Line #12 Recap/FamilyGuyS20E15HardBoiledMeg


1	Meg is hanging out at a sports bar, bored out of her mind, when she is approached by a hot guy named Seymour who begins flirting with her. The two of them go for a drive when he instructs her to pull into the parking lot of a convenience store... which he proceeds to rob at gunpoint. Meg manages to evade the cops, displaying some extremely impressive driving skills as she does. Seymour is impressed and the two of them soon kick off a crime spree all over Quahog, eventually planning to rob a Ross Dress for Less after their memorial day sale.
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3	Meanwhile, Peter and the guys go to a VR Arcade and Quagmire ends up getting an extremely persistent case of hiccups. After repeatedly trying and failing to get rid of them, Quagmire asks Peter to MercyKill him because he's been unable to eat or sleep (and also because of Peyton Manning's assault accusation just going away). Peter agrees and makes preparations to kill Quagmire. However, as Quagmire is saying goodbye to his cat, his cat scratches him and his hiccups go away. Regardless, Peter still tries to kill Quagmire, tying him up and stuffing him into the trunk of his car.
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5	Chris overhears this and tries to talk Meg out of it, but she refuses to listen. She and Seymour hit the Ross and they manage to get away, only for Seymour to be shot. Meg tries to get away from the shooter only to crash headlong into Peter in Quagmire's car. Chris arrives and when Meg tries to save Seymour, the camera pans over to reveal an empty passenger seat. Turns out that Seymour never existed and the entire A-Plot was just Meg living out an elaborate hallucination due to eating contaminated mustard packets.
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7	The end of the episode reveals that Peter didn't kill Quagmire because the gun he was going to use jammed ([[SuspiciouslySpecificDenial not because he missed with all six bullets]]), and that the entire episode was just a VR simulation lived out by Seymour in a VR Arcade.
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9	!!Tropes
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11	* AccidentalHero: Meg crashes into Peter allowing Quagmire to escape from the trunk.
12	* BaitAndSwitch: When Dr. Hartman recommends hypnosis to treat Quagmire's hiccups, Peter relates how said hypnotic treatment helped him uncover a traumatic memory. Said memory shows Peter paying to see Music/{{Nickelback}}, seemingly setting up the usual TakeThat. However, Peter then states he loved the music and that the actual traumatic event was splitting his pants during "Photograph".
13	** Another subverted TakeThat, at the end Seymore is asked if he wants to use the WesternAnimation/BobsBurgers simulator next and he enthusiastically says they should have led with that.
14	* BlackComedyRape: After Seymour pulls out the gun at the convenience store parking lot, Meg responds by telling him that he doesn't need to threaten her to get her to have sex with him.
15	* TheCameo: The cutaway of Quagmire's funeral features [[Recap/FamilyGuyS4E9BreakingOutIsHardToDo the "Who else but Quagmire" guy]] openly grieving while saying the phrase.
16	* ChekhovsGun:
17	** Meg spends the entire episode slurping down mustard packets. A newscast and the end of the episode reveals that the mustard has been contaminated with a strain of E.Coli and that "having an imaginary criminal boyfriend" is one of the potential side-effects.
18	** Also, at the start of the episode, Meg mentions that she went to a car wash with a bunch of flashing lights earlier. After it's revealed that all of her escapades with Seymour were just hallucinations, the episode cuts to a scene of her in the car wash with blue and red flashing lights, mimicking police lights.
19	** The VR Arcade the guys visit at the start, turns out the whole episode was Seymour doing a Family Guy simulation.
20	* CoincidentalBroadcast: Lampshaded, when questioning why Meg's been hallucinating the TV comes on and Brian suggests maybe it will have the answer.
21	* DemotedToExtra: Lois, Brian and Stewie only appear briefly in a couple of scenes in this episode, and the former two only get a line or two in in total, while Stewie is TheVoiceless.
22	* {{Foreshadowing}}: A small detail as to note there might be something up with Meg's "getaway driver" story is the fact Meg was using the same car, with the license plate on and wearing no mask, and doing the same crime multiple times. With that, it would be expected that the cops would come to the Griffin household and arrest her, but such a scene never happens.
23	** Adding to this, you'd expect that Joe, being an off-duty police officer while hanging with Peter, Quagmire and Cleveland, would learn about Meg's escapades from his co-workers, and at least question Peter or Lois about it, but such a scene never shows in the episode as he is never seen again after hanging out at the virtual reality arcade.
24	** Also worth nothing is that Seymour had bags of money every time they pulled off a heist. Something nobody would be able to get unless they broke into the safe, and not 7/11's and stores.
25	* HiccupHijinks: Quagmire has the hiccups, and asks his friends to help get rid of them. PlayedForDrama later on, when he can't sleep or eat because of the hiccups, to the point he asks Peter to put him out of his misery.
26	* HopeSpot: Quagmire is finally free of his hiccups and about to go to sleep, only to be grabbed by Peter and stuffed into the car's trunk.
27	* InstantExpert: Meg somehow instantly acquires driving skills that would put her on par with the average ''Fast & Furious'' protagonist or [[Film/BabyDriver Baby]]. [[JustifiedTrope Justified]] as none of it is actually happening for real.
28	* OnceMoreWithClarity: After the reveal that all of her escapades with Seymour were just hallucinations, scenes where Meg and Seymour were together now show that Seymour was never truly there.
29	** And [[TakeOurWordForIt according to Chris]], Meg spent the entire "theft" of Ross Dress for Less in the parking lot revving the engine with her hand down her pants.
30	* PetTheDog: Chris taking the fall for Meg's joyriding definitely counts.
31	* PoorCommunicationKills: Chris tells Meg he thinks she's confused but she blows him off before he can explain that Seymour isn't real.
32	* SchrodingersButterfly: We're at first led to believe Seymour was just a hallucination of Meg's, then we learn he was the only real person in this episode and the rest was just a VR simulation.
33	* TookALevelInKindness: Lois and Peter are a lot nicer to Meg in this episode, with them actively taking interest in her during breakfast, Peter allowing her to use his car and once taking her to a Stevie Nicks concert while Lois fell ill.
34	* ThrowTheDogABone: Despite being the series ButtMonkey and everything she went through during the episode, Meg manages to avoid major trouble when Chris volunteers to take the fall for her actions.
35	* ThroughTheEyesOfMadness: Seymour never existed. Meg was just hallucinating due to eating contaminated mustard packets. Despite this, how Meg ended up driving to the same ditch Peter ended up in to shoot Quagmire remains a mystery.
36	* WhamShot: Meg looking to see Seymour, while asking what they're going to do about him, only to reveal that Seymour's not there.
37	* WhamLine: Followed off from the WhamShot.
38	-->'''Chris''': Meg, there never was a Seymour.

Context Recap / FamilyGuyS20E15HardBoiledMeg