Recap / The Venture Bros S 5 E 6 Mommas Boys

One night at the Venture Compound, Hank and Dermott are preparing to sneak out to perform a gig at a local bar. An angsty Dean is talking to a girl (apparently) on the phone, to whom he professes his love. Doctor Venture is also expecting a call from his friend “Ted”, who is actually the Teddy Ruxpin expy Teddy Talk-to-Me that the boys used for his fake interrogation in Every Which Way but Zeus. As it turns out, Hank has been maintaining the illusion of Ted as a prank, and he and Dermott set up another such call to distract Doc while they go out. Since Doc is in the habit of talking “at” people instead of “to” them, he spends the next several hours lecturing “Ted” about the latter’s problems with “Grumpy Bandersnatch” in “Bygolly Gulch”.

A week later, Doc is going through “doll withdrawal”, and becomes concerned for Ted’s safety. He searches the compound for bugs and discovers the Teddy Talk-to-Me doll in Hank’s room with the tape inside. Instead of recognising it for what it is, however, he mistakes it for a bug planted by Grumpy Bandersnatch and puts the compound on lockdown while he and Sgt. Hatred plan their next move.

Unwilling to come clean about their deception, Hank and Dermott decide the only way to fix the problem is to find a real “Ted”. Gary (who is still camping out on the Venture Compound), advises them that the man who voiced Teddy Talk-to-Me is now a resident at Dunwich Asylum, a mental institution run by the Guild of Calamitous Intent for genuinely unstable villains. In order to infiltrate the asylum, Hank, Dermott, Gary and H.E.L.P.eR. stage a bank-robbery, posing as insane would-be criminals. Hank and Gary are taken to Dunwich as planned, but H.E.L.P.eR. and Dermott are mistaken for mere sidekicks (who do not have full Guild rights) and are taken to the local police station.

Dean, meanwhile, arranges a meeting with his “mystery girl”, who turns out to be none other than Myra Brandish, also held at Dunwich Asylum, with whom Dean is pursuing a maternal relationship. The visit goes awry, however, when it is revealed that Myra has brainwashed one of the guards, who helps her to kidnap Dean and smuggle them both back into the asylum.

Doc and Hatred set out to rescue Ted. Unable to find “Bygolly Gulch” on a map, Hatred uses his vPhone (yet another Apple product expy developed by Jonas Jr.) for directions. Since Bygolly Gulch doesn’t actually exist, however, the vPhone instead leads them to Bygone Gulch (conveniently located right beneath Dunwich), where Hatred accidentally drives their jeep off a cliff edge and into the gulch.

Within the asylum, the residents are preparing for Mothers’ Day. Hank and Gary encounter the disfigured “Teddy”, but before they can explain their situation, the other residents suddenly begin rioting. Myra enters the room on a litter, having brainwashed the rest of the residents into believing she is their mother as well, with Dean bound and gagged before her. She announces her intent to (somehow) have Dean returned to her womb so she can “finally” give birth to him. Her choice of words causes Hank to realise and declare that she isn’t their real mother after all. His declaration breaks Myra’s hold over the other inmates, who begin rioting again in earnest. In the ensuing chaos, Hank, Dean, and Gary escape the asylum before Guild reinforcements arrive.

Back at the police station, Dermott and H.E.L.P.eR. are permitted a phone call. H.E.L.P.eR. (whom Dermott can now, inexplicably, understand) suggest he summon Doctor Orpheus, who appears from thin air, puts the guard to sleep, erases Dermott’s arrest record, and calls a taxi to bring them home. On the way, Orpheus explains that he had felt the summons of a “Venture boy”, which clues Dermott in on his father’s identity.

Down in the gulch, Doc and Hatred exchange death confessions. Doc reveals to Hatred that Myra is indeed not the boys’ mother (though he had quietly encouraged her delusion), and that Dermott is his bastard son. Hatred is about to reveal the truth about “Ted”, when the jeep suddenly begins to slide further down the gulch. Fortunately for Doc, a timely rescue arrives in the form of “Ted”, who has traded Myra’s brainwashing for the delusion that he actually is Teddy Talk-to-Me. The two exchange pleasantries, and Ted runs off into the night.

In the stinger, Doc and the boys are back in the kitchen the next morning, recounting their respective adventures. Doc apologises to the boys about Myra, explaining that he needed a caretaker for them as children, before reminiscing about the saucier side of their relationship. Dermott takes this as a cue to leave, but not before giving Doc a parting “See you later… Dad!”

Tropes

• Break Out the Museum Piece: Due to his confusing 'villain' name of "Flying Sidekick", the police take an old-timey "ball and chain" out of their museum display to put on Dermott while in custody as they believe he can fly.
• Continuity Nod:
  • Doc is still "talking" with Ted from Any Which Way But Zeus.
  • Hank mentions "'70s-era David Bowie punching out a man with no limbs on his front yard", referencing The Revenge Society.
• Early-Bird Cameo: One of the villains at Dunwich is a prototype for Wide Whale, who gets introduced the following season.
• Giving Up on Logic: Dermott questions how Rusty could really believe their whole "Teddy" prank. Hank mentions some of the outlandish things that have actually happened, and Dermott quickly goes along with it.
• Meaningful Name: Hank chose his supervillain alias for maximum Hank-ness.
  Hank: I'm Enrico Matassa, Latin playboy and insane egomaniac! My name means Hank Hank! And I'm also using a hank of yarn as a weapon! Also, this is a huge hankie!
• Properly Paranoid: Discussed by Hank and Dermott when Dermott questions how Rusty could believe that his friend "Teddy," which is actually just a talking teddy bear the boys were using to play a prank on him, is in danger. Hank mentions some of the outlandish things that have actually happened in the form of Continuity Nods (i.e, '70s-era David Bowie punching out a man with no limbs on his front yard) and Noodle Incidents, which make the Teddy situation seem perfectly reasonable by comparison.
• The Reveal:
  • Dermot is finally clued in on being Dr. Venture’s son by Dr. Orpheus.
    Dermot: See you later. Dad.
  • Myra isn't Hank and Dean's mother.
• Shaped Like Itself: While robbing the bank posed as Guild villains, H.E.L.P.eR is introduced as:
  Gary: "And that’s our crime robot that we named Crime Robot!"
• Shout-Out:
  • "Dunwitch Asylum" is a reference to HP Lovecraft's The Dunwich Horror as well as the Arkham Asylum from the Batman franchise, which itself is named after a town used in several of Lovecraft's stories.
  • Some of the inmates resemble Batman villains such as Two-Face and The Clock King.
  • When instigating a riot in order to save Dean, Gary paraphrases "Mother" and quotes "The Trial" from The Wall.
  • The scene with the Native American inmate throwing a water fountain through a window is a reference to One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest.
  • When H.E.L.P.eR tells Dermott to try psychically calling Dr. Orpheus, Dermott compares him to Dr. Bombay.
  • Myra escapes containment while Dean is visiting Dunwich by pretending to "eat the face off" a guard and then wearing his uniform. This is how Hannibal Lector escapes prison in The Silence of the Lambs.
  • Myra calls Dean her "collectable Deanie baby", referring to the (once) popular line of plush toys, Beanie Babies.