Season 2, Episode 4:
A Clue on Film
It’s a waiting game as Callie tries to repair Dennis’s damaged videotape, and the gang all attend the annual Demon Night Drive-in.This episode contains examples of:
- Almost Kiss: After getting home from the drive-in, Belinda and Chet lean in to kiss, but Brian and his date walk in right before they can.
- Amazingly Embarrassing Parents: Downplayed since she knows he means well and is doing it for the right reasons, but Belinda looks rather sheepish and a bit apologetic about her dad's Boyfriend-Blocking Dad tendencies as she stands in the background while Brian grills Chet.
- Amnesiac Lover: Inverted. As Lucy tells Joe, she and Dennis actually broke up after having a fight the night he was kidnapped, but then his subsequent memory loss means he doesn't remember that she dumped him. It's left their relationship in a gray area, with Lucy behaving like they're still together because she doesn't have the heart to break up with him again, after all that's happened, when he can't remember the first one.
- Bait-and-Switch:
- Belinda's ex-girlfriend Erica shows up at her house, wanting to get back together with her, and invites her on a date (which Belinda looks a bit tempted by), right as her new Love Interest Chet is arriving at her house to pick her up for a movie, giving the impression that Chet's going to walk in on something that's Not What It Looks Like and their budding relationship will be damaged as a result. Instead, Belinda firmly turns Erica down and leaves with Chet, it doesn't cause any real issues between them*, and Erica is never seen again.
- When the boys are in George's Secret Room, Joe hears a noise a few minutes later and steps out to check it out, but gets captured by a bearded guy and two thugs in Demon Day masks; Frank tries to lock the door at Joe's urging so they can't get him too, only for them to attempt to break it down and trigger the explosive that destroys the room. Then it's shown this was just a vision from the Eye; it's never made clear just what it's trying to tell him, but this is shown to be the first instance of Stratemeyer successfully tracking its use.
- Big Brother Instinct: Played straight and inverted in Frank's vision from the Eye at Gloria's house. He hears Joe struggling with someone and leaves the Secret Room to check on him, and when he sees a man holding his brother at knifepoint flanked by two thugs in demon costumes, yells at them not to hurt him. Joe, in turn, shouts for Frank to lock himself into the room because he's the one they really want.
- Both Sides Have a Point: The conversation between Joe and Lucy at the drive-in, where they each express their frustration with the other's attitude about the case. Notably, after talking this out, they become significantly warmer to each other from now on.Joe: Just trying to help your boyfriend.
Lucy: Are you? 'Cause it seems like you only care about Dennis because something messed up happened to him. Did you even know who he was before that?
Joe: So what? He needed my help. I mean, some people send flowers or write cards. That doesn't find someone in the woods. - Boyfriend-Blocking Dad: Brian shows some shades of this towards Chet due to his interest in Belinda, but he pretty quickly sees that Chet is a good guy who's respectful in his feelings for her, and doesn't take long to warm up to him.
- The Bus Came Back:
- Sort of. After ex-Dean McFarlane became a case of What Happened to the Mouse? last season, Fenton receives some recent surveillance pictures of him from Sam.
- And on that note, Sam Peterson, Fenton's former partner, who hasn't been seen since the first half of the first season, appears again as his Friend on the Force who provides him intel for whatever project he's been secretly working on.
- Caught on Tape: When the Hardys and Callie are able to piece some of Dennis's tape together, they discover that he witnessed someone in Tom's shack planning a bombing while he was in the East Woods. They looked up and saw him filming them, which is why he was taken.
- Chekhov's Gun: In "Conflicting Reports", when searching Elroy's shack, Frank noticed a powdery substance on the table, sniffed it, and identified it as flour. Here, Frank, Joe, and Callie see from watching Dennis's tape that whoever was in the shack was mixing the flour with hydrogen peroxide to build a homemade dynamite bomb, and realize they're going to set it off somewhere on Demon Day.
- Chekhov's Gunman: Frank has a vision where someone with a thick beard and sunglasses in a hooded coat takes Joe hostage at knifepoint. Later at the Drive-In Theater, Frank sees this man wandering around and chases after and attacks him, and he turns out to be JB's latest disguise.note
- Chekhov's Skill: The fact that Callie's dad owns the town's film store where she's worked on occasion comes in handy when the Hardys need to salvage Dennis's damaged tape that Tom gave them, as she knows exactly the right treatment to ensure as much of the film is saved as possible, and they are indeed able to get some vital clues from it.
- Cold-Blooded Torture: Angela and Mack overpower JB in his motel room and once again threaten to inflict this on him (at least of the Eye Scream variety, possibly more) with his own razor since he still hasn't found the Eye for them yet. He's forced to admit the Hardys have it, but convinces them to let him go for now so he can get it from the boys himself, and later takes the chance to skip town.Angela: We had a deal. You find the Eye, you get to keep both of yours. (...) You have 24 hours. Or I'm going to come back and give you a real close shave.
- Continuity Snarl: Callie notes to Frank that "the first time we hung out alone", Gloria locked them in her study as part of a test to be inducted into a secret society. While this did happen in "In Plain Sight", it was certainly not the first occasion they spent time alone together, having also done so on the Ferris Wheel in "Of Freedom and Pleasure", and at Wilt's and while breaking into the library in "Secrets and Lies".
- Conveniently Interrupted Document: Videotape here. Callie is only able to salvage some of Dennis's waterlogged tape to begin with, and then when a masked intruder breaks into the Shaws' store and attacks Joe, he's only able to escape with part of what she saved, meaning there's a lot of missing parts when they go to watch it. Still, what they do have contains crucial clues as to what Dennis saw and who the culprit is.
- Defrosting Ice Queen: Lucy, whom Joe has a crush on, has been cold to and uncooperative with him throughout the case and seems to hate him, as he bemoans. But at the drive-in, Joe explains why he pushes so hard when investigating and that he's ultimately doing it to help her as well as Dennis and everyone else, and she softens enough to invite him to watch the movie with her. During it, they accidentally touch hands, but she doesn't move hers away, and eventually confesses to Joe what she little she knows about what happened that night. Joe does his best to comfort her, and while he has to leave soon after to look at Dennis's tape, assures her that he knows she's not the culprit, endearing him to her further.
- Dr. Jerk: Downplayed with Dr. Burelli, Dennis's new psychiatrist. She coolly sends the boys out of Dennis's room when she finds them there, but does soften a bit when she sees how worried they are, and tells them a little more about his condition. Then dismisses them once again.
- Dramatic Irony: Brian introduces his girlfriend, Angela, to Belinda and Chet, who have no idea yet that she's part of Stratemeyer Global and is evil, and just greet her politely.
- Drive-In Theater: Most of the gang goes to one of these to watch a Slasher Film, per Demon Week tradition. Frank and Callie watch from his car; Joe and Lucy are on a picnic table with a radio; and Chet, Belinda, and Biff watch from the back of his truck.
- He Knows Too Much: The Hardys discover after watching what they're able to salvage of Dennis's tape that he was kidnapped in the first place because, while filming in the East Woods, he stumbled upon Tom's shack, where someone in a Bridgeport track team coat was plotting a bombing for Demon Day, and caught some of it on camera before the person looked up and saw him at the window.
- I Warned You: After being threatened by Stratemeyer Global, and having warned the boys about them before, JB comes to the drive-in presumably to talk to Joe, but ends up being cornered by Frank instead. He first tries to tell them to leave town to get away from Stratemeyer, but when Frank points out that they can't do that since they live there, JB makes it clear that he knows the boys still have the Eye and they need to stop using it because Stratemeyer now has the ability to track it. His parting words before fleeing Bridgeport himself are "Don't say I didn't warn you."
- If You Ever Do Anything to Hurt Her...: Brian Conrad gets some of this when first meeting Chet, admiring his truck before saying he's a car guy too, and his car is "fully-loaded on the inside." Chet seems to largely win him over, though, by saying "It's what's on the inside that counts, right?"
- It's All My Fault: Part of the reason Lucy didn't want to tell Joe what she knows about the night Dennis went missing is because she blames herself for it. They had a fight, she broke up with him, and left Dennis in the woods alone, where he eventually got taken. Joe assures her it's not her fault, but she's not convinced.
- Jerk with a Heart of Gold: Discussed by Joe with Lucy. He straight-up admits that he can sometimes be really pushy, aggressive, and insensitive while questioning people of interest in a case. However, he clarifies that this is because he needs to find the truth to keep people from getting hurt; he knows what it's like to lose someone you love, and doesn't want anyone else to have to go through that as well.
- Meaningful Name: Fenton and Sam lampshade this about McFarlane's boat, named the Ellie: it's the phonetic spelling of the letters "L.E.", for Laura Estabrook (who became Laura Hardy), McFarlane's high-school sweetheart and The One That Got Away.
- Oblivious Guilt Slinging: Callie initially intends to keep her visit to Gloria in prison a secret from Frank, at Fenton's encouragement, but when Frank tells Callie that she's what got him through the past year and compliments her, she's overwhelmed by guilt and blurts it out to him.
- Offscreen Breakup: Lucy reveals to Joe that, on the night Dennis went missing, they had a fight when she didn't want to trespass into the East Woods with him to film, broke up with him, and left, explaining why she wasn't with him there. However, thanks to Dennis's subsequent amnesia, he doesn't remember their breakup, so she's continued to act like his girlfriend because she does still care for him and doesn't want to hurt him.
- One Head Taller: When we meet Belinda's ex Erica, it's clear they were this when they were together. Belinda is pretty tall, almost Chet's height, while Erica is quite short.
- Papa Wolf: While driving Callie home, Fenton notes how upset she looked at the prison, and asks if Gloria threatened her or something similar. Callie assures him that this wasn't the case. He also says she did the right thing by not telling Frank about her visit there for now because he's "been through a lot lately," and Fenton doesn't want him to be hurt even worse by learning this.
- Pet the Dog: Under threat of Cold-Blooded Torture, JB is forced to admit the Hardy Boys have the Eye, but when Angela then tells Mack to go get it—with the implication he'll do so violently—JB immediately protests that the boys don't have it on their person, despite not actually knowing this for sure, to protect them. He also implies to Angela and Mack that he's going to trick or manipulate the Hardys into giving him the Eye, but when he encounters Frank at the drive-in, he's quite candid about the danger they're in from Stratemeyer if they keep using the Eye, even telling him about how they've figured out a way to trace its signal, and then just skips town after delivering this warning.
- Red Herring: After JB is threatened by Stratemeyer with 24 hours to get the Eye from the Hardys before they start torturing him, Frank's later vision of a guy who turns out to be a disguised JB taking Joe hostage implies that he's going to use threats or coercion to get it from them. Instead, he just shows up at the drive-in to give them another warning about Stratemeyer before fleeing Bridgeport, and is completely non-violent to the point that he doesn't fight back when Frank attacks him at first before knowing who he is.
- Slasher Film: Most of the main characters go to see one called "Demon Day Massacre" at the Drive-In Theater. It's apparently an annual showing there, and of the old, cheesy, So Bad, It's Good variety.
- So Bad, It's Good: In-universe, this is how the traditional Demon Week Slasher Film is regarded. Chet sums it up pretty nicely:Brian: How was the movie?
Chet: Really bad and really good.
Brian: Just how I like 'em. - That Came Out Wrong: Belinda confronts Brian about who he really met up with when he falsely claimed to her that he'd be in a work meeting all day, and he answers that it was a real estate agent. She assumes this means they're about to move again and reacts with dismay, and Brian says this word-for-word in response before clarifying that the woman is a real estate agent whom he's dating.
- Third Wheel: When Biff comes to the drive-in, she can't find Joe (who's with Lucy) and Phil is the only one who didn't come, so she becomes this:
- Biff is hesitant to join Frank and Callie when the latter offers for this reason, but Callie assures her she won't be a third wheel, and Biff rides there with them in Frank's car. But she quickly realizes it's going to be too uncomfortable in the cramped backseat and bails.
- Instead, she asks to join Belinda and Chet. Chet seems to see it this way, starting to say no before Belinda gladly welcomes her, especially because Biff sits in the middle between him and Belinda and starts munching on some of their snacks.
- Wham Shot: Brian Conrad introduces his new girlfriend to Belinda and Chet, and it's Angela Todd, the leader of the group of Stratemeyer Global agents who are trying to steal the Eye.
