7 May 2019

Upon seeing Darryl in trouble, Henry cannot help but crack a dad joke at his state of affairs. The other dads are able to hop on the bandwagon but Darryl is caught in a projectile vomit spin of forgetfulness and death that’s distracting him far too much to contribute. The plan has gone south, so the dads jump into their backup plan: combat!

Henry jumps in first with his light hammer, but is so unused to the idea of harming another human being that he misses his attack entirely. Glenn flourishes with his nunchucks only to hit himself in the nuts once again. The injury causes Glenn to take a deep breath in, making him high and sending him into the same spin Darryl is currently trapped in. Ron steps in to help his fellow dads, throwing the disassembled skip-it at both guards. He lands the hit, killing one guard immediately and totally missing the other. The uninjured guard rushes Ron, successfully nailing him with both of his attacks.

Three Redbrands charge out from the warehouse, vomit covered and desperately trying to dispel the smoke around them. It seems that the hot boxing portion of the dads’ plan was partially successful. The large antechamber making up the majority of the warehouse doesn’t have much smoke in it, but a smaller room in the back has smoke pouring out from under the crack at the bottom of the door.

Darryl, confused, vomiting, and spinning, sees these three men and puts out his and for an introduction. All three of the Redbrands stop and one offers his hand in return, his confusion evident from his expression. Darryl takes it and starts to ask questions to hopefully clear up his drug-induced confusion. The conversation doesn’t get far when the guards spot their dead friend and realize they’re being attacked. When Darryl spots the skull Ron fractured mere moments ago, he once again vomits – this time all over the three Redbrands.

Henry feels very weird about what just happened with the hammer; however, that doesn’t stop a deep anger from rising up within him. This anger fuels his magical transformation into a panda. Bear-Henry lunges for one of the guards with a bite and chomps down. He follows the attack with a swipe from his claws, just barely missing it.

While Henry bears-out, Glenn is still feeling fuzzy from his unexpected high. He spots Ron and his injuries and fist bumps him, healing his injuries and getting him back in the game. All healed up and ready to go, Ron summons the terrifying voice of his father to intimidate their enemies. The spell produces unexpected results, hurting Ron more than it does the Redbrand guards.

The three guards Darryl vomited on take a moment to shake the puke off. The remaining Redbrand lunges for the panda bear that just attacked him, successfully landing a hit. Bolstered by the strength of being a bear, Henry is able to shake off the injury. The chaos of the battle isn’t helping Darryl shake off his confusion, and after a quick aside with an equally confused Glenn, he slips into an age-old pattern of anger. As the rage overtakes him, the spectral spirits of Darryl’s favorite fathers emerge from his body. Darryl’s favorite fathers include his own father, Abraham Lincoln, George Washington, and Mike Brady from The Brady Bunch. When he swings for an attack he misses, disappointing his newly summoned protectors.

The appearance of the ancestral protectors has hyped bear-Henry up, and he’s ready for his next attack. He snaps his jaws at one of the Redbrands, misses, and takes another swipe with his claws. He bisects the guard with his claws. The death thrills the bear part of Henry, but horrifies the human part of him. Glenn takes a moment to survey the scene before deciding that the substances in his system have made him feel rather sociable. He attempts to charm one of the three Redbrands near Darryl. Complimenting the guard’s outfit seems to be the key. He’s charmed, immediately recognizing Glenn as an old friend.

Between Ron’s father’s voice booming through the area and the disappointment of Darryl’s ancestral protectors, the atmosphere is heavy with fatherly sorrow. It fills Ron with a bizarre sort of rage. He sees the chain of the skip-it in the distance and gets an idea. Once he retrieves the chain, he goes to redeem himself by sneakily strangling one of the guards from behind. Ron manages to get the chain around the Redbrand’s neck, but before he can pull it tight, the Redbrand notices and tries to stop him. The guard tries to wrestle the chain off unsuccessfully, allowing Ron to pull it tighter and restrain him.

Glenn, while floating, nudges the Redbrand he charmed away from the brutal fight his fellow gang members are taking part in. Under the guise of catching up, Glenn does his best to deceive the Redbrand-turned-friend to call off the alarm set off earlier. The Redbrand believes Glenn and immediately reaches for his whistle to let anyone inside know that it was a false alarm. The remaining Redbrand is outraged at this. Instead of blowing his own whistle, he decides he should probably deal with Ron, who’s currently choking out his friend. He swipes at Ron with his shortsword, misses, and instead cuts off his suffocating friend’s ear. Panicked, he tries one more time to hit Ron. Once again he misses – this time slicing off his friend’s other ear. This sets off a series of dad jokes, causing damage to Glenn and quite a bit of damage to the Redbrand who cut his friend’s ear off. This scene only further convinces the Redbrand Glenn charmed that his fellow gang members are betraying one another.

Darryl, after failing so miserably the last time he tried to attack, tries to keep things simple. Unfortunately, he still misses when he swings his golf club. Henry takes a moment to survey the scene and decides that it’s time to de-bear. Once again in human form, he looks at the Redbrand who just cut off his friend’s ears and tells him to just take the L. That persuades the Redbrand to sheath his sword and leave this massacre and his mistakes behind. The Redbrand with no ears drops his weapon and very nervously shakes Darryl’s hand when it’s offered.

With combat settled, Glenn brings his charmed Redbrand over and begins to do introductions. The Redbrand introduces himself as Harrelson. Glenn is quick to shorten his name to “Harry” in conversation. When asked, Harry tells the dads that the Battle Axe of Hatred is inside the hideout, located in the room where all the smoke is pouring out. Glenn calls a dad huddle to discuss this new information. Their plan is to get Harrelson to run into the room, grab the axe, and run back out while holding his breath. To try and convince him of this, Henry says he wants to see the Battle Axe of Hatred in the moonlight. That fails so Darryl tries to intimidate him instead. This has more success.

Despite Harrelson’s reluctance, he agrees with the dads’ plan to get the Battle Axe of Hatred and bring it out to them. Ron secures the deal by making it clear that Harrelson will not have job security if he doesn’t return with the axe. While they wait for Harrelson’s return, the Doodlers all put their hands in the middle to celebrate a good play. Henry immediately feels grossed out by the copious amounts of blood and viscera left on his body after tearing through those Redbrands as a bear. Harrelson returns after this, worried about the smoke pouring out of the room. Glenn advises him to hold his breath but, as a backup measure, writes bring the axe out on his hand. Ron adds or you’re fired to the same hand just to be sure this part of the plan goes off without a hitch.

Harrelson heads into the smoke. He makes it to the axe successfully, but on his way out inhales the smoke. However, the writing on his hand reminds him of his mission. The momentum of puking and tripping pushes him out of the room and towards the dads. A bundle is secured in his arms. Glenn takes it and pushes Harrelson back into the smoke-filled room.

Nick rushes over and is immediately excited, trying to coax the dads into the van so they can head back to the Watermice. Henry puts a pause on that. He wants to be certain that the bundle contains the Battle Axe of Hatred. The axe is not an actual axe, but rather a guitar very similar to Glenn’s favorite model. There’s a powerful energy emitting from it that Glenn can feel. He decides to keep it close. The axe makes Henry nervous, but Glenn is enthralled with it. He continues to strum chords and even does a rock and roll cover of “Wonderwall” for Ron.

Once Glenn has had his fill of messing around, the Doodlers and Nick all pile back into the van. Odyssey-san is out of gas, so Glenn takes a moment to whisper some sweet nothings and power the van up. While Glenn and Nick are in the backseat, Nick reveals that he made up the entire curse with the wizard. He wanted to keep hanging out with the Watermice and was worried he wouldn’t be able to because the other dads seem like buzzkills. Nick suggests that he and Glenn ditch the other dads and run off to do their own thing. Glenn is absolutely on board, and the two begin to hatch a plan.

While Glenn and Nick have their aside, Darryl fills Cern in on how everything went with the Redbrands. They get into a conversation about dads and Ron makes it clear he doesn’t want to talk about his. This leads into a disagreement between Ron and Cern, where Cern pointedly reminds Ron that he was being kind of a dick to him the day before. Ron tries to dismiss it, but Glenn cuts in to point out the different ways Ron was being a dick. Henry is checked out of the conversation since he’s far too occupied with using a pack of wet wipes to get the viscera off his body.

The dads and company arrive back at the Watermice den. Ellory meets them, asking all sorts of questions about how it went. Just as Nick is explaining that they did not make a quick or quiet escape, the Redbrands ride up and demand a battle over the taking of the axe. The Redbrand leading the charge announces that this won’t be any ordinary battle. No – this is a battle of the bands.