1.02: Top Banana

The episode kicks off with a news report from our favorite AD news anchor about the Bluth banana stand burning down. Cut to George Sr.’s new home at the Orange County prison, evidently a week before the fire. George is practically making out with an ice cream sandwich while assuring a worried Michael that “there’s always money in the banana stand”. He tries to get Michael in on the ice cream action, but Michael’s not having it. He wants to know if George is hiding travel records from him, but his father is more interested in introducing Michael to his roommate T-Bone (“he’s a flamer”), to whom Michael is supposed to give a job at the Bluth Company. Michael’s not happy about this.

George Michael is having trouble dealing with his cousin as his new roommate since he pretty much fell in love with her after she kissed him, so he asks Michael to give him more hours at the banana stand. Michael is impressed, and promotes him to manager. He goes into the freezer only to find a paper bag with a sign saying “DEAD DOVE DO NOT EAT”. Upon looking into the bag, he looks uncomfortable, but admits, “Well, I don’t know what I expected.” Heeheehee.

Lindsay and Tobias are lounging around, and Michael scolds them for not even shopping, since all that’s in the freezer is a dead dove. “You didn’t eat that, did you?” GOB asks from the couch behind him. Tobias tries to gain sympathy for his tough actor’s life, but Lindsay points out that he’s never actually been on an audition, prompting him to channel Steve Martin (“Excuuuuuuse me!”) and run out of the room.

Michael tells Lindsay she’s setting a bad example for Maeby, who turns out to be chilling on the floor behind the couch. “Is there a carbon monoxide leak in this house?” Michael asks. So he sends Maeby to work with George Michael, much to his son’s dismay, telling him to “Stay on top of her, buddy. Do not be afraid to ride her. Hard.”

At the banana stand, Maeby eats melted chocolate off her hand, then to get money for skeeball cheats the register by throwing out a banana for every dollar she takes. George Michael, as usual, is nervous.

Michael visits Lucille, who hilariously is on the phone saying “Then why don’t you just MARRY an ice cream sandwich?!” She lies to Michael that she was talking to GOB, then interrupts him with “I don’t know where they are” before he can even tell her he’s looking for the flight records. She says George Sr. is in charge of where the flight records are kept and “all that”, and they’re probably in a storage unit somewhere, but she doesn’t remember where it is.

More pressingly, she’s worried about GOB, since Michael isn’t including him in the business at all. She thinks Michael should give him a job to “make him feel special”.

Michael: But he’s not special, mother.

Lucille: No. *pause* But he loves you…

I love this family.

The next day while out and about, Tobias picks up a copy of “Actor Pull”, which, when we see the other copies next to it, turns out to be “Tractor Pull”. Michael comes across him at the moment of realization, and Tobias is about to spiral into self-hatred before Michael points out an ad for Open Auditions right behind him, so Tobias runs off to “call them again”. Michael sees a flyer for a “Pre-Christmas Fur Sale” and gets an idea.

He calls Lucille, and tells her that the IRS is coming by her apartment to see if she charged any big-ticket items to the company. “Furs, or… I don’t know. Just a heads-up.” Next thing we know,  Luz is dragging an entire rack of furs onto a city bus. 

“Oh, that poor woman,” says Michael, spying from nearby. He follows the bus.

Lindsay has come along with Tobias to his audition as spousal support. Once it’s started, Tobias asks for his motivation: “Am I panicked about the fire, or am I being brave for everyone else?” The client is confused, as the commercial is for a fire sale (I have to say, I had never heard of that term before this episode, but apparently it’s a thing). Tobias decides to give it a shot, and proceeds to freak the hell out like the whole building’s burning down (WE’RE HAVING A FIRE!… sale”). He ends up flat on the ground, apparently dead.

Of course this whole routine, even if the commercial WAS about an actual fire, is woefully over-acted, and the producer asks if he’d like to try it a little simpler. Tobias: “…No.”

The producer comes out of the room and recognizes Lindsay, who expresses enthusiasm when she learns that the South Coast Boutique is having a fire sale. Her delivery makes Roger look thoughtful, and Tobias defeated.

Michael is still following Luz, who is even transferring busses with that damn coat rack. Michael arrives just before she does at the storage unit…which is surrounded by fire trucks and has obviously just been put out. Michael finds a scrap of a photo of George Sr., and pouts while the firemen confirm that it was arson. “Definitely the work of a flamer”. Michael looks annoyed while behind him, a bus pulls up. Luz gets off, sees the wreckage, and immediately starts pounding on the bus door to be let back on.

Back at the model home, Lindsay is updating Michael on her new acting job. Tobias pretends that everything is all right and runs out of the room again. Michael shares his suspicions with Lindsay that George Sr. is trying to run the business from prison instead of letting Michael do it, and GOB pops up from behind the fridge door to take offense at the idea that the Bluth company is Michael’s business. Michael panders to his brother by asking him to deliver an “important” letter, and since GOB suspects that his plans of trying to return a frozen dove may not be entirely productive, he agrees.

Back at prison, Michael argues with George Sr that they don’t have the money to hire T-Bone in exchange for the arson. “There’s always money in the banana stand,” George winks. Michael, irritated, informs him that in fact he trusts HIS son enough to put him in charge of the banana stand. George doesn’t look too sure about that, and we cut to said stand where George Michael, Maeby, and now T-Bone are all shoved behind the counter.

 

Maeby decides to go to dinner on her banana/doll exchange, and when T-Bone questions her math she comforts George Michael with the fact that “He’s an arsonist, not an embezzler”.

Lucille calls Michael to the apartment because “GOB is not happy” about the paltry responsibility he’s been given. Michael asks if it was too hard for him and she disagrees: “Oh he mailed the letter. That’s not the point.” (A montage shows us that actually, GOB tried to throw the letter into the ocean as an act of defiance, although the physics of the act didn’t quite work out).

 She doesn’t care that he’s unhappy, she just wants him to stop calling her.

Turns out Lindsay is also over at the penthouse to go out to lunch with Lucille with the money she has not yet made. They end up at the same restaurant where George Michael and Maeby are playing hooky. George Michael goes over their financial system again and Maeby finally realizes that they’re doubling their losses, which causes George Michael to pretty much hyperventilate at the thought of his father’s reaction. Maeby tells him to think of what George Sr., the businessman, would do. He looks over to Lindsay and Lucille’s table, where they are being served a flaming plate of Bananas Foster.

Michael rides up to the banana stand to find T-Bone, who with perfect delivery recites, “Welcome to Bluth Bananas, where bananas are our business. May I interest you in a banana this day?” Michael is EVEN MORE annoyed that George Sr. is taking over everything, but has some unanswered questions. “You burn down the storage unit?” he asks T-Bone, who immediately becomes one of my favorite minor characters with his response: “Oh, most definitely!”

Michael retreats to the beach to think, and GOB approaches to chide him for not working when “the rest of us are busting our asses to deliver your mail”.  Apparently GOB thinks that as the older brother, HE should be in charge, even though he doesn’t actually want the job. They’re discussing their father’s lack of respect (for Michael as a businessman, GOB as “…a MAGICIAN!”) when Michael gets a call from Maeby, and upon hearing that SHE thinks George Michael is about to do something irresponsible, rushes over to the banana stand.

T-Bone is watching George Michael stuff newspaper around the base of the banana stand, a gas can nearby, and muses, “I’m gonna get blamed for this”. Ha! Michael intercepts his son, who in a total panic admits his screw-up. As the narrator wisely notes, “Michael realized that he had done to his son what his father had done to him”. So he decides to “burn this son of a bitch”.

Cut to father and son watching the blazing banana stand some hours later.

GOB rolls up on his Segway to join in the cathartic moment. “You mailed that insurance check, right GOB?” Michael asks, and in response he slllooooowwwllyy backs up his Segway and wheels away, with Michael on his heels.

The next day Lindsay, hungover from her celebratory lunch, sleeps through her commercial shoot. They call Tobias as backup, but he’s too busy with his pity party sobbing in the shower (note: wearing nothing but cutoff shorts) and doesn’t hear his phone. 

 

Back at prison, Michael, now smugly enjoying his own ice cream sandwich, tells George that the banana stand is gone. “Are you crazy?!” his father demands. “There was money in that banana stand!” Michael stands his ground, and George Sr. clarifies: “There was $250,000 lining the walls of the banana stand.” Michael is startled. “What? Why didn’t you tell me that?” George Sr. doesn’t know how much clearer he could have been. “THERE’S ALWAYS. MONEY. IN THE BANANA STAND!”

 

“On the next episode”, such as it is: GOB tosses his dove into the ocean, and Michael rebuilds the banana stand (it needs to show up in future episodes, obviously).