I’m kind of a Grinch when it comes to Halloween. Sure, I like the candy, and little kids in cute little costumes are adorable but the whole getting dressed up thing is too much of a hassle for me. While I can’t relate to Claire's love of all things scary, I can understand her wanting one holiday and the support of her family.
My own disinterest in Halloween doesn’t come with one major bad memory. I didn’t get my hunchback caught on something and pee my pants as Cameron apparently did. I’ll just chalk it up to a series of bad costume choices. Whether I wore a costume that kept me too warm or wasn’t warm enough and required me to wear my coat over it, or it was hard to move in or the wig itched, I always ended up uncomfortable and annoyed by the end of the night. The candy was always worth the effort but now I’m less inclined to bother getting dressed up.
Claire’s the opposite of me. She loves Halloween and wants everyone to love it with her. But Cam was reminiscing about his traumatic Quasimodo experience, Gloria was talking weird (we’ll get to that in a little bit), Haley was dressed up like a sexy Mother Theresa and Phil was stressing out about his marriage after learning that the neighbor’s wife left him without warning.
Claire pointed out that she was willing to make adjustments to her level of participation, enthusiasm and tradition for the rest of them when it came to their holiday customs, which prompted everyone to suck it up and help her enjoy the holiday.
“There are exactly three people in costumes here. A tool, a douche and me.”
Justin Kirk was back on the show tonight! (Insert (R)Andy Botwin/Newman love!).
Mitch had some issues at work when he was falsely informed that everyone dressed up for Halloween at the office. The two guys (We’ll call them Douche and Tool) that tipped him off weren’t messing with his head. They really did get dressed up. They just happened to be the only two people there who did dress up every year and everyone, including the big bossman looked down on them for it.
Mitch, who wore a muscled Spiderman costume to work ended up putting a suit on over the costume before anyone saw. This resulted in him being packed into his suit and making funny noises when he moved around. In the end, he dropped his suit in the toilet, tried to sneak out of the office wearing the Spiderman costume and accidentally set off a car alarm that drew everyone’s attention. Douche and Tool looked impressed. Charlie? Not so much.
As an aside, the whole bulky look thing and the comments he received reminded me of the time George-Michael (in Arrested Development, not the singer) kept on the muscle costume because Maeby said he had a nice body when she saw him in it. Mitch might have appreciated the flattering comments to his faux-physique if he wasn’t so anxious about getting the costume off.
Carpool Tunnel Syndrome
For Gloria’s portion of the episode, Jay teased her about how she said things. It wasn’t just her accent, but more the cultural gap as she often mis-hears and mis-repeats common words and phrases. For example, she thinks “Blessing in disguise” is “Blessing in the skies.” She tries to argue with Jay that her issue isn’t so bad but is barely able to defend herself when Jay opens a box of the “baby cheeses” Gloria ordered from him and finds a baby Jesus instead. In that case, it was the accent.
Gloria went over the top in attempting to speak English like an American. Her forced American accent reminded me of Buffy the Vampire Slayer when Spike attempted to hide who he was by covering up his British accent. (“I’m just here with Xanderrrrr.”)
Reality check
I loved Phil’s reaction to finding out his neighbor was getting a divorce and the insecurity that followed. This is often the case when we hear that something bad happened. Hearing that someone’s spouse left them “out of nowhere” is enough to cause anyone to do a status-check on their own relationship. Though in the case of the neighbor, “out of nowhere” probably wasn’t the case. Claire didn’t seem surprised that the relationship ended. Deep down I bet the neighbor wasn’t either. But Phil’s concern was a fair response and it’s realistic issues like these, which are often laced with humor that make me love Modern Family.
Other notable quotes…
“If Claire doesn’t get her Halloween, she turns into a real rhymes-with-bruja.” – Phil
“Yesterday’s lazy cures today’s crazy.” Cameron (when Mitch remembers he left the suits he picked up from the dry cleaner in the trunk of the car)
“Trust me. I am sparing you an entire day of guys asking if you have a rough tongue.” – Claire (encouraging Haley to change out of her sexy-cat costume before going to school)
“Who wants to live in a world where dogs eat each other? Doggy dog world is a beautiful world full of little puppies.” – Gloria, deciding her way of saying it is better anyway.
"I wet my pants! I wet my pants!" Cam, crying with his head on a platter.
Random Note
Not sure what was creepier; How Phil looked in his costume or his voice with that microphone thing he was using.
