"We're taking you bitches hostage."
— Liam McPoyle
While Dee, Dennis, Mac, and Charlie are held hostage by the McPoyles, Frank crawls through the vents (à la Die Hard) to find his will.
This episode provides examples of the following tropes:
- Air-Vent Passageway: Frank spends most of the episode crawling through the air vents above Paddy's. They're shown to be ridiculously complex, even containing Charlie's hideaway "the bad room".
- Anguished Declaration of Love: Mac abruptly confesses his love for Dennis during a tense moment, followed seconds later by Charlie doing the same for Dee. Neither is reciprocated.
- Berserk Button: Ryan McPoyle does not take kindly to the gang making fun of his sister Margaret.
- Big Ol' Unibrow: Dennis comments on this when he's trying to seduce Margaret.
- Bottle Episode: The entire episode takes place inside the bar.
- Bottomless Magazines: Frank fires his revolver (which is a Smith & Wesson Model 19 with a six round capacity) about 12 times without reloading.
- Butt-Monkey: When the three masked assailants burst into the bar and start waving guns around at the beginning of the episode, the guys all immediately tell them to take Dee.
- Cloudcuckoolander's Minder: Mac claims that nobody understands Charlie's "mental retardation" better than he does when Frank asks him to decode Charlie's map of the air vents.
- "Die Hard" on an X: Die Hard in an Irish bar. Frank takes on the John McClane role, crawling through the vents in the trademark white vest, stepping on glass, and even duct-taping his gun to his back for the climax.
- Dramatic Unmask: The McPoyles do this when they remove their balaclavas at the end of the cold open.
- Exact Words: When Liam tells Ryan to stab somebody, he ends up stabbing Liam, pointing out that he didn't specify it had to be one of the hostages.
- Get A Hold Of Yourself Man: Charlie slaps Dee in the face three times in quick succession to snap her out of her Stockholm syndrome.
- Gilligan Cut:Dennis: (to the whole gang) Nobody has to die.
(cut to Dennis and Dee alone in the bathroom)
Dennis: Somebody has to die. - A House Divided: Despite initially stating that they have a better chance of making it through their ordeal if they stick together, the gang spend the entire episode shifting allegiances and stabbing each other in the back in an attempt to survive at the cost of the others.
- Human Notepad: Charlie claims to have the real map of the air vents tattooed on his ass. It ends up being subverted, though; he just wanted an excuse to fart in Mac's face.
- I Love the Dead: Ryan threatens to massacre the gang and "play with their bodies" if they don't cooperate.
- Imperial Stormtrooper Marksmanship Academy: Frank fires wildly at the McPoyles at the end of the episode, somehow missing all three of them despite having a clear shot.
- Inheritance Murder: With Barbara dead, Frank is worried that Dennis and Dee are plotting to kill him to claim their inheritance.
- "L" Is for "Dyslexia": While searching the vents, Frank comes across a message written by Charlie that's more or less complete gibberish.
- Lecherous Licking: Ryan does this to Dee when she tries to join the McPoyles while suffering from Stockholm syndrome.
- Lima Syndrome: Dennis deliberately attempts to invoke this in Margaret by seducing her so that she'll help him escape. Unfortunately for him, she'd a deaf mute who can't read lips, so it all turns out to be for nothing.
- Limited Wardrobe: In an express acknowledgement of the McPoyle standard attire wearing briefs and bathrobe, the gang are forced to dress identically as a ploy to confuse the cops.
- Noodle Implements: The McPoyles' list of demands, which includes a reversible Planet Hollywood jacket.
- Now or Never Kiss: Charlie lays one on Dee just before the "immunity challenge" starts.
- Reckless Gun Usage: At the beginning of the episode, Mac cocks Frank's gun before pointing it directly at him, and then points it at his own head.
- "Shaggy Dog" Story: It's revealed at the end of the episode that the McPoyles' weapons were actually fake all along, and the whole thing was just an elaborate prank.
- Shirtless Scene: Dennis "pops his shirt off" in order to seduce Margaret. Later, all three of the guys end up half-naked after the McPoyles force them to change into their favored outfit of bathrobes and tighty-whiteys.
- Shout-Out: The episode makes several deliberate references to Die Hard.
- Stockholm Syndrome: Discussed throughout the episode, with Mac and Charlie seemingly under the impression that it's a physical illness like the flu. Dee does eventually end up succumbing to it, at one point attempting to join the McPoyles and turning a gun on the rest of the gang.
- Sure, Let's Go with That: After Charlie and Frank reach the roof, Mac, Dennis, and Dee exclaim that Charlie and Frank have come to save them. Charlie and Frank clearly went to the roof to escape but quickly agree with them anyway.
- Take My Hand!: Parodied in the climax, when Ryan falls of the roof of Paddy's; Liam desperately grabs his hand, only for Frank to push him off with a plank of wood. He falls in slow motion to the ground below... only for it to be revealed that they're only a storey up, and he lands on his feet.
- Trademark Favorite Food: The McPoyles are obsessed with milk to the extent that they use it to treat wounds.
- What You Are in the Dark: In a deliberate parody of such stories, instead of banding together against the McPoyles the gang immediately start betraying each and preparing for who is going to die first.
- Whole-Plot Reference: The McPoyle's take the gang hostage claiming the cops are outside in an explicit parody of Die Hard. As it so happens, Frank was in the air vents trying to recover his will he gave to Charlie.
