TVSquad

Hank Hill is an extremely boring character. You can't blame Hank for that, though, as he was created to be the eye of the hurricane, the calm, reasonable center of it all. It's a credit to Mike Judge that he was able to take such a simple man and make him the focus of a show which has lasted ten years. While Family Guy is a natural extension of The Simpsons, King of the Hill has existed in its own "down home" world where the head of the household must maintain order and civility, not add to the damage. Both Homer Simpson and Peter Griffin are hilarious characters because they're spontaneous and free to pretty much do anything or have anything done to them. Hank, however, is ruled by an ethos that tells him to always do the right thing, or at least what he feels is right. Mike Judge created a series which showed just how difficult it can be to maintain that simple kind of life, and he made it both engaging and hysterical. When Judge created Beavis and Butthead neither those who loved it nor those who rallied against it seemed to really understand that it was a satire of our throw-away popular culture and not, as it appeared on the surface, a celebration of rudeness and decadence. King of the Hill gave Judge the chance to refine his point of view, and for those of us who have stuck with the series despite it never having the kind of push or choice timeslots shared by other animated fare, it still continues to impress. While the sun is no doubt setting on the series, I think as time passes people will realize that King of the Hill, despite being about country bumpkins living in a small Texas town, had much more to say than people realized.

In last night's episode Hank, Peggy and Bobby go on a nature walk to visit a rock formation which is shaped like a tea kettle (known as "the Tea Kettle"). Much to Hank's disgust, the Tea Kettle is covered in graffiti. Hank assumes others will be just as mad as he is and can't understand why the city manager doesn't send a fleet of men to the rock formation to clean it post haste. Hank decides to clean the rock himself and Peggy offers to cover the story for the newspaper.

As Peggy researches the history of the Tea Kettle she finds that several famous and historical people had visited the rock. Hank is thrilled that his beloved Tea Kettle has such a rich history, but it's soon revealed that those men weren't coming to see the Tea Kettle, but instead were visiting a brothel. It's further revealed that Arlen was once known as Harlottown, and that it was, in fact, founded by prostitutes. Peggy tells the city manager who begins to tout the rock and its ribald history as a tourist attraction, claiming that Salem, Massachusetts proved with the witch trials that celebrating a town's unfortunate past can result in huge tourist dollars. Arlen is even chosen to host the Adult Video Awards.

If there was any problem with last night's show it was that it seemed to wrap up a little too easily. Hank helps two porn stars fix a flat on their limo and they all agree that Arlen should not be so intently focused on its questionable past. Hank appears on stage at the awards and offers a final plea for preserving the "PG version" of the town, and everyone agrees and signs Hank's petition. It's a typical "impassioned speech changes everyone's mind instantly" ending which I think King of the Hill usually avoids. I'm not too concerned with such things though, as at this point I'm just sitting back and enjoying the show's last remaining days and knowing there will probably never be another one like it.