Lois Comes Out of Her Shell

"Lois Comes Out of Her Shell" is the sixth episode of the eleventh season and the 194th overall episode of the animated comedy series Family Guy. It originally aired on Fox in the United States on November 25, 2012, and is written by Danny Smith and directed by Joe Vaux. In the episode, Lois has a midlife crisis leaving Peter desperately trying to keep up with her. Meanwhile, Stewie adopts a turtle from the park, but the turtle is determined to kill Stewie.

Plot

Lois is not looking forward to her birthday, but Brian suggests throwing her a surprise party. After Peter reads a poem that lowers Lois' spirits even further, she decides to turn her life around by adopting a different, younger lifestyle with longer hair after a makeover and shopping trip.

Lois' lifestyle causes conflict within Peter, who is not sure about the changes but certainly likes most of Lois' new persona. But her new lifestyle soon begins to wear on him. When he gets tired at a party, he becomes a drag on Lois and she splits to party with younger girls. Back home, Peter moans about her behavior. On television, a report regarding Justin Bieber shows Lois hanging out with the teen girls. Lois sneaks into the concert intending to seduce Bieber but Peter bursts in and beats him up. After Peter demands that Lois come home and start acting her age she refuses, citing what he said to her. Peter apologizes and admits that he really likes Lois for who she is. When Bieber is called back onstage Peter is forced to go out and substitute "Conway Bieber". Back home, Peter reiterates his love for Lois, but mistakes her age. After she corrects him, he says "Get out of this house."

Meanwhile, Stewie Griffin finds a turtle in a pond in a park and decides to take him back home as his pet and names him Sheldon. Sheldon decides to avenge his removal from his natural environment by ruining the family's life. When Stewie has a close call with Sheldon in the vicinity he begins to get suspicious. Sheldon's attempt at revenge is revealed late one night and Stewie is forced to flush him down the toilet. When he reaches the end of the sewer pipe, he returns for more revenge. Stewie finds Rupert's and a stranger's head in boxes and vows to get even with Sheldon. After Sheldon bursts into Stewie's room for a showdown, Stewie nearly loses his fight until Mario jumps on Sheldon and kills him.

Reception

The episode received a 2.9 rating and was watched by a total of 5.77 million people, making it the second most watched show on Animation Domination that night, beating The Cleveland Show and Bob's Burgers but losing to The Simpsons with 7.46 million.^[1] The episode was met with mixed reviews from critics. Kevin McFarland of The A.V. Club gave the episode a B-, saying "Lois Comes Out Of Her Shell" is that kind of Family Guy episode, setting the bar very low with two telegraphed plots with very few surprises. It’s not perfect by any stretch of the imagination, but compared to the times when the show is lazy in structure and joke execution, episodes like this one are vastly preferable. It takes a well-worn sitcom theme—desperately trying to appear younger while growing old—and peppers it with crude body humor and late to the game cultural references like Justin Bieber."^[2]

Carter Dotson of TV Fanatic gave the episode three and a half stars out of five, saying "On the comedy front, Lois acting out as a young woman as part of her midlife crisis played on some expected notes, what with the juxtaposition of middle-aged Lois trying to look and act young. It was all worth it for what it led to: Conway Bieber. That hair was looking fine. The B-plot with Stewie finding a turtle and keeping him as a pet, who then turned out to be evil, felt almost more like something out of American Dad than Family Guy, but it was amusing enough. Not as amusing as Conway Bieber, but really, what is? Nothing. Nothing at all. Overall, while I have some misgivings about just how genuine this episode’s newfound heart was, it still made at least some sense, and it had Conway Twitty with superimposed Bieber hair. Worth watching, I’d say."^[3]

References