The Story
A smattering of rogue gray hairs propels Linda into a midlife crisis. Her solution? Go to Gretchen at the salon and see if she can eradicate them with hair dye. A mole is threatening Tina’s old Thunder Girls troop by giving cookie-lead information to a rival troop. Her solution? Enlist Louise’s help and see if they can finger the mole with sisterly teamwork (and some non-help from Gene). Neither story line’s arc plays out as planned, but hilarity ensues as Linda becomes an unexpected blonde, and Louise and Tina butt heads as cookie-selling teammates, then enemies.
The Highlights
The episode opened with a glimpse at Belcher family time: Bob watching TV, Linda reading, and Gene and Louise picking out Linda’s gray hairs.
Linda: Hey, stop counting my gray hairs!
Gene: We would count Dad’s, but his hair is so fragile.
Bob: No, it’s not … Oh my God, a clump.
Unfortunately for Gene and Louise, but fortunately for us, that bald spot just keeps getting more and more legendary. [+1 point for Gene pointing it out.]
Linda attacked her hair problem, head on. She tried to kill the gray hairs with color — but when you’re friends with someone like Gretchen, something really bad is bound to happen.
Linda: You made me look like a zebra! Fix it, please. Fix it. Fix it. Dye it back.
Gretchen: No, dye it blonde.
Linda: What?
Gretchen: Trust me. Everything is better as a blonde. Everything looks better. Everything tastes better.
Linda: Like what?
Gretchen: Ketchup packets, cough drops …
[+1 to Linda for the animalistic awareness; +1 to Gretchen for being the laziest, Ketchup-loving best friend and worst hairdresser ever.]
Linda embraced her new look — a completely blonde transformation — almost immediately. She sported a sultry voice and a seductive ‘tude she hoped would rekindle her romance with Bob. Reactions:
Gene: Ah, it’s middle-aged-mom Barbie!
Tina: I like your hair; it matches your teeth.
While taking the trash out, Tina spotted her old troop leader, Ginny. Dressed as trash, the commander-in-chief told Tina that Troop 119 has a mole who’s giving cookie leads away to their rivals, the rough, tough, and gruff girls of Troop 257.
Tina: I thought Katie just had a beauty mark?
No, it was much more serious than that. [But +1 to Tina for always thinking of others and remembering important facts about old Thunder Girls.]
Ginny was crazy in this episode. She inexplicably became an overly competitive troop leader, but it was a nice development for her character. She begged Tina to rejoin the troop to help finger the mole. It was a tough call for Tina, though, as she was effectively bumped out of the Thunder Girls because she was too old, a preteen no more.
Tina: Me? Rejoin? But my wounds are still fresh? (I mean, I don’t actually have wounds, and if I did, I would do first aid on them because I have that patch.)
Tina ultimately accepted, and she wanted to write about her endeavors. But Ginny underlined that they could take no chances. They must go DEEP undercover. [+1 to Tina for her ability to swallow her pride and turn the other cheek in the name of helping others, and +1 to Ginny for her crazed dedication.]
Tina wasted no time digging back out her sash and other Thunder Girl accoutrements. Upon learning the news of her sister’s phoenixlike revival from the ashes of puberty back to the cookie-laden, hair-braiding ladies in blue, Louise was a tad disappointed.
Louise: You’re like the Brett Favre of Thunder Girls.
P.S.: This is important: Linda wants the kids to call her “Blom,†because now she’s a blonde mom. [+1 to Linda for killing this episode’s portmanteau game, and of course +1 to Tina because sports.]
Tina, well past the point of retiring from braid trains and cookie missions, pulled a Michael Jordan and went back to the Thunder Girls for one last hurrah. To her chagrin, she learned Louise also joined to execute an aggressive undercover attack plan. Also, Jodi, Ocean Avenue’s favorite germaphobe, was there:
Jodi: Did you know the last chip in the bowl is 93 percent skin cells?
[+1 to Jodi for looking out for the girls’ well-being; also, great to see you again.]
Back home, the sisters mapped out the troop’s suspects (which was basically everybody, including — at his request — Gene):
Tina: Katie, she’s in honors math.
Louise: Or she’s an evil genius.
Tina: Julie, she’s kind of a motormouth.
Louise: Is she yapping about troop secrets?
Tina: Rena, she’s a little on the short side?
Louise: But maybe she’s telling tall tales?
Tina: Jodie, she wears rubber gloves because she’s a major germaphobe.
Louise: Or so she won’t leave any fingerprints behind.
Tina: And finally, there’s Molly, she’s double-jointed.
Louise: Or a double-crosser.
[+5 points for Louise’s unwavering, unbiased scrutiny; +1 to Tina for being a pacifist.]
Meanwhile, with the kids away, Linda tried to test out her new hair on Bob, posing as a sexy assistant, then a WWII nurse, then a mustachioed doctor.
Linda: So blonde, so delicate and blonde. Here are your buns, Mr. Belcher.
[+3 to Linda for her kind-of-sexy troika of personae.]
Throughout the episode, Louise’s tactics to root out the mole became increasingly dire. She began by turning the girls against each other; then she honed in on specific suspects and attempted to torture them. Tina didn’t like that one bit.
Tina: Troop 119 shaped me into the woman I am!
Gene: I thought your underwear did that.
[+1 to Tina for keeping it real; +1 to Gene for keeping it even realer.]
Louise’s first — and, unfortunately, only — torture victim was Jodi, whose glasses Louise confiscated in an attempt to make her snitch. With her Tina senses tingling, the big sister came to quash the fun, rescuing the glasses (but freaking out the germaphobe even more) and officially shutting Louise’s operation down.
Jodi: What are you doing?
Tina: Just that thing where I breathe on the lenses and wipe them off with my shirt.
[+2 to Tina for being maternal, and for being a boss.]
Gene’s whole role in this episode had been to gather literal dirt and trash from Tina and Louise’s cohorts. If it sounds like a throwaway runner, it’s because it was. But it wasn’t completely worthless. He invented a new look for himself:
Gene: Trash fashion. I call it Trashion.
After getting the boot from Troop 119, Louise went even more undercover by joining Troop 257. They’re a rough bunch of girls, known for whittling knives out of wood, making fart sounds, and bullying kids after school. For Louise, it was forbidden love at first sight. Also, she changed her name to Alanis, from Newyorknewyork, Michigan. [+1 for being stealth as hell.]
Also, just look at that troop handshake.
And then this, which is one of the best cuts in Bob’s Burgers history:
Gretchen continued to be a nuisance but also delivered one of the best moments of the episode when she dyed her hair brunette and compared herself to Tina Fey:
Gretchen: Linda, who’s that brown-haired beauty spinning around in your restaurant? Who’s that girl? It’s me — whoa, I really am dizzy.
[+2 to Gretchen for trying so hard to spin.]
It didn’t take very long for Tina to discover the mole, thanks to some Thunder Girls strategy.
Tina: Let’s just say it rhymes with Tina.
[+1 to Tina for her resourcefulness; -1 to Tina for almost throwing herself under the bus.]
Louise saved the day, though, recognizing Rena’s subconscious willingness to engage in Troop 257’s secret handshake. There were a lot of comments about how intense the Thunder Girls were, but Gene’s was undoubtedly the best:
Gene: Yeah, you’re like Linda Hamilton when she does all those angry pull-ups.
At the end of the day, the sisters made their peace, Tina giving Louise a friendship bracelet as a token of their unbreakable, and definitely fortified, bond.
[+1 to Louise for waxing sentimental in her own way; +1 to Tina for being generous; and another +9 to Louise for ultimately revealing the mole and essentially defending her big sister’s honor.]
The MVP
Linda, Jodi, Gretchen, and Ginny all put up good fights for special recognition in this episode. Also, as much as this episode was about the Thunder Girls and Tina, Louise was the true shining star. Not only did she grow a little in her fondness for her big sister Tina, she also took some big risks going undercover as a double agent and acted in a manner beyond her years. Those feats, combined with the zingers in this episode, earn her this week’s crown.
Bob’s Bonus Sliders:
- Louise seems to be getting more and more mature, accepting, and loving every week.
- Gretchen needs to try that spinning thing in every episode.
- I hope this isn’t the last time we see Troop 257.
- Bob’s trashion outfit in the end credits looked like a health-code violation waiting to happen, but it was great.