Snip, Snip
Struggling algebra teacher and warlock-in-training Abe North (Bud Cort) quits his job, planning to use his knowledge of the dark arts and his contact with the spirit world to rig the local lottery so he wins the jackpot. Unfortunately, when he tunes into the drawing, he loses said jackpot by one single number to hairdresser Ann MacColl (Carol Kane). After unsuccessfully trying to get his job back, Abe decides to break into Ann's shop and swipe her winning ticket, only to learn that she had sinister assistance for her own victory.
Tropes:
- Always Someone Better: Ann turns out to have rigged the lottery before Abe did, since she's more skilled in black magic than him.
- The Bad Guy Wins: Ann wins the lottery, kills Abe, and has all her dreams come true, turning the math professor into her latest headpiece.
- Born Unlucky: Ann and Abe have miserable lives, though while Ann's misfortunes are usually limited to her lack of success in having a long-lasting romance, Abe has it way, way worse.
- Butt-Monkey: ABE. If you want proof, keep reading below.
- Creepy Crows: Ann has one as a pet, having named it "Lucifer".
- Downer Ending: From Abe's point of view, Ann kills him to have all the success she could ever want.
- Entitled Bastard: Though he does have a legitimate Freudian Excuse to be so miserable, Abe spends the episode acting like an entitled little shit who feels that the world owes him for his life of misery.
- Evil Versus Evil: Abe and Ann are both loners who have led horrible lives, and they align themselves with the dark spirits down below solely to become rich. The conflict comes from when they battle each other for the winning ticket.
- The Fourth Wall Will Not Protect You: Before we learn Abe's final fate, Ann looks right to the camera when mentioning to her latest customer that she's been "dying" to try a new hairstyle on him, as if she's giving a warning to anyone else who's thinking about trying to screw her over.
- Human Sacrifice: This is apparently the final portion of the ritual for perpetual victory, wherein the caster must kill someone more pathetic than they are to achieve all their dreams.
- Loners Are Freaks: Ann's only form of company is her pet raven "Lou", and she's villainous enough to practice the dark arts to win the lottery and get a boyfriend.
- Loser Protagonist: Nothing even remotely good ever happens to Abe. Before he practiced black magic, he'd be ridiculed by class after class of rowdy students, whose ungrateful parents blamed him for not being a good teacher instead of themselves being atrocious role models. His money problems become aware to the viewers, too, as he yells to the headmaster (who doesn't know who he even is) that he makes half of what the janitor makes. When he turns to the dark arts and uses demonic magic to rig the lottery, he gradually discovers that he's been outmatched by Ann, who he was hoping to swipe his winning ticket from. He's such a loser, in fact, that Ann was specifically looking to lure him into her salon and kill him, because he was the perfect sacrifice to complete her own victory spell. The end of the episode reveals that Ann lopped off his head and turned it into the latest headpiece in her salon.
- No Honor Among Thieves: The spirits that Abe consulted about the lottery spoke to Ann before they did him, telling her all about him and how to get rid of him.
- Number of the Beast: Abe's lottery ticket reads "666666", whereas Ann's reads "666667".
- Strange Minds Think Alike: Abe and Ann, both living mediocre and pathetic lives, turned to the dark arts to rig the lottery in their favor. Too bad Ann is more skilled than Abe.
- Take This Job and Shove It: Before he tunes into the lottery drawing, Abe calls up the headmaster of his school and tells him off, vowing that he's going to quit and be a rich man for the very first time. As expected, he doesn't win the lottery.
- Tempting Fate: Continuing from the above, Abe insults and yells at the headmaster of his school, claiming that after he wins the lottery, he'll be rich for the first time in his life. Naturally, he doesn't win the lottery, and the headmaster is not in a forgiving mood.
- Villain Protagonist: Abe is a mathematics professor who got into black magic for the greedy, petty purpose of being rich.
- Villain with Good Publicity: Though she's a wicked sorceress who kills Abe to have all her dreams come true, Ann is known by Phil, one of her most loyal customers, as a sweet young lady who won't let money change her.
- Wham Shot: The end of the episode, where we see Ann's gotten a new headpiece that looks suspiciously familiar to Abe.
