User reviews

Three very familiar faces from classic-era TV and/or movies guest starred in this episode: Richard Deacon, Pat Harrington Jr., and Jane Withers.

The title to this episode refers to Deacon's character, "Borden T. Pike," who is manager of the city gas company which is determined to run a pipeline through the neighborhood, which includes underneath the Munsters house. Withers plays "Fanny," Deacon's jealous wife.

After frazzled employees come back to Deacon's office explaining they saw monsters, while accidentally digging into the Munsters basement, Pike goes to look for himself, determined not to be taken in. Thus, when he sees the Munster family he figures it's all a ruse so he's not scared or intimidated.....until Grandpa turn into a bat. Then Pike splits, in a hurry.

The next scenes are the best as Pike has his insanely jealous wife meet a couple of the Munsters and Grandpa gives the utility guy a hard time. There are some very funny lines in here, such as near the end when Pike's boss tell him, "Men like you give gas a bad name!"

In the end, pun intended, things work out to everyone's satisfaction, including Pike's marriage. "After meeting you," Pike writes to Herman, "my wife and I have never looked so good to each other."

This episode works extremely well because it remains so focused on its plot, characters, and the basics of the Munsters' interaction with the outside world.

The city needs to put a new gas pipeline beneath suburban homes, including the home of the Munsters. They figure that 25 feet below ground should be more than sufficient, but little do they expect that they Munsters have a dungeon far below ground, which they accidentally break into. At the same time, the city official in charge of the pipeline, Borden T. Pike (Richard Deacon), has employees who are telling wild stories about the Munster house and a wife who keeps accusing him of fooling around.

The events have the Munsters effectively playing a shell game with Pike. When Pike finally sees the Munsters for himself, he figures they're just trying to scare the city into coughing up more compensation money. There's a funny moment when an unexpected Munster shows up for an appointment, and there is a lot of well-done ancillary material establishing the Munsters topsy-turvy view of the world, such as thinking it's beautiful weather when it's stormy. Pike's Pique also has a lot of interesting things to say about trust, including the extended climax with shifting expectations and attempts to cover up various levels of mistrust.

After the brilliant Rock-A-Bye Munster, this episode seems remarkably average, with an uninspired plot (about a local gas company's plans to lay a pipeline under the Munster's house), and fairly routine comedy: there are the usual bad puns; plenty of jokes based on the family's rather skewed view of life (eg. they think that thunderstorms are great and are upset when the weather clears up); and loads of silly moments as frightened people attempt to flee the scene after having met the Munsters.

It's all too familiar stuff, and one longs for something truly hilarious to happen before the closing credits roll—but it never does.