The Last Halloween is the fifth episode from Season 11 of Modern Family. It aired on October 30, 2019.
Plot Summary[]
Phil is determined to finally scare Claire on Halloween. Meanwhile, for the first time, Gloria is feeling self-conscious about her age when someone correctly assumes she is Jay's wife; and Mitch and Cam head to the WeHo Halloween Carnival after Lily decides to go to her first Halloween party alone.[1]
Episode Description[]
Halloween has rolled around again, and Phil is determined to scare Claire. However his axe in the chest fails to work. The two decide to see a movie, but Phil is scared as The Texas Chainsaw Massacre re-release was sold out so they end up going to a new Japanese movie and he doesn't know where the jump scares are. On their way home from the cinema the two pass a house that Phil has been scared of for the past year due to the mysterious occupant. Claire wants to prove to Phil that there is no reason to be scared of a haunted house. But because Phil considers himself as a wuss, Claire goes alone and and approaches the occupant... who turns out to be a skeleton. She turns around to find an old woman holding an axe behind her, leaving her terrified. It's then revealed the whole thing was a long-standing set-up by Phil who used an empty house to finally scare his wife. Claire is very impressed.
Alex and Luke meet with their partners in a restaurant, but it turns out that when in Antartica Alex accidentally send naked pictures of herself to Bill's creepy colleague due to a phone number mix-up and Bill breaks up with her. As for Luke, he reveals that several years ago, he pranked a house which turned out to be Janice's and she also breaks-up with him, leaving both sister and brother for advice time.
As for Mitch and Cam, they feel that it's the good time for judging a festival, but they realize that Lily was at a party without an adult. When they fail to find her at the house, they come home and learn that she actually came home before them because of a boy who used her as a way to seduce one of her friends. They talk it out with her and comfort her.
And, Jay has wanted to show to Joe some artisanal chocolate bars, but Manny accidentally gave it to children who were trick and treaters. So, they spend the night to search it but find it empty, leaving time for a discussion between two men.
They finally manage to find Gloria, who during the whole episode, was concerned because of fear of ageing and accidentally won the Drag Queen Contest.
Main Cast[]
(The characters struck out do not appear in this episode)
- Jay Pritchett
- Gloria Pritchett
- Manny Delgado
Joe Pritchett- Claire Dunphy
- Phil Dunphy
Haley Dunphy (Haley Marshall)- Alex Dunphy
- Luke Dunphy
- Mitchell Pritchett
- Cameron Tucker
- Lily Tucker-Pritchett
Dylan Marshall
Guest Starring[]
- Jimmy Tatro as Bill
- Amy Pietz as Janice
- Andy Walken as Deadpool
- Kelly Mantle as Drag Queen
- Kelly Hawthorne as Denise
- Michael Marc Friedman as Norm
- Clint McRay as Boy Scout
- Johnno Wilson as Zombie
- Alex Perez as Waiter
- Allen Hooper as Joseph
- Jeff Greenberg as Bernard
Trivia/Goofs[]
- Haley, Dylan and Joe do not appear in this episode, making it the second halloween episode without Haley beside Open House of Horrors, the only other halloween episode without Joe since his introduction played by Maguire after Good Grief and the second episode in a row not to feature Dylan since Reid joined the main cast.
- However, Joe is mentioned by Manny and Jay.
- Lily should not have an Instagram account as you have to be 13 to have one.
- Both Gloria and Lily have Instagram.
- Alex and Luke are the only children to appear in every Halloween episode, counting also Halloween which was an episode made before Aubrey's arrival. And Luke is the only child to appear in every episode in which his parents run.
- Alex and Luke break-up with their boyfriend/girlfriend.
Continuity[]
- The seventh and final Halloween episode, after "Halloween" (2010), "Open House of Horrors" (2012), "Halloween 3: AwesomeLand" (2014), "Halloween 4: The Revenge of Rod Skyhook" (2016), "It's the Great Pumpkin, Phil Dunphy" (2017) and "Good Grief" (2018). In this latter episode, Jay was also obsessed by food.
- Also, with this episode, there have been at least one new episode broadcasted between September 21st and November 4th.
- September 21st : Dude Ranch, When Good Kids Go Bad and A Tale of Three Cities
- September 22nd : The Old Wagon
- September 23rd : Pilot and Summer Lovin
- September 24th : The Long Honeymoon
- September 25th : Suddenly, Last Summer, First Days and New Kids On The Block
- September 26th : Bringing Up Baby and I Love a Parade
- September 27th : Lake Life
- September 28th : Phil on Wire and A Stereotypical Day
- September 29th : The Kiss
- September 30th : The Bicycle Thief and The Day Alex Left for College
- October 1st : Do Not Push
- October 2nd : Larry's Wife and Snapped
- October 3rd : Kiss and Tell
- October 4th : The Long Goodbye
- October 5th : Door to Door and Blindsided
- October 6th : Earthquake
- October 7th : Come Fly with Me and The Closet Case
- October 8th : The Cold
- October 9th : Farm Strong and Perfect Pairs
- October 10th : Schooled, Snip and A Sketchy Area
- October 11th : Catch of the Day
- October 12th : Hit and Run
- October 13th : Strangers on a Treadmill
- October 14th : The Incident and She Crazy
- October 15th : Marco Polo
- October 16th : The Late Show and Pool Party
- October 17th : The Butler's Escape and Torn Between Two Lovers
- October 18th : Sex, Lies & Kickball
- October 19th : Go Bullfrogs!
- October 20th : Unplugged
- October 21st : Coal Digger and The Verdict
- October 22nd : Won't You Be Our Neighbor
- October 23rd : The Help
- October 24th : Open House of Horrors and Good Grief
- October 25th : It's the Great Pumpkin, Phil Dunphy
- October 26th : Halloween 4: The Revenge of Rod Skyhook
- October 27th : Halloween
- October 28th : Run for Your Wife
- October 29th : Halloween 3: AwesomeLand
- October 30th : This episode
- October 31st : Yard Sale and On the Same Paige
- November 1st : Ten Years Later
- November 2nd : Treehouse
- November 3rd : Chirp
- November 4th : En Garde
- Seasons 1, 3, 5 and 7 are the only seasons without any Halloween episode.
- Bill's sixth appearance after Royal Visit, We Need to Talk about Lily, Can't Elope, Stand By Your Man and Good Grief, the latter also being an Halloween episode, this marks the second themed episode in which he appears.
- Janice's third appearance after Yes-Woman and Snapped although she is mentioned in Perfect Pairs.
- Bill and Janice break-up with Alex and Luke. Alex previously broke-up with Ben in another Halloween episode , It's the Great Pumpkin, Phil Dunphy also in a restaurant and also an episode in which one of Gloria's sons was missed. Luke also was in a restaurant with a girl he was supposed to like in Written in the Stars.
- Claire and Phil went also to the cinema in Our Children, Ourselves.
- Phil also wears for the second time a lady disguise after Spring-a-Ding-Fling.
- Gloria wore glasses on Farm Strong
- Claire and Phil run also on Run for Your Wife and CHiPs and Salsa.
- Claire does laundry in Do It Yourself.
- Yes-Woman also featured a character named Denise, although it was off screen, it was Janice's daughter who seems tho have been removed from the show.
- It has been said that Claire was very brave, however in The Feud, Alex, Haley, Cameron and Lily managed to scare her.
- The Bicycle Thief,Slow Down Your Neighbors, Won't You Be Our Neighbor,Halloween 3: AwesomeLand and The Big Guns were also episodes in which Phil and Claire compete against neighbors.
- Luke distrusts Bill in this episode but trusted him in Royal Visit and distrusted Alex in Under Pressure.
- Luke and Alex give advice to one another, Alex helped Luke in Fight or Flight and he stayed with her in The Closet Case.
- This is the third episode in which a classical music is played after Sleeper and A Year of Birthdays the former also had a ragtime.
- Bill and Janice appear for the last time.
Cultural References[]
- Gloria is dressed as Elsa from Frozen.
- Mitch, Cam and Lily are dressed as witches.
- Cam dresses as a judge with Dorothy's (Judy Garland) ruby slippers, a reference to Judge Judy.
- Manny is dressed as Sigmund Freud
- Phil is dressed as Norm's mother from Psycho.
- When Phil and Claire go to the house, "The Entertainer" from Scott Joplin is played at piano.
- Cam owns a lot of Anita Baker records.
- Judith Light is at the party, as are several Martha Stewarts and Dog the Bounty Hunters.
- The Japanese baby horror movie could be based on Ju-On: The Grudge.
Reviews[]
- The A.V. Club gave it a "B+"
