- “Wait, is this a Star Shrek movie?”— Teddy to Louise Belcher
"The Hawkening: Look Who's Hawking Now!" is the sixth episode in Season 10, being the one-hundred-and-seventy-eighth episode overall.
Plot[]
Bob and Louise are riding high, hosting an exclusive screening of a Hawk & Chick movie at the restaurant, until the actor who plays Hawk throws a wrench into the works, for his own mysterious reasons.
Synopsis[]
Kojima is in town in two days to visit Yuki Kojima and her new baby, so the Belchers are planning a private screening of one of the Hawk and Chick films in their restaurant. Louise is the most excited, planning for such things as a signing booth, when Dominic from the local cinema (and Hawk & Chick fan club, the Chicklets) arrives and tells them that he has gotten his hands on an extremely rare, never-released-to-theaters director's' cut of Hawk & Chick Versus Cephalopod Monster. He explains that a collector he met on an online forum agreed to loan the print, and Louise is quite excited, feeling this will be the most important day ever. At school, she invites everyone to the screening during lunch in the cafeteria, but receives a confused reception from the other kids who have never heard of the movie series or its actors. Rudy says he will go, but soon everyone's attention is drawn to his right arm being in a cast (after falling off a bunk bed). Louise tries to focus back on the movie screening, but everyone is centered around Rudy, who reveals that the cast is coming off on Saturday, the same day as the screening. Later, Dominic comes by and explains that the collector does not want to loan the film print to the venue unless they put up a $1000 deposit as collateral. As the Belchers do not have the money available, Bob cancels the screening, despite Louise's protests about how the students will be there and worries that Koji might not stop by.
The next day at school, Louise is still grumbling about the collector when the kids are all standing looking at Rudy's glow-in-the-dark cast, with the older kids figuring to do a party to celebrate when it comes off the next day. Before Tina can tell them all that the Hawk & Chick screening party is called off, Louise suddenly decides to tell them that it is still on. Louise explains to Gene and Tina that their father won't put up the money, but they will. At the theater, Louise forges a check to Dominic with Bob's signature and tells Dominic that her parents put up the money but not to bring it up to them. The next day, as the screening is set up, Louise lies to her parents that Dominic put up the money himself but not to mention it as it was an inheritance from his grandmother. Tina and Gene are nervous due to going behind their parent's backs, but Louise tries to assure them that nothing will go wrong; the screening will be a success, they give the film back and the collector tears up the forged check, and their parents will never find out. As the screening begins, the restaurant is packed, including the kids from school (with Tammy holding up a selfie stick and Andy & Ollie asking if Shrek or Spock is coming). Rudy tells Louise that the cast is coming off later that day, and there is still a small spot for her to sign. Koji arrives and meets the club, Teddy, and Rudy, impressing him with a story of how intensely he stayed silent with a broken arm during a mime class, to Louise's chagrin as she tells Dominic to start the movie. Koji is however suddenly nervous when he finds out which film it is, and its director cut status as well.
During the screening of the movie, Koji is still on edge and sneaks to get the second reel of the film, and runs off with it while saying that no one should ever see it. Dominic and the Belchers soon realize that their stories regarding the money don't line up and that Louise forged Bob's name on one of the checks. She sheepishly admits it, and Bob soon runs out to find Koji is gone. They try to call his phone but never hear from him, and Yuki's phone mailbox is full due to calls from Bob as well. Linda chides Louise for putting the restaurant's financial future in danger with the check. Lousie tries to justify it and that Dominic can buy them time with the collector to track Koji down. Yuki's phone texts back that her dad is not there, but the formal "thank you for your concern" strikes Louise as odd. Bob figures there msut be somethign on the reel that Koji did not want them to see, and remembers that they have a copy of Hawk & Chick Vs. Cephalopod Monster on VHS, so they can check what it is. Watching in the restaurant, the family and Teddy notice that there is an obvious edit of a scene where a gate is intact when Hawk and Chick walk through it, and then destroyed after they walk through it, which Bob wonders if they never caught it because of their crappy VCR. Linda speculates that maybe the film is haunted due to an extra dying on set and then having their ghost be captured on film, resulting in a cut so that theater audiences would not be haunted. Gene speculates that Koji, back in the 1970s, was running up large tabs at Tokyo discos, and cast the club owner's incompetent nephew as an extra, only to have him then cut out for messing up on-camera and behind the scenes. Tina wonders if the missing scene was a love scene, that the woman inside the monster suit was Koji's one true love and during the last fight scene, the two started making out. Dominic arrives while on the phone to reassure the collector before handing the phone to Bob, and is nervous as well. Yuki calls and says her father and Louise are both at her house, and they realize Lousie is not in the restaurant. Bob, the kids and Dominic head to the car while Linda talks about Yuki's baby on the phone.
At Yuki's house, she opens the garage for Louise, and they see Koji with the film and holding the baby in a puch, but he threatens to cut the film print up. The belchers show up and Koji says he wants to cut one scene, whiel bob tries to talk him out of it due to possibly losing a lot of money. Yuki epxlains that she called them, as her father had hidden her phone while she was napping so she would not hear Bob's 15 ranting messages (altohugh he claims that 5 were ranting, the other 10 were reasonable). Bob asks Louise how she knew Koji was there, but she explains she didn't, it was a hunch based on the formality of the text. She also explains that she didn't tell them where she was going because she didn't know if she was right, but wanted to fix her mistake. The other Belchers bring up their theories on what the scene is to Koji's confusion (for one, the actor in the monster suit was a "nice guy but not my type" in his words), and Louise manages to distract him by having Linda run in order to hold the baby, and handing the print off to Bob. Kojima doesn't want the world to know, but everyoen else stills does, and Louise explains that this is all her fault, as she loves Hawk & Chick and wanted everyone else to like it too, to be a big shot and asks how they can help. Kojima finally relents, and asks them if they have ever heard of Itsuki Sugimoto. They have not, and he explains that it is because fo him.
Back at the restaurant, the Belchers, Koji, and Dominic are watching the second half of the reel. On screen is an actor, Itsuki Sugimoto, and Koji explains: Sugimoto was a "no-name" with one scene, but the camera loved him, and his performance was more captivating that Koji's, who felt he looked like a guy pretending to be a smaurai while the other was putting on an acting clinic, and after filming, all anyone ocudl talk about was Ituski. So a jealous Kojima used his influence to get him cut out of the film, and now he teaches acting classes and local theater, never knowing that it was Kojima, not the studio, that cut him out. The Belcher kids suggest he call to apologize, while Louise suggests he get this version of the film released, which he says he might try but without as much pull at the studio anymore. The collector calls to get the reel back, and Louise accepts that she messed up. The next week at school, Louise approaches Rudy to apologize for not sharing the spotlight and turning the screening into his "Cast Away" party, and he is okay, since the bunk bed is still there and his dad got a trampoline so his arm might break again, as well as saving the cast so Louise can sign it (not before recoiling at the unwashed arm smell first). Louise offers to take Rudy out for frozen yogurt to make up for it.
Ad ad plays over the credits, for the Hastings Classics DVD release of the director's cut edition of the film, Hawk & Chick vs. Cephalopod Monster: The Final Slice, digitally remastered and featuring the restored Itsuki scene.
Videos[]
References[]
External links[]
- "The Hawkening: Look Who's Hawking Now!" on IMDb
- "The Hawkening: Look Who's Hawking Now!" press release via The Futon Critic
- "The Hawkening: Look Who's Hawking Now!" script via Springfield! Springfield!
- "The Hawkening: Look Who's Hawking Now!" review at The A.V. Club
- "The Hawkening: Look Who's Hawking Now!" at the US Copyright Database