Black-ish Season 6 Ep 19 question - Shakeys?

I'm still a few eps back but I think there are still a very few Shakeys around.

 

He was talking about the pizza place.
There's still at least one not far from the (fictional) Johnson house (and Disney Studios as well).

I haven't been to Shakey's since I was a teenager but either someone on the writing staff considers it comfort food or it's a joke about Junior's tastes.

 

I understood you.
And I think you're misinterpreting the scene.
Junior didn't want "just pizza".
He wanted "Shakey's Pizza".

I think Bow was confused because Junior was insisting on "Shakey's Pizza" as if it's special.
(And as I remember it, it's not. In fact there are multiple pizza places that serve far better pizza near the Johnson Home. Numero Uno, for one.)
Or Junior wants the atmosphere of Shakey's for some odd reason.

It's not "code" for something else (as far as I know).
(The joke might have worked better if Junior was insisting on Chuck E. Cheese.)

 

My guess is that Shakey's paid some promotional money for the mention. Same as AT&T TV did (as that was their presentation at the Ad firm that Dre works at.) But yeah, I think that Junior was trying to specify that specific pizza joint (hence, we paid for the ad, we want our name mentioned). As an East Coaster for most of my life I never visited one, but I had remember them being referenced in other places, movies or the news or whatever.

I still can't eat "chain" pizza, so I probably wouldn't have eaten there if I had seen one on a visit to SoCal.

 

For me it's hard to think of Shakey's as a chain since there are only 2 in the entire state (1 in western WA not too far from us and 1 in eastern WA), even though they have 48 in CA and 6 in Mexico. I wonder how much control the franchisor exercises over the WA stores.

We serve fun at Shakey's. . .also pizza.

 

There were over 300 restaurants at its peak and it was nationwide.

 

I took it exactly as you did and went away from it having no idea what he meant. It did sound like he was referring to something other than the pizza place to me, also.

Then I forgot about it, so I'm glad to see some opinions here on the convo.

 

There's still a number of them in this area but I can't recall seeing/hearing any advertising for them in decades.
(Heck, the only reason I still think about them is that I occasionally drive by one. Contrast that to the commercials they used to have about mojo potatoes.)
So I don't think that that it was paid product placement.

More like a joke that didn't fully land.

Would it have worked better if it was:

Jr: OK, I'll get the flu shot but then I want McDonalds.
Bow: OK, I could got for some burgers
Jr: No mom, I said I want McDonalds