Recap / Cheers S 10 E 8

Episode: Season 10, Episode 8
Title: Where Have All the Floorboards Gone?
Directed by: James Burrows
Written by: Ken Levine and David Isaacs
Air Date: November 7, 1991
Previous: Bar Wars V: The Final Judgment
Next: Head Over Hill
Guest Starring: Kevin Mc Hale, Paul Willson

"Where Have All the Floorboards Gone?" is the eighth episode of the tenth season of Cheers.

It's Norm's birthday! The gang gets him what he wanted most of all, a beer. But they also get him a Boston Celtics jacket, delivered by none other than Sam's buddy, Kevin McHale, Boston Celtics all-star.

The gang falls into their usual inane chatter. They start wondering just how many bolts are required to hold down the wooden panels of the Boston Garden floor. When McHale starts wondering too, Carla yanks him out of the bar, terrified that he will get sucked in to their barfly life—but it's too late. Kevin plays horribly in his next game, because he's too busy counting bolts. The gang at Cheers realize that, to save Kevin McHale's basketball career, they must break into the Boston Garden and count the bolts.

In the B-plot, Lilith changes her hairdo. It goes badly.

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Tropes:

• '80s Hair: Lilith's truly impressively terrifying perm.
• As Himself: Kevin McHale, Boston Celtics all-star, makes his second appearance on Cheers as himself. This time, his wife Lynn also appears.
• Blinding Camera Flash: A random gag has Woody blind Sam with the flash from his camera, causing Sam to drop several beer mugs.
• Brick Joke: Rebecca tells Lilith, with a straight face, that her ridiculous Afro looks nice. She is able to do this, and not laugh, because she has a rat trap clamped down on her fingers. At the end Frasier gives Lilith a heartfelt speech about how he's behaved terribly and he should not have laughed at her effort to try something different and change her appearance. He has two rat traps, one on each hand.
• Comically Missing the Point: Carla mentions the idiotic conversations the gang has, and suggests that soon, they'll be on to topics like "if the Brady Bunch crashes in the Andes, who will they eat first?" Woody, not recognising she was just raising a hypothetical, chimes in with "probably the maid, 'cuz she ain't kin."
• Continuity Nod: The dates don't exactly match up, but on the other hand the exact date is never mentioned on the show anyway. In any case, the other episode where Norm's birthday is mentioned, "Diane Meets Mom", also aired in November.
• The Constant: Another gag about just how long Norm's been at Cheers, when he mentions several different businesses that've been next to the bar, which none of the others can remember. That's how long it's been since he last went to the gym.
• Gag Haircut: Lilith decides to change her look, and get something different than her usual bun. It's a mistake, as she winds up getting an absurd poofed-out cloud of hair. Frasier can't stop laughing.
• I Have This Friend: Woody's extremely obvious way of confessing that he forgot to replace the bolts on the floorboard at the Garden, causing Kevin McHale to trip and fall during a game.
• Infectious Insanity: Carla tries warning Kevin about getting involved in the discussion about the bolts, citing Frasier constantly hanging around the bar as proof that if Kevin stays, he'll become sucked into idiotic conversations as well. Sadly, she's too late, and Kevin becomes obsessed.
• Little Known Facts: Averted. Cliff says that, for Norm's birthday, he learned a bunch of little known facts about birthdays, and he will not share them with Norm.
• Morton's Fork: Frasier knows answering either way to Lilith's question about whether she should change her hair will get him into trouble. If he says "yes", she'll take it as criticism. If he says "no", she'll think he's lying. Frasier tries going with "just do what you think you should do", but Lilith sees through that too, and calls him chicken. Eventually, Frasier takes Option No. 4: Run like hell.
• Newscaster Cameo: Glenn Ordway, Boston Celtics broadcaster, makes an appearance on the Celtics broadcast. (Although in Real Life Ordway was a radio broadcaster.)
• Prim and Proper Bun: Lilith decides she needs to change her bun. It doesn't work out.
• Questioning Title?: A pun on "Where Have All the Flowers Gone?".
• Shown Their Work: Cliff identifies the blueprints that Kevin brings to the bar as actually being for the new Boston Garden. The new Garden (the "TD Garden" in the age of corporate naming) opened in 1995.
• Tempting Fate: Kevin declares nothing will stop him counting all the bolts in the Boston Garden floor. His wife suddenly enters the bar, pissed as hell.