Review: Duncanville “Plumbdog Millionaire”

Overview (Spoilers Below):

Duncan is excited that Mia’s coming over to his house for the first time, but he’s worried about exactly how she’ll react to his family members and their unique idiosyncrasies. With pizza rolls at different temperatures and little sisters who can’t keep their mouths shut, Duncan is determined to do something to make Mia like him. When the opportunity comes to star in a commercial for his dad’s plumbing business, he takes the risk—and ends up almost losing Mia along the way.

Our Take:

Duncanville’s third season continues its run with another new episode. It’s not quite up to the high standards set by some of the shows funniest moments, but Plumbdog Millionaire is still a solid episode that provides some fun gags and a decent emotional arc for Duncan and his dad.

But the episode stars off with another dynamic: Duncan and Mia. Duncan has harbored a crush on his ultra cool classmate for a while now, and even though she’s joined the main friend group of late, it seems like things are still progressing pretty slowly for her and Duncan. This is the first time she’s come over to the Harris house for a so-called ‘date’ (because she doesn’t count that time she carried Duncan to the school nurse). This awkward situation is handled pretty nicely by the show, with plenty of silliness like Jing immediately hating Mia while Jack and Annie try to make awkward small talk.

Though the episode purports to be about Mia and Duncan’s blossoming relationship, it’s also a story of Duncan and his father’s shared hubris. The two of them are used to surviving paycheck to paycheck, so when they’re exposed to an excess of fame and wealth, they pretty much immediately become huge assholes.

That’s where the main conflict of the ep comes in, as Duncan and Jack take Mia and Annie to a popular chain for a dinner date but wind up getting carried away with their fans and spend more time playing limbo with them than paying attention to their dates. I think the episode is at its best when these sorts of awkward familiar situations are exploited rather than the crazy fame kind of stuff. Mia teaching Jing about blue and yellow was cute with the nose ring compliment coming as a nice surprise.

The ending with Duncan and Jack shooting another commercial where the Wad dies was a nice way to set things back to rights, and it was cool to see Duncan and his dad working together on this despite the mostly negative outcome. I feel like we’ve gotten a lot of Duncan and Annie episodes, partly because it’s fun to have Amy voicing both characters, and those are nice, but Duncan and Jack is an interesting pairing that I always appreciate.