God, The Devil and Bob 1.7 - Bob Gets Committed

Plot: Bob is rescued from a night spent taking care of measles-ridden Andy by Donna, so that he can resume his planned trip to the strip club with Mike and Barry. But God is waiting in the parking lot with an assignment. The Lord giveth, and the Lord taketh away.

God asks Bob to deface a billboard by writing "SMILE" on it. The highway patrolman is surprisingly understanding, until the Devil uses a homunculus to make Bob assault the cop. Bob's arguing in the back of the patrol car with "the Devil" gets him a trip to Grassy Knoll Asylum. While Bob tries to devise an escape with the help of the other patients, the Devil assumes Bob's identity. Two things go wrong for the King of All the is Evil: One, Donna is entirely resistant to his attempts to charm, command, plead her into sex. Two, the Devil is apparently not immune to measles. And during the course of Donna caring for "Bob", the Devil falls for her.

How's Bob going to get the Devil out of his bed? Maybe with a little help from the musical library of Tony Orlando.

Quote of the Episode: Smeck - 'This is so cool. Why don't we do this more often?' Devil - 'Because it's cheap, Smeck. We're better than this.'

Smeck Smacks: 1 (18 overall).

Other: Smeck likes Stratego, which I remember seeing ads for in '90s Marvel comics, but have never played. The ads featured would-be alien invaders who think it is the key to Earth's defenses. The alien infiltrator was so proud he'd brought it back to his bosses. Boy, will his face be red when it turns out Earth's defense strategy is, "argue among ourselves, maybe throws some nukes at the problem."

One of the patients, named Fred, introduces himself to Bob while dressed up as a doctor. The orderly arrives swiftly to take back the clipboard and lab coat. And a fish-shaped Jell-O mold. I'm not clear on why Fred had that, but I'm also not clear on why they made him give it up. Maybe the thought of making Jell-O brings him joy. Let Fred have his joy!

God brought the Devil a ficus while he was sick, which ended up with the Devil grumbling about wanting a plumeria. He did take it with him back to Hell. I can't imagine it'll do well in that dry climate.

Andy saw through the Devil's disguise immediately, although he believed Megan when she said Dad was a pod person, so he wasn't quite in target. Splashing Bob with the bucket of water mixed with chemicals was a good try, though.

The Devil wound up being right that God making Bob deface that billboard was just the opening move in a larger plan. The balloon Bob stole had a smiley face on it, and it briefly lands right on top of the billboard. Which makes people stop and notice and be happy. I'm confused by this world where cars stopping on the freeway to gawk at something on the side of the road doesn't prompt angry honking and profanity from the vehicles behind them.

The patients end up taking the balloon back to the hospital, which is good, I guess? The show doesn't pretend like they just magically got over their troubles because Bob let them come with him. Or that they aren't aware of the fact they have a condition? I'm not sure what Bernie's was, although he understood immediately when said the Devil was after his family.

It was nice that Bob, having returned home and driven the Devil out, immediately got suspicious when Donna mentioned he'd been in bed a lot recently. 'Cause then he started trying to figure out if she and "Bob" got up to anything, and Donna got to make a few cutting remarks in the direction of his sexual prowess and intelligence. I'm sure she'd been consciously holding back while he was under the weather.