"Duchess of Wails" is the fifth episode in Season 3 of Foster's Home for Imaginary Friends. It was aired on September 23, 2005.
Summary
Foster's is finally able to get rid of Duchess when she is adopted, much to Frankie and Mr. Herriman's delight. However, the family that adopted her turns out to be Mac's neighbors and her complaining gets to be too much for Mac's mother to handle. Terrence tells Mac that she is thinking about moving to Singapore (which Terrence thinks is in Wisconsin). Mac and Bloo attempt to frame Duchess by wrecking up her owner's home, but this only makes them love her more. They decide that they must bring her back to Foster's, but are prevented from doing so when Terrence warns of their arrival. In the end however, Terrence's plan fails when the Foster's residents learn about Mac moving and agree to take Duchess back.
Reception
This episode is hated by many fans and is considered as one of the WORST episodes in the entire series. Its mainly criticized for these reasons.
- It turns out that those people who adopt Duchess were Neighbors of Mac's, yet somehow Mac didn't know those people lived beside him?
- Mac's mother wants to move because of Duchess beaver next door? are you serous?!?! It's not THEIR fault!
- There's also the fact that the Gold Plaque Herriman shows Mac & Bloo is vastly contradicted by everything they do. They are suppose to accept any imaginary friend no matter how bad (Considering that this episode is right after the hated Imposters Home for Um Make Em Up Pals episode, that says a lot) they are, but yet that motto doesn't apply when they assault Mac & Bloo for trying to bring Duchess back to Fosters. It seems like it was just there to explain why they put up with Duchess.
- Fans also criticized the Housemates instantly taking Terrence's side over Mac and Bloo's. As It makes no sense that the Housemates instantly trust and take Terrence's side despite them knowing that Terrence is a cruel bully who likes see Mac suffer, yet it never occurs to them Terrence can't be trust. And when they find out the truth, Terrence gets away with nothing more than Death Glares from the Housemates and what are Mac & Bloo greeted with? Despite knowing Mac would move away if Duchess didn't come back, they decide to make Mac & Bloo Duchess personal slaves under agreement that she can stay, meanwhile Terrence gets off Scot-Free and Duchess smacks Mac with her Hairbrush! THATS FREAKING CURL!!!!!!!!!
- This episode is also quite dark, such as the climax near the end on the episode were Mac and Bloo desperate trys to bring Duches back to Fosters in a stormy weather, only for the Imaginary Friends to prevent that by blocking paths and Wilt throwing freaking carrots at Mac and Bloo!
- The ending were both Mac and Bloo are being force to take care of Duchess was HIGHLY criticized for being completely random, horrible unfairly punishing Mac and Bloo who did nothing wrong, and making everyone betray them for no reason.
Trivia
- This is one of the few episodes where Duchess plays a major role. (In fact this is Duchess' biggest role)
- Duchess calls Mac and Bloo "Blinky and Clyde", two names of the ghosts in Pac-Man.
- The Foster's motto says "Any friend who enters through this door we will house and nurture forever more" but the plaque reads "nuture"
- Mac incorrectly states that Singapore is in Malaysia, as Singapore is an independent country off the coast of the Malay Peninsula.
- This is the 2nd (and last time) where we see Duchess and Terrence in an episode together, however their roles are different and they don't team up again.
- This is the second episode since "House of Bloo's" where we see Mac's mom.
- Madame Foster in the episode says "Show em what's up, Doc!" before carrots are thrown. This is a reference to Bugs Bunny's iconic phrase "What's up, Doc?" and his tendency to eat carrots.
- The Applebee family bears similarities to The Flanders family from The Simpsons as Mr. Applebee is very similar to Ned Flanders.
- The sequence where the residents of Foster's defend the house against Duchess's return is a parody of the battle of Helm's Deep in The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers.
- Bloo somehow stays over at Mac's house, despite the fact that its largely against the rules of the show.
- The music that plays while Bloo shows Mac his mittens is the same music that he dances to in Adoptcalypse Now.