Hell Comes to Quahog

Hell Comes to Quahog is the third season 5 episode of the FOX animated television series Family Guy.

Plot summary

Template:Spoilers Meg complains after Peter leaves her at the roller rink, so Peter agrees to get her a car. Peter, convinced by a swindling salesman (who often appears in the series), buys a tank instead. Meanwhile, Quahog suffers from a heat wave, exasperated by the electricity-hoarding shopping corporation, Superstore USA, which comes to Quahog and puts strain on local businesses and costs many residents their jobs. Peter spearheads a protest of the store, but flip-flops after experiencing its “industrial” air conditioning and gets a job there instead. Peter is grossly incompetent and sleeps on the job and plays hide and seek in the coat racks. Meg is promoted to assistant manager and her first job is to fire Peter, she instead chooses to quit and Peter is able to say, “I love y…” but Stewie and Brian then use the tank to “defeat” the shopping center, and Quahog is saved. Template:Spoilerend

Notes

• Peter temporarily loses his job at the Pawtucket Brewery. It is assumed all things in the town returned to normal once the Superstore was destroyed.
• The car dealership “Wilkins Hyundai and Subaru”, which was last seen in the episode Patriot Games, appears again in this episode.
• This episode of Family Guy, and the episode "Failure is not a Factory-installed Option" of American Dad! (also created by Seth MacFarlane), which were both originally broadcast on September 24, 2006, dealt at least partly with sleazy car salesmen.
• The rounds that the tank fired varied in destruction throughout the episode. The first time Peter fires the main gun, it only blows a small hole in the ground, and the next minute, was able to partially destroy Cleveland's house, and at the end, when Stewie and Brian fire the gun, it completely destroyed the Superstore USA.
  • Also Peter could fire from the unbuttoned commander's position of the tank, whereas Brian fired from the driver's position.
• The Canadian network Global's airing of the episode left the one occurrence of the word “fucking” uncensored.
• Opie is seen working in the same room as Peter, but Opie had previously been promoted to his own office and replaced by Soundwave, a Transformer, who is also Peter's co-worker.
• The power in the Griffin home goes out in the living room in one scene when the blackout occurs, but in the kitchen during the blackout, the lights are on.
• In the opening scene when the men are showing playing table tennis at the Drunken Clam, there is a typo on the word "Patriot", misspelling it as "Patrtot".
• In the U.S., 9.65 million viewers tuned in to this episode.
• Paddy Tanniger (introduced in "Fore Father") is killed by Brian and Stewie in the tank in this episode; his last words were "So, you got a tank, big whoop, wanna fight about it?" This was alluded to in the DVD commentary for "The Perfect Castaway". However, Family Guy's loose continuity means it is possible that he will return in a later episode.
• The disco song that plays during the scene where Peter, Cleavland, Quagmire, and Joe are rollerskating is a disco rendition of Beethoven's fifth symphony, which was made popular by Walter Murphy, who is the composer for Family Guy.
• The theme of this episode is extremely similar to that of South Park episode Something Wall-Mart This Way Comes, which also involves the head of the family getting a job at a large superstore. This episode aired the following November.
• A controversial flashback involves Brian shopping at a Kmart earlier in his life. Outside the store, a mentally retarded child begins to roughly pet Brian, to which Brian bites the child's arm, making him cry. The flashback was cut out of the FOX premiere, but was seen when the episode premiered on Adult Swim on November 12, 2006.

Cultural references

• The title is a reference to the cult film Hell Comes to Frogtown starring 'Rowdy' Roddy Piper
• The end of the toilet with herpes scene is a take on Lisa Loeb's Stay (I Missed You) plays.
• The man driving the aforementioned Hummer is seen watching Madagascar in the same skit.
• The Hummer driver yells "YEAH, RUMSFELD!!!" after his aggressive driving causes several accidents. This is likely Brian's inference about who would drive a Hummer: loud, obnoxious, careless -- and an extreme conservative to boot.
• A cutaway shows Peter starring in a Broadway musical version of film Red Dawn. In it, visible poster of the musical Wicked is displayed.
• Lois and Peter go to a drive-in and see Neil Simon's The Even Couple, a parody of The Odd Couple movie.
• Superstore USA is, in general, a parody of the discount retailer Wal-Mart. Many things satirize the retailer; for example, the design of the Superstore USA is basically the same as a typical Wal-Mart, and Superstore USA has a smiling sun logo, which is a parody of Wal-Mart's smiley face.
• Peter is watching television a parody is shown of a Pepperidge Farm commercial, where the pitchman threatens the viewer with blackmail (alluding to a hit and run incident) unless they buy some Milano cookies.
• Peter's description of the feeling that stepping inside Superstore USA gives him is a parody of York Peppermint Pattie commercials.
• A cutaway shows Peter murdering Yogi Bear, presumably as a favor to Ranger Smith.
• When Joe sends the last ping-pong ball out the window, Peter says he will get some more from Mr. Moose, a reference to the character from Captain Kangaroo who, as a regular joke, has ping-pong balls dropped on the Captain.
• In one scene, Peter wears a uniform similar to the one worn by General George S. Patton, right down to the gloves and horsewhip.
• The Easter Egg hunt scene with Richard Gere is referring to an old urban legend about him going into an ER to get a gerbil removed from his anus (after the sexual act of gerbilling).
• The manager of Superstore USA tries to escape from Brian and Stewie's trail of destruction by hiding in the bathroom. The tank then smashes the walls surrounding it, and a massive smiley face stand crushes the manager. This is similar to the death of Gennaro in Jurassic Park.
• While working at Superstore USA, one of Meg's duties is to give Sloth, the deformed strongman from the 1985 film, The Goonies, a Baby Ruth candy bar (as character Chunk did in the film).
• A cut to a scene from Ghost Whisperer alludes that the spirits choose to come to the main character for help because of her enormous breasts.
• The note from the electric company incites an animated version of the season-one opening of the 1970s PBS show The Electric Company.
• Marvel Comics character Iceman is alluded to being homosexual when his wife finds his ice trail leading to a gay sex cinema.
• Upon arriving at the rink, Peter says to Meg, “Grab some wood there, bub.” This is a reference to Principal Vernon's line in the film The Breakfast Club.
• Inside the tank, Brian chews on a cigar, similar to Hannibal Smith.
• In the car shop there's a General Lee.
• Tom Brokaw is parodied as having a street gang of himself. As well, Brokaw's pronunciation of words containing the letter "L" was repeatedly satirized
• While protesting outside the Superstore USA, Peter raises his fist and erroneously chants "GATTACA!" (a movie from 1997) instead of the famous line "ATTICA!", from the movie Dog Day Afternoon.