Peter and Brian are sentenced to attend Alcoholics Anonymous and the duo make it a safe space for recovering alcoholics.
Tropes:
- Abusive Parents: This is what Peter could become if he doesn't control his drinking habits: a drunk, abusive father who gives his family daily "cigar burns".
- Anti-Alcohol Aesop: Played with; it is alright to enjoy drinking alcohol, just don't overdo it to the point that it endangers you and/or anyone you care about.
- Bait-and-Switch: Peter, to his annoyance, keeps mistaking opening logos for the opening of the film he and Brian are seeing at the start of the episode.
- Belief Makes You Stupid: A cutaway portrays the birth of Jesus as the catalyst for war and friends killing each other needlessly.
- Book Dumb:
- At the start of the episode, Peter incorrectly guesses that the star of Forrest Gump is named Tim Honks. Then we are shown the correct answer, Tom Hanks, but Peter apparently has no idea who Hanks is. Brian even lampshades that the trivia questions the theater gives out are very easy and pandering.
- The DVD extended version even takes things up when Peter cannot guess the color blue, even when it is showing in front of him, so he calls up Quagmire for help.
- Does This Remind You of Anything?: When Bruce starts talking about "giving yourself to a higher power," and how "A.A. is the only way out," he sounds kind of like a cult leader. Brian also asks whether or not he and Peter are "allowed to have a different view."
- Freak Out: The seagull has this reaction after finding out what the KFC he's been eating really is.
- I Ate WHAT?!: The end of the episode has two seagulls in a landfill drunk from drinking the beer Peter throws out, with one saying that an awesome kind of food is the stuff found in buckets labelled KFC. The other informs him that he’s actually eating another bird, to which the first seagull has a Freak Out.
- Insane Troll Logic: Brian says that that AA hasn’t really helped people over the years and says that people will be addicted to AA instead of alcohol, even though recovering alcoholics have better things to do in their time then attend AA 24/7 and only go to AA when required to. He also states that people who prefer to drink alcohol are more fun despite the amount of damage that "fun" can do.
- It's a Wonderful Plot: Death shows Peter what would happen if he kept on drinking, and if he had never drunk alcohol throughout his life. For the former, he is an abusive husband and father and ends up in an affair with his employer Angela, who Peter finds to be revolting. As for the latter, he ends up an exemplary father, husband, and human being in general and prefers to hang out with dignified sober people who drink milk rather than the rowdy Quagmire and Joe who are still drinking beer.
- It's All About Me: Peter and Brian are so devoted to their dependence on alcohol that they completely don’t take how it negatively can effect others.
- Jerkass Has a Point: As condescending as Lois acts in this episode, she’s completely right about how AA will do Peter and Brian some good since their love of alcohol causes problems. To say that Peter and Brian do not agree with her one bit would be an understatement.
- Karma Houdini: Downplayed as Peter and Brian do face repercussions when their alcohol obsession causes problems at the start of the episode and when they get the other recovering alcoholics hooked on booze again, Death does show Peter what would occur if he kept on drinking non-stop.
- Never My Fault: Peter says that everybody else who has a problem with his and Brian’s drinking is to blame rather than admitting that he and Brian are responsible for their own drinking.
- O.O.C. Is Serious Business: Bruce has always been a laid-back Nice Guy, but when Peter brings alcohol to AA, he nearly loses his shit. Granted, he gives in after minimal convincing, but still.
- Overly Long Gag: "Mr. Booze" is, without exaggerating, one of the longest songs of the series. Peter and the others really mean to distract the police.
- Prefers Proper Names: Peter is shown an Alternate Universe where he lived a life of sobriety. In this world, one of his friends is named "Johnathan", and is explicity stated to prefer being called by his full name
- Shout-Out:
- The entire "Mr. Booze" song pays homage to a scene in Robin and the 7 Hoods to mislead Joe.
- Peter mentions the Nickelodeon show CatDog and even sings a quarter of the song.
- Take a Third Option: After seeing how abusive he will become if he keeps drinking and how boring he would be if he never drank, Peter decides to only have half a six-pack and throw the other half away at the end of the episode.
