Threat Levels

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“Threat Levels”
American Dad! episode
The Smith's house under quarantine
Episode no.	Season 1 Episode 2
Guest stars	Carmen Electra
Written by	David Zuckerman
Directed by	Brent Woods
Production no.	1AJN02
Original airdate	May 1, 2005
Newspaper Headline	"Stuff Happens As Wave of Ambiguity Spreads"
Season 1 episodes
American Dad - Season 1 May 1, 2005 – May 14, 2006
Pilot Threat Levels Stan Knows Best Francine's Flashback Roger Codger Homeland Insecurity Deacon Stan, Jesus Man Bullocks to Stan A Smith in the Hand All About Steve Con Heir Stan of Arabia: Part 1 Stan of Arabia: Part 2 Stannie Get Your Gun Star Trek Not Particularly Desperate Housewife Rough Trade Finances with Wolves It's Good to Be Queen Roger 'n' Me Helping Handis With Friends Like Steve's Tears of a Clooney

	Season 2 →
List of American Dad! episodes

"Threat Levels" is the second episode produced and the official series premiere of the tv animated series American Dad!.

It features the special voice guests Kevin Michael Richardson (as Scab Bum), Busy Philipps (as Dana), Curtis Armstrong (as Snot), Daisuke Suzuki (as Toshi), Ralph Garman (as Hazmat Guy), Stephen Root (as Dick), Eddie Kaye Thomas (as Barry), Mike Henry (as Jackson/Charlie) and Mike Barker (as Terry Bates).

[edit] Plot

Stan accidentally brings home a liquid contaminated with a deadly virus. The CIA puts the entire family on quarantine, and since they are supposed to die within a day, they decide to spend it watching the entire first season of 24 on DVD. While they wait for a horrible death, Roger makes plans to redecorate the house once they are gone. As it turns out, however, that sample of the virus was inactive.

The virus scare causes many neighbors of the Smiths to put their houses for sale, and so Francine meets a real estate agent and wishes she too could go into the business. Stan then uses his connections to have the real state agent they had met, "Barb", shipped to Guantanamo and put Francine in her place. But Stan is ashamed when Francine makes more money (in her new real estate job) than he does. He tries to resolve the problem by having Francine's boss arrested and her agency shut down, but Francine goes into business on her own, working out of the house and even hiring Roger as her personal assistant.

Hayley uses one of the houses in her mother's portfolio to set up a shelter for the homeless. Steve and his friends, looking for a way to make money to buy a Gamestation, had wanted to use the place to run a Girls Gone Wild knockoff. When Hayley's shelter prevents this, they decide to use the situation and run bumfights with the homeless men at the shelter. When informed of this by Hayley, Stan sees an opportunity to start making more money than his wife; he muscles Steve and his friends out and takes over the bumfight business.

This infuriates Steve and Hayley (for different reasons), and to break Stan, Hayley unionizes the bums, who go on strike, leaving Stan without a fight to offer to his paying customers. He is then tricked into fighting an enormous man, described as a bum so bad that he "killed his own name". As it turns out, however, Hayley and Steve had rigged the fight, as the bum was actually an actor paid to throw the match (after having pummeled Stan a bit).

At this point, Francine apparently convinces Stan to come to terms with her making more money than he does. In actuality, Stan uses his CIA contacts to kidnap Alan Greenspan's dog and force him to raise interest rates and virtually put the real estate market (and Francine) out of business.

[edit] Cultural references

Donald Trump demands payment when Stan says "you're fired". This is a reference to Trump's attempt to trademark that phrase, which he uses often on his show, The Apprentice.
Steve's idea to hold bumfights may be a reference to Bumfights: Cause for Concern, a film made by some high-school students, which featured homeless people beating each other up for money.
The GameStation is a combination of Nintendo GameCube and Sony's PlayStation. The actual console resembles a Sega Dreamcast. the name was also used on the show Teen Titans.
When Roger says "the boss is being a real catch you next Tuesday" while referring to Francine, the expression catch you next Tuesday is an backronym for the word "Cunt", when "you" is read as "U". The "All in the Family" feature on the DVD tells that the crew was surprised that the phrase wasn't cut.
There is a bum version of Rich Uncle Pennybags from the Monopoly board game in the "Fighting Bums Local 302" protest group.
The montage in which Steve details his plan for he and his friends to get a GameStation is possibly adapted from the similar montage near the end of the 2001 film of Ocean's Eleven, a possibility established by the widescreen presentation of the montage and the end of the montage, which has Steve and his friends playing a GameStation, wearing tuxedos, outside of the fountain in Las Vegas that, in Ocean's Eleven, the crew gathers outside after the heist.
When the CIA employees are allowed to leave work early, the song Unchained by Van Halen plays.
The news anchors of the Channel 3 report make their debut, and hint they are homosexual by the rainbow coloured opening titles. The rainbow is a symbol of the gay community.

[edit] Notes

The original broadcast of this episode on FOX scored a 6.3/9 rating, bringing the total viewers for the episode to 9.47 million.
Adult Swim airdate: May 12, 2005.
The original broadcast of this episode on Adult Swim received a total of 1,133,000 viewers among adults 18-34.
Adult Swim cut the part where a couple get splashed with blood as Francine shows them the backyard of the house where the bum fights are held the first time the episode aired. In the third airing of this episode on Adult Swim (Sunday, May 15, 2005 @ 11:00 p.m. EST), the scene was left intact and has been left intact ever since.
In the U.L it aired on May 6 , 2005 and garnered 4.9 million viewers. It came 3rd in its timeslot and was the 9th highest rated on CB's that week.
After Francine shows Stan her first paycheck, Klaus's lip sync doesn't match his words (the DVD set does have a table read/animatic version of this episode [Disc 3; Special Features section] that includes scenes and dialogue that aren't in the final version, so viewers can find out what Klaus's original lines were on this part).
Stan is seen whistling the tune of the show American Dad! as he walks out grabbing his thermos.