Review: Bob’s Burgers “Tweentrepeneurs”

Karl Marx would be proud.

Overview (Spoilers!)

Tina, Gene, and Louise prepare for their new business class. Bob remembers the promise he made when he started the restaurant: that he would never compromise on quality. In class, the kids each pitch a product, and Jimmy Jr.’s is selected—a sanded piece of wood with googly eyes called a “Wood Chuck.” Tammy determines that she, Jocelyn, Jimmy Jr., and Zeke will work in sales while the Belchers and Rudy create the Wood Chucks.

The production team members work their butts off, and the others sell the Wood Chucks effortlessly. The sales team uses the proceeds to buy a soda machine that they don’t allow the Belchers and Rudy to use. They wall off the space in the classroom, giving each salesperson an office and forcing the Belchers and Rudy to share a cramped corner. Tina delivers their demands to the sales kids—Rudy wants a dust mask so that the sawdust won’t exacerbate his asthma—but Tammy bribes Tina with her own office.

Tina realizes that they’re buying snacks faster than they can sell Wood Chucks. Tammy suggests that the production team create the Chucks in 5 minutes each rather than 20. Gene, Louise, and Rudy “quarter-ass” their work, creating splintery Wood Chucks with unpleasant smiles.

When conditions don’t improve, Gene, Louise, and Rudy quit. Tina comes up with her own product, a tiny, un-sanded version of Wood Chucks. She tries to get googly eyes for half price, but Edith only agrees if she’ll buy $100 worth. When the new product doesn’t sell, Tina panics about her debt and the possibility of failing the class. She tries to sell the company to Teddy, but Teddy trusts her because he trusts Bob’s Burgers. Tina realizes that she let her family down and comes up with the idea of just selling googly eyes. The kids break even and get a B-.

In the B plot, the Belchers deal with a dine-and-dasher who repeatedly eats a burger and manages to leave with a free meal. Finally, the dasher comes back and pays for all the meals he stole, confessing that he just loves their food. The Belchers agree to serve him if he eats with his hands and feet tied, with Tina feeding him the burger.

Our Take

On this week’s Bob’s Burgers, the Belcher kids lead a proletariat revolution. I jest, but in all honesty, this episode does a great job of explaining the basics of Marxist theory in a funny way. So far, season 9 is killing it when it comes to off-the-wall original storylines I haven’t seen before in animation.

Some comedic highlights: Tina’s “business casual barrette.” Louise pitching a new product that’s a literal knife. Teddy’s sketch of the perp, which just consists of eyes and a nose. The phrase “entre-manure.” Linda wondering if Tina will do their taxes. The lights turning out due to the kids’ failure to bring in funds (turns out it was just the janitor flipping the light switch). Gene pasting googly eyes on his nipples so that he can say “my eyes are down here.” Tina telling the dasher “I’ll be your feeder today. Would you like me to pretend your food is some kind of airplane or train?” to which he responds, “Train, please.” Honestly, the whole last scene is incredible. The way the dasher just accepts all the insanity around him is hilarious. I also appreciate that the burger of the day—the “Cops and Rabe-ers” burger, topped with broccoli rabe—fits the episode’s B plot so well.

Occasionally, “Tweentrepeneurs” evokes clichés that seem out-of-place in such an original storyline. Mr. Frond tells Tina that, if their company goes bankrupt, she’ll fail the class and gets “terrible at business” written on her permanent record, but it’s okay because she merely asked a hypothetical question. While this joke has been done in lots of comedy shows, it’s really impossible for me to believe Frond really mistook her terrified question for a hypothetical. And Rudy’s frenzied screeches that “everything looks like a Wood Chuck” to him now feels unnecessary and too literal. The ending, too is sort of predictable: it’s very obvious that Bob’s promise about quality would come back to haunt Tina, that the kids would “tear down these walls” and declare equality for themselves. But these are small nitpicks in an otherwise excellently executed episode.

So far, season 9 seems to steer away from plots involving Bob, Linda, and the restaurant (for three episodes, the two of them have only featured in minor B plots) in favor of stories about the kids and their friends. While I do think the show is at its best when focusing on the younger Belchers, Bob’s Burgers is starting to feel like a kids’ program about school rather than an adult sitcom about a burger restaurant. Hopefully, we get to see more of Bob and Linda in the future, if only for variety’s sake. The dasher plotline is a refreshing break from animal-focused stories, and though it’s a little predictable—and the dasher’s third attempt at conning the Belchers still confuses me—it’s a cute, funny idea. When the guy kept dashing, I saw it a mile away, but I certainly couldn’t foresee that ending.

This episode made me laugh a whole host of times, so I can’t really complain. And who knows—maybe it’ll inspire a whole new generation of socially-conscious businesspeople.