After a cheerleader is injured at a competitive meet due to unsafe conditions, the Team endeavors to bring down the athletics company that runs the meet. Unfortunately because they're the only game in town, they basically make the rules. So to change the rules, the Team has to go to the very top.
The One Where They Steal a Congress.
Tropes Stolen In This Episode:
- Alpha Bitch: PEP Athletics Executive Wendy Baran carries herself with all the smug self-confidence of a High-School Mean Girl who bullied her way into a position of power. Watching her unravel is half the fun.
- Bavarian Fire Drill: Sophie's entire con is one long Fire Drill, culminating in her grabbing an office and a few congressional aides that nobody's using to keep track of her ever-expanding Chain of Deals.
- Chain of Deals: Trying to get Congressman Caballo's support on the Bill somehow leads to Sophie brokering an arms deal in the Middle East...and having a fort named after her.
- Chekhov's Skill: Congresswoman Berkus can only be convinced by numbers and facts, so Hardison is forced to become a government funding expert. This comes in handy when Baran tries to pull funding from her affiliates and Hardison is able to block every attempt with his knowledge of obscure regulations.
- Corrupt Politician: Surprisingly, only one member of the Committee is even remotely susceptible to outright bribery, which complicates the Team's plans. As Elliot says, "You can't con an honest man."
- Divide and Conquer: HR-505 needs four votes to pass. The team splits up to individually work on each undecided committee member.
- Fish out of Water: Parker gets roped into being the replacement cheer coach because she's the best gymnast on the Team. Of course that doesn't mean she knows the first thing about interacting with teenage girls.
- Gilligan Cut: As the Team heads to the Congressional hearing regarding Bill HR-505, Hardison asks: "It's a law that'll keep teenage girls out of wheelchairs! Who's gonna object to that?" Cut to Congressman Legrange pontificating about "unnecessary government overreach."
- Good Cop/Bad Cop: Nate and Parker take these roles respectively when grilling another cheerleader on where Madison is.
- It's All My Fault: Cheerleader Madison blames herself for the fall that severely injured her teammate.
- Load-Bearing Boss: Legrange. The Team realizes early on that he, as the Chairman of the Committee and Obstructive Bureaucrat Extraordinaire, is the one mark they absolutely need to have turned in favor of the bill, or else getting the other three votes won't make much of a difference.
- Meaningful Echo: At the initial hearing Legrange states, "I used to be a quarterback; I know a thing or two about cheerleaders." When Baran makes her play for Legrange's support, she says, "I used to be a cheerleader; I know all about quarterbacks."
- Mundane Made Awesome: Deconstructed with the competitive cheer industry, with a hefty dose of Truth in Television. The main plot point is the fact that cheerleading has become just as profitable and just as athletically demanding as any professional sport, but because it's defined as an "activity" rather than a sport it's not subject to the same regulatory standards. Which means a company like PEP Athletics can get away with blatantly unsafe practices that would never be allowed in a "real" sport.
- Normal Fish in a Tiny Pond: Legrange is a career Washington Insider who's perfectly content with his position. He rejects any offers of money or power; all he wants is to remain where he is and not make any waves. He literally says, "I've worked too hard to be the biggest fish in my particular small pond." The only thing he fears is bad publicity, which is the only way the Team gets to him. The mere hint of word getting out that he might have accidentally accepted a bribe from Baran is enough to get him to change his tune on HR-505.
- Reasonable Authority Figure: Berkus is in favor of HR-505 in principle. The additional spending required to update equipment and training is what causes her to balk, and which sends Hardison down a rabbit hole of regulations and appropriations to find $20 million somewhere that no other agency is using.
- Screw the Rules, I Make Them!: The main obstacle the Team has to bringing down PEP Athletics is the fact that they run the entire competitive cheer industry through a number of affiliations and shell corporations, which means they can essentially write their own rules. So the only thing they can do is get a bill passed that redefines what cheerleading is at the basic level.
- Sherlock Scan: Sophie reads the body language and facial expressions of the committee members during the first meeting regarding HR-505, and is able to identify the four people on the fence about it. They become the marks in the con.
- Villain of Another Story: John Zahn, a Congressman who is willing to take bribes for his vote, seems like the kind of guy who would be the mark of most episodes. However, his willingness to sell himself ridiculously cheap cause the team to make use of his services and win him over to their side instead of taking him down. Instead, a lot of conflict comes from trying to influence his more honest colleagues (a Slave to PR and a pair of reasonable yet cynical career politicians) to oppose the villains at the voting table.
