Nightmare on Grace Street

"Nightmare on Grace Street" is the third episode of the third season of the animated comedy series The Cleveland Show, The episode aired on Fox in the United States on October 2, 2011.

This episode is written by Jonathan Green and Gabe Miller and directed by Phil Allora. This episode received mostly mixed to positive reviews from critics for its storyline and many cultural references. According to Nielsen ratings, it was viewed by 4.66 million homes in its original airing.^[1]

Plot

After an introduction by Gus while he retrieves ingredients for his hairy turkey sandwiches, Donny stops by the guy's table at The Broken Stool where he annoys them with his sense of humor. Back at the house, Rallo is preparing for his first sleepover at his friend's Walt's house but Cleveland Brown Jr. is disappointed as he isn't allowed to come. At school, Roberta is taking a break from Federline Jones while he takes his SATs prep classes when she catches a glimpse of Edwin Mullins, a new student. Noticing his pale, dark looks and a trickle of pizza sauce dribbling from his lips, Roberta gets the idea that Edwin could be a vampire. Introducing herself, Roberta ignores hints from Edwin that he isn't interested in her.

At the sleepover, Rallo gets frightened and calls up Cleveland to come get him. Cleveland tries to pass the task off to Donna but she orders him out to get Rallo himself. Cleveland teases Rallo about being scared and picks up a hitch-hiker to scare Rallo further. But kicks the hitch-hiker out of the car when he tickles Rallo without paying any attention to Cleveland. Later at The Stool, the guys win a jack-o-lantern contest by being the only ones Gus knows and Terry Kimple invites everyone except Donny back to his house. At the house, Cleveland gets scared by being in a strange place and calls Donna. When she picks him up, she makes him get in the back of the car where he gets frightened by Rallo and they continue to argue over who is the bigger chicken. The arguing continues into trick-or-treat where thanks to Donny's annoying jokes, the fail to get candy from Wally's house. When the kids get on to Cleveland for Donny ruining their fun, Cleveland tells him to take a hike. The arguing over who is braver starts again with Cleveland and Rallo darting into traffic until Donna grabs them and forces them to call it a night.

Roberta tries to attract Edwin by jumping off of a cliff into a like like she saw in the movies, but is rescued by a moonlight swimmer named Caleb. Roberta gets the idea that he is a werewolf and has to think over who she wants to be with. Donna drives Rallo and Cleveland to the abandoned McCafferty house and forces them to be brave by spending the night in the house together. As they try to settle in for the night, Cleveland and Rallo hear noises and investigate, discovering spooky surprises that Donna and Jr. planted as traps while they watch on a web cam at home, unaware that Donny is slipping into the house with an ax to extract revenge for being snubbed. When Donna gets up for some snacks, Donny bursts in looking for Cleveland. When they tell him that Cleveland isn't there, Donny decides to start by killing Donna and Jr. instead. Back at the McCafferty house, Cleveland and Rallo decide to call a truce and leave together. Pausing briefly at a driving range while stalling for time, Cleveland and Rallo decide to face the music together and head for home.

At a Halloween party, while trying to decide if either Caleb or Edwin should become her lover, she has them go into a room to fight it out over her. Nervous about what is going on, Roberta has her friend Anna look in on them and finds out that the two of them are having sex together. Back at the house, Cleveland and Rallo arrive to find Donny disguised as Donna who he has tied up with Jr. Donny attacks Cleveland with his ax. While they struggle, Rallo sprays the fluid from Cleveland Jr.'s "WD-40" costume onto the floor, enabling Cleveland to force Donny out the window to his death as he screams about hating black people. Cleveland ends by noting that they were pretty brave after all. Things come to a close with a musical number as Gus hauls away Donny's body.

Cultural references

• Episode title is a parody of the classic thriller film Nightmare on Elm Street.
• Roberta's subplot contains elements of the Twilight saga, notably the "Eyes on Fire" music from Blue Foundation when Edwin Mullins was seen walking and jumping off of the cliff.
• Cleveland getting scared in the haunted house and saying zoinks, as well as getting a Scooby Snack from Rallo is an obvious parody of the classic Hanna-Barbera cartoon Scooby-Doo.
• Donny's breaking into the house with an ax and line "Here's Donny!" parody Jack Nicholson's character of Jack Torrance in the 1980 film adaption of Stephen King's novel The Shining. The line itself is a parody of Johnny Carson's introduction nightly on The Tonight Show With Johnny Carson.
• When the family dress up for trick-or-treat, Donna is dressed as Michelle Obama, wife of US President Barack Obama. Cleveland is dressed as the University of Notre Dame's fighting Irish leprechaun. Jr. is dressed as a can of WD-40, a popular lubricant and Rallo is dressed as Phil Specter.
• The original title of the episode included the parenthetical "(That's the Name of Cleveland's Street)", because the name of the street where Cleveland lives was never mentioned on the show before.

References

External links

Wikiquote has quotations related to: "Nightmare on Grace Street"

• "Nightmare on Grace Street" at the Internet Movie Database
• "Nightmare on Grace Street" at TV.com