M.O.D.O.K.’s son Lou is causing issues in the planning of his Bar-Mitzvah due to his own unique tastes, leading Jodie to beg her estranged husband to ‘normalise’ their son – something which doesn’t prove easy.

M.O.D.O.K.’s problems are of the more domestic variety this week, as Jodie begs for him to do something to make their son Lou more normal, after his rather unconventional ideas for his Bar-Mitzvah. Top of the list of things to do away with is his obsession with magic, something which M.O.D.O.K. decides needs to be done. Unfortunately, when he takes his eye off his son for a second, Lou jumps through M.O.D.O.K.’s portal to Asgard (don’t you hate it when that happens?) and things get weird real fast.

Aside from the fun aspect of the portal itself (kept by M.O.D.O.K. to literally dump things on the Asgardians from great heights for giggles) this is an opportunity for the writers to really up the ante on the bizarre. From marauding giant squirrels to goats of various types (flying, fainting and screaming) it never misses an opportunity to make a silly joke out of something. And then there’s the war.

Through a sequence of events, M.O.D.O.K. and his son end up on opposite sides of a war between Asgardians and Kobolds, which is mostly presented to the viewer as a series of black and white scenes with a voiceover of combatants of both sides writing letters home from the front, Civil War-style. The conflict seems like it will never end, and then it does, in the most M.O.D.O.K. way possible, as father and son experience a genuine bonding moment.

But real life is seldom as simple as that, and before the credits roll it’s clear that M.O.D.O.K. has some real work to do to reach his son and help him separate fantasy from reality. It’s a slightly weird, low-key ending given it’s not really the message you think the episode is shooting for, for the most part, but there’s no denying it’s one of those moments where the show transcends its general impression as crass, juvenile humour and hits some serious feelings.

Verdict: An interesting exploration of the complexities of father/son relationships, told through the prism of the usual M.O.D.O.K. lunacy. 9/10

Greg D. Smith