1001 Animations: Dia-Bill-ic Shock

Show: King of the Hill
Episode: S13 E1
Year: 2008

Writer(s): Sanjay Shah


For all the crap I give King of the Hill, I actually do love the show. It's one of the very few adult cartoons that actually feel real to me, like I can actually imagine meeting these characters in real life. On some level, I can really see a little bit of myself in some of these guys, for better or worse. For the record, I mostly click with Bobby and Dale, but Bill has his charms as well. A lot of Bill's episodes tend to go deeper into his past and his own emotions, when they aren't making fun of his crippling loneliness and depression at least. The world has really messed this guy up hardcore: Bill is largely a representation of a lot of us who've failed to live up to our own potential and hit rock bottom, having been left unable to deal with our failures. From his harsh upbringing to his ugly divorce with Lenore, William Fontaine Delatour Dauterive is pretty a better representation of social anxiety and fear of failure than even Fluttershy of MLP: Friendship Is Magic.

 

One of my fears is ending up like my father: old, short-tempered and diabetic, and the diabetes is a realistic fear for me. I mean, you've seen me: I'm HUGE! I can really connect with Bill here when it turns out too much junk food can have serious adverse health effects, like early adult onset diabetes. No, I'm not diabetic, but if you've seen my body, I'm a candidate for it. I have Asperger's syndrome; when you have Asperger’s, you're more sensitive to certain things than most people, and besides sound I'm very sensitive to taste. My diet consists of pizza, Coca-Cola, peanut butter sandwiches, the occasional apple and banana, chips, ice cream (sugar free) and McDonalds food. I take a multivitamin to try and get the nutrients if I can remember it, of course, and I am still in largely good condition despite my weight at age 25; I do fear for the future sometimes like Bill here. I'm afraid THAT is what I'm going to end up like later in life! Either that or some fatass who "washes himself with a rag on a stick"*, but, of course, getting healthy is really hard.

 

I'm no expert, but I do know diabetes is like a chemical imbalance in the pancreas, I guess, where it doesn't produce insulin properly, and it fucks you up inside because of stuff. I don’t know, I forgot what Satan told me! I do know that it's easy to manage compared to like cancer and stuff, but some people are very hard to really change for the betterment of themselves, and if you're like me, you'll know changing your diet is like impossible by now! I mean, Bill's blood sugar spiking twice in a week? If that were me, yeah, this shit would kill me quickly if I had it; that I am pretty sure of. And yeah, there really are some doctors that don't give a shit about you because they believe you can't change even with all the advice they give you; they're brutal towards you, truth or not! Still, Dr. Weismann is in the wrong for scaring Bill like that: he told him he'd lose his legs, so why not have Bill in a wheelchair?

 

Now, I know right from the start before the reveal Bill isn't actually crippled, but his confidence might as well be! Dr. Weismann made him feel lower than garbage, Bill felt truly worthless when he was told that he "would" lose his legs if he doesn't shape up! He isn't in this wheelchair as a test-drive to see what it would be like, he's truly given up and is just waiting for his legs to stop working and then die! At least until he meets a man that shows him that just because you can't walk, it doesn't mean you're less of a person and you shouldn't just lay down and die! That man? Is Sam a.k.a. "Thunder"! He's definitely one of the most upbeat and proactive disabled characters I've seen in animation, I mean we've had examples like Jimmy Valmer of South Park who don't let their disabilities get them down, but in Bill's own words, he "makes walking seem lame." It helps the guy stays in great shape with a pimped out chair and a rugby team! Actually, this is how I learned of wheelchair rugby, and rugby in general!

 

On the outside, "Thunder" seems like a bad influence that's just going to drop Bill because he can take advantage of him and can come off as a muscle bound asshole. I assure you that's not the case. In a way, this guy is Bill's personal trainer who helps him really see the bright side of life from a different perspective. He manages to make Bill confident, happy and realize that diabetes or not, he shouldn't just throw his life away! Of course, he eventually learns Bill was never really wheelchair bound, and both he and the guys are realistically pissed off at him, and yeah, I'd be angry too and probably assume he was faking for sympathy, especially after Hank and the guys remodeled his house! There's also this subplot with Bobby learning to eat vegetable foods since Peggy goes health crazy; it's alright, I guess. I mean, I'd NEVER drink that wheatgrass shit, I will DIE before I give up coke!

 

Bill gets so depressed, he honestly tries to reignite his diabetes and kill himself with sugar! Let me just say diabetic suicide is one of the slowest and most painful ways to go; don't do it, please don't do it! Yeah, Bill could walk the whole time and basically forgot about that part, but it's thanks to "Thunder" he got control of his diabetes and gained confidence! In that wheelchair, he was an inspiration, but he's still inspiring since he, again, cured his diabetes! He beat the big D, and it's "Thunder" who reminds him of that. And the end where he just beats the shit out of Dr. Weismann makes it all come together perfectly.

*The Simpsons’ episode "King Size Homer"

King of the Hill is owned by Fox.

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