I'm reviewing The Taunting Hour because it is an episode that did something very wrong and disgusting. This episode came out back in March 2022, and after seeing it when it came out, I knew this was easily a top 10 worst episode of the show. The word I could use to describe this episode is: ATROCIOUS. There were no positives to this episode at all. The concept seemed good but it just did not work at all here. Before this episode, we hadn't gotten a bad episode on this scale since October 2019, but this episode broke that streak of no bad episodes on this level. So, let's get into this.
The episode begins with Lynn at a soccer game against Beaverton with the rest of the family cheering her on, but Chandler purposely blocks Lincoln from seeing the game. Now, Chandler is the least of this episode's problems. As we know, he is just a school bully and that's his nature.
The game continues and things appear to be going fine. But then, Scoots comes in and starts to heckle Lynn in the middle of her game saying that Lynn has emu legs. It then gets into her head causing her to miss the goal. Eventually, all of Scoots' comments get the better of her and she freezes in place and it ends with Beaverton scoring a game winning goal and Scoots laughing at Lynn
We then go to the house where Lynn is very angry and goes to her room. She then starts rage lifting 60 pounders. Lincoln then tries to help Lynn with her problem. After all, he's the man with the plan right? Well, it eventually this plan backfires later on without his knowledge. We will get to that part later.
Lincoln shows Lynn that she is not the only one in the family to have a hater. He starts by showing Lynn a video of Lola at a pageant doing her ribbon dance but one of the judges says it's the same thing from a previous pageant. What the judge says is 100% constructive criticism given how many times in the series we see Lola do the exact same ribbon dance throughout the series.
He then tells her that others in the family have haters. So first, they go to Luna's concert at the Burnt Bean and the manager says they sound worse than her grandma's piccolo band. Lynn then makes a note about that. Then, the two go over to the restaurant where Mr. Grouse gets a meal that he says tastes bad and that Lynn Sr. should stick to lasagna. Third, they then go to Rita's office where they find a bin with letters to the editor for the writing column.
One of the letters reads: Dear Rita, your advice stinks. Lynn opens one of them and lots of hate emojis blast at her. They leave and go back to the house and go onto the computer looking at mean comments on Luan's comedy blog. Finally, they go to one of Lisa's science presentations with Todd, her robot. One of the scientists says that he sick of seeing Todd so many times and that it's embarrassing with his colleague agreeing.
Then, we go back to the house that evening at the dinner table where Lynn is feeling better. She thanks Lincoln for helping her see that she should not make a big deal about having a hater. She and Lincoln reveal to Lola, Luna, Luan, Lynn Sr., Rita, and Lisa the nasty things their haters say without them knowing. This then causes them to sulk and feel sad. Keep in mind that both Lincoln AND Lynn are involved in telling them about their haters. This is a major red flag here because of what happens the next night and who gets blamed.
Anyways, this causes the criticized Louds to have nightmares and they can't sleep. The next day, they try to make it past the day. Unfortunately, they end up having a terrible day when they were thinking about what their haters say behind their backs.
This includes Lola being unable to perform her ribbon dance at a pageant believing the judges will think her performance is boring, Luna being unable to deliver jokes on a livestream thinking about all the mean comments she got, Lynn Sr. freaking out by imagining Mr. Grouse saying his food is terrible and even freaking out when he actually sees Mr. Grouse, Luna imagining Chunk is the Burnt Bean manager asking her why she even bothered hiring her, Rita imagining receiving many hate letters from people telling her that her advice ruined their lives, and finally Lisa freezing in fear when she thinks that all the scientists will criticize her for using Todd in her presentation.
Then, we cut to the house that night with Lincoln watching a movie on the TV, and this is where everything comes crashing down. The criticized Louds burst through the front door extremely angry at him. They question him why he told them about their haters and that they were all freezing up. He told them that he only told them because he wanted to help Lynn feel better. Oh but it gets worse. At that moment, Lynn punches through the door also extremely angry at him. She says that his trick to help her did not work as Scoots harassed her more at the mall food court and she says she got emu legs again.
Lincoln then questions why they're paying attention to their haters saying that it doesn't matter what they say. Then Luan uses Mr. Coconuts to accuse him by saying that he doesn't have to deal with it. Finally, the worst part about this scene is where Lola yells "YOU JUST GO AROUND RUINING LIVES!!" at Lincoln and everyone else calling him a life ruiner, EVEN THE PARENTS!! At this point, I lost it. This was the point where this episode broke me.
Remember how I said that both Lincoln AND Lynn were both involved in telling them about their haters? Well, they decide to pin the blame entirely on him! ARE YOU KIDDING ME?!?! Lynn was just as involved! Also, Lincoln was not trying to deliberately piss them off. He didn't know that they would lash out entirely at him afterwards! They only take their anger out on Lincoln, but Lynn gets away with it?! It does not make any sense!
The next day, Lincoln has no choice but to tell them about his hater just to get back on their good side, and let me just say, the ending is absolutely DISGUSTING. He shows the videos of many instances of Chandler heckling him. He makes the point that Chandler's comments hurt him at first but that ignoring him began to make it easier for him.
The rest of the Louds just decide to take his advice and they don't really learn their lesson. It all comes to a sad end with Mr. Grouse coming in and Lynn Sr. blocking him out thinking that he was there to hate on his food again. But Mr. Grouse was actually trying to tell him that he forgot to put the parking brake on vanzilla. This results in vanzilla rolling backwards and Lynn Sr. chasing it down, and that's the episode.
I don't even know where to begin with this. All I can say is that this episode broke me. I couldn't find anything good about this episode. All of the characters involved minus Lincoln were very unlikeable. All Lincoln did was try to help Lynn with her problem and he didn't know what would happen.
He was not trying to deliberately make them angry. He was just trying to help someone.
The way this could've worked is that if Lincoln and the rest of the Louds that have haters pitched in to help Lynn, it could've been better. But nope, this is what we got instead. Also, Luan being involved in this episode was very questionable. Remember Head Poet's Anxiety? Well, this episode basically took that episode and threw it in the garbage. Also, Luna? Really? One of Lincoln's nicer sisters was involved in this as well? It just blew my mind.
The part where everyone lashes out at Lincoln and the ending are just unwatchable. Why is the ending so bad? Well, the fact that they don't apologize to Lincoln for what they did to him the previous night is absolutely DISGUSTING. They has absolutely NO right to take their anger out on him. It was even worse because even the parents were in on it the whole time. This is where it gets very personal for me.
As someone who grew up with a very angry mom that would target me for very stupid reasons, this is why the episode broke me. The part where even the parents call Lincoln a life ruiner really hit me close to home. That's why it angered me to the max. Then again, it would anger anyone. Now, let's get into the characters involved.
Lisa, Lola, and Luan make my bottom 3 on my rankings of the Loud siblings. It honestly doesn't surprise me that they were involved. I was just so shocked at Luna's involvement. She's supposed to be one of the nicer sisters. The parents' involvement, I already talked about. I hated them all in this episode. And finally, the main focus of the episode. Lynn.
Lynn has been in my top 3 of my rankings ever since Singled Out and Hurl Interrupted. Normally with a character I love, I could never hate them. The worst I could be towards them if the do something bad is that I would just be disappointed, but, I'm gonna say it. I absolutely HATED her in this episode. The fact that she was involved in telling the rest of the criticized Louds about their haters and that she got away with it is just unacceptable.
There's a fanfiction of this episode on DeviantArt where Lincoln stands up for himself and retaliates. He rages at them, calls them out for all the bad things they do, and leaves the house, along with Leni, Lucy, Lana, and Lily putting the criticizes Louds in their place for what they did to Lincoln. I'd honestly recommend you read that than watch the episode. It's 10x better.
I just cannot believe that Andrew Brooks thought that this was a good idea. What he wrote in this episode is very disgusting. Look, before this, I had high hopes for him. He wrote great episodes like Strife of the Party, and Much Ado about Noshing. I had a lot of respect for him at first, but now, he is one of my most hated writers on the show, much like Sammie Crowley and Whitney Wetta. He should not be allowed to touch Lynn ever again.
This episode was at first a top 10 worst episode of the show, but given my personal experience with an angry parent, this is instead top 5. It currently sits at number 4 on my list. I was going to give it a 2.6/10 because of the concept, but the concept just flat out did not work at all here. This episode was just a complete nightmare.
Final Score: 1.6/10
