Modern Family returns from its three week break, bringing us into the final stretch of the season.

The episode begins with Jay feeling somewhat crestfallen at a recent picture for his Costco card, but is still willing to bet that his night on Cam’s bowling team will last longer than Gloria and Mitch’s night out with Haley.

Just before the bowling tournament starts, Cam informs Jay that it is an all-gay league, and therefore in order to not be disqualified, Jay needed to pretend to be gay too. At first Cam tells Jay not to worry, he’s gay enough, but Cam’s newest rival and captain of the opposing team Martin (Oliver Platt) is on to them, so Jay is advised to ‘flounce it up’. When this doesn’t work, Cam tells Martin that Jay was only acting weird because he has a crush on him, but when Jay inevitably finds out, rather than get offended, he commends Cam on his competitive streak.

As tensions began to heighten, Martin stutters his way to asking Jay out, but he tactfully turns him down, which in turn knocks Martin off his game, meaning Cam’s team, Britney Spares, won the trophy. Just as Cam was celebrating, Jay feels guilty about Martin, and admits he isn’t actually gay, getting Cam’s team disqualified, leaving Martin’s team, The Merry Men, to win by default.

Mitch’s night was off to a great start; he and Gloria were prepared to prove Cam and Jay wrong, that is until Haley arrived. She informed them that the doors of the club do not even open for another hour, and she will be meeting her friends outside at 10:30 pm, ready for the band which goes on at midnight. To Mitch and Gloria this seems like an awfully long night, and despite the pair persuading each other they had to do this to prove they were not old yet, they were in the club for all of about 10 seconds before bailing.

The rest of the Dunphy family are busy with a highly inappropriate marble statue called ‘Marble Wood’ on one of their neighbouring houses, which brings Claire and Phil together with their old troublesome neighbours Ronnie (Steve Zahn) and Amber (Andrea Anders). The four all have dinner together and all is well until Claire and Phil refuse to tow away the statue, but Phil accidentally runs it over and then manages to talk them out of getting found out.

This episode captures some of the humour from some of the earlier seasons, and none of the storylines lacked that, here’s hoping to more like that!

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