Recap: SON OF ZORN brings us to The Battle of Thanksgiving

Season 1, episode 7 : “The Battle of Thanksgiving”
Written by Jon Kern
Directed by Payman Benz

[All photos courtesy Fox Broadcasting Co.]

We start this episode with Craig (Tim Meadows), Alan (Johnny Pemberton), Edie (Cheryl Hines) and Zorn (voiced by Jason Sudeikis) about to take part in a Turkey Trot. Zorn wants to come over for Thanksgiving, but Edie tells him not to come, because her mother, Roberta (Jenny O’Hara) is coming and she doesn’t like Zorn very much.

So, Zorn spends the day alone at work…or he thinks he’s alone. It turns out Linda (Artemis Pebdani) is at the office as well. She doesn’t like the holiday, having had a pet turkey as a kid. They talk and Zorn decides to try to be on his best behavior and go to Edie’s for Thanksgiving.

Craig and Edie prepare Thanksgiving dinner; Edie wants to show her mother how great her life is now. Roberta arrives and after some passive aggressive comments about how Zorn ruined Edie’s life, they all sit down for dinner…when there’s a knock at the door. Zorn has come for dinner as well.

Edie is upset, even though Zorn has arrived with a nice jacket and turtleneck on and has a pie for the dinner. Even though she wants him to go, Craig convinces Edie that Zorn should stay.

The meal starts and Zorn does well putting up with Roberta’s digs at Zorn and Zypherian culture (or lack thereof). Zorn even tries to put on pants…Craig pants…that he’s wearing. Just to show her that he’s trying to change.  Craig even takes Zorn aside and tries to give him pointers on how to handle Roberta’s passive aggressiveness.

The tips are working, until Roberta decides to show Zorn a documentary about Zypheria and its “true hero” Vulturzor. This sends Zorn into a rage. Roberta retreats to her/Alan’s room.

Zorn goes to apologize and brings her a piece of snorkleberry pie. She takes it has a bite and promptly dies. Turns out Zorn got the berries mixed up. Oops.

Zorn calls up his Zypherian doctor, Klorpnis (voiced by Nick Offerman) for a remedy. Luckily there is one, so he sends Alan for the ingredients. Alan brings Craig in on this little secret and they get to work on bringing Roberta back to life; all it takes is a kiss. A rather sensual kiss. Craig volunteers, and Roberta is alive again…unfortunately, Edie finds them out in the middle of the kiss.

Zorn and Edie argue and Zorn leaves.

Roberta, having recovered, agrees to give Alan the money for the music program on one condition. He never sees his father again.

This is a bridge t0o far for Edie, who confronts her mother about her behavior and Roberta admits to purposely pushing Zorn’s buttons. Edie decides that her mother is just t0o poisonous to her life and Roberta promptly packs her bags and leaves.

Edie, Craig, and Alan pack the dinner up and go to Zorn’s place for dinner. “I should have killed your mother years ago,” Zorn says.

Analysis:

Well, I think it’s doubtful we’ll see Edie’s mother again. But Zorn is right, he should have killed her years ago. She was just a hateful shrew. If my mother had acted like that towards someone I loved I would have probably cut her out, too. The actress who plays Roberta, Jenny O’Hara, seems to play similar characters on other shows. Of course, the shrewish mother-in-law is a trope that’s as old as TV.

Zorn tries his best to try to win her over, even Craig gives him pointers. But in the end, she’s irredeemable. She just can’t get beyond her prejudice against Zorn.

Craig is the patron saint of letting stuff just roll off your back. Any abuse he receives, he just lets it go. We could all learn a lesson from Craig. That lesson would be not to let stuff go until you’re a pushover. Edie was willing to give her mother a wide berth and let her hatred of Zorn go. Until she tried to clamp down on Alan’s dreams by giving him the old “you’ll get what you want, but only if you do things my way” thing. That was just plain nasty and toxic.

Going back to the beginning of the episode, I like that fact that Zorn had safety pinned his race number into his skin (if you looked carefully you can see the blood on the number. I guess for him that little pin prick is nothing. It was very nicely done, the animation team deserves a pat on the back for that detail.

An interesting note, the narrator for the documentary about Zypheria in this episode was Sarah Koenig from This American Life and the hit podcast Serial. They should have her show up in an episode fully one day. It would make an interesting tale having her badger Zorn about his perceived persecution of Vulturzor. I would love to see this happen.

Well, we have some good news on the ratings front, it rebounded for this episode to the same level it was at for episode 3. However this might be hurt by another hiatus, this one for two weeks due to the Thanksgiving holiday. Ironic, isn’t it?

 

Son of Zorn airs Sunday at 8:30/7:30 Central on Fox. It can also be found on Amazon Prime Instant Video, Hulu and Fox.com. For more information, visit the official website.