In the far-off decade of the 1990s, trouble brews on the set of Hercules: The Legendary Journeys when star Kevin Sorbo goes missing after an earthquake hits. Under the threat of the show's cancellation, the remaining staff members struggle to find their star and pitch new ideas to buy some time.
Tropes for this episode include...
- As Himself: An unusual double case. Kevin Sorbo in the show is still played by the real actor Kevin Sorbo, but the show Sorbo is the real Hercules having ascended to godhood and living among mortals. Which means Hercules is playing himself for his own TV show.
- Batman Gambit: Ares set up all the natural disasters knowing Hercules would go and help the people rather than star in his TV show.
- Breather Episode: Coming off the very dramatic "Armageddon Now" two-parter.
- Clip Show: The bantering of new ideas for the show is presented by using previous episode clips to illustrate the ideas. Notably, they even squeeze in footage from Hercules and Xena – The Animated Movie: The Battle for Mount Olympus and the Young Hercules Pilot Movie.
- Didn't Think This Through: Paul proposes bluffing the audience by doing a story where Hercules is trapped in-between worlds, leaving the other characters forced to face the Sovereign without him. Liz points out that Kevin also played the Sovereign.
- Diegetic Soundtrack Usage: While in the bathroom, Rob, Jerry, Alex, and Paul start whistling and humming the show's theme song before really going all out with it.
- Establishing Character Moment: We get a montage of each of the producers in the middle of doing something that sets them up when they get the bad news, such as gun fan Jerry doing some paintball and Paul being drunk in Vegas.
- Evil Cannot Comprehend Good: Averted. Ares was right that Hercules wouldn't put a TV show ahead of the lives of innocents; he just underestimated how quickly he'd get the job done.
- Evil Is Petty: Ares and Strife rigged the events of this episode just to get the Hercules TV show cancelled.
- Rage Breaking Point: With the cancellation deadline in its last minutes, Alex and Roberto's idea to retool the show around a monkey hero named Chimpules pushes the tensions among the staff into a full-fledged fight.
- Real Life Writes the Plot: The whole episode is the writers' own commentary on how they had to work around Kevin Sorbo's real life health problems during this season.
- Rock–Paper–Scissors: Jerry proposes retooling the show to star Ares, while Liz advocates Callisto. After some clips, Alex questions what the villains would even do without Hercules around. We cut to a scene of Ares and Callisto playing this intensely, until the latter wins.Ares: [storming off] Dumb blonde!
Callisto: Hey! - Self-Deprecation: This episode is basically the show's staff poking a whole lot of fun at themselves, being portrayed as neurotic, inept and downright crazy.
- Shout-Out:
- The title is a reference to the film Yes, Virginia, There is a Santa Claus.
- Apparently, Ares likes Millennium (1996) and Strife likes Cop Rock.
- When it looks like the staff has been fired, Melissa wonders if The Adventures of Sinbad is hiring.
- Spin-Off Babies: Discussed. Melissa suggests retooling the show to focus on Herc's younger days and floats some ideas. Beth balks at doing this since they haven't even been able to recast just one character, but Rob still likes the idea and keeps it in mind for a spin-off.
- Terrible Interviewees Montage: What we see of an attempt to get a new Hercules actor does not go well.
- Time Stands Still: The final fight is frozen mid-battle while Ares and Strife take the time to gloat.
- Time-Freeze Trolling Spree: Strife takes the time to line up one of the other staff members in the way of a fired bullet.
- Underestimating Badassery: Hercules mocks Ares for once again underestimating his capabilities.
- The World Is Not Ready: Herc's reasoning as to why he hasn't gone open with the fact that the Greek Gods are real and works under the guise of a mortal.
