Airdate: 05/13/2007
Lois runs for Mayor of Quahog against incumbent Mayor Adam West, once she notices how polluted the local lake has become. Lois is elected as mayor and successfully cleans the lake, but quickly succumbs when the toxic-dump owner pressures her to let him resume dumping toxins into the lake.
Tropes used in this episode:
- Accidental Truth: Lois scares Quahog into paying to restore the lake by saying it's being used by Hitler and the Legion of Doom as their base of operations to plan Jesus's assassination.Narrator: Meanwhile, at the Legion of Doom… (cut to the Legion watching Lois on their monitor)
Lex Luthor: How did she discover our plan?!
Solomon Grundy: ME SOLOMON GRUNDY kind of dropped the ball on that one. - Affably Evil: Jason Voorhees gets interviewed about the lake being cleaned of pollution and calmly discusses all the positive benefits to the restoration. He also stops for a moment to stab two teenage girls dead before finishing his analysis. He also runs a clothing boutique, and — in the same pleasant tone of voice — threatens to murder the clerk if she screws up.
- As Himself:
- Don Most (Ralph on Happy Days) briefly appears as himself as a forest spectre.
- Adam West brings on Jimmy Smits to help him appeal to Latino voters.
- "Bang!" Flag Gun: Alluded to when Quagmire says he's been sleeping with so many women to get their approval for Lois that this is all that would come out if he tried to masturbate.
- Body Horror: Parodied. When Jake Tucker shows off to his friends and dives underwater, the toxic waste fills the water he's in and when he resurfaces, his upside-down face turns right-side-up as a result of the toxic waste dumped into the lake. This horrifies him and his friend so much that they run out of the lake as he screams "Ah, my face!" and it gets Lois to change her mind.
- Bowdlerise: A lot of parts were edited/altered between the FOX version and the versions shown on cable and DVD
- After the "vacation with the Price Is Right yodeler/Cleveland in Plinko" cutaway, there's a scene where Peter and Lois arrive at the cabin and Meg points out that it's between two oak trees. Lois asks, "Well, there's a lot of trees around here. How do we know we're in the right spot?" The scene then cuts to an overhead shot where the entire area where Quagmire's cabin is is shaped like a penis, with Brian stating, "Uh, I think it's a safe bet this is the place."
- For reasons unknown, Lois' line when the family enters the cabin is changed from "Wow, Quagmire's got a nice place," (TV version) to "This looks comfortable." (cable and DVD version)
- The scene of the Griffins walking in on Quagmire about to have sex with a Japanese woman: On FOX, the scene ends after Quagmire asks, "Oh. Hey. Is this the week you guys were coming out?" On cable and DVD, Quagmire adds, "And here I am, cream on my face, hair a mess, and in mid-coitus. I must look a sight!"
- On DVD, there's a scene after the Donny Most/Brigadoon parody, where Peter shows his family how to hang food from trees to keep animals from getting at it — and ends up attracting The Pope.
- Another DVD-exclusive scene during the campfire sequence where Lois sees the Stephen Hawking-esque couple from "Brian Goes Back to College" at the campsite across from theirs "singing."
- Peter's campfire song summarizing Brokeback Mountain: On FOX, Peter says "gay sex"; on DVD and cable, it's "butt sex".
- The Griffins losing their hair because of the polluted lake and Stewie discovers Brian's Ziggy tattoo: On FOX, Brian grumbles, "Ah, geez!"; on DVD and cable, Brian grumbles, "Jesus!" note
- The scene of Stewie pretending he's Mozart: on FOX, when he flashes the audience his butt, he's wearing white, frilly underpants; on cable and DVD, he has a bare butt.
- The cutaway of Adam West (with slicked-up hair, thanks to his deal with the oil company) hitting on a woman at the bus stop: On FOX, Adam's pick-up line is "Hey, baby, wanna take a gander at some Adam West penis?"; the DVD and cable version is the less clunky, more upfront "Hey, baby, want some Adam West penis?"
- Tom Tucker's line during his report on Lois running for mayor: On FOX, his question is "Can a woman be mayor, or will she just menstruate all over the city?"; the DVD and cable version replace "menstruate" with "bleed" (which is the same thing, only "bleed" is, by the FOX censors' standards, cruder).
- Quagmire's line about how he had sex with every woman in town so Lois can get the female vote: On FOX, he complains that he has one sperm left who's alone and scared; On cable and DVD, he says that if he tried to masturbate, a little flag with the word "Bang!" (seen on a lot of trick guns) would come out.
- When Brian says "Fuck you!" to another dog, the F-word is bleeped out on TV.
- When the lake gets polluted again, the DVD features a conversation between the "screaming black dolphins" who first appeared in "I Take Thee, Quagmire". One of them drops an MF-bomb.
- Chewbacca Defense: Lois winning over the undecided voters by saying "9/11."
- Comically Small Bribe: A Played for Drama example, as it demonstrates how Lois is bending her values; she allows dumping to resume in the lake for nothing more than an expensive fur coat.
- Corrupt Corporate Executive: Bob Grossbeard is an oil CEO who bribes Quahog's mayors into letting him dump runoff into public lakes.Stewie: This guy don't sit right with me, Lois. He don't sit right with me.
- Corrupt Politician: Mayor West lets the oil company pollute the lake in exchange for free oil for his hair. Lois starts to become one herself after she's elected mayor.
- Dude, Not Funny!: Stewie has this reaction to Peter's impersonation of a woman with postpartum depression. It doesn't help that he was holding Stewie's head underwater as he was doing it.Stewie: You son of a bitch! Don't even joke about that!
- Embarrassing Tattoo: After all of Brian's fur falls off, Stewie notices that he has a Ziggy tattoo on his butt, and Brian admits that he used to be a fan of Ziggy, but then points out that they and the rest of the family should probably go to the hospital.
- Failed Attempt at Scaring: The Griffins go to Quagmire's cabin to spend some time outdoors, and interrupt him about to have sex with a woman because he forgot that was the weekend he let them borrow his cabin. That night, as they sit around the campfire telling scary stories, Quagmire's turn is about a woman not leaving the morning after a one night stand, which cause the Griffins to just stare at him blankly.
- Interrupted Intimacy: Quagmire lets the Griffin stay at his cabin for the weekend, but at the beginning of the episode, the Griffins hear something from upstairs and walk in on Quagmire and a Japanese woman about to have sex, and Quagmire admits that he forget that this was the weekend that the Griffin family was coming.
- Legion of Doom: The trope namers themselves appear after Lois claims they were plotting with Hitler to assassinate Jesus. Turns out, she wasn't too far off the mark.Lex Luthor: How did she discover our plan?
Solomon Grundy: Me, Solomon Grundy... kinda dropped the ball on that one... - Mundane Made Awesome: "Every hundred years, in this spot, Donny Most rises from the mist!" Cue him doing exactly that, with an angelic choir announcing his presence:Choir: Donny Most, Donny Mo-ost,
He was Ralph on Happy Days
Donny Most, Donny Mo-ost,
Now he rises from the haze
[Beat]
Don Most: Actually, it's Don Most now.
[he descends back into the mist]
Choir: Donny Most, Donny Mo-ost,
Sunday, Monday, Happy Days... - Non-Answer: Lois responds to two audience questions with merely, "9/11." And the questions had nothing to do with national security.
- Non-Indicative Name: Bob Grossbeard does not have a beard, gross or otherwise.
- Our Zombies Are Different: The corpse of Jim Varney
, who Peter reanimates in a failed attempt to bring back John Belushi. - Shout-Out:
- There's one to Amadeus. When Stewie mocks Peter while playing the clavichord, we cut to an elderly Peter telling the story to someone else back in the 1800s.Peter: Go ahead! Mock me! But it wasn't Stewie who was laughing at me... it was God! [Ominous Latin Chanting plays in the background]
- Donny Most rising from the mist every 100 years is a reference to Brigadoon. To complete the reference, the song sung about Most's appearance has the exact same melody as the titular song from the musical.
- Brian is revealed to have a tattoo of Ziggy.
- There's one to Amadeus. When Stewie mocks Peter while playing the clavichord, we cut to an elderly Peter telling the story to someone else back in the 1800s.
- Status Quo Is God: Enforced. At the end of the episode Adam West regains the title of mayor when Lois is ready to give it up. A man points out it doesn't work that way, and is shot for it by West.
- Stimulant Speedtalk: A Cutaway Gag features Peter doing cocaine, after which he spends several seconds asking if they have enough napkins at high speed, anxiously looks around the room, then repeatedly asks if the framed painting on the wall behind him is straight until he Deteriorates Into Gibberish and smashes it in a fit of rage.
- Stock Footage: When everyone cheers after Lois says "Nine-Eleven" again, footage of the infamous "Crying Girl" from American Idol is used.
- Take That!: American politics gets it with both barrels throughout the episode. Not only do we have the obvious example of Mayors taking bribes from big companies, but undecided voters are openly called "the biggest idiots on the planet." This is proven with how they reject Lois' Boring, but Practical policy proposals while fawning all over Mayor West's glittering generalities. Lois is able to scare the people of Quahog into supporting her cause by making up ridiculous conspiracies and dropping controversial terms in meaningless ways (most of her campaign platform just had her saying the phrase "9/11" over and over again).
