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Recap / American Dad S 13 E 3 Hayley Smith SEAL Team Six

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Release Date: February 8, 2016

In an attempt to find why Hayley is such a dour Soapbox Sadie, Roger (as Dr. Penguin) hypnotizes Hayley into acting like a six-year-old, which sits well with Stan and Francine (who loved Hayley back when she was a happy child), but not Jeff (who doesn't like sleeping with a childish woman) and Klaus (who was once traumatized by "Happy Hayley"). Meanwhile, Steve buys a slow cooker from a shady, trenchcoated man so he can enjoy a tender pulled pork.


Tropes:

  • Amusing Injuries: Hayley injures Stan's back when jumping on top of him.
  • Bad People Abuse Animals: Hayley has to witness a man assaulting a seal on live TV.
  • Beware the Nice Ones: Despite generally being mild-mannered and easygoing, Jeff has almost no issue killing a seal to save Klaus.
  • Cheerful Child: Hayley was this as a child, in which she was constantly referred to as 'Happy Hayley'. Then comes her 7th birthday party...
  • Conspicuous Trenchcoat: Steve and his friends encounter a man hanging out near an alleyway wearing a trenchcoat, who offers to sell them a slow cooker. He's even told off by a bunch of actual perverts for not being like them.
    Tim: You boys in the market for some... soft... pork?
    Barry: Oh dear.
  • Cynicism Catalyst: Hayley used to be a Cheerful Child until one birthday she saw news of a horrible injustice that went unanswered. She's been critical and bitter about the unfairness of the world since.
  • Didn't Think This Through: Steve insists on slowing the cook of the pork until it is absolutely perfect. Unfortunately, he leaves it cooking for 12 days, by which time it has gone bad and the boys have to get an ambulance.
    Paramedic: Who gave you the stupid idea you could eat 12-day old pork?
  • Emotional Regression: Roger (as Dr. Penguin) hypnotizes Hayley into believing she's six years old again, leading her to start acting, talking and dressing like a child.
  • Explain, Explain... Oh, Crap!: Steve and his friends quickly realize they have made a terrible mistake as they eat the 12-day old pork.
    Snot: Divine!
    Toshi: It's so tender!
    Steve: Yet, it... leaves something behind. Metallic, maybe?
    Barry: Furry, almost... moving.
    Snot: With... perhaps... maggoty undertones?
    (Cue ambulance siren)
  • Hated by All: When Stan tells the now childlike Hayley that Jeff's on trial, she declares she hates Jeff. Stan bluntly adds everyone does.
  • Idiot Ball: Steve was told that the longer you slow cook pork, the better it tastes, so he decides to leave it in for twelve days. He would have left it in even longer if he hadn't had a nightmare about it.
  • Kangaroo Court: Played back and forth. The prosecutor has the jury ready to find Jeff guilty thanks to his charismatic opening statement and the judge asks if Jeff even wants to mount a defense since he is obviously going to be convicted. Then it tilts the other way when Dr. Penguin takes the stand and hypnotizes the jury to find Jeff not guilty.
  • Karma Houdini: Invoked. Jeff gets away with killing the seal (albeit in self-defense) with the help of 'Dr. Penguin' hypnotizing the jury to acquit, which causes Hayley to once again witness an unfair moment and snap out of her Emotional Regression.
  • Lethal Chef: Steve insisting on letting the pork slowly cook for nearly two weeks gets him and his friends hospitalized.
  • Mushroom Samba: After eating the bad pork, Steve hallucinates that the shady man he bought the slow cooker from is really two pigs in disguise, and that the paramedic is also a pig taking him into a pig-shaped car.
    Steve: He's pigs! He's pigs!
    Paramedic: I gotta restrain this one. He's onto us.
    (The paramedic takes off his mask, revealing a pig head)
    Steve: This isn't an ambulance! It's a goddamn ham-bulance!
    (The hambulance drives off, before cutting to Steve in the back of an actual ambulance with his friends)
    Steve: Pigs... pigs everywhere. They're all pigs.
    Barry: I think Steve ate a lot more than us.
  • Punctuated! For! Emphasis!: Jeff as he beats the seal to death to save Klaus.
    Jeff: Stay! Away! From Klaus!
  • Shout-Out: A key clue to what changed 7-year-old Hayley comes from a photograph of her pointing at something out of frame, while someone else in the photo is taking a different picture at the angle that would reveal what she saw. This is also a pivotal mystery in The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo.
  • Stalker with a Crush: Joe Chandler, who took the key photo at Hayley's 7th Birthday Party, has grown up to be obsessed with her, with an entire room devoted to her covered in pictures he took of her through the years. He appears again at the end taking a Polaroid of her from the tree outside her bedroom.
  • Too Dumb to Live: Steve and his friends left pork sitting in a slow cooker for 12 days and thought it was okay to eat.
  • Took a Level in Cheerfulness: Once all is said and done, Hayley's emotional regression to her childhood cheerfulness does leave her with a softened enough disposition to actually smile at small joys once she's restored to normal.
  • Used to Be a Sweet Kid: As it turns out, Hayley was a Cheerful Child until she witnessed a baby seal getting clubbed to death on live TV during her 7th birthday party, realizing life wasn't fair.

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