‘King of the Hill’ Mysteriously Changes Classic Season 12 Episode Title on Streaming

With just a few weeks left until the King of the Hill revival hits Hulu on August 4th, a cadre of eagle-eyed fans noticed something unusual while revisiting the show’s 12th season. The episode once known as “Untitled Blake McCormick Project,” named after the series’ co-producer, has now been given a new name. 

“Hulu changed the episode title. ‘Three Men and a Bastard’ has always been titled ‘Untitled Blake McCormick Project.’ I wonder what happened,” one such fan observed on the King of the Hill subreddit.

These claims seem to be somewhat disputed by various online sources — the episode still appears as “Untitled Blake McCormick Project” on IMDb, Google and the show’s fan Wikipedia page, which lists “Three Men and a Bastard” as an alternate title. Still, fans had some ideas surrounding this switch. 

“The episode is also referred to as ‘Three Men and a Bastard’ on Adult Swim, home video and syndication. TV networks and stations dislike placeholder titles, which is what ‘Untitled Blake McCormick Project’ was,” explained one Redditor, noting that the new title likely existed to appease Fox’s famously strict Standards and Practices Department in the 2000s. “Now that Hulu is getting ready to premiere the revival, it’s going back and getting rid of the placeholder titles for the originally intended episode titles.”

Meanwhile, to another Redditor, the whole thing was a very hyper-specific marketing ploy aimed at drumming up excitement for another season. “Hulu now has the rights to King of the Hill and because it doesn’t have to follow the same broadcast standards of a TV network (despite being considered a cable provider), decided to use this title,” they speculated, arguing that the move was to “garner interest for the new season.”