| “ | Hey, what if we all put tape over our mouths until Grandpa gets here? That could be fun. | ” |
"Interview with a Pop-pop-pire" is the sixteenth episode in Season 12, being the two-hundred-and-thirty-second episode overall.
Plot[]
Big Bob is coming to dinner so that Tina can interview him for a school project. While the family waits for Pop Pop to arrive, they take turns coming up with their own versions of an infamous tree incident that happened to him in his younger years.
Full story[]
At the Belcher home one evening, Gene is warming up his singing voice in the living room in order to showcase his "rock opera" to his grandfather, while Louise brags that "Pop-Pop" will be too busy looking at her newly acquired Burobu cards, and Tina says he will be busy with her, as she is interviewing him for a school assignment, the whole reasons he is visiting. Louise dismisses her and plans got get Big Bob to see her incomplete collection and get her the missing cards, while Gene wasn't to show off The Gene-uine Article and his new invention, the "glam-eridoo," a makeshift didgeridoo made of paper and glitter. Tina says she needs him to focus on the interview, and Linda comes in to ask what the report is about. Tina says they have to interview an older relative with several assigned questions.
Linda is happy to see Tina's assignment as she lays out cheese and crackers for snacks, while Bob is more hesitant, noting his father is not the most talkative person. Tina is confident, however, and plans on asking what moment most shaped him. Bob says it might be "the tree thing," but the others have no idea what he is talking about, so Bob explains that a tree almost fell on Big Bob when he was younger, which Bob thinks is the reason why he does not like forests (having also seen his father yell at a tree once).
Tina tells him to stop so Pop-Pop can say it all when the phone rings. Linda answers; it is Big Bob, saying he will be late for dinner due to his diner walk-in breaking, meaning he will have to pack food in ice to prevent it spoiling. He also says he is bringing milk before hanging up, to Bob's frustration. Louise wants to know more about the tree story that they have never heard before, while Tina wants to wait to get it in her report. Bob says he only knows that a tree almost fell on his father but does not know much else, while Louise starts speculating that it happened in "The old country," before cars and computers.
Louise's story[]
Her story takes place in a medieval world where Big Bob was a cool, no-nonsense cop.
Bob points out his father was never a cop. Linda shushes him and tells Louise to continue the story.
Big Bob was on the case of a giant in the clouds above who was taking villagers and grinding their bones to make bread he'd then sell back to the other villagers, which also made them sick with nonstop farts. Big Bob gets a tip and climbs a giant beanstalk to find the giant (which Bob notes is Jack and the beanstalk with cops). In the clouds and vines, Big Bob searches and finds the giant, who had previously been caught picking a shop building. Big Bob confronts the giant about grinding up the bones into bread, but the giant insists he gave it up due to being messy and intensive to get the bones out of villagers. Big Bob is skeptical and gets a call on his cell phone from the crime lab on test results for the bread.
Gene questions how Big Bob could have a cell phone at such an early date, and Louise says it was a landline with a cord going down all the way to the ground.
Big Bob learns that the bread does not contain villager bones, but beans. The giant feels vindicated at his innocence.
Louise tells the family that everyone gets the story wrong, that the giant was not the bad guy, but the beanstalk was. Tina points out the giant did grind up bones at some point, and Bob notes that beanstalks are not trees, but Louise insists they are and that the beanstalk was the worst of all.
Big Bob hangs up and wonders who might be trying to frame the giant, when the two are encircled and captured by stalk tendrils, which morph into a cage made of bean vines.
Bob is confused that a beanstalk held his father and giant prisoner, while Tina Wyatt's them to stop so she can hear the actual story from Pop-Pop, but Louise continues.
The vine cage is guarded by two henchmen, whom Big Bob asks why their boss wants people to fart so much anyway, with one implying that since farts are 30 percent carbon dioxide, more of it in the air will help the stalk grow, but the other says the two will probably be turned into fertilizer. Big Bob asks the giant for anything that could help them escape, and the giant uses a lock pick made out of villager's bone on him to pick the cage's lock. This leads to a fight sequence where Big Bob and the giant throw the henchmen off the beanstalk, which does not kill them.
Big Bob and the giant then get pushed by the beanstalk, but do not die when landing. Big Bob asks how to defeat it, when a Weed Whacker salesman comes by, and demonstrates a wood-and-metal weed whacker on the beanstalk, cutting through it. The beanstalk nearly crushes Big Bob, who then arrests the beanstalk and its henchmen. The townspeople cheer, and the giant becomes Big Bob's cop partner.
Bob tells Louise that her story was a "great guess" but probably not what happened. Gene says he has a more accurate idea of what happened with the tree story, even as Tina says they could talk an about something else.
Gene's story[]
On a sunny day in a forest, Big Bob is hiking and looking for a spot to set up his campsite. Just hen, he hears a message on a radio left in the woods, of. A scientist saying they cannot fight "them" if they remain undetected, but the "they" looking to stop people from camping confuses the young Big Bob. He sets up a campsite and made an ice cream float using supplies from a cooler and took out a glam-eridoo.
Tina asks if they had the item then when Gene just invented it, but Linda says she buys it.
Big Bob is about to play when a pine cone drops, startling him. Having dropped his float glass, he goes to retrieve it when he finds a pair of glittery binoculars. Picking them up, he sees the world in black and white and takes a look around, before finding an alien monster that looks like muscles in tree shape in front of him.
Bob confusedly asks if there are aliens, which the family tells him is possible.
Big Bob realizes he can only see the alien with the binoculars, which realizes he can see them, and vanishes. Just then, a scientist who looks like Louise runs up to him, saying they don't have much time. The scientist says she designed the binoculars, and was part of a small group of campers who picked up the alien signals and tracked them to study them. Just then, a horde of secret tree aliens start running towards the two, who run off.
Gene takes a cheese break when Bob notes that the story sounds a lot like the movie They Live, and concernedly asks Gene if he had seen it recently. Gene admits that when Bob was watching it before, he snuck out of his room to watch it from the hallway. Gene gets back to the story.
The tree aliens are gaining on the scientists and Big Bob, but the aliens are klutzes who keep falling over due to being tree-shaped. the scientists post the ranger station, and barely manage to get in to bolt the door. The ranger asks what is going on, and is given the binoculars to see the trees are aliens. The scientist says that the aliens want to stop people from camping so they can harvest Earth's forests resources for their own planet.
Big Bob asks how to stop them, and the scientists says they need to destroy the signal the aliens are using, but hasn't figured out where the signal is coming from. Just then, the ranger holds them up with a stick, explaining that they are too close to finding out how. Big Bob asks why she sided with the aliens, and the ranger says they promised her a job in their space forest that has good benefits. As they cannot check their binoculars to check if the stick was a gun with their hands up, the ranger ties up Big Bob and the scientist behind the station for the aliens.
As the ranger talks to the tree aliens, Big Bob tells the scientist to kick over his backpack. She does, and he grabs his glam-eridoo with his mouth to start playing. The music makes the aliens start dancing, along with the ranger. The scientist then notices the ranger station's antenna malfunctioning, as it was the transmitter, but the frequency of the instrument is interfering. Big Bob keeps playing the glam-eridoo until the antenna explodes, removing the alien's tree disguises and forcing them to flee the planet. Big Bob and the scientist escape their ropes, and Big Bob sets out to set up his camp again.
Gene finishes the story, while Bob brings up that his father hates camping in real life, before saying to Gene it was a great story. Tina wants the others to shut up before their grandfather arrives, but Linda start speculating on the story too.
Linda's story[]
The tree that almost crushed Big Bob may have known him personally and wanted to crush him (which Bob a see happening a little). Big Bob would go to the tree every day to ask for apples, branches for firewood, leaves for funky leaf belts, etc. The tree liked being friendly but then started getting annoyed, and one day when Big Bob wanted to carve his WiFi password in it, the tree decided to fall on him.
Just then, Big Bob shows up in the living room, startling everyone. The kids hug him as Bob asks how he got in, and Big Bob says the door was unlocked, to Bob's concern. The family go to start eating, but Tina yells for them to stop, as she really needs to interview her grandfather. Big Bob agrees while Linda goes to keep dinner warm.
Tina asks Big Bob about the moment that most shaped his life. he answers that it would be the time he went camping and a tree almost fell on him, with Tina pretending to be shocked. Bob comes as his father says there is not much more to it, and makes a remark about it going the way he thought (extremely short). Big bob hears him, and soon, the two are in an argument over Big Bob's lack of communication and short way of talking, to the kids's concern. Big Bob decides to leave when Linda comes into the living room to let them know the pasta is warm. Tina tells Bob to be quiet and Big Bob to sit, and the two apologize to her. Tina asks more about the tree incident, looking to know "when it happened, where it happened, why it happened, who it happened to" and how it shaped him.
Big Bob's story[]
Big Bob says he was in his 20s, they were camping in a park he forgets the name of. It was on a rainy night in a tent, and his girlfriend, their grandmother, left the tent to use the bathroom.
Bob is surprised to find out his mother was there, as his father never said she was there before. He confirms it, and that they were not married then. Tina asks what happened then.
The winds were picking up, and he heard a crack. Suddenly, the tent collapsed, and he managed to crawl out, finding a big tree had fallen over on the tent. It had just missed him, and had their grandmother not left, she would have been crushed. As Tina asks him why he think the moment shaped him into who he is he answers: He's not dead, for one, and it made him think about their grandmother and life in a different way. He saw her face as she returned after he crawled out of the tent, and thought about how much she meant to him, realizing in that moment that he wanted to marry her. And six years later, he did propose.
Tina is happy to hear her grandmother said "yes', and Bob is stunned, having never heard any of that. Linda says out was a beautiful story while Louise says her story had a giant. Big Bob tells Tina she is a good interviewer, Bob does as well, while she admits she cannot reader notes every well. Linda suggests they eat the pasta as it is mostly warm, telling Tian to ask more questions over dinner.
Later after dinner, Bob and his father are washing dishes, with Bob still surprised at never knowing the whole tree story parts with his mother. Big Bob admits he could be better about sharing that info, and that he didn't want to bring Bob's mother up because he was worried that he'd make Bob think about her and get sad. Bob says it may have, but in a good way, because they'd be talking about her; as well, he could be better at asking his father about things. He asks if there is anything else he should ask, while Big Bob makes a joke about having another family before saying he's brought Bob up to speed. Louise calls from another room about her Burobu display, while Gene prepares to debut his "rock opera" and says it will be an hour. Bob and his father leave the kitchen, with Bob saying the performance will likely be longer as Linda accidentally sits on Louise while trying to get a good seat.
Videos[]
External links[]
- "Interview with a Pop-pop-pire" on IMDb
- "Interview with a Pop-pop-pire" press release via The Futon Critic
- "Interview with a Pop-pop-pire" script via Springfield! Springfield!
| Season 12 Episode Navigation | v • t • e | |
|---|---|---|
| Manic Pixie Crap Show • Crystal Mess • The Pumpkinening • Driving Big Dummy • Seven-tween Again • Beach, Please • Loft in Bedslation • Stuck in the Kitchen with You • FOMO You Didn't • Gene's Christmas Break • Touch of Eval(uations) • Ferry on My Wayward Bob and Linda • Frigate Me Knot • Video Killed the Gene-io Star • Ancient Misbehavin' • Interview with a Pop-pop-pire • The Spider House Rules • Clear and Present Ginger • A-Sprout a Boy • Sauce Side Story • Some Like It Bot Part 1: Eighth Grade Runner • Some Like It Bot Part 2: Judge-bot Day | ||
| ← Season 11 | See also: Episode Guide | Season 13 → |