Recap: Gloria Moves Out as Country's Biggest Singer Arrives in Town in Season Five Premiere of "Big City Greens"

While one person escapes the Greens' basement in the season opener of Big City Greens, a special guest finds himself trapped there to usher in the fun of the hit series for a fifth season.

Gloria Green

As we launch into season five, it almost feels like we’re about to meet a significant new character as Gloria tells the rest of the family - and the audience - that she has date with Tyler. She was set up by the Kaitlins, and this has proven to be such a big deal that kids (who were going to go out to the country to see their mom) call Nancy and have her come to Big City instead. 

The family is excited, and Tyler (who sounds an awful lot like Dylan Sprouse) shows up to a borderline interrogation and questionable harassment from the entire Green clan. As Gloria shows up, ready for her date, Tyler points out how interesting her family is. She then goes on to explain that they aren’t really her family, and leads to a worsening chain of events that explains how she ended up living in their basement. Tyler gets so overwhelmed and frightened that he runs away and cancels their date. 

Then it hits Gloria. She needs her own place to live again. 

Enter our favorite realtors, Don & Dawn, who take her to a series of different neighborhoods throughout Big City to explore her different budgetary options. Spoiler: not all of them are great. But then, she finds a perfect apartment with two bedrooms that is within her budget. How is this place so nice and affordable? Well, its in a less desirable location because of the neighbors. Yes, that’s right. This is in the apartment building right next to the Greens house. But, that also makes it an easy walk to the cafe. Knowing she won’t find a better deal, has plenty of room for an art studio, and can have guests like Tyler come over, she signs the lease.

The family gathers together to congratulate Gloria on the big move, and to say a celebratory happy goodbye, Bill has made a video (in perhaps one of the best sequences in the entire series for anyone who uses video editing software) with pics from her socials and all the fun they have had together as a family. 

Gloria realizes, perhaps emotionally but a bit more disheartened, that every thing she has achieved has been through their help. She is Gloria Green. Now that she feels like she can’t be on her own, she has accepted her fate, and starts acting like a person from the country, making country breakfast and wearing a Cricket-esque outfit and sporting country hair. 

The adults are questioning her behavior, which becomes even more alarming by the time Nancy arrives. Of course, the kids think nothing of it until Cricket finds Gloria throwing her paintings away, along with all her art supplies and crumpling up the lease. Its only when they hear her pet parrot, Admiral Mustard, repeat Gloria’s true feelings that everything is revealed. To help, Nancy and Cricket devise a plan to get Gloria into the new apartment. 

When Gloria wakes up the next day, everything of hers is gone, and Cricket tells her that he turned in her lease application, enraging her. She then gives chase, and follows Cricket into the new apartment to discover all her stuff sitting there, looking right at home. 

Cricket reveals he didn’t actually turn in her lease (as that would be illegal) and that he and Nancy did this to have her see what life would be like on her own again. While Gloria wonders how she can make it work, considering the Greens have helped her nearly every step of the way, Cricket also reminds her that the Greens (namely him) are responsible for a lot of the setbacks she has had in life. 

Gloria decides to take the apartment after all, though it might be stretching her budget thin. So, despite all the worries about getting help from the Greens, she also accepts an offer from Nancy who offers to help with rent so she can use the other bedroom to stay in when visiting the kids. Gloria hands the paperwork over to Don & Dawn, happy they finally got this apartment off the market. She steps onto the balcony and is able to see Bill shouting back to see if the plan worked. Perhaps a sign of things to come this season. 

Also, peep the new intro for the show now, past this episode, featuring Gloria’s new apartment (replacing her basement moment). 

Daddy Ditty

It’s Farmer Appreciation Day in Big City, and it might be a bigger event than Bill’s birthday or even Father’s day. Point is, it’s a big deal, and the Greens are trying to figure out the best way to surprise him. To do so, Cricket, Tilly, and Alice have made a homemade card to reveal what they have done for the occasion. 

As they’re explaining this to Gloria (who is still moving the last of her belongings), Bill comes in very excited about an upcoming performance by his favorite country singer, Rusty Twang. He even casually drops a hint that he might want tickets to this concert as a gift for Farmer Appreciation Day. 

Gloria assumes that the family has gotten Bill his concert tickets, considering how bad he clearly wanted them. Alas, they did not. What they did get him was a big display of Bill-loons. 

We then cut to the balloon store (peep the homage to a Big City Greens episode director) where we see Cricket handling an Up-level amount of Balloons, all formed to look like the giant head of Bill Green. 

A gust of wind takes the balloons directly into the path of a big bus, blocking the view of the driver and causing him to crash into nearby power lines. The balloons break apart from their formation, ruining the gift and many head into the power lines, causing flashes of light and further explosions. 

However, out of the wreckage comes a country singer, and its Rusty Twang himself. The singer (who sounds an awful lot like Luke Combs) is wondering what happened as he steps off the bus, making sure nobody is hurt. That’s when Cricket gets the bright idea - they can have Rusty write Bill a song just for him. They offer to take them back to their house for some country hospitality while the bus gets repaired. From here, things go quite off the rails and the episode might have been better as a Halloween entry - but that’s coming later we think. 

As Rusty comes into the house, they are serving him up with great food and comforts while they pitch the idea of writing an original song for Bill. Turns out, songwriting isn’t as cut and dry as it seems and the family is waiting before Rusty is reminded that he has a concert to play - and more importantly - songwriting takes time. 

As Rusty goes to leave the house (in a hurry), Cricket, Tilly, and Gramma resort to pulling him back into the house and locking him in the basement. The only witness to this, new neighbor Gloria, has her headphones on after Bill introduced her to Rusty’s music and can’t hear the ruckus being made down below. Inside, Gramma has locked the door to the basement, with the idea that not only will this allow time to write the song for Bill, but then Rusty will thank them later after the song becomes a huge hit. 

After falling down the stairs, Rusty awakens in the basement and sees the horrific farming equipment and Glorias painted handprints turning the whole situation into a nightmare for someone who doesn’t know the Greens. 

Rusty asks for some writing supplies, clearly asking for equipment to help him make an escape. Instead of looking for something to break a door down or anything like that, he makes an emergency transmitter. Fortunately, Officer Keys has proven to be a big fan of Rusty, and when the singer didn’t show up at the venue as expected, he is on the case looking for the missing singer. 

Rusty is trying to transmit an emergency message, but is interrupted by Cricket and the family as they ask for a progress update regarding the new song. They want to hear what he has so far, so the singer improvs some fun lyrics that are actually a call for help. Fortunately, Officer Keys hears the transmission, and is enjoying the tune until he realizes it might be a real call for help. Especially considering that Rusty is giving a full description of the location where he can be found. 

Keys is pounding on the door, and Bill returns home from his day out, knowing something is afoot now. While Keys looks for Rusty in the basement, there is nothing to be found except a noisy water heater. As such, the officer leaves to continue looking for the singer. Bill, however, knows something is wrong. He knows the problems and noises the water heater has, and the noise it is currently making is not one of those normal noises. Bill investigates, and finds himself face to face with Rusty Twang duct taped to the backside of the water heater. 

As the kids and Gramma explain themselves, Bill is flattered but still knows this is wrong and vows to help the singer get out. As such, the rest of the family has now locked Bill in the basement with him. Bill knows the house though, and some of its weak points - like a termite riddled floor. He baits the rest of the family into the weak spot of the floor, trapping them and watching them wrangle their way out with Gramma’s key shaking loose, allowing them to escape. 

Rusty makes his show - despite Big City thinking he is dead - where he debuts a new song about what has proven to be the worst day of his life. We the audience get to hear the new ditty, about how you should steer clear of the Greens when in Big City. The whole episode is great, but the song is the icing on the cake that it all leads up to. 

You can see the first episode of the fifth season of Big City Greens now on Disney+, Disney Channel, and even Disney Channel YouTube.