Recap / Tales From The Crypt S 3 E 3 The Trap

The Trap

This isn't the end for him. The real thing is much sweeter.

Crypt Keeper: (wearing a suit and sitting behind a desk that reads "Crypt Keeper Assurances Ltd."; he pushes a stone slab over an open coffin, then notices the viewers) Greetings, bores and ghouls. I'll be with you as soon as I finish with this customer. (pushes an exposed arm into the coffin) We were just going over some of the terms of his coverage. (finally pushes the slab completely on top of the coffin) I'll bet this is one clause he won't be getting out of. (cackles) Tonight's nasty nugget concerns a man with a problem. He wants to collect on his life insurance without dying in the process. I call this little annuity: The Trap.

After being fired from his latest job as a pizza delivery man, the abusive and slovenly Lou Paloma (Bruce McGill) gets into an argument with his wife Irene (Teri Garr) over the dismal state of their finances, Irene's doubt over her husband's ability to provide for them having become a long-standing frustration between the couple. With the reluctant help of his police coroner brother Billy (Bruno Kirby), Lou concocts a scheme to fake his own death via murder and collect $500,000 on his life insurance policy so he and Irene can start a new life in Rio. Despite some initial setbacks, and hints of an attraction between Billy and Irene, the ruse the trio play is able to successfully fool the police. At Lou's faux memorial service, Billy and Irene become more attracted to each other and have sex atop of Lou's coffin, nearly sending it into a crematorium while he's still inside. As the three celebrate afterwards, Billy and Irene suggest that Lou go to Rio first, leaving Irene and the money behind for a while to avoid raising suspicions. Lou takes their advice and has plastic surgery to alter his appearance, but after six months of hearing nothing from Irene, he loses his patience and flies back to the US. Lou is shocked to find that his house has been completely remodeled and Irene is now married to Billy. Neither of them claim to know him, and when he calls the police to explain his insurance fraud scheme and their double-cross, he is arrested, tried, and convicted of his own murder. He is executed in the electric chair, while Irene and Billy celebrate their happy ending in Rio.

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Tropes:

• Adaptation Name Change: In the comic, the husband was named Matt Hall and the third member of the scheme was named Larry Grover.
• Adaptational Heroism: In the comic, Irene was a gold-digging nag who manipulated her Henpecked Husband Matt into the insurance fraud scheme she thought up, and had an affair with the local undertaker. Irene and Larry betray Matt at the first opportunity and gladly accuse him of being the killer in order to cover their tracks. In the episode, Irene and Billy (standing in for Larry) still have an affair and keep the money, but they're portrayed in a more positive light (as they sympathize with the other over the abuse Lou inflicts on them and neither of them being the one to think up the scheme).
• Adaptational Job Change: Originally, the third member of the scam (Larry Grover) was a local undertaker who was only involved because of Irene. In this version, Billy is Lou's brother, as well as a coroner working for the police department, which justifies him being directly involved in the case and being able to sell the lie of his brother's murder.
• Adaptational Villainy: In the comic, Matt had to be nagged into the insurance scam and was made the fall guy for his own murder. Lou, the episode's version of him, is an abusive sack of garbage who comes up with the scam himself and brings about his own demise by provoking Irene and Billy.
• Asshole Victim: Lou is one of the biggest on this show, so it's no surprise that the scumbag gets what he deserves in the end.
• Bad Liar: Early in the episode, Irene struggles with keeping Mr. Neve off her and Lou's backs and stumbles through his coaching. She develops a way better poker face later on, after she marries Billy.
• Be Careful What You Wish For: When Billy asks what he wants, Lou says he wants to be dead. The end of the episode has him getting exactly what he wants.
• Because You Were Nice to Me: Irene falls in love with, and later marries, Billy, since he's way nicer to her than Lou ever was.
• Beware the Nice Ones: Billy and Irene are genuinely nice people who want to do the right thing, but as Lou finds out, you mistreat them one too many times, and you'll meet your own peril.
• Big Brother Bully: Lou, so very much. He constantly abuses the fact that he's the older brother to get Billy to do what he wants.
• Black-and-Grey Morality: Lou is a complete scumbag who treats his family horribly and would rather make a quick buck than an honest living. Billy and Irene commit perjury and insurance fraud, but both of these felonies are brought about by Lou's actions, and he completely deserves everything they subject him to in the climax.
• Blackmail: Lou has been so desperate for money that he's had Billy embezzle cash out of their mother's retirement account. To get him to help in the insurance fraud scheme, Lou threatens to tell their mother that Billy alone took the money (citing how Billy manages the account and signs all the withdrawal slips). Irene later says that she would've vouched for Billy, but Billy knows that it wouldn't have mattered (for reasons that become quite apparent during the memorial service).
• Bookends: The episode begins and ends to the tune of Peter Allen's song "I Go to Rio".
• Cassandra Truth: Nobody believes Lou when he comes back to America with a disguised appearance. And when they find his fingerprints on the murder weapon, well...
• Cloudcuckoolander: Paolo, the waiter in Rio who constantly visits Lou at his table commenting about the sunset. Interestingly enough, he's called as a witness during Lou's trial:
  Paolo: Of course I know this man. His name is Smith, Señor Smith. We have watched many beautiful sunsets together.
  Lou: (gesturing in disbelief) ...Fuckin' waiter.
• Comforting the Widow: Billy and Irene become attracted to each other during Lou's memorial service, though Lou is still alive at the time.
• Creator Cameo: Michael J. Fox, director of this episode, plays the prosecutor during Lou's trial.
• Deadpan Snarker: Irene, when Lou tries to play dead while scratching a persistent itch on his crotch.
  Irene: Oh, great. That's what we're gonna tell the police when they get here. "Oh, yes, Officer, he is dead, but he just can't stop scratching himself."
• Defiant to the End: Unable to prove his "innocence" and sentenced to death for his own murder, Lou has only one thing to say to the prison guards:
  Lou: I'm Lou Paloma. Blow me.
• Didn't Think This Through: Lou tells the cops everything about his scam to try to take Billy and Irene down with him, but he has absolutely no way to prove his identity (especially with his surgically altered face). Worse, after McClaine arrests him, his blood and fingerprints are matched to the DNA samples found on the knife and poker. With his body having "officially" been cremated, there's no way to prove his claims without Billy and Irene telling the truth.
• Due to the Dead: Sergeant McClaine goes to Lou's sparsely attended memorial service out of respect, being the only non-family member there.
• Epic Fail: As part of his Establishing Character Moment, Lou tells Irene that he got fired from his job as a pizza delivery man after delivering a pie to an office tower and spending hours looking for his car, which he still doesn't find when he comes home.
• "Eureka!" Moment: After yelling at insurance collector Mr. Neve over the phone, Lou bemoans how he's been giving the insurance companies his money his whole life and ditching him when he really needs it, which leads to him thinking up his fraud scheme.
• Evil Old Folks: She's not exactly evil, but Mother Paloma comes across as an absolute bitch to anyone who isn't Lou.
• Eyes Never Lie: When Billy comes over to hear what Lou has to say, we get close-ups of him and Irene looking at each other, which makes their attraction immediately clear.
• Faking the Dead: The focus of Lou's scheme, with help from Billy, in order to collect his life insurance policy.
• Flipping the Bird: Variation: Prior to turning off his TV over an insurance collection commercial, Lou flicks his chin at the set, an Italian gesture on the same level as flipping the bird.
• Foil:
  • Billy is everything his brother could never be. While Lou is a Lazy Bum with no scruples about making a quick buck (even stooping so low as to fleece his mother's retirement fund), Billy is a respectable police coroner who only goes along with his older brother's schemes because Lou keeps blackmailing him. Lou also treats Irene like crap and won't let her get a job, whereas Billy shows nothing but kindness toward his sister-in-law (later wife) and encourages her to get a career.
  • From what we hear of him, Mr. Neve has an ego and attitude quite similar to Lou, the two of them even yelling at each other in similar ways. The difference is that Neve has a steady job and is berating a deadbeat with a laundry list of excuses, whereas Lou can't hold down a job and treats everyone like crap without justification.
• Get-Rich-Quick Scheme: The scheme in question boils down to Lou faking his own murder to collect his life insurance.
• Gone Horribly Right: Lou does such a great job at making it look like he's been murdered that no one, even the cops and the D.A., believes his claims of who he is when he comes back "home" six months later... and that the only way he could know all of this is if he's the murderer.
• Happily Ever After: A rare example for this series, as everybody gets their just reward: Lou receives a satisfying Karmic Death, while Irene and Billy live the high life on his insurance policy.
• Hate Sink: LOU. He's one of the most horrific people ever to appear on this show. The episode continually hammers it in that you're supposed to hate him with every fiber of your being and dance for joy when he gets his just desserts. And trust us, you will.
• High-Voltage Death: For the third time in the show, a character is sentenced to death by electric chair.
• Horrible Judge of Character: Call it senility, dementia, or blatant stupidity, but Mother Paloma actively loathes Billy, the kindly son of hers who has a stable job, and dotes endlessly on Lou, the other son of hers who became an abusive deadbeat who was actively fleecing her retirement money.
• Humiliation Conga: Lou goes through a very well deserved one after returning from Rio. He finds out that his wife and brother got married, kept the insurance money, spruced up the house, and pushed him completely out of their lives. When he tries to get back at them by exposing their scam to the cops, they refuse to believe him and instead arrest him for his own murder. At the subsequent trial, Lou is verbally shat upon by nearly every witness (even his own mother unintentionally screws him over by mistaking the defense attorney for him and calling herself Eleanor Roosevelt), sentenced to death, and executed.
• Hypocrite: Lou, (who admitted to cheating on her at least once) denounces Irene for hooking up with Billy while he was away.
• Ironic Echo: Lou ends his phone call with Mr. Neve by yelling for the collector to blow him before hanging up. Lou's last words? "Blow me."
• I Want You to Meet an Old Friend of Mine: Michael J. Fox directed this episode for a series co-produced by Robert Zemeckis, and plays the prosecutor during the closing trial. Furthermore, Sergeant McClaine is played by James Tolkan (known for playing various Stricklands in the Back to the Future trilogy), and Fox's prosecutor questions him during the trial.
• Jerkass:
  • Lou, no question.
  • Mother Paloma is one as well, but only to anyone who isn't Lou. Must be where Lou got it from.
• Karmic Death: Early in the episode, Lou reminds Billy that he's the one who took the money from their mother's retirement account, and threatens to rat him out for it. When Billy says that the money was actually given to him, Lou retorts that he'll deny everything and adds that Billy's name is on all the withdrawal slips, giving Billy a motive for doing so for himself. In the end, Lou is convicted and executed for his own murder because Billy denied any knowledge of his involvement in his scheme, and ensured that there was no way to prove he handled the supposed murder weapons.
• Laser-Guided Karma: While Lou definitely gets what he deserves in the end, Mother Paloma, who always rebuked Irene and Billy while doting on him, gets her share of karma as well, being driven to insanity by the grief of Lou's death.
• Laughably Evil: Lou is an awful, awful person, but he comes across as greatly comedic in his delivery.
• Lazy Bum: As part of his atrocious character, Lou can't hold down a job to save his life. His job as a pizza delivery man is only the latest in a long line of jobs he's been canned from.
• Lighter and Softer: This is one of the more easy-going episodes of the series. With very little gore presented, light-hearted musical cues, and everyone being a pretty big ham, it come off as more of a thriller-comedy than a full-fledged horror episode.
• Love Triangle: Between Billy/Irene/Lou.
• Moment Killer:
  • While going over the story they've prepared, Billy and Irene are about to share a kiss, but Lou stumbles back into the living room cursing about his corpse make-up.
  • During the memorial service, when the others step out of the room, Billy and Irene start making out on Lou's coffin, but they have to give it up when Mother Paloma suddenly storms back in to see her dead son. This is a good thing, though, since the mechanism for sliding the coffin into a furnace was accidentally activated during the interim.
• Murder the Hypotenuse: Lou gets this via Billy and Irene getting revenge on him.
• No Celebrities Were Harmed: Mr. Neve, the insurance collector, sounds exactly like Edward G. Robinson, possibly as part of the episode's Lighter and Softer nature.
• No-Holds-Barred Beatdown: Since Lou can't fake unconsciousness on his own, he tells Irene to knock him out with the fireplace poker. To motivate her, he rattles off several horrible things he's done to her, including cheating on her with her best friend. This prompts Billy, who hates how his brother treats Irene, to snatch the poker out of her hands and whack Lou in the head until he's knocked out.
• No, You: During their brief conversation, Mr. Neve tells Lou to get a job and calls him a bum.
  Lou: Hey, you can't talk to me like that! This is Lou Paloma you're talkin' to!
  Mr. Neve: Hey, hey, hey! You can't talk to me like that!
• Obnoxious In-Laws: Mother Paloma, who has even less regard for Billy and Irene than Lou does.
• Oh, Crap!: Billy, when he thinks his beatdown of Lou actually resulted in a case of Accidental Murder.
• Parental Favoritism: For whatever inexplicable reason, Mother Paloma favors Lou, the asshole deadbeat who indirectly embezzles her retirement fund, and constantly berates Billy, the kind man who made a comfortable and respectable living.
• Police Are Useless: Sgt. McClaine and his men are mere pawns throughout the episode, never once considering that Lou might be telling the truth about his faked murder.
• Poverty Food: The opening scene briefly shows that the Palomas have a cupboard stocked with cans of tuna, indicating that it's all they can afford to eat with their finances and Lou's poor job performance record.
• Rage Breaking Point: As part of his scam, Lou needs to be knocked unconscious. He tries to get Irene to knock him out with a fire poker, but Irene is reluctant to try, until Lou eggs her on by saying he cheated on her with her best friend. Irene proceeds to wail on him with the poker for that, though her efforts don't knock him out. However, it turns out that Billy is also enraged by his older brother's treatment of Irene and gives Lou his own No-Holds-Barred Beatdown.
• "The Reason You Suck" Speech: As part of his closing argument, the prosecutor directly tears into Lou (disguised as Mr. Smith), calling him a pathetic and worthless bastard who's ruined the lives of everyone close to him.
• Related in the Adaptation: Billy and Lou are brothers in the episode. In the comic, the husband and undertaker weren't related.
• Right for the Wrong Reasons:
  • In her grief, Mother Paloma accuses Billy of killing Lou. He certainly did take part in his brother's scheme and hit him over the head with the fireplace poker. She also blames Irene for the supposed death, but only in the sense that Irene allegedly wasn't there to protect him.
  • Like everyone else, the prosecutor thinks that Lou is some disgusting lowlife murderer playing a sadistic game, but he's technically right when he accuses Lou of trying to weasel his way back into a married couple's lives for financial gain.
• Sanity Slippage: Lou's apparent death is shown to have driven Mother Paloma off the deep end, having her confuse the defense attorney for Lou and calling herself Eleanor Roosevelt.
• Shout-Out: Lou describes the months he spent waiting in Rio for Irene as "wasting away in Margaritaville".
• Sibling Triangle: Irene is married to Lou, but she falls in love with his affectionate brother Billy, who genuinely returns her feelings. They get together in the end after Lou's Karmic Death.
• Small Name, Big Ego: Lou thinks he's a big shot who makes all the decisions in his life, but he's really a worthless deadbeat who has no idea what other people are capable of.
• Small Role, Big Impact: The episode may very well not have happened if it wasn't for Mr. Neve yelling at Lou over the phone about his life insurance policy.
• Sympathetic Adulterer: Irene, who grows attracted to Lou's brother after he keeps beating her, insulting her, and admits to having sex with her best friend.
• Thicker Than Water: Lou invokes this to get Billy's cooperation, despite the fact that he only cares about himself.
• Threat Backfire: Lou threatens to give up Billy and Irene's roles in his plan if they don't give him his money. They don't even bother worrying about this threat, since they know the cops will never believe that Lou is who he says he is.
• Tropical Epilogue: Billy and Irene end the episode enjoying their new life in Rio, having given Lou what he deserved for all his abuse.
• Tuckerization: The episode opens with Lou having already been fired from Zemeckis Pizza, named after executive producer Robert Zemeckis.
• Two-Timing with the Bestie: To further add to Lou's record of scumbaggery, he has apparently slept with Irene's best friend Betty LaRue in the past, which he uses to fuel Irene's rage in order to get her to knock him out for the investigation.
• The Unfavorite: As if Mother Paloma inexplicably favoring the abusive Lou isn't bad enough, she's openly disdainful of Billy, the child who actually did something with his life. This was hinted at early on, but it's made clear later at Lou's memorial service:
  Mother Palmoa: I wanna be with my son!
  Billy: Ma, I'm your son, too.
  Mother Paloma: Don't rub it in!
• Unwitting Pawn: Sergeant McClaine and the other police officers are this to Lou's scam. However, Lou finds out too late that he's become a pawn himself to Billy and Irene.
• Villainous Breakdown: When found guilty for his own murder, Lou screams in a rage as the bailiffs snap on the cuffs. However, on his execution day, Lou is more defeated in his final words.
• Wife-Basher Basher: Billy absolutely hates the way his brother treats Irene, and when given the chance, he hits Lou over the head with a fire poker again and again out of revenge for what he did to the lady.
• With Friends Like These...: Not only does Lou admit that he's cheated on Irene, but he did so with her best friend.
• World of Ham: Thanks to the Lighter and Softer nature of the episode, pretty much every character is a huge ham. The main examples would be Lou, Mr. Neve, and the jury forewoman, who furiously and repeatedly pronounces Lou's guilty verdict loud enough for the angels to hear it.
• Wrong Genre Savvy: Invoked. Billy and Irene out-gambit Lou by denying his claims and taking advantage of how his prints and blood are on all the evidence. As such, the authorities believe him to be a sadistic and cold-hearted murderer trying to shamelessly score money out of the grieving relatives of his victim, instead of a guy whose relatives helped him pull off an elaborate insurance fraud scheme.
• Xanatos Gambit: Billy and Irene convince Lou that Irene leaving the country with the insurance policy so soon after the memorial service would look too suspicious, so Lou leaves for Rio on his own, gets plastic surgery, and spends months waiting for her. In the meantime, Billy and Irene hook up, get married, and keep the money for themselves. They fully expect Lou to come back to the States and make a scene so he'll incriminate himself (and only himself), which comes to pass, with no one believing him when he tries to explain what happened and him getting electrocuted as a result, but they'd also win if he just stayed away.
• You Have to Believe Me!: Nobody believes Lou's claims about him not being an imposter when he returns from Rio.
• Your Television Hates You: Early in the episode, Lou is seen watching an advertisement about how to make insurance collectors leave you alone, which prompts him to turn the set off after making the Italian "flick-the-chin" gesture to it.

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Crypt Keeper: (stamps "CANCELLED" on an insurance form) Poor Lou. I bet he wished now that he'd gone for the term life. Even a life term would have been an improvement. Although you've got to admit, he's never looked so juiced about his future! (cackles) So what do you say? (holds up another insurance form) Can I interest you in a policy? The benefits are great, but the scream-iums will kill ya! (cackles)