Modern Family season 9, episode 18 recap: Daddy Issues

On the latest episode of Modern Family, Phil struggles to find Claire an anniversary gift, Gloria’s ex looks incredibly familiar, and Cam and Mitch find out they’re missing a woman’s touch in raising Lily.

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Typically, when it comes to anniversary gift giving, Phil always brings it. However, this year he’s off his game. To make matters worse, Claire suddenly is completely on top of her gift which only adds more pressure for Phil to come through.

Meanwhile, at the Pritchett house, Manny and Jay are planning to go to a comedy show but they aren’t bringing Gloria along because they don’t think she’ll understand the jokes. During this episode, one of Gloria’s exes is coming over to stay with them also. Jay plans to alpha him to please Gloria.

At the same time Cam and Mitch set off the alarm in the mall only to find that there was a bra tucked away in their bag. Lily says that she did it as a prank so Cam and Mitch decide they need to discipline her because this is following her getting into a fight at school. They do plan to let her go to the popular girl’s slumber party first though.

Jorge

Gloria’s ex, Jorge (Gabriel Iglesias), arrives and his appearances shocks Jay. Rather than a sexy Latin musician walking through the door, it’s basically an older version of Manny. Manny, however, is oblivious to the uncanny similarity in appearance but Jay now has some questions.

As they talk, Manny loves Jorge and thinks he’s perfect. He’s into everything that Manny is into. He hates sports and sings opera, appreciates the finer things, they even sip their tea the same way. At this point Jay asks when Jorge dated Gloria (before or after Javier, Manny’s father) and Jorge says that there was some overlap. Jay is almost completely convinced that Jorge is Manny’s dad but Manny still doesn’t seem to realize this is a possibility.

Alex comes by the house and immediately notices the similarity. She offers to do a DNA test and leaves with each of their hats.

Lily is growing up

Cam and Mitch are at the school to meet with one of Lily’s teachers concerning the fight. When Cam mistakes the female reproductive system for the inner ear the tone for their story arc is set. They continue to miss clear clues as to what is going on with Lily.

She got into a fight because she was being teased for not having a bra. This is why she was trying to steal one. The teacher suggests that they get her a training bra. They start to realize they are missing some essential knowledge to help Lily with her development but still think they can figure it out at this point.

With Lily already at the sleepover, Cam and Mitch have to deliver the bra to Lily. They show up to the group of girls and proceed to embarrass Lily by pretending to not know anything about the female body. At this point they realize that they need to get one of the women in their lives to talk to Lily as she continues to grow into a woman since they won’t be able to guide her in certain areas.

Gloria and Jorge

When Gloria arrives she mistakes Jorge for Manny and Jay enjoys this mixup. He thinks that Jorge has had a physical transformation since he dated Gloria and is glad that she sees that her son looks like him.

Just then, Alex returns with the DNA results and Manny just so happens to see the paper. The results confirm that Jorge is Manny’s father and Manny is devastated. He believes his entire life was a lie and that his time with Javier was actually just creepy time he spent with a random man. This makes Jay emotional as well and the two share a moment.

That’s when Gloria can no longer contain her laughter. This was all an elaborate April Fools joke. She wasn’t pleased with them saying that she didn’t get their comedy so she planned this elaborate joke to prove that she was capable. However, this one went too far. Alex is bothered by it and Jorge, who used to work on a veal farm, says he’s never witnessed anything so cruel.

The Anniversary gift

While it appeared Claire may have been bluffing about her gift, she wasn’t. Phil is completely impressed. She rented their old apartment on Airbnb and set up a romantic throwback dinner. It’s perfect. Phil, meanwhile, never found an appropriate gift. He gets lucky though because Claire is so happy with hers that she says his can wait until tomorrow.

That’s when things start to go horribly wrong. The neighbors above them start blasting music and when Claire goes to get them to stop, she bursts a pipe. Just then the fish sticks catch on fire, Phil goes to open a window and the candles fall over which catches the table on fire. Then raccoons come in through the window and start eating the food. Now Phil has no choice. He has to open his gift.

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It’s, a fancy mop? He uses the water jets to put out the fire, then he reveals that it also has a claw. He uses the claw to fix the pipe Claire broke, then scare the raccoons back out of the window. Phil then knocks out the power, lights a candle, and re-spools Claire’s mix tape with this do-it-all tool. Claire is impressed, but still has to ask.

“You got me a mo-” before Phil interrupts her because this is his moment.

Modern Family returns next Wednesday at 9/8 Central on ABC.