The Big Bang Theory - The Maternal Combustion - Review

All pictures below were taken from SpoilerTV, CBS, and Warner Bros. I give credit to all of their hard work.

Leonard's mother (Beverly) vs. Sheldon's mother (Mary):

Sheldon bragged about his work (when Leonard and him BOTH WORKED ON IT) to his and Leonard's mother. Everything seemed normal when the guys' mothers met for the first time ever until the ladies and Penny were left to talk. It all started when Beverly did not like Mary quoting the Bible so much, which leads her to insult her for liking Sigmund Freud. Their mothers keep arguing for having different religious beliefs and poor Penny tries to calm down the ladies. They are not the only ones arguing. Their sons are arguing because Leonard is mad that Sheldon keeps bonding with his mother and getting all of the attention. Later on, Sheldon and Beverly go for coffee to calm things down and she wants to apologize for upsetting her. Meanwhile, Mary lets Leonard know that his mother loves him and offers spaghetti and hot dogs to him and Penny but he doesn't feel like he has earned at.
At the end, the mothers shake hands and agree to respect their beliefs. She also adds that she will pray for her, but Beverly doesn't have a reaction. Before she leaves, she offers an awkward hug to her son, which he agrees to. It seems that everything is fine between him and his mother for now.

I look forward to meeting Amy's rest of the family (We met her mom in Season 4) next season and it'll be interesting to see how they react to Sheldon assuming that they are still together in S9.

Howard/Bernadette & Raj/Stuart:

Elsewhere, the guys are acting like couch potatoes. Bernadette is irritated with them acting weird all the time especially with Stuart and Howard having a bad habit of waking up without pants on and scratching their butts. She gets firm with them including Raj. She demands that they clean up to see what it's like for her to clean up their mess all the time. They agree to this and everything looks clean until Howard's shoes get stuck on the floor. It causes her to force them to reclean the kitchen. At the end, Raj starts to whistle "It's a Hard-Knock Life" from the wonderful musical of Annie. They sing with them while cleaning as well. I had low expectations for this sub-plot considering I was all in for Beverly vs. Mary, but it was a good storyline. Most of the time, the guys like to sit around all day when they are not working and I'm glad that Bernadette stood up for herself and acted like Mrs. Hannigan (the villain from the musical) to them. I think it would have been even better if she got even more sassy. I like her when she is like that.

Overall:
This is one of my favorite episodes of the season. The promos hyped to all of Beverly vs. Mary and it stayed true to it. The subplot was a good filler and the homage to Annie towards the end was cool, too. I have high hopes for the season finale.