With Raven Baxter back in San Francisco in the fifth season of Raven’s Home, we see Booker exploring his new neighborhood in the third episode, titled “Escape from Pal-Catraz.” This episode also features a few callbacks to That’s So Raven. Here’s a recap of the fun from this episode.
(Disney)
Booker is up late watching TV when Raven calls down for him to go to bed. Just then, the announcer sells him on watching a few minutes of “Alcatraz: Declassified.” Before he knows it, Booker realizes that it’s morning and he spent the whole night watching TV. Obsessed with the show, the announcer says there’s another eight-hour marathon starting now and Booker sits back down.
Later, Victor finds the living room empty and nobody comes when he calls. Thinking he’s home alone, he sits in his recliner with a blanket ready to take a nap. Alice suddenly appears, begging to go to the zoo to watch the tigers feed. Victor says he’s too tired, suggesting she paint a tiger instead. “Just remember, this was all your idea,” she threatens. As Victor closes his eyes, the doorbell rings and he gets up to let Booker, Ivy, and Neil in. Booker wants to watch “Alcatraz: Declassified,” but Victor suggests they just go on a tour of Alcatraz instead. When they leave, Raven suddenly appears on the couch ready to watch “The Real Housekeepers of Hoboken.” She is interrupted by a vision of a fire at Victor’s restaurant. “Oh no, The Chill Grill!” Victor gets up, asking if Raven had a vision and what’s wrong. She lies and says the restaurant ran out of cheese, which freaks him out because it’s Fondu Friday. She says she will take care of it and Victor gladly gets back in his recliner for the nap that keeps getting interrupted.
The Chill Grill is busy when Raven arrives and she gets nostalgic for her teenage years when she enters. “Hello Chill Grill, my own friend,” she says. “Hello, Raven,” a voice answers. It’s Lazlo, the head chef, and Raven doesn’t remember him. He swears he was around when she was a teenager and Raven has a few flashbacks (all clips from That’s So Raven with Lazlo digitally inserted). He is Victor’s right-hand man at the restaurant. Raven sees a flame in the kitchen and gets worried, but Lazlo says it’s just his blackened catfish.
Beth is the name of the tour guide Booker, Ivy, and Neil get at Alcatraz and Ivy and Booker both get into a fact fight at the start of the tour. As it continues, Booker corrects Beth when she takes them to Al Capone’s cell, saying the infamous gangster had two cells. Beth tells him that’s just a rumor and that he shouldn’t believe everything he hears on TV. As the tour moves on, Booker holds Ivy and Neil back, saying he knows their guide is wrong. When Ivy refutes Booker’s claims of a second Al Capone cell, he plays on her need to prove that she’s right and gets her to come along with him. They go to cell 433 and look around for the initials “AC,” which should be carved into a corner. Just as they find it, Neil lets go of the door and it slides shut. They’re locked inside.
Lazlo further tries to jog Raven’s memory by explaining that he has kept in touch with Chelsea and Eddie. The more time Raven spends watching Lazlo cook, the more nervous she gets that he will start a fire. He leaves toast in the toaster so long it starts to smoke, he leaves burgers on the grill so long they get charred, and when he delivers a dish to a table, it’s actually on fire. That’s the last straw for Raven, who grabs a fire extinguisher to put it out, spraying some of the customers in the process. Lazlo gets angry and quits, handing his chef’s hat to Raven.
While Victor sleeps, Alice quietly drags in a tub of art supplies. “If I can’t go to the zoo, the zoo will come to me,” she says as she takes out black paint and begins putting stripes on Victor’s face.
Raven fills in as chef at The Chill Grill, changing all the orders to grilled cheese, which is all she knows how to make. Lazlo appears as the next customer, gloating as he watches Raven fail at his job. Raven is flustered as some of the grilled cheeses come back from unhappy customers, who walk out. As Lazlo tries to offer advice, Raven tells him he’s distracting her, which is how accidents happen. Just then, she knocks over the order carousel with a trey and it falls, the paper orders catching on fire. “Oh snap! I started it,” Raven realizes. The customers evacuate.
Ivy tries to escape from cell 433 by taking off her shoe and throwing it at a cell release button, which Booker smugly informs her was deactivated long ago during a breakout attempt. They fight about whose fault it is that they got stuck in the cell in the first place and Neil confesses that he closed the gate on purpose, hoping it would cause Booker and Ivy to work together like in an escape room. The lights go out as Alcatraz gets ready to close for the day. Using flashlights on their phones, Booker tells them that Al Capone reportedly broke free from this cell and that guards found a hammer and chisel inside, which means he must have dug a tunnel. Neil stands on the toilet to peek into the air vent, but the toilet slides away from the wall. There’s a tunnel behind it and Ivy admits that she was wrong, this must have been Al Capone’s cell at one time.
Raven finishes putting out the fire with Lazlo’s help. He starts to leave, but Raven asks him to stay, apologizing for thinking he wasn’t being safe. He tells her that the customer ordered the toast burned, that charred burgers are on the menu, and that the flaming flounder is his specialty dish. He tells her that Victor is like family to him and that The Chill Grill is one area of his life that he doesn’t need to worry about. Raven gives Lazlo his chef’s hat back and asks him not to tell her dad about the fire.
Booker, Ivy, and Neil get back to Victor’s house and agree not to tell anyone that they were the first people to successfully escape from Alcatraz, since they would get in trouble with their parents for sneaking away from the tour. In the living room, Alice hands Booker some paintbrushes and tells him “Good luck.” He’s confused by this until Victor wakes up, his face painted to look like a tiger. We see the outside of the house as Victor yells “BOOKER!”
Raven’s Home returns next Friday, April 1st, with another new episode (no joke!) titled “A Streetcar Named Conspire.” Here’s the official episode description from Disney Channel.
Booker’s visit to San Francisco is ending, so Raven pulls out all the stops to get him to stay. Meanwhile, Victor builds Alice the dollhouse of her dreams.