| “ | Well, they don't give you a medal for the messing-up part, but you're gonna do that bunch if you want to get to the gold medal part. | ” |
—Laurie Hernandez to Harley
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"Stuck in a Gold Medal Performance" is the thirteenth episode in Season 2 of Stuck in the Middle and the thirtieth episode overall. It first aired on June 23, 2017, to 1.32 million viewers.[1]
Summary[]
The Diaz family hosts Olympic medalist, Laurie Hernandez, for a dinner that spins out of control.[2]
Plot[]
Georgie returns home from a trip to Boston where she met her role model - the Olympic gold medalist athlete Laurie Hernandez. During the meet, Laurie had told Georgie that she's proud to have another Latina athlete, at which point Georgie tried to impress Laurie by telling her how "authentic Latino" her family is. She even went as far as to invite Laurie to their house for an authentic, home-cooked Latino meal.
Since Laurie is going to be in the neighborhood this Friday, she tells Georgie that she will stop by their house on her way to New York. Now, Georgie has to get her family to learn how to act Latina in order to impress Laurie Hernandez. She starts studying Spanish; She asks Suzy to learn how to make authentic Latino food, and she gets Ethan and Tom to watch Spanish telenovelas in order to have something to talk to Laurie about. Suzy tries to make Latina food using Abuela's recipe but she messes up and realizes it's too late. So, she plans to serve lasagna. Georgie makes the lasagna "more Latina" by adding the spicy scorpion peppers.
Meanwhile, when Rachel's cheerleading squad puts her in charge of firing up the crowd, she asks Harley to invent something cool. Harley happily takes the opportunity because it gives her a chance to look cool and hang with Rachel especially since Rachel doesn't usually like being associated with her siblings while at school. Harley puts in so much effort to come up with a machine for an awesome laser light show.
Unfortunately, the machine malfunctions during the main event, embarrassing Harley in front of the entire school. She ends up covered in foam. Rachel blames Harley for letting her down in front of her fellow cheerleaders. Harley is not used to failure. So, she becomes very stressed trying to figure out what went wrong. Ethan tries to cheer her up and make her think outside the box but Harley shuts him down rudely. She continues working so hard until she falls asleep. She starts dreaming that the wires in her machine are trying to choke her while her Invention Bag is defending her. After that experience, Harley tells Rachel that she's given up. So, they get mad at each other.
The tension between Rachel and Harley continues even when Laurie Hernandez arrives. Georgie forces them to leave the room so that she can sell her "authentic" Latino culture to Laurie. But, it doesn't go too well because they tried too hard. The food is too spicy and it turns out that Laurie doesn't even watch the Spanish telenovelas Georgie expected. After the failed dinner, Laurie Hernandez tells Georgie that she doesn't have to try so hard to prove that she's the perfect Latina. Being a good Latina just means being a nice person.
After figuring out what's going on between Rachel and Harley, Laurie convinces Harley not to give up on her inventions just because one failed. Sometimes you win, sometimes you lose. Harley takes the advice and puts on an amazing laser-light show, with a special performance by Laurie Hernandez during the next game.
Cast[]
Main Cast[]
- Jenna Ortega as Harley Diaz
- Ronni Hawk as Rachel Diaz
- Isaak Presley as Ethan Diaz
- Ariana Greenblatt as Daphne Diaz
- Kayla Maisonet as Georgie Diaz
- Cerina Vincent as Suzy Diaz
- Joe Nieves as Tom Diaz
Special Guest Star[]
Guest Cast[]
- Jaida-Iman Benjamin as Traci
Absent Cast[]
Continuity[]
- Tom mentions the fact that they gave Georgie a Quinceañera in a hurricane from the episode Stuck in the Quinceañera.
- Georgie's struggle with Spanish is seen again in Stuck in a Besties Battle when Daphne uses it against her to win over Abuela.
- Georgie mentions that she took 2 years of French and she's still bad at it. This is brought up again in Stuck with Rachel's Secret when she uses it to call Rachel's school in France.
- Abuela's love for telenovelas is mentioned again in Stuck in a Besties Battle.
- Georgie's "lasagna" is nominated for a Diaz Award in Stuck in the Diaz Awards.
Trivia[]
- Laurie thinks that the Diaz family really cares about their Latin culture because Georgie told her that when inviting her to visit the family in Marshport.
- Suzy called Abuela for authentic Latino cuisine recipes but did not realize how work-intensive they would turn out to be.
- When Tom mentions Laurie appearing "on that dance show," he is referencing the fact that she holds the record of being the youngest champion on Dancing with the Stars (the inspiration for Dancing With My Dad} winning the Mirrorball Trophy during Season 24 with her partner Valentin Chmerkovskiy in 2016 at age 16.
- Guest star Laurie Hernandez shot a BTS video wherein she passed out faux "Gold Medals" to the younger cast members for various (and dubious) achievements while on set.
- Ariana - Getting out of makeup the fastest.
- Isaak & Kayla - Most creative recycling team.
- Ronni - Fastest speed texting between takes.
- Malachi & Nicholas - Best impromptu dance party.
- Jenna - Most patient cast member.
Quotes[]
| “ | I really put myself out for you. I talked to you in public. I waved at you. And this is how you pay me? | ” |
—Rachel to Harley
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| “ | Then the wires started talking to me which would have been really disturbing if my invention bag hadn't hold them off. | ” |
—Harley
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International Premieres[]
- September 30, 2017 (Hungary, Latin America)
- November 22, 2017 (Israel)
- January 16, 2018 (Spain)
Gallery[]
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To view the Stuck in a Gold Medal Performance gallery, click here.
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