Bazooka Steve (American Dad!)

Bazooka Steve is the 12th episode of the 12th season of American Dad! It was written by Joel Hurwitz, directed by Rodney Clouden, and first aired on May 29, 2017.

Plot
Steve becomes the town pariah of Langley Falls when he convinces Johnny Concussion, the quarterback of the Bazooka Sharks, to quit football.

Why It Sucks

 * 1) This episode is completely derivative of The Simpsons episode “The Boys Of Bummer” as it focuses on a town tormenting and bullying a young boy over making a sports team lose an important game.
 * 2) It is a Steve torture episode as he becomes ostracized, mocked, bullied, and tormented by the entire town of Langley falls to the point where he is forced to run away to an uncharted island all because he had caused the Bazooka Sharks to lose a championship game.
 * 3) The episode is also very hateful and mean-spirited as it portrays the bullying of Steve as completely justified.
 * 4) The townspeople are shown to be very selfish as they do not care that the reason why Steve convinced the quarterback Johnny Concussion to quit was because he was suffering too many concussions to the point where the concussions were killing him.
 * 5) When Steve tries to explain his actions on the radio, the radio host refuses to listen to him and instead falsely accuses him of possessing drugs and planning to use them on Johnny Concussion without consent without any evidence to back it up.
 * 6) Both Stan and Francine are very unlikable because they join the mob in bullying Steve, which can be considered child abuse since he is their own son.
 * 7) Francine is not only unlikable but she is at one of her absolute worst in this episode because she rats out Steve to the upset Bazooka Sharks fans, showing that she cares more about the them than her own son, whom she was shown to be overly nurturing towards in past episodes.
 * 8) It chooses to portray Steve as the one in the wrong because he disrupted the enjoyment of the adults during the weekend when they are all off from work.
 * 9) None of the townspeople, including Stan and Francine, are ever punished for tormenting Steve in this episode and they never apologize to him either.
 * 10) Terrible Ending: Steve realizes that he was wrong to encourage Johnny Concussion to quit and convinces him to come back to football and continue receiving concussions.
 * 11) This episode teaches a very awful moral: looking out for other people for their health is wrong.
 * 12) The subplot featuring Hayley and Roger is not much better, and feels forced and rushed. It just consists of Hayley paying off a thousand dollar debt to Roger by being a taxi driver.
 * 13) There is a distasteful joke about cannibalism in this episode where one of the concessions in the football arena includes ice cream made from the cremated ashes of dead football players.
 * 14) This episode tries to teach a good moral that interfering with public sports matches is wrong, it is very poorly executed as Steve interfered with the football match out of concern for Johnny Concussion’s health and well-being and Steve was excessively tormented throughout the episode for his interference.

The Only Redeeming Quality

 * 1) Steve, Hayley, and Jeff are still likable in this episode.

Reception
The episode received a 6.7 out of 10 on IMDb. However, some fans criticized it for being mean-spirited toward Steve and having a dull subplot.

Videos
qkSiwdfLkhg