Modern Family, "Travels with Scout": I am not left-handed, either

A review of last night's "Modern Family" coming up just as soon as I lose the deposit on that fog machine...

I often have less to say about the episodes of "Modern Family" that work than the ones that don't, and since two and a half out of the three main stories this week were very funny, I'm going to be brief.

Cameron's brief drumming career was a nice example of the writers striking gold with an unexpected character crossover, with Dylan and his bandmates briefly being awed by Cam's stick skills, and Mitchell and Hayley bonding over their totally rockin' boyfriends. Jay's fiasco with the slasher film was a good story where good intentions (and a mental image of Mitchell's friend as a sweet kid who would never star in such a movie) led to increasingly bad consequences (and which gave Rico Rodriguez his usual chances to shine as Manny), and in the main plot, I enjoyed both Claire's growing affection for Scout and Luke unintentionally acting like a dog.

But as to the main part of the main plot, I think I find Fred Willard a little too perfect in his casting as Phil's dad, if that makes sense. If you wanted to cast someone who'd be Phil plus a few decades, you go get Willard, who's made a career out of playing men who think they're much funnier than they actually are. But the idea that Phil is the way he is because his dad is exactly like him, while logical, was maybe too on-the-nose to click for me, and I spent a lot of the Willard scenes waiting for the episode to swing around to someone else's story.

Still, very funny overall ("What's up with 21 Jump Street?"). What did everybody else think?