Review: Bless the Harts “Tiny Pies”

Overview:

The Hart’s have new neighbours moving in all the way from New York City. In an attempt to impress the city folk, Jenny and Betty pretend to bake them a basket of hand pies. But, unfortunately, when word about their pies reaches the city, the women end up way over their head.

Meanwhile, Wayne is worried about his grandma losing her job when the bar she works at is about to close. Thankfully, he and Trevor have hatched up a plan to raise enough money to save the establishment. But, if they plan to win a state-wide Cornhole tournament, they will have to learn how to handle their bags.

Our Take:

The penultimate episode for Bless the Harts gives us a glimpse of what a third season may have looked like. Fox typically likes to order a few extra episodes from their animated programs each year and store a couple in the vault until the following season.  The Simpsons have done this for several years. But with Bless the Harts ending after this run, we get to see these final few episodes intended for future years.  

Surprisingly, this was one of the more enjoyable episodes of the season and series. Instead of some cliché family drama, this plot decided to add some fun and unique elements.  

Bringing in a couple of characters from New York City was an intelligent choice for the series, a move that could have better served the show from the beginning. It gave the comedy a chance to commentate on Southern stereotypes in a way that we all expected Bless the Harts to be. It is almost a shame that we don’t get to see more of this.

Additionally, the series rarely figures out a way to use golden-hearted Wayne in a substantial manner. Instead of him going through another moral dilemma, this episode featured his good soul doing whatever he could to help his grandmother. The manoeuvre opened the doors for Wayne’s character to have more fun throughout the episode, which paid off with many cornhole innuendos and an awesome montage.

Unfortunately, while this episode is a step up from many of the season’s plots, it is still not enough to make us miss the show in any way. The A-plot/B-plot formula has become redundant in today’s television which has been leaning towards larger ongoing storylines for some time. Further, if a show cannot find a way to make these duelling plots converge by the end of an episode, the entire thing can feel like a mash-up of ideas.

In all honesty, with Bless the Harts shutting down entirely in a couple of short weeks, there is hardly much point in catching up on these episodes anymore. However, it is interesting to see the directions that the show was headed towards. Some of it is strong, like narrowing down the humour. While some things were only about to get messier, like the saturation of new characters being introduced. But this episode gave us a good glimpse at what the show could accomplish if well-balanced.