7x13 The Grand Mama-Pest Hotel

[8.5/10] Bob’s Burgers loves to explore a normal, relatable thing and take it in a crazy, offbeat direction, especially with Linda. (See also: “Mother Daughter Laser Razor”) It always works like a charm on me. So I was definitely on board with this one, where Linda is worried about Tina growing up, getting embarrassed of her mother, and the pair drifting apart, and takes it to absurd, Linda-like extremes.

Of course, Tina could be forgiven for being embarrassed by her mother. Linda is an outsized personality who isn’t always great about tamping down on her less public-friendly impulses. But the episode never makes her unsympathetic even as she does these ridiculous things, because it comes from that understandable insecurity. Sure, the mature, adult thing to do would be to embrace Tina take her first few flaps out of the nest, but that makes Linda’s attempts to ingratiate herself to her daughter both sweet and cringey.

The show finds the funniest ways to illustrate this. I love Dylan’s mom and how comically desperate she is for her daughter’s attention. Her frantic hopes for affection, excitement over scallop sheers, and photos of her kid while sleeping are all sad but funny dramatizations of Linda’s worst nightmares. And Linda trying to solidify her relationship with Tina by acting like she thinks teenagers act is great too.
I was also a big fan of the B-story, which sees Gene and Louise deciding to throw a bachelor party for Bob since he never got one, with predictably misguided results. Things like taking shots of apple juice, inviting Teddy as the “sexy surprise,” and drawing on Bob’s face bring the laughs, as does Bob’s deadpan acceptance of all this lunacy as usual. Bob + wacky madness = fun everytime.

That’s the thing, even when the story gets a little bumpy in this one, with Linda’s shtick going a bit too far, it’s all too funny to really care. The “heroine conference,” the astronaut/blackbelt female role model, Bob being inspired by her speech, the kids coming up with “Dad-chelor party,” Mr. Frond’s “tough voice,” all keep the laughs coming as the narrative rolls along.

And while it’s a bit embarrassing, the ending tugs the right hearstrings too. Linda going all Linda, but realizing that her daughter still loves her and wants to be close to her even as she’s growing up and making new friends works well as a resolving beat. No show mixes the insane and the heartfelt like Bob’s Burgers does.

An underdeveloped B plot that had a lot of potential. Dadchelor party is a great premise for the pretty rare combination of Bob and the younger children. It was swallowed by a just bad A plot of Linda getting paranoid that Tina was getting too old for her. This is of course entirely in her head but none of it works. It's not a good sincere episode which Bobs does have and it's not a good wacky episode. It just doesn't work on any level so what we're left with is an episode that goes too far and comes off less wacky and more unbelievable. I'd have loved a heartwarming episode about Tina growing up and being too old for her mom only to learn that she was never too old for Linda.

Maybe this would have worked better if they switched the plots. Making the Dad-chelor party the primary story and then check in with Linda losing her mind over a fear that is completely unfounded. Instead the A plot felt as directionless and unsure where it was going as Linda when she urged Tina and her new friend to come out of their rooms without a plan on what they were going to do or where they were going to go. We saw how awkward, embarassing, and unsuccessful that was for Linda. The irony is the writers are Linda in this episodes.

That said it's been six seasons and I don't think I've seen another episode at this level which just speaks to the quality and entertainment of Bob's Burgers.