Review: Bob’s Burgers “A Fish Called Tina”

Overview(Spoilers Below):

Tina’s big day has arrived. 

Finally, she will play the role of a mentor when the eighth graders join the fourth graders for some bonding at school.  Always ambitious, Tina takes the responsibility seriously. Though her young mentee finds her overbearing and makes a request not to be paired with Tina any longer.  After getting some advice from her own former mentor, Tina goes all-in. Which backfires as expected, though she does learn how she has been a great mentor all along.

Meanwhile, a new gym, The Pumpin’ Patch, has moved in next door to the restaurant.  Bob and Linda decide that it’s time for them to start sculpting their bodies. After their first big workout, they wake up the next morning feeling the burn and regretting their choices.  Unfortunately, the contract they agreed to is binding, and it’ll take extreme measures to get out of.

Our Take:

Bob’s Burgers is riding high right now.  There is a full-length movie coming out later this year that is backed and promoted by Disney money.  And, the latest episode, “Drumforgiven” received the most US views the show has had in several years. As the show enters the latter half of its tenth season things are looking bright.  Each new episode continues to prove what makes this series so valuable. Especially with lines such as, “If God wanted us to listen to audiobooks, he wouldn’t have given us TV”. The intelligent humour is as strong as ever, and the characters continue to get stranger.

Only Tina could take a school project as simple as spending time with the littler kids so seriously. 

But, at the same time, of course, she would.  Her passion for mentorship gets some background with some flashbacks to her own fourth-grade mentor, Madison.  And, to be fair, the girl did look out for her. Tina just loves to take things to another level, though, and she has to learn a lesson about her overbearing nature.

Thankfully, Tina has her siblings, and they have her.  The Belcher kids are like none other seen on television.  Not just for their quirky characters, but the bond that they share.  Where most siblings on TV are divided by some rivalry, these kids always have each other’s backs.  We have seen them go through countless adventures. Yet still, when episodes end on touching notes of sibling love like this one does, it reaches the heart.

Another thing that makes Bob’s Burgers a great show is that the B-plot always manages to hold up to whatever is going on.  This time around, the new gym, The Pumpin’ Patch, inspires Bob and Linda to get in shape.  And, as most of us have learned, there is a lot of suffering involved in that. The couple plays the role of how we all feel about working out and gym memberships. Maybe they even taught us a lesson on how to get out of it entirely.  Still, it would have been great to see Bob get ripped.

Overall, Bob’s Burgers always manages to maintain a high calibre of humour.  As the years pass the show only seems to get tighter and better. This was a basic episode within the series’ own formula, yet it continues to improve in small ways.  The second half of season ten should still have some gems in store for us, but even simplified episodes like this one make the show worth watching.