"Hug N' Bugs" is the very first episode of Bless the Harts. First aired September 29, 2019. Directed by Pete Michels. Written by Erin Wagoner.
To help pay their water bill, Jenny Hart (Kristen Wiig) sells Betty's Hug 'N Bugs (sort of like Beanie Babies) taken from her mother's storage. Unfortunately, the buyer turns out to be Jenny's mother, Betty (Maya Rudolph).
Meanwhile, Jenny's boyfriend, Wayne Edwards (Ike Barinholtz), concerned that Jenny's daughter Violet (Jillian Bell) doesn't see him as a real father, resolves to make Violet a studio just like the one she drew in her graphic novel.
Tropes
- All for Nothing: Jenny sells Betty's Hug N' Bugs over the internet to pay for their water bill, but the only one buying them was Betty herself, thinking she was adding to her collection. Jenny finds out and realizes that she had just been recycling their own money, leaving the bill unpaid.
- Author Avatar: In-universe example. In the pilot episode, Violet is working on a fantasy comic that's blatantly based on her life, and the protagonist, Indigo, is clearly based on herself.
- Bizarrchitecture: The studio that Wayne builds for Violet in their backyard counts to the point where the Harts are petitioned to take it down.
- Made of Explodium: The Hug N' Bugs dolls were recalled due to being highly flammable; the commercial even had a caption warning about it. When the Harts set them on fire inside of Wayne's building for Violet, they explode and send the structure flying like a rocket.
- Stopped Reading Too Soon: Wayne peeks at Violet's comic book and sees that her father is depicted as a badass demon with dragon wings, while he's a tree stump. When he tells Violet about it in the end, she shows him the ending, in which the demon is vanished and Wayne becomes a wise tree that rescues her.
- Tempting Fate: Betty scoffs at the water company shutting off their water, reasoning "Can they turn off the rain? Can they turn off the ocean?" She soon changes her tune when the water is shut off in the middle of her shower.
