Written by Lindsay Katai
Storyboarded by Kellye Perdue & Ryann Shannon
Storyboarded by Kellye Perdue & Ryann Shannon
The quartet's uneasy alliance is tested by an unavoidable challenge in their first car together: dancing in a high-stakes octopus debutante ball.
Tropes:
- All of the Other Reindeer: Grace gives hints that she didn't get along so well with the other kids in her dance classes.
- Bookends: The episode has Tuba and Hazel singing as the group crosses to another car. It ends with Hazel happily singing this same song to Simon.
- Dramatic Irony: Everything that Grace and Simon say about the train: like how the Conductor is a god, how he is amazing with that big number of his and that he was the one who built the train, One-One is evil, etc. The audience knows at this point that 1) the Conductor's a "she", 2) she's no god, she's a widow in mourning who refused to grow up and replaced the true Conductor One-One, 3) Amelia only built a few cars (one of them Grace and Simon just destroyed two episodes ago), 4) One-One's sense of morality is skewed as they force passengers on the train to help overcome their problems and only see the denizens as therapists and 5) children don't get vaporized, they get to go home when their number drops to 0.
- Foreshadowing: Tuba mentions how she's alone but Hazel says that she's "with us" [Hazel, Simon, and Grace]. Two episodes later...
- Identity Amnesia: Hazel doesn't remember who she is or where she came from.
- Mysterious Past: Hazel's Identity Amnesia means that her past is a total mystery.
- Noodle Incident: Grace was saved by the Conductor in the past, which is how she got her ideas about the supposed order of the train.
- Parental Neglect: Grace mentioned how her parents didn't get to see her after a recital so she could have ice cream with her fellow dancers.
- Pimped-Out Dress: Grace wears one when she has to dance.
- Pragmatic Villainy: Grace agrees to play along with the car's rules rather than fight their way out since Hazel and Tuba are in agreement that it's the most sensible course of action, though she assures Simon they'll resort to violence if they have to.
- Stage Mom: Grace references this when wondering about where Hazel learned about dancing. It's implied that she also has one.
- Super Not-Drowning Skills: The group passes through a car filled with water that they can breathe in, with bubbles containing various creatures.
- Wham Shot: The last scene of the episode has Grace's number drop.
- Win to Exit: The Debutante Ball Car only lets passengers out if they can perform a ballroom dance, and Simon's attempt to bypass it just leads him to an endless black void.
