Cricket holds all the power in Smalton while Gloria loses all hers at the Gloria + Green Cafe when she hires her friends in this week’s episode of Big City Greens.
Handshaken
We’re back in Smalton for this half of the episode and Remy is along for the ride with the Greens as they go to the local Seed & Feed. Remy is trying out his new country persona (which is a little over the top) while the family runs into Good ole’ Joe.
They are looking for a specific type of feed for their farm animals when they encounter Joshua and his gang. Joshua (not Josh) has the strongest grip in town and strikes fear throughout the town. In the country, the person with the strongest handshake commands the most respect, and Joshua has all the power with his strong grip.
Nobody wants to shake his hand, not even Bill or Joe. Cricket doesn’t see the problem and shakes Joshua’s hand, instantly getting his hand crushed and ridiculed, being called a wet towel in front of the crowd.
Cricket sets out to increase his hand strength and come back and take down Joshua, but back at home, he can’t even crush a can of Splish.
There has got to be some way to figure out a way to increase his grip strength, and he starts to explore options. One of which is greeting Butterscotch, the Green’s new horse from last season and brushing her mane. However, Butterscotch’s mane is quite knotted, and as Cricket brushes, it inflicts pain upon the poor horse, who rears back as Cricket brushes and launches him into the upper rafters of the barn.
Nobody is aware that he is in the barn, literally holding onto a lone rope with his right hand and hanging high above. He isn’t discovered until much later in the day by Tilly and Remy, and when he is rescued, discovers that his hand is much stronger now after holding on to the rope, fully able to crush cans and maybe even Joshua’s hand too.
Now, it’s time to head back to the Seed & Feed and find him.
They do, and Cricket quickly shakes and crushes the hands of the rest of Joshua’s gang before quickly gripping and crushes Joshua’s hand, knocking him down and taking his hat.
Now Cricket feels like he has all the power and quickly makes his way through the rest of the town, establishing himself as the strongest handshake in Smalton. Pretty soon, everyone in town fears him and as he walks the streets, until it comes down to one man to stop his reign of terror.
Bill Green.
Knowing his son can’t be the reason for the fear in town, Bill takes on Cricket and reminds him that he has been working with his hands his whole life, and shakes his son's hand into submission. Defeated, Cricket has to give Joshua his hat back (it is personal property after all) and the town can rest easy, knowing the strongest handshake in town is a handshake of righteousness and not power hungry evil.
Coffee Mates
At the Gloria + Green Cafe, Gloria feels like she can’t have a social life after video calling her friends, the Kristens, while working. After all, she spends all her time at the cafe and is afraid to leave. She only has Cricket and silent partner Gramma for help. Gramma suggests that the Cafe is doing fine and she can afford to hire reliable help so that Gloria can leave and have fun every once in a while.
After a bit of thinking, Gloria has a thought that would allow her to have a social life AND stay and watch the cafe – she can hire all of her friends.
Once they show up though, not much work is getting done and Cricket is feeling the brunt of the shift, unable to handle all the customers on his own while Gloria tries to spend time with her friends instead of having them all work.
Next door, Tilly is questioning her youth since she found a gray hair, and is dealing with her own mid-life crisis, though I think it's more of a 1/10 th of a life crisis. She is playing nostalgic with her old children's toys and even heading to the local playground to play with younger kids to hold on to her youth.
At the cafe, the Kristens are more concerned with their dating profiles online and an impromptu photo shoot begins, again leaving Cricket to handle everything. At a point, the girls decide they want to leave and head to a cat cafe, especially since the cafe doesn’t have a great vibe. This gives Gloria the idea to turn the cafe into a cat cafe, getting Cricket to wrangle all the cats. This goes about as well as you think it would, and customers and Cricket get attacked by the cats. This leads Cricket to a walkout, going on strike with a sign he has had prepared since the day that he got hired. This leads the girls to figure out the coffee machine on their own, grinding the beans and one of their bracelets into a machine causing it to explode. This causes the Kristens themselves to quit and Gloria back to being on her own, but a few words from Cricket inspires Gloria to actually hire reliable and responsible help.
At the end of the episode, we are introduced to Jade, a new shift manager, and it looks like she might be around for a bit.
This episode of Big City Greens is now available on Disney Channel and the DisneyNOW app. You can also catch up with earlier episodes streaming now on Disney+.