King Of The Hill: Does Dale Ever Find Out About Joseph? Here's The Closest He's Come

"King of the Hill" had many running jokes throughout its initial 13-season run, like Peggy (Kathy Najimy) thinking she's great at speaking Spanish when she's really terrible. But one of the more implausible recurring gags is how Dale (Johnny Hardwick) never caught onto the fact that Joseph (Breckin Meyer) wasn't really his son. 

The joke's evident to the viewers and the rest of the characters. It's apparent Dale's wife, Nancy (Ashley Gardner), had an affair with John Redcorn (Jonathan Joss) since Joseph bears such a strong resemblance to them. Nancy and John maintain the affair for many years without Dale ever getting wise. It's all the more humorous, given the fact Dale is a conspiracy theorist, so he's constantly questioning everything anyway. But he never questions Nancy's loyalty.

Despite all this, Dale never learns the truth about Joseph's real parentage, even when he should've picked up on the signs. For example, in Season 3's "Dog Dale Afternoon," Dale catches John climbing into Nancy's window but assumes he's working on a new mower. That wouldn't be the last time Dale came close to finding out Nancy's secret, and given how close he's come and still missed it, it's a safe bet he'll never learn (or accept) the reality of the matter.

Dale's refusal to recognize that Joseph is not biologically his son becomes almost nonsensical at a certain point. He'll accept any other explanation other than Nancy having an affair, as demonstrated in Season 6's "Of Mice and Little Green Men." In this episode, Dale realizes he wouldn't have been present when Joseph was conceived, so he comes to the conclusion that aliens were responsible for Nancy getting pregnant. However, arguably the most implausible scenario occurred in Season 7's "Vision Quest."

This storyline sees Hank (Mike Judge) and Dale take their sons on a vision quest, mainly so that Joseph can become more in tune with his indigenous heritage. However, Dale's the only one who really sees something, and through this spiritual journey, he realizes that Joseph's father is Native American. Dale takes this to mean that he himself is Native American, much to the chagrin of everyone around him. Dale reached some outlandish conclusions to justify him being Joseph's biological father, likely because he saw Nancy as the perfect wife and John as such a good friend. 

While everyone else in Arlen could see the truth, Dale just couldn't, but honestly, it didn't matter. Dale treated Joseph like his own flesh and blood and supported Nancy for many years. When Peggy learns the truth in "Peggy's Headache," she learns to keep the secret to herself because revealing it would break up an otherwise happy family. But with a "King of the Hill" revival coming to Hulu, there's always a chance the truth will come out then.