Review: American Dad “Death by Dinner Party”

Looks like the Colonel is CHICKEN!

OVERVIEW (SPOILERS)

The news is abuzz with news of another series of murders by the “Dinner Party Killer”, a serial killer who only kills people at dinner parties. All of this is happening right at the time Francine is putting together her OWN dinner party! WHAT ARE THE ODDS? Though her bigger concern is with Roger and his pranks, even though it should be Klaus destroying the kitchen. Soon everyone arrives, including fan-favorite and break out character, Colonel Withersby. I know people are gonna want me to give some background info on the guy, but it’s so lengthy I just don’t have time to get into it. Just go back and watch the whole series, because he’s got a lot of great episodes, especially in Season 9.

Suddenly, the lights go out, and Jeff has vanished. Yep, Roger’s starting his prank. Unfortunately, no one’s really into it…until the lights go off again and recurring neighbor character Tuttle is also gone and Roger had nothing to do with it. Of course, no one believes that, and so Roger is locked in the basement. Things should be back to party mode now, but someone else goes down into the basement to beat Roger senselessly with a pipe. He awakens to find everyone standing over him except Greg, who now is also missing. This must mean the killer is in the house, and so they have to get out. Or they would if there wasn’t an awful storm going on (hey, maybe they’ll crossover with Family Guy again!). So they’re trapped, unable to get help, and the killer might be among them. But it definitely isn’t the Colonel.

The group splits up, with everyone on edge. They soon stumble upon Tuttle’s body, and an eyeglass from a monocle and the only person they knew who wears one is the Colonel, who’s currently looking menacingly at Steve. They go to confront him, but find a dead boy who Klaus asked to bring gyros. The Colonel is innocent (obviously), and debunks the other monocle glass as belonging to someone else. They do find some lipstick, though, leading to suspecting Greg of all people, who’s returned. This would make sense if he wasn’t stabbed immediately after being accused and crushed by the chandelier before he could say who killed him.

The remaining partygoers panic, not helped by the power going out yet again and Bullock being the next to die. Roger finds a flashlight but keeps stumbling on more and more victims until he’s the only one left. Him and…The Colonel. Roger goes to stab him in anger…

…but the lights turn back on, revealing it all to be a revenge prank against Roger. He responds to this well, and by that I mean he threatens to retaliate much harder than they did on him. Though that does leave the question of who the actual murderer is…and he’s an actual guy who’s on his way. Sleep tight, everybody!

OUR TAKE

Well, not the first time a Seth MacFarlane show has used a murder mystery setting. Family Guy did this about eight years earlier with its hour-long “And Then There Were Fewer”, and used it as a way to permanently kill off long recurring characters who had outlived their usefulness (unless they were voiced by James Woods), like Diane Simmons and Muriel Goldman. So, I didn’t think it would be odd for this episode to do the same with characters like Tuttle, who’d weirdly gotten a resurgence in appearances but really didn’t serve many purposes outside of just being “the nice neighbor.” Greg also seemed like someone who could reasonably be on the chopping block since Terry left him a season or two ago, though Bullock would’ve been quite the risk. Being a well documented Star Trek fan, I have almost no doubt that MacFarlane is going to be keeping Patrick Stewart employed as long as one of them is alive, just as he did with Adam West and Carrie Fisher. However, the tension completely deflated once main cast members started seemingly dying, though that might just be my fault for getting hyped about an American Dad episode.

Also, I guess this counts as their April Fool’s Day episode since it’s about pranks and is the last one they’d be able to air before then. Maybe next week is going to be Easter-related? Either way, happy Spring Break!