Summary
“Whacking the Mole” sees Abishola come to terms with her feelings for Bob, as his company becomes woke.
This recap of Bob Hearts Abishola Season 1, Episode 5, “Whacking the Mole”, contains spoilers. You can check out our thoughts on the previous episode by clicking these words.
Bob Hearts Abishola Episode 5 opens with Bob (Billy Gardell) and Abishola (Folake Olowofoyeku) sat on their usual bench, discussing their families. Abishola has many siblings and her father has three wives — a concept which fascinates Bob, who wonders if they all crush his spirit at once or if they take turns (ha!). Soon, Abishola declares she no longer wants to talk about family, or about anything, and kisses Bob. It was all a dream!
Abishola wakes up on the bus with Kemi (Gina Yashere), sweating. Kemi asks her about the dream. Was it sexual? She assumes so. PG, R or X-rated? No answers are forthcoming.
At home, Abishola is still a bit frosty with Auntie Olu (Shola Adewusi) and Uncle Tunde (Barry Shabaka Henley), and is short with Dele (Travis Wolfe Jr.), who gets a major telling off for playing a game on his laptop after finishing his homework. It isn’t until the rant is over that he reveals what game he was playing: Chess. She tells him to carry on, but he has to win.
Abishola has another dream about Bob in “Whacking the Mole”, this time set it in the shower. She wakes up suddenly. At work, she discusses the dreams with Kemi and Gloria (Vernée Watson), admitting that they have been about Bob. While she insists she isn’t interested in Bob in that way and has no time for romantic nonsense, Gloria insists that a part of her must be interested, or she wouldn’t be having the dreams. Abishola suggests avoiding him, which prompts Gloria to explain the concept of whack-a-mole: He’ll just keep popping up.
Meanwhile in Bob Hearts Abishola Episode 5, Douglas (Matt Jones) and Christina (Maribeth Monroe) are pitching an apologetic ad campaign to show the compression sock industry that they’re woke, and feel guilty about their whiteness. The proposed slogans are simply, “We’re sorry,” and the catchier, “Compression good, oppression bad.” Bob rightly thinks both — and the entire idea — is ridiculous. Luckily Abishola calls, but unluckily she says she won’t be able to see him again for quite a while.
While catching the bus the next day, Abishola slips on ice and hurts her back. She’s still having troubling sleeping. Kemi suggests she sees someone who knows about these things, and in the best gag of “Whacking the Mole”, Abishola writes off psychiatrists as “American nonsense” while showing a lot of interest in Kemi’s idea of a psychic.
A small, easily-missed detail at the hospital is that Abishola saves up her paid sick days and takes the money at the end of the year to pay off her student loans. However, she’s too sick and contagious to be at work at the moment, so Gloria sends her home, where Olu and Tunde question why she allowed her to. That night, she once again dreams of Bob, this time imagining playing whack-a-mole with his head.
Douglas and Christina bring in Goodwin (Bayo Akinfemi) and Kofo (Anthony Okungbowa) for a meeting, asking them to help them feel less guilty. Goodwin mentions that in his whole time at the company, every supervisor he has had has been white. When Bob asks Dottie (Christine Ebersole) why this is, she says his father had very specific preferences when it came to management. In short: He was a racist. Abishola arrives out of the blue and tells Bob — on the recommendation of her psychic — that she does, in fact, want to see him again. He gives her a ride home while Douglas, after seeing her for the first time, quips, “I’m glad dad’s dead.”
Bob Hearts Abishola Season 1, Episode 5 ends with Douglas and Christina presenting Bob a promotional video, first of apologizing animated socks, then of Goodwin and Kofo, both wearing “supervisor” t-shirts, insisting that the company feels like family, as Dottie looks on from between them like a hostage. Not that anyone asked me, but I don’t think it’ll play well.
