Recap / The Great North S4E07 "Judy Presents: The Staircake"

RECAP:
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Original air date: March 24, 2024

Written by: Caroline Levich
Directed by: Michael Baylis

When Ham enters a cake competition in New Fork, the whole family goes on a road trip there on a tour bus. Unfortunately, Ham's patience is put to the test when things start going wrong on the trip: Beef is too tired to drive so Ham has to drive the bus himself, Wolf and Honeybee being unable to help due to their Shrek costume making it hard for them to move, and Judy trying to create drama for her documentary.

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Tropes:

• The Alleged Car: The Tobins borrow an old tour bus from the junkyard to drive to New Fork. The ignition is faulty, so they can't stop or it'll take forever to restart, the brakes are shot, and the bathroom is unusable because of a family of muskrats living inside the toilet. After Beef accidentally releases the muskrats from the bathroom and chaos ensues, Ham is unable to stop the bus due to brakes failing and the steering wheel stopped working, resulting in the bus crashing into a firework stand where the engine catches fire and ignites the fireworks. As a result, the bus becomes inoperable and the Tobins can only travel using a horse carriage which they have to pull themselves.
• Beware the Nice Ones: Ham is normally calm and nice and he would rarely express his anger, but his trip to New Fork with his family has really tested his patience and he tries to suppress his frustration. After the bus crashes and his cake is ruined, the family complains they won't be able to do the things they wanted to do at New Fork, and this causes Ham to finally release his frustration on them and call them out for their selfish behavior.
• Carrying a Cake: The Tobins have to take Ham’s large, elaborate cake to New Fork on a dilapidated tour bus. Due to the family’s shenanigans, the bus crashes and part of the cake is destroyed. In desperation, Beef and Ham reconstruct the missing part with dirt and hope the judges don’t taste from that part of the cake. It works!
• Couch Gag:
  • The boat in the opening is "Wet Hot American Chum-Mer".
  • Wolf's T-Shirt says "Fartin Scorsese".
• Disaster Dominoes: The entire road trip is just one big disaster waiting to happen:
  • Beef was too tired to drive because he binge-watched a show the night before the big competition causing them to be an hour late from their agreed departure time.
  • Wolf and Honeybee decided to wear full body costumes that were too big and too bulky, so they were unable to go to the top of the bus to help hold down and fasten the cake, and the costume prevented them from driving making them useless for the entire trip.
  • Moon is actively trying to get Ham to take the more dangerous road so that he can buy explosives at Kevin Boom Boom's Fairytale Discount Grenades and Fireworks.
  • The bathroom contains muskrats, which escape thanks to Beef lifting the lid during the drive and cause a panic.
• Distracted by the Sexy: The show that Beef binge-watched was "Cynthia, Fix My Cake", a cooking show all about fixing ruined cakes, because Beef always has a backup plan. Unfortunately, he couldn't focus on the show because he was too distracted by Cynthia's "very very ginormous gazongas". Ham admits that even he gets mesmerized by the jiggling of Cynthia's bosom, and he's not even attracted to women.
• Documentary Episode: Downplayed. Judy was planning to shoot the trip as part of a documentary for school and shamelessly manipulated things to make it more interesting. In the end, however, Judy sells her camera to help Ham make it to his cake competition, leaving the documentary unfinished.
• Fake Food: In order to fix his damaged cake, Ham fixes the cake by mixing it with soil and covering it with frosting. During the competition, Ham uses Reverse Psychology on the judges to get them to try the normal cake instead of the dirt cake.
• Freeze-Frame Bonus: The yeti appears after Dirt finds a basketball in the woods, wearing a basketball shirt.
• The Internet Is for Porn: Aunt Dirt refers to the computer as the pornography typewriter. Also Wolf and Honeybee found out about Group Shrek online, but weren’t aware it was an orgy.
• It's All About Me: The Tobins (with the exception of Beef) only go on the road trip to go to locations at New Fork that suit their own interests. When things go downhill, Ham yells at them for making the trip about them.
• Late to the Realization: Wolf and Honeybee are excited to go to New Fork to go to Group Shrek, which they believe is a fan gathering to talk about Shrek, when in reality it's actually a Shrek-themed orgy. They're even oblivious to the fact that Group Shrek is a pun off of group sex. Judy immediately figures it out but doesn't tell Wolf and Honeybee because she doesn't want to interfere in her documentary. By the time they make it to Group Shrek, after a few minutes inside, they finally realize it's an orgy and quickly leave the place.
• The Load:
  • Wolf and Honeybee chose to go dressed as Shrek and Fiona so they could go to what they think is a Shrek convention but was actually an orgy. Their costumes made it impossible for them to do anything useful during the trip, like hold Ham's cake steady or drive the bus; and when they have to stop for a pee break, their inability to take off their costumes costs them a half hour of drive time.
  • Beef is the only one who cares about Ham's cake competition and he does his best to ensure the trip to New Fork will go smoothly, and he's typically the The Reliable One. That is, that was his plan, but because he binge-watched a show about fixing cakes the night before the trip in order to help Ham, he ends up too sleep deprived to be useful to Ham and the first thing he does before the trip is arrive one hour late for the trip to start and crashed the bus into a tree stump when he fell asleep at the wheel. He spends most of the trip asleep and sleep screaming and he later accidentally frees the muskrats from the bathroom and cause chaos on the bus. Once he finally has enough time to sleep, he becomes helpful again by dealing with the muskrats and talking to Ham about his problem.
• My God, What Have I Done?: After Ham calls his family out for using his trip to New Fork for their own purpose, they realize their selfishness and make it up to Ham by selling their stuff (minus Aunt Dirt since she has nothing to give up) to buy a horse carriage so they can pull Ham to New Fork.
• Poor Communication Kills: Whenever something goes wrong for Ham, he would typically say "It's no big deal". His reason is because he doesn't want to be a burden to anyone so he doesn't try to make a big deal about himself, even when he secretly wants them to support him. While Beef isn't trying to defend his family's selfish behavior during the trip, he points out that because Ham said the cake competition is "no big deal", the rest of the family believes him and they don't take his competition seriously. Beef tells Ham that it's okay to let others know when something is a big deal and he shouldn't keep it to himself.
• Rage Breaking Point: Ham has to deal with his family's shenanigans on the road trip to New Fork. However, once the bus crashes into the fireworks store Moon wants to go to and the cake gets ruined, Ham finally loses it and gives his family a scathing "The Reason You Suck" Speech and storms off.
• "The Reason You Suck" Speech: Ham gives one to his entire family after their shenanigans cause the bus to crash and ruin his cake, pointing out that they should have been supportive of him and made this about themselves.
  Ham: The whole point of this trip was me and my cake and my competition! And you guys never come to my competitions. Hell, you never even ask me about my competitions. So I thought, "Oh, wow, finally everyone is coming to see me, Ham Tobin, maker of cakes". But you all just used me to get a free ride to New Fork. And now there isn't even a ride because our bus is ruined. And worse, my cake is ruined! You are all selfish, and I am honestly embarrassed to be a Tobin. I'm changing my last name to Tooobbbbbeeeeegatonerrothorizizi. Yeah! Well, actually not that, but I'm gonna go brainstorm what I'm changing it to! (storming off) Ugh!
  Wolf: Hot damn. We broke Ham.
• Reverse Psychology: In order to fix his damaged cake, Beef suggest to Ham to replace it with packed soil, which he agrees to since he points out the judges never try a piece from the front of the cake, and he also comes up with the idea if he suggest to the judges that they try the dirt cake first, they'll ignore his suggestion and try the other cake instead. During the competition, Ham does exactly that and it works and he ends up winning the competition.
• The Rival: The reason why Aunt Dirt is tagging along to New Fork is because she wants to get revenge on her former friend Hilda, who stole her story about finding a basketball in the woods in perfect condition and she plans to throw basketballs in her face (one of them containing milk inside). But it's not just her story she stole, Hilda keeps copying Dirt in an attempt to always one up her.
• Road Trip Plot: The Tobin Family is going to New Fork for Ham's baking competition, carrying Ham's large cake, everyone wants to go to New Fork for different reasons:
  • Wolf and Honeybee want to attend a Shrek movie meet-up, unaware it's actually an orgy.
  • Moon wants to visit Kevin Boom Boom’s Fairytale Discount Grenades and Fireworks to buy explosives.
  • Judy wants to make a documentary movie for her project.
  • Aunt Dirt wants to visit a rival in New Fork and humiliate her by throwing basketballs at her.
• Screw This, I'm Outta Here: The second Wolf and Honeybee realize “Group Shrek” is actually an orgy, they immediately flee the house to the other Tobins (who were wondering how long it would take them to realize).
  Wolf: Start the carriage! Group Shrek wasn’t what we thought it was!
  Honeybee: Go, go, go! They nasty! Let’s go, let’s go, let’s go!
• Sell What You Love: After Ham calls out his family for their selfishness, they feel bad for being unsupportive and ignoring his competition so they buy a horse carriage, with them pulling it, to get to New Fork thanks to Judy selling her camcorder, Moon using his firework money, Aunt Dirt having nothing to give up, Wolf and Honeybee selling their Shrek hands, and Honeybee selling her Fiona breasts.
• Shed the Family Name: After Ham calls out his family for only thinking about themselves and not supporting him, he tells them he's embarrassed to be a Tobin and decides to change his last name, but can't think of a good name.
• Shout-Out:
  • Wolf and Honeybee compare the bus being unable to stop to Speed.
  • One of the muskrats gnaws its way out of Wolf's costume around the chest region, reminiscent of the Chest Burster scene from the movie Alien. Of course, since he's dressed as Shrek, this also references the scene where Puss in Boots bursts out of Shrek's shirt in Shrek 2.
• Stupid Sexy Flanders: Inverted: with Ham. While he’s fully gay, he admits that even he gets mesmerized by Cynthia’s jiggling bosom on “Cynthia, Fix My Cake” when Beef confesses that’s the only part of the show he was able to focus on.
• Surprisingly Realistic Outcome: Moon was hoping to buy some explosives at Kevin Boom Boom's Fairytale Discount Grenades and Fireworks, but he's immediately shot down by the store owner because he's a minor and needs his parents' permission to make a purchase.
• Talking in Your Sleep: Not talking, but screaming, Beef often screams in his sleep when he's overly exhausted.
• Tempting Fate: After the Tobin's bus crashes into a fireworks display, Wolf is grateful that nothing exploded. Cue fireworks explosion.
• Twitchy Eye: Just before Ham calls out his family for only thinking about themselves and not caring that his cake got ruined, Ham's eye starts twitching with anger when they start talking about their own problems and forgetting about him.

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♫ When your layers are acting crazy
And your frosting tastes like gravy
Don't crawl inside a snake
Just yell out "Cynthia, fix my cake!"
She arrives in a hot-air balloon
With her pet Rosie Raccoon
Carrot, vanilla
Chocolate, funfetti
No matter the flavor, she'll get it ready
When it comes to cake, she's the best
With some help from her ample chest
She's here, so take a break
You got her
Cynthia, fix my cake! ♫

—Cynthia, Fix My Cake! theme song