S9E19 "CHiPs and Salsa"
The episode begins with Haley at work, and luckily the way that her boss is portrayed this time isn't quite as extreme as the first time. She is still, however, incredibly dumb, but this time this leads to some genuine laughs, which, while not that great, are better than being completely repulsed by this character. Haley's boss is currently interested in peppers, and Haley brings up the peppers Gloria uses in her salsa. Haley and Jay try to convince Gloria to sell her salsa, and she reluctantly goes to a meeting. Gloria ends up convincing Jay that they shouldn't sell it, but this turns out to be unintentional, as Gloria actually wanted to sell the salsa. The fact that Gloria wouldn't tell the others of her change of heart seems unrealistic, and in the end another layer is added onto the story which ends up being completely unnecessary, as Haley's boss gets a rash on her face from the salsa.
It turns out that Phil has not stopped bringing up his victory over Claire in the early first season episode "Run for Your Wife", and Claire has finally had enough. This story concept screams that the writers have run short on ideas, so they are revisiting old episodes' concepts. Not only is this revisited, but the idea behind this season premiere is as well, the idea that Claire and Phil are not as young as they once were. It's a good thing that Ty Burrell and Julie Bowen are naturally so funny, otherwise this story would come off as extremely stale. This time, it is taken farther than last time, as Phil and Claire accept that this is where their lives are headed. Also, as this goes on, Luke decides that he wants to goes to college, which feels like the show is backtracking on what it decided on last season, and makes fun of community college along the way.
When Mitch is trying to be convinced to become a prosecutor (which seems completely unrealistic, considering that this isn't anything like the type of law he practiced), he gets to give Cam an opportunity that he always wanted, to be on a ride-along. Everything in this story seems like a stretch, from Mitch considering becoming a prosecutor, to Mitch having Cam get in the back of the police car even though this ride-along is supposed to be for him, to Cam getting the opportunity to interrogate Mitch about the job opportunity in an interrogation room. Everything just feels manufactured for Cam's comedic moments, which, to be fair, were decent. For the most part, however, this story seems pointless.
This wasn't a terrible episode, but it wasn't very good either. It had some good funny moments, but each story also had its issues, whether it was lacking in believability or originality.
Score: 5/10
What did you think of "CHiPs and Salsa"? Leave your thoughts in the comments!