After the tragic passing of Johnny Hardwick, many fans are remembering the role he was best known for: King of the Hill‘s Dale Gribble. As a voice actor, producer, story editor, and staff writer, Hardwick was essential to the very DNA of the beloved animated sitcom about suburban life in Texas.
Hardwick, who passed away at the age of 64, was announced dead by the Travis County Medical Examiner Office of Austin, according to CBS News. A cause of death has not yet been announced.
Dale was known as a conspiracy theorist and bounty hunter who reveled in his day job as an exterminator even as he tried and failed to give protagonist Hank Hill (Mike Judge) life advice now and then. Despite his theories about global puppet masters who secretly control our every move, a long-running joke in the series is that Dale was completely oblivious to the fact that his wife Nancy has been cheating on him with John Redcorn.
Hardwick, who started out as a stand-up comedian, was slated to reappear as Dale for a Hulu revival of the series but it’s now unclear if he will be heard again as the character. So in his memory, let’s count down the top 10 Dale Gribble quotes throughout the series.
10. “A level three tornado will blow an egg right through a brick wall. Twister chasers call it ‘Humpty’s Revenge.'”
From Season 2, Episode 2: “Texas City Twister.” Dale’s supposed expertise on tornados proves to be about as reliable as Napoleon Dynamite’s scientific research about the Loch Ness Monster as he tells Bobby a questionable scale for how to measure the intensity of twisters.
9. “There is no greater survival skill than the ability to start a fire without matches. Lucky for me, the Arlen plains are rich in natural propane tank deposits.”
From Season 13, Episode 10: “Master of Puppets.” Like The Office‘s Michael Scott, Dale proved in this episode to be a failure at emulating the reality show Survivorman by blowing up a supposedly “natural propane tank deposit.”
8. “Whatd’ya got under the foil, Mr. Party Pooper, some party poop?”
From Season 3, Episode 10: “A Fire Fighting We Will Go.” Leave it to Hank to be the only one taking a volunteer fire-fighting gig seriously among his friends, prompting Dale to accuse him of being a party-pooper in a hilarious fashion due to his inability to craft a good zinger.
7. “‘Ignor-anus.’ It means ‘stupid,’ you moron.”
From Season 6, Episode 13: “Tankin’ It To The Streets.” In this hilarious reveal, Dale finally lets Bill know the true nature of his top secret experiments was nothing more than being the subject of a placebo, which the exterminator is convinced is why Bill is now an “Ignor-anus.”
6. “Apparently this door has some kind of anti-opening device.“
From Season 4, Episode 15: “Naked Ambition.” Dale’s attempt at busting Boomhauer out of a mental hospital, where he is being held thanks to a comedy of errors, is thwarted by his inability to “exfiltrate” the facility, thanks to a locked door.
5. “Gentleman, I’m sure you recall my long-dreamt dream of building a guard tower in my yard.”
From Season 12, Episode 22: “A Loser’s Manual. Another one of Dale’s wacky schemes to get around government red tape, the sheer absurdity of his plan to erect a 39-foot guard tower in his yard is made even funnier by the redundant manner in which he announces it.
4. “(To John Redcorn) I don’t kid about my mower. Now, get inside and start massaging my wife.”
From Season 3, Episode 20: “Dog Dale Afternoon.” A classic case of Dale being more protective over his lawnmower than his own wife, John Redcorn’s aside to Nancy as he is caught climbing into her bedroom window makes this moment even funnier: “He’s taking some of the fun out of this.”
3. “What happens if my tee shot lands on a bird’s back and he carries it out of bounds but then is attacked by a larger bird who grabs the ball and drops it in the hole? Is that still a hole-in-one? Because that’s how I’m going to play it.”
From Season 5, Episode 15: “A Man Without a Country Club.” Dale’s long-winded golf hypothetical, which is funny in itself, will generate tears from uncontrollable laughter after you hear Hank’s retort: “Dang it, Dale. It already happened once. What are the odds of it happening again?”
2. “Gentlemen, the crap has literally been scared out of me”
From Season 6, Episode 13: “Tankin’ It To The Streets.” Through a series of wacky events, Dale and the gang find themselves inside a tank during active war games on a military base, prompting Dale to utter the hilariously matter-of-fact bowel movement update to his friends.
1. “Pocket sand!“
From Season 6, Episode 2: “Soldier of Misfortune.” In this classic episode, a fake mission set up by Hank to restore Dale’s confidence goes awry when the cigarette-smoking aspiring mercenary grabs a stranger’s briefcase and uses sand from his pocket as a defense while uttering the maneuver aloud like a Yu-Gi-Oh character, birthing one of the internet’s most loved memes.