After a Time Skip from the previous episode, we observe life in the Otto house. Taylor is now taking classes at Greg's college, and as she's studying psychology she is naturally choosing to psychoanalyze everyone around her, much to their annoyance. Cooper, now living with the Ottos, is trying (and failing) to master chores in order to please Katie. Anna-Kat has begun taking fencing classes (with Franklin, who is now her for-real boyfriend), and Oliver is applying for an internship he is sure will finally be his ticket into Harvard. Katie has sold her lasagna business and, with even her youngest now too old to need constant attention, she is growing bored and needs a new hobby. Greg, meanwhile, is upset when he learns a new lifestyle center is being built on a meadow which was the site of an important Revolutionary War event. But Katie makes a mess of his appeal to the town council. Meanwhile, Oliver bombs his interview and decides to think outside the box, and Franklin finds himself having to fight a bully at school.
Tropes:
- Alternate Universe: This episode firmly establishes that the show does not take place in a universe affected by the COVID-19 pandemic, unlike several of its other fellow ABC sitcoms (like The Conners and blackâ˘ish). Amusingly, at the end of the episode, Oliver (baffled at everyone's adoration of his mother) muses that perhaps they're in another dimension.
- The Bully: A shockingly old-school bully character appears in this episode, threatening Franklin and willing to fight with him... until he runs off with his tail between his legs after Franklin backflips a couple times. He even tattles on Franklin!
- Call-Back: At Oliver's job interview, the interviewer pegs Oliver as a typical would-be Harvard applicant, correctly guessing that he did an "atypical sport" (ballet) and "community service" (the teen help line), and saying that he's a dime a dozen, refusing to even continue the interview.
- Comically Missing the Point: Cooper, as usual.
- His class project of an energy drink with "real 24 karat gold flakes" serves no demonstrable purpose, other than to be ridiculously expensive. When he quotes the selling price as $50,000 a can, the teacher points out that a six-pack would cost more than a house. Cooper replies "yeah, but not a nice house". Oliver muses that Cooper probably isn't going to get a good grade.
- Cooper is comically inept at doing all the household chores he takes on, though using a Swiffer without inserting a sheet to collect all the dust and particles probably takes the cake. (He later reveals he cleaned the toilet the same way.)
- Feigning Intelligence: Taylor is trying way too hard to impress everybody by regurgitating the information she learned from cracking open her intro psych textbook. Trip eventually calls her out on this.
- Good Parents: Much as she drives her three biological kids to distraction, Trip, Cooper, and Franklin all think and speak highly enough of Katie that Greg suggests perhaps she should run a parenting blog.
- He Is Not My Boyfriend: When Taylor and Oliver are appealing to Katie to leave Trip and Cooper alone, this exchange happens.Taylor: My clinical recommendation as a member of the higher education community is to stop bothering our boyfriends...Oliver: Not my boyfriend.Taylor: ...and focus on anyone else.
- Know-Nothing Know-It-All: Taylor is studying psychology but completely fails to understand how her snobbery and rude remarks are alienating everyone around her... not least her book-dumb boyfriend, Trip.
- Relationship Upgrade: Anna-Kat and Franklin are finally a real couple by any reasonable definition of the word, though it's clearly something that both of them still have some getting used to.
- Time Skip: The previous episode was set in the spring, and this one is set in the fall, with several intervening events having taken place in the interim. (This is because "Graduation" was written as the season 4 finale.)
- Written-In Absence: The first episode where Angela doesn't appear; this is explained away by both Doris and Angela being on vacation and Angela being unreachable (apparently by choice, as Baltimore isn't known for having a large number of tunnels blocking cell signals). It would subsequently be revealed that Carly Hughes had left the series on unhappy terms (her name no longer appears in the opening credits).
