Lester Crinklesack and his son are a big part of “The One About Friends”, causing all kinds of ruckus in Stoolbend. Cleveland just wants Junior to have some friends yet things go horribly wrong because of it. Will Cleveland be able to save the day and make a friend of his own along the way? Keep reading for the full episode review.
Episode Summary
Cleveland notices that while Rallo and Roberta have lots of friends and are having no problem being social, Cleveland Jr keeps to himself. Hoping to fix this, Cleveland sets out to find some friends for his son. The first two attempts go horribly awry, with Cleveland getting his wallet stolen by a boy at the basketball court and being surrounded by police after his conversation with an undercover cop comes off as sexually charged.
They see Lester’s son Ernie kicking a can all by himself, so Cleveland takes advantage of the opportunity to introduce the two young men. Soon after, they are having lots of fun together and playing pranks on Tim and Holt. Ernie stays for dinner and is about to leave when Cleveland invites him to spend the night.
The next evening, Ernie comes over again but this time he has a bag full of his belongings. Lester is upset that his boy wants to live somewhere else and says that Cleveland can keep him. Before long, though, Ernie begins wearing out his welcome — he kills a chicken, pees in the kitchen sink and his pet possum “princess” wreaks havoc on Cleveland’s crotch.
Donna, citing previous experience with Robert, suggests that Cleveland call child protective services. According to her, they will just sit Ernie and Lester down and force them to resolve their problems. However, once the social worker sees just how atrocious the living conditions are at the Crinklesacks’, he rushes away with Ernie and takes him to a foster home.
Lester simply cannot be convinced to get his son back, until Tim and Cleveland work together to paint the government as the culprit behind everything. Cleveland gets sharply dressed and is ready to go to a hearing, but Lester took a different approach to fighting for his son and has rounded up several of his gun-toting buddies.
They all travel to the foster family’s house and Lester and “The Sons of Stoolbend” are all ready to go in guns blazing, but Cleveland somehow manages to get Lester to take the civilized approach — which lasts about a minute. The social worker refuses to return custody of Ernie so Lester calls his friends in and a huge gunfight between them and the foster parents ensues.
While the bullets are flying, Lester and Ernie iron out their misunderstanding and are reunited. Also during the battle, Cleveland yet again gets someone to see things his way, but the social worker is killed by a bullet. Thinking quickly, Mr. Brown picks up the dead hand and forges the signature, but when he looks up, the foster parents have Lester at gunpoint. Springing into action, Cleveland shoots the chandelier and traps them, effectively ending the fight.
Analysis
This episode showcased Cleveland as a well-intentioned yet somehow impatient dad who kept bumbling things up. Although his goals were eventually accomplished, there were many stumbling blocks along the way. This sets him apart from Peter Griffin in that Peter just does whatever he feels like without much regard for outcome.
Lester was a focal point this time around, and in effect this felt like an extension of the pilot with things slowly unraveling for the sake of fleshing out this supporting character. Unfortunately, Rallo and Roberta appear only briefly, leaving a little to be desired. I feel like an episode like this could have waited a week or two for the sake of getting to know Cleveland’s new family a bit more.
The cutaway jokes weren’t really as sharp as last week and some of the jokes felt a bit tired, but some were memorable. I personally enjoyed Cleveland dressing up as Lester and Holt coming in dressed as Cleveland, to which Cleveland replied “We may dress as you all but you all may not dress as us.” Another funny one was Roberta communicating with all of her friends via two phones, twitter and facebook.
The Verdict
Overall, “The One About Friends” was an average episode that wasn’t quite funny or memorable enough. We didn’t get to see enough of the Tubbs children, but at least Donna played a significant role in the episode. Now that Lester’s character has been given an extended showcase, hopefully he will become a funny character that is good for a little more than redneck jokes.
The Cleveland Show further grounds itself as more of a sitcom than its predecessor, as Cleveland forges a friendship of his own in the process of trying to do so for his son.
Final Score: 7.5 out of 10
Related posts:
- Episode 7 “A Brown Thanksgiving” Review
- “Da Doggone Daddy-Daughter Dinner Dance” Review
- Episode 5 “Cleveland Jr. Cherry Bomb” Review
- Episode 4 “Birth of a Salesman” Review
- Episode 1 “Pilot” Review
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Well, it certainly was funny. In my opinion, the best episode yet, and I sure hope that from here The Cleveland Show is going to keep this level of humour.
And by the way, another great review from the CS blog.
Much better than the Debut episode….Still dont like the Voice for Rollo however..not “tough enough”
all i know is that i’m naming my first born son “crinklesack”
Does anybody know what’s the title of the song when Cleveland goes shoe shopping ??