We love covering King of the Hill, and Dale is one of the most interesting characters
on the show.
Over the years, he came up with a lot of get-rich-quick ideas and other ploys to try and get ahead
in some way.
But which idea was the most brilliant?
And which was the most idiotic?
I’m Kifinosi with WickedBinge and this is Dale Gribble Schemes : Dumb to Brilliant.
For this list, we’ll be ranking based on what plans Dale cooked up and how successful
they ended up being.
First up here, it's the Practically Brainless Schemes.
This spot is reserved for ideas that were not well thought out.
Taking the gold medal of dumbest scheme was trying to use a frozen fish to avoid jail.
Everyone on Rainy Street was off the ball for this episode.
Hank wound up buying drugs under the assumption that it was fish bait.
After using the drug to catch a ton of fish successfully, Dale harped on Hank to get more
and more of the substance.
While purchasing something stronger, Dale and Hank were arrested and given a chance
to avoid a jail sentence only if they could prove the drugs worked as bait.
When the judge joined Hank and Dale fishing, Dale tried pulling one of his most idiotic
and poorly planned ideas.
Dale made a show of catching a fish quickly, only to be caught when the judge found it
frozen.
The silver medal for dumbest scheme goes to trying to make his house fit for the ice age.
After Nancy was offered a job in Dallas, Dale was left alone in their house.
This resulted in him installing a ton of air conditioners and ordering a walrus.
First off, we do not know what the plan was for the walrus.
And making his son endure the cold temperatures, risking frostbite, was neglectful.
At least Dale gave up this endeavor after he was taken down by Bobby.
The bronze medal of the dumbest scheme was trying to get Joseph to kill a panda.
During this episode, Joseph had wound up falling in with a rough crowd of kids.
In his concern, John Redcorn suggested a vision quest and gave Hank strict instructions to
follow.
However, the one that wound up having the vision first was Dale.
Dale misinterpreted the message as meaning he himself was Indigenous.
After this, Dale began acting as though he was Native.
When Joseph finally did have a vision of his own, Dale again completely missed the point
and instead took Joseph to kill a panda to impress his peers.
Thankfully they were stopped, but this would have ended badly for everyone involved.
Speaking of making bad calls with Joseph, next, we have trying to leave Joseph with
a rich family.
While Dale isn’t always the sharpest guy in the room, he clearly loved his son and
only wanted what was best for him.
When Joseph had a lot of schools after him for his skills as a quarterback, Dale forced
his son to attend Spencer Academy thinking it would provide the best future.
Despite trying to make the transition easier for Joseph, Dale couldn’t buy his son’s
way into the lifestyle all the other students were accustomed to.
It led to Dale leaving Joseph with another family, believing they would just take Joseph
in without question.
Though this was a bad idea, Dale did eventually wise up and use his experience with Spencer
Academy to pay back their bribe money.
Next up was agreeing to a murder suicide pact.
It’s well known among fans of the show that Dale is fond of using the name Rusty Shakelford
to avoid trouble and get out of having his name on any documentation.
Eventually, the real Rusty Shakelford showed up on Dale’s doorstep, pleading with Dale
to stop using his identity.
Dale, in typical fashion, took it as a threat to his life and decided to hide from Rusty
rather than face him.
At the same time, Peggy was avoiding Cozy Kitchen.
When Peggy and Dale exchanged their troubles while hiding in the hedges, they came up with
the idea to form a fake murder suicide pact.
They figured that if they could trick everyone then they could avoid any further harassment.
Of course, this wound up blowing up in their faces.
Literally.
This actually helped in the end, with Peggy able to convince Cozy Kitchen to leave her
be and Dale being forced to face Rusty.
Next up is the Grade School Schemes.
These were well enough on paper, but wound up backfiring horribly.
Our first scheme in this category is pretending to be more insane.
After he was convinced he was losing his mind to dementia, Dale committed himself to a mental
institution.
When Hank stated that Joseph and his girlfriend Lori were considering going “all the way,”
Dale attempted to leave.
However, Dale had been unable to leave on his own volition, leaving him to act on a
plan suggested by Peggy.
While this scheme wasn’t originally Dale’s idea, we had to give him credit for doing
all the work.
Acting crazier to get a proper evaluation might have worked out in Dale’s favor...if
he could manage to keep his mouth shut.
Unfortunately, Dale used the evaluation as a chance to go on a few different ramblings,
which resulted in him being committed to a more secure institution.
The next scheme up is attempting to stow away in a big rig.
When Hank decided to rent an eighteen-wheeler rather than a standard moving van, Dale, Bill
and Boomhauer wanted nothing more than to go on the trip to Arizona.
Hank had instead decided to take Bobby, which made the guys jealous.
They then came up with the idea to take advantage of the ample space to sneak in with the furniture.
What they hadn’t anticipated was how horrible a trip in the back of a semi would be in scorching
temperatures.
With no water and few supplies, Dale made the call to eventually shoot through the back
so they could be free of the confines of the truck.
Up next, we have Dale crashing Khan and Hank’s family vacation.
After Khan invited the Hills on a trip to Mexico, Dale, Bill and Boomhauer expressed
some jealousy over it.
However, Dale had been the only one to think it was a good idea to go down to Mexico and
impose on their stay.
After being spotted by one of the employees at the pool, Dale wound up exposing that Hank
and Khan were taking up far more space than they originally paid for.
Dale had no way of knowing that he was ruining Khan’s plan to get a cheaper room, but we
still think choosing to push himself on his friend’s vacation was pretty ridiculous.
Taking the next spot, we have Dale’s attempt to be a waitress at Bazooms.
The idea of exploiting gender stereotypes to get a cash settlement has been done in
a few different shows.
But in Dale’s case, his bluff was called when he was, in fact, hired for a job he wasn’t
qualified for.
On paper, it was a good enough idea.
After all, Dale had no waitressing or customer service experience.
However, his bluff was challenged, and Dale was fired after giving away food for free.
For the final spot, we have stealing a news van.
On the one hand, this was a ridiculous idea to put into action.
Especially when you consider the whole point was to gain as much attention as possible.
Dale, Nancy and Peggy all went through with the plan knowing they would be caught.
On the other hand, we have to credit Dale for helping to pull this scheme off.
They wound up getting the exact result Nancy had wanted.
The news station was ecstatic with the footage they got from the incident -- but not before
they almost died horribly in a forest fire.
Next up our list is the Average Schemes These are, as the name implies, pretty average in
terms of intelligence.
Not too smart, but not too dumb.
Fairly normal.
For the first ranking in this section, we’re calling the backhoe incident.
Dale, Bill and Boomhauer could be reckless with tools and machinery from time to time.
This episode was a prime example of just how out of control Dale and Bill could be compared
to their friends.
This is evident with Bill trying to open beer cans with the backhoe and Dale crashing into
Bill’s house.
After Hank got fed up with their antics and began hanging out with someone else, Dale
and Bill decided to become more skilled with the backhoe to regain Hank’s friendship.
Digging in the pet cemetery would have been a straightforward idea with minimal consequences,
but this is Dale, after all.
After daring each other to make more impressive moves with the machine, they wound up becoming
trapped in the equipment for a couple of days.
Of course, we had to include the time Dale tried to use his kidney for free stuff.
When a favorite racer of the guys ended up needing a kidney, Dale was the only one with
a match.
Being Dale, he used the leverage to get John Force to agree to give him vacations, promotion,
and status.
In a twist of fate, John Force ended up not needing the transplant, so Hank agreed to
hand Dale’s kidney to a ten-year-old boy.
Dale was in a state of panic at the news and plotted to steal the kidney back, only handing
it over to the boy after getting a bunch of toys and suckers.
Who could forget when Dale tried to create a haunted bed and breakfast?
After learning about Ms. Wakefeild and her desire to die in Hank’s house, Dale decided
it was the perfect chance to create a bed and breakfast for Nancy’s Christmas gift.
We give Dale some credit for the idea since haunted places are often sought after as tourist
destinations.
However, we did dock a lot of points because we aren’t sure how exactly he thought Ms
Wakefeild would be able to show up in an antique mirror or shuffle around as an apparition.
Next, we have Dale’s attempt to launch Daletech.
Oddly enough, this could have worked if Dale marketed it correctly instead of overcharging
and badgering his neighbors.
After all, he already had equipment installed in everyone’s houses.
But Dale had been convinced that Cotton giving free security was the only issue he had.
So, he focused all of his energy on turning everyone against the war hero.
Still, we have to place this toward the more brilliant part of our list because Dale’s
equipment was what ended up catching Khan and Mihn.
Taking the next spot is another failed career of Dale’s: bounty hunting.
A small class in an afternoon is not enough time to properly learn how to be a bounty
hunter, but it’s not really Dale’s fault that the program existed.
It’s also not his fault that they didn’t properly train him and were set up to let
anyone graduate.
They literally gave them all the answers for the short test to follow.
While Dale didn’t end up catching his guy, we still gave him some points for coming up
with the idea to use Ladybird to avoid the guard dogs.
Now we’re really getting into the College Bound Level.
These are the ideas that are just a stone’s throw away from the top, proving they have
the ability to be the best, but just fall short.
First to be in this category, we have Dale taking the role of the Smoking Bandit.
In another Dale and Joseph-focused episode, Dale struggled to get his son to show him
some respect.
The problem led Dale to light up a cigarette while out at a diner, refusing to put it out
even with the new law in place.
The incident then caught the attention of the local paper, and soon Dale was labeled
the Smoking Bandit.
The sensational news impressed Joseph and led to Dale continuing to go out in public
to smoke.
It wasn’t until Hank was fed up and demanded they hunt down the Bandit that Dale stopped.
It was an odd way to get his son’s respect, but we give Dale an A for effort.
Up next, we have Dale’s attempt at truffle hunting.
Renting a pig, going and foraging...Dale seemed to have the basics of truffle hunting pretty
well figured out.
He might have been able to make a little bit of money.
However, Dale called it quits after losing track of the pig and then seeing it get high
off mushrooms.
Taking the next spot, we have Dale’s temporary pursuit of taxidermy.
After the local dump raised its fees to dispose of animal carcasses, Dale decided it wasn’t
worth his time or money to properly dispose of the animals he killed until he had a larger
load.
This meant he had a lot of squirrels to practice on when he decided to try his hand at taxidermy.
When Peggy joined in, offering her expertise on posing the animals, they quickly moved
on to more complex and larger animals.
It would have been a nice way to get a few bucks, but Dale never mentioned the hobby
again after losing the contest.
Surprisingly, Dale’s attempt to pretend to be in the CIA is ranked next.
Dale did not do well for the majority of this episode.
He shot at the cash register while telling a story to his gun club.
He sprayed poison in JoJack’s face.
He wound up robbing a man while grabbing the wrong briefcase.
It was just a rough time for the exterminator.
But in the final moments, after Hank revealed himself to be Mr Big, Dale was able to take
out Mad Dog. Dale may not have called the police as Hank had begged, but he did call
a few flower delivery companies to make it seem as though he was working with the CIA.
He used the same trick from his story earlier.
The ruse worked, with Mad Dog fleeing the scene and Dale being voted president of the
gun club.
This next ranking we’re going to simply call Chuck Mangione.
After Hank suggested Dale as the exterminator to deal with Mega-Lo’s rat problem, Dale
had difficulty figuring out why his traps weren’t working.
In his investigation, Dale noticed that the wires on the cameras were chewed in a pattern
that didn’t match that of a rat.
This eventually led him to think that a monkey might be loose in the store.
Dale then found more things around the store that seemed as though someone was tampering
with the merchandise.
So, he changed his theory and claimed that Chuck Mangione was hiding out in the Mega-Lo-Mart
somewhere.
As crazy as it sounded on paper, Dale wound up being right.
Chuck was, in fact, hiding from the demanding contract he signed with the company.
Finally, we have The Genius Schemes.
These displayed the capability of running large-scale operations.
They show how dangerous and powerful the character can be.
Dale’s next scheme that made it to our list is making Hank look like a villain.
Dale is known for sneaking into his friends’ homes, but no one expected a tunnel system
to be built.
At least not until Hank fell through it.
Not only did Dale build something that messed with the structural integrity of Hank’s
home.
Dale was also an inconsiderate and invasive host.
This eventually led to Dale and Hank not paying close enough attention to where Hank was cutting,
so Dale wound up getting a finger severed off.
Because of this injury, Dale was able to turn everyone against Hank and effectively paint
Hank as an unreasonable and violent neighbor.
Dale was able to maintain everyone being on his side, even after Hank saved their lives
from being crushed.
By the end of the episode, no one had apologized for turning against Hank.
Instead, they justified his anger as a good thing, going with the idea that Hank being
a bad guy could be helpful.
The bronze medal of most brilliant scheme was planting fire ants on Hank’s lawn.
This was one of the first schemes Dale ever pulled.
After Hank had told Dale to stop spraying his lawn, Dale retaliated against the humiliation.
In what was a very impressive operation, Dale planted the ants along the lawn by sneaking
them in the legs of his jeans.
He was then able to deposit them without notice.
He spent the nights thwarting any attempt to eradicate them.
When Hank did finally cave and ask Dale to help him get rid of the fire ants, Dale used
the chance to destroy Hank’s lawn to completion.
The only reason we had to give this scheme a bronze medal is that Dale was exposed by
Peggy because he left all of his evidence out in an unlocked basement.
The silver medal of the most brilliant scheme was taking on big tobacco.
When Nancy decided she needed a facelift to keep working as a weather girl, Dale took
it upon himself to try and find a way to get the money for the operation.
Dale’s solution ended up being suing Manitoba Cigarettes under the claim that their secondhand
smoke had damaged Nancy’s skin, putting her job at risk.
Dale took it a step further, convincing Nancy and Manitoba that their marriage was in jeopardy.
This idea was messy, but we gave it the silver medal ranking because it ended up working.
Dale did in fact trick Manitoba, even after they attempted to use a wire to catch him
in a lie.
Dale only lost the case because he decided it was worth losing the money to reconcile
with Nancy and tell her the truth.
In the final scene, we see that Dale was still able to ensure Nancy’s job would be safe
by threatening to sue the news station for age discrimination.
Finally, the gold medal for the most brilliant scheme was the carbon offsets.
Like some of the other schemes on this list, Dale wound up gaining some allies to pull
this one-off.
Dale used Strickland’s need for a better reputation to capitalize on selling carbon
offsets.
Hating the work, Dale had bailed out on actually planting the trees.
Hank exposed Dale’s laziness, but the secret was still hidden from the public when Dale
came up with the plan to use a former friend’s property for Buck’s concert.
Not only did Dale end up making quite a bit of money, but even Hank revealing the truth
did absolutely nothing.
Dale and Buck were able to get away with recovering Strickland’s image while doing almost no
work for it.
But let us know in the comment section if you agree with our ranking.
And tell us what we should cover next.
Remember to hit that notification bell and binge our Dumb to Brilliant playlist.
Where we figure out which characters have the most wits.
But most importantly, stay wicked.