Well, here it is. American Dad has given us the next installment of the Tearjerker Saga, in “For Black Eyes Only,” and it is… well, to be honest, it’s a little disappointing. Don’t get me wrong; it’s incredibly fun to watch, and the sheer audacity of a show taking an episode to re-purpose all its characters just to make a James Bond parody is something worth applauding. And, really, something only American Dad could do. The show takes the label “cartoon” very, very seriously, and it shows, especially in scenes like the opening this week, where Stan ends up wearing Francine’s (sorry, Sexpun’s) body like a hula hoop.
But I still can’t help but feel like it doesn’t live up to the promise of the first Bond spoof the show put out. Maybe it’s just because Roger as Tearjerker is no longer the main villain, and instead we get Black Villain, who runs out of jokes about two minutes after showing up. So, what, he’s cheap? And that’s it? Sure, the plot to melt the ice cap with blow dryers solely to make his house in Detroit become beach-side property was silly enough to make me laugh, but it still felt like he was missing a gimmick, the kind of thing that you could mine the James Bond series for to exaggerate and get some humor out of.
Besides that flaw with the villain, however, the episode is full of ridiculous nonsense, which is exactly what I want from this show, especially in an episode like this. It ranges from the extreme, like all the Tearjerker clones killing and making out with each other, to the contextually absurd mundane, like Tearjerker at the flea market, trying to talk himself out of buying a framed photo of an old man that he inexplicably wants to buy. While I’m not sure if American Dad is planning on bringing back the Tearjerker Saga ever again, or if “For Black Eyes Only” is even a worthy sequel to the original, I’m at least glad that this show is on the air, doing things like this.
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