Carpoolers: 1.13 ‘Take Your Daughter to Work Day’ Recap
March 9, 2008 by Chandra
Original Air Date: March 4, 2008
As much as it pains me to say it, “Take Your Daughter to Work Day,” almost certainly the series finale, gets my vote as perhaps the worst episode of Carpoolers. It’s too bad the sitcom had to go out with such a weak showing. Then again, saving the not-so-good for last means fans have a longer continuous string of previous well-done episodes to remember fondly.
As the title of the episode states, it’s Take Your Daughter to Work Day at AUBREY’s job, and he brings along his little girl MICHELLE (Guest Star China Anderson). Before he heads to his floor, GRACEN and LAIRD advise him that he’s a superhero in his daughter’s eyes. Therefore, when Aubrey and Michelle get upstairs and she begins talking incessantly about her friend whose father is a heart surgeon and how big his office must be, Aubrey is too embarrassed to let her know that he has no office, just a small and cluttered cubicle.
Instead of revealing the truth, Aubrey takes Michelle into the office of Vice President Mr. Latero (Guest Star Dave Foley), which is across from his cubicle, so she can take a picture to use in her school report. While they’re inside, Michelle notices a picture on the desk of the office’s actual occupant and his family, and like any normal kid, she asks who the people are.
Panicking, Aubrey immediately grabs the framed picture and drops it on the floor, where the glass shatters. He then cuts his hand trying to clean the mess up and hurry his daughter out of the room before his boss arrives. Shaking his wounded hand only causes the blood to splatter all over the white sofa, and when Mr. Latero arrives with his daughter and she sees the blood, she thinks it’s an emergency and releases the fire alarm.
Drenched in water, Mr. Latero meets with Aubrey later and begins talking about the company’s difficulties in the last year. Aubrey automatically assumes he’s about to get fired, so in a preemptive strike, he tells his boss everyone calls him stinky behind his back because he stinks as a boss and because he actually stinks.
Unfortunately for bigmouth, Mr. Latero was only going to ask him to create a list of people he thought should get axed. But, following his insubordinate behavior, Aubrey is let go right then and there, and he and his daughter are escorted out of the building by security.
It’s understandable, then, that the rest of the carpoolers are surprised when Aubrey shows up in the car the next morning, ready to drive into the city. He’s determined to find a job before his daughter’s report is due so she’ll have something to write about.
After Aubrey confesses all of the jobs in his field seem to be gone and DOUGIE reveals his analysis of Aubrey’s finances shows his nest egg will run out in nine days, each of the men offer suggestions for a replacement job, most of them unsuitable.
For instance, Aubrey can’t help out at Laird’s dentist’s office because watching the procedures would make him faint. He also can’t help out at the online college MARMADUKE is attending because he wouldn’t be able to disrobe to serve as a naked model for the art class. So, Dougie finally refers him to his wife CINDY, who’s making a killing in the neighborhood selling Green Queen beauty products.
Cindy sets Aubrey up with his very first Green Queen Scene party, and lots of people attend. Everything seems to go well, until his enthusiastic and effective speech, when Aubrey’s watch catches on one women’s bra. He yanks the undergarment all the way off while trying to free himself, and then smacks Cindy in the face with it, knocking her backwards against a wall. Predictably, Cindy soon fires Aubrey from the Green Queen job, too.
After this last public and humiliating failure, Aubrey gives up and let’s himself go, to the extent that he doesn’t prepare to attend his daughter’s in-class presentation on his job. The carpoolers grow concerned about him, and they drop by his house to make sure he’s alright. During the visit, Gracen convinces Aubrey not to miss his daughter’s report by making him aware that if he doesn’t go for her, he’ll never be able to forgive himself.
Being the good friends they are, the entire carpool gang accompanies Aubrey to Michelle’s school for moral support. Aubrey rushes to the front of the class when it’s his daughter’s turn and informs everyone he’s unemployed so she won’t have to embarrass herself. His hastiness and honesty are unnecessary, though, because Michelle has written a report about how she thinks his main job is being her dad and he’s the best at it.
When Aubrey returns to work three days later to pack up his belongings, Mr. Latero comes over and asks where he’s been. It turns out he was just showboating for his daughter and wasn’t really firing Aubrey. Mr. Latero claims he even winked at him to let him know it was just pretend. In response, a relieved Aubrey lies he was also just pretending when he said the vice president smells bad.
Elsewhere, Cindy fuels her car with Green Queen products, which apparently are strong enough to stand in for gas. And, Gracen and Leila attend Marmaduke’s graduation from college … in front of his computer in his room.
