cousin Danica by having Edna distract Danica with a weird dance while Elba taps her on her shoulder to distract her even more and then she takes the gun from her hand.
- Epic Fail: See Didn't Think This Through and Stopped Reading Too Soon.
- Foreshadowing: Before Cousin Danica opens the door to the Tobins, she puts a black ski mask away before they could see it. Just before Ham comes out to her, Chief Elba arrives at her home to arrest her and we later learn she used to be a bank robber.
- Freeze-Frame Bonus:
- When Wolf and Honeybee are first deciding on which Alaskan serial killer to investigate, Honeybee has a list pulled up on her laptop. The listed killers are The Snow Machine Strangler; The Talkeetna Meet-and-Greet Killer; The Sitka Squisher; Fairbanks Firestarter; Snow Angel of Death; Juneau Goon; The East Ketchikan Killer; The West Ketchikan Killer; and Ice Pick Rick.
- In the last scene, when Crispin receives a text from Ham that he's ready, the last text Crispin has from Ham is that he thinks Planters mascot Mr. Peanut is hotter than the Mucinex Booger.
- Hostage Situation: When Chief Elba arrives to arrest Cousin Danica and Beef refuses to give a fake alibi for her, Danica pulls out a gun and takes everyone hostage and keeps them in her basement.
- Indubitably Uninteresting Individual: Criminal past and unpleasant personality aside, Cousin Danica is a thoroughly dull person. Her entire house is brown because all other colors are too showy for her. She has a porcelain rabbit collection that consists of one rabbit. Her cellar pantry is full of nothing but (opened) mayonnaise.
- Irony: The Tobins visit Cousin Danica hoping when Ham comes out to her that she'll be shocked to hear it, satisfying Ham's coming-out bucket list. Just when he's about to come out to Danica, Chief Elba arrives to arrest her and Danica comes out to the Tobins that she's a criminal. Everyone is shocked from the reveal and they do all the things Ham wanted his family to do when he came out to them.
- It's All My Fault: Ham blames himself for everyone being held hostage by Cousin Danica because he wanted to have a dramatic coming-out.
- Jerkass: Cousin Danica. She never stops insulting or being critical of people. It's this exact behavior that makes Ham seek her out, as he hopes that, given her bad attitude, she'll have a more intense reaction to Ham's coming out than the rest of his family, though Beef worries she'll be too intense and actually hurt Ham's feelings. Ham never did get to tell her.
- Justified Criminal: Play straight first and then subverted. Cousin Danica reveals she was a bank robber because she got fired from her job and her home was about to be foreclosed on. The second time she did it was because she was bored, and the third time was because she "caught the bug".
- Open-Minded Parent:
- After Crispin came out as gay to his parents, they had a brief time processing their feelings, and then they show their support by launching illegal fireworks on their front lawn, which resulted in them accidentally burning down their mailbox and being fined thousands of dollars.
- If anything, Beef may be too open minded as he worries at the end of the episode that in his (as well as the other Tobins') attempt to be supportive of Ham, they may not have taken Ham's coming out seriously enough.
- Papa Wolf: As soon as Danica pulls out a gun, Beef gets all the kids (including Crispin) behind him without a moment of hesitation.
- Police Are Useless: Zig-Zagged. Chief Edna and Elba don't actually carry their guns with them (instead keeping them in their glove compartments), so they are laughably unprepared when Cousin Danica pulls a gun on them. However, they are able to successfully Distract and Disarm her.
- Rule of Three: Taking the joke from the pilot to its logical extreme, Ham recalls three times that he came out to the rest of his family. None of the three times are the first time he came out and just as Beef did in the pilot, they simply tell him that they love him just the way he is.
- Shout-Out:
- When the Tobins were driving to Mayor Peppers' wig party, Ham wore a wig that resembles Sailor Moon's iconic hair.
- Crispin knows that Ham loves Frasier, but the prospect of dying in Cousin Danica's basement dampens his enthusiasm for listening to David Hyde Pierce's analysis of the show.
- Both Mariska Hargitay and Christopher Meloni of Law & Order: Special Victims Unit get a shout out, but Honeybee just can't remember the name of the latter. Wolf can, and remarks on how good looking Meloni is.
- Honeybee thinks she could have helped keep the Orca Bay killer from a life of crime by collaborating with her on a Mystic Pizza musical adaptation.
- When Wolf and Honeybee learn that the Orca Bay Slicer had already been caught and they haven't read the full article on Wikipedia, Wolf exclaims "Well Crap-Lumbo!"
- Sibling Team: Edna and Elba are both sisters and chief of police at their respective town. And despite fumbling the hostage situation by not bring their gun with them, they both work together to Distract and Disarm Cousin Danica.
- Stopped Reading Too Soon: Wolf and Honeybee decides to investigate the Orca Bay Slicer for their podcast and later think Cousin Danica is the killer. Later, they learn Danica isn't the killer and the real killer already confessed years ago, and Wolf and Honeybee realized they didn't finish reading the article about the killer before they started their investigation because they got too excited about it.
- Surprisingly Realistic Outcome:
- After Crispin came out as gay to his parents, they show their support by setting off a bunch of illegal fireworks, which one of them accidentally burned down their mailbox and they were later fined thousands of dollars.
- Just because Chief Edna and Elba are the police and they order Cousin Danica to freeze, Danica isn't going to listen to them if they don't have guns on them while she's the only one who does.
- Triumphant Reprise: At the beginning of the episode, Ham sings how he imagines his coming out would be. At the end of the episode, the Tobins and Crispin recreate his perfect coming out and sings it like before but with his family joining in.
- Understatement: After Cousin Danica pulls out a gun and plans to take them hostage, Crispin thought when he first met her that her vibe was off, and now he thinks her vibe is way off.
- What the Hell Is That Accent?: When Honeybee tries to create her own podcast voice, Wolf thought she was trying to do an Australian accent but she tells him it's supposed to be a British accent.
