After learning that "Anais" is the answer to the computer password question, "Who is your favorite child?", Gumball and Darwin try to win Richard's affections — and end up pitting Nicole against Richard over who the favorite parent is.
Tropes:
- Apple of Discord: The computer's password ends up causing a fight over which of the kids and the parents are the favorite.
- Arson, Murder, and Jaywalking:Richard: That's it, I've had it with you two! You've choked me, you burned me, the steak you fed me was undercooked!
- Batman Gambit: Anais changed the password to her own name with the hint "favorite child" so Gumball and Darwin would waste all their computer time fighting with Richard.
- Bread, Eggs, Breaded Eggs: As Gumball is envious of Richard's apparent favoritism toward Anais.Gumball: Dude, they're even finishing each other's—
Darwin: Sandwiches!
Gumball: No, sentences.
Richard: (talking to Anais) Sweetie? Can I finish your—
Anais: Sandwich? Sure! - Car Fu: Nicole tries to keep Richard out of the electronics store while she buys Gumball and Darwin a computer by locking the door, but he just drives through it.
- Conveniently Empty Roads: Downplayed, where other vehicles intervene in the chase between Richard and Nichole's cars every once in a while but the rest of the time the highway is clear to them.
- Elephant in the Living Room: When Darwin asks Gumball why they should both be trying to make Gumball Richard's favorite child, Gumball hesitates to say it's because Darwin is adopted. Instead he just says it's because Darwin is already his favorite and Darwin buys it.
- Engineered Heroics: Gumball and Darwin try to earn Richard's favor by hiding a vicious dog in the back seat of his car, then saving him from the dog by distracting the dog with a steak. Richard is the one who runs after the steak into the road and is hit by a car.
- Exiled to the Couch: Nicole warns Richard he'll be sleeping on the couch if he doesn't follow her directions for cutting down the kid's computer time.
- Homage Shot: After Richard accidentally spills gasoline all over the pumps, we get a frontal shot of him angrily driving off with the station erupting into a fireball in the background, re-enacting the last shot of Mad Max.
- Hypocritical Humor: Nicole tells Richard that parenting isn't a competition, but seconds later starts trying to beat him to what he thinks will win their kids' affection.
- I Am Big Boned: Richard is choking and Gumball says he's too fat for the Heimlich maneuver, but Darwin tells him that's not a nice way to put it. So Gumball says "He's got too much personality!"
- I Resemble That Remark!:Richard: Sorry, kids. You know [Nicole] can be a real dragon sometimes.
(fire starts coming out from the door Nicole is behind)
Nicole: I heard that. - Irony: The kids' computer has Anais, Darwin, and Gumball happily sitting together, shown after Gumball and Darwin apparently find out they're The Un-Favourite.
- Karma Houdini: Anais callously manipulates Darwin and Gumball, tricking them into thinking their dad doesn't love them as much as her, just to get some extra time on the computer. It succeeds perfectly, and she even changed the password again so they couldn't use the computer even after she was done while Anais gloats about it with a smug grin as if she did it to spite both of them. The episode ends before Nicole hears about this, so one is left to assume Anais would be in serious trouble afterward.
- Mid-Battle Tea Break: In the middle of a car chase, Richard and Nicole both pull over to fill up their gas tanks. When paying, Nicole politely asks for the credit card, uses it, and throws it away so Richard couldn't pay.
- Orifice Evacuation: Gumball force feeds Richard a huge sandwich then some mayo because he thought it must have been dry. The mayo leaks out of Richard's nose and tear ducts.
- Potty Dance: Richard makes it obvious he'd been hiding in the kids' room all night to make a dramatic entrance when he dances around "like his bladder's about to explode".
- Quote Mine: One attempt to make Richard dislike Anais is a video with clips of her (some from previous episodes) poorly edited together to say "My dad is a dork; he looks like a leg of ham in a pink leotard and smells like the underside of a watchstrap." It would have worked if Darwin hadn't accidentally included a recording of him explaining the plan.
- Ramp-rovisation: Nicole uses a car carrier's ramp to get her, Gumball, and Darwin to the other side of the highway, away from Richard. And into oncoming traffic.
- Reading the Stage Directions Out Loud:Richard: (reading a card Nicole is holding up) Your mother has nothing to do with this. I take full responsibility for being the bad cop this time. Read this or you sleep on the couch tonight.
- Stealth Hi/Bye: Larry demands the Wattersons pay for the damage they did to the store. Nicole drops a cracker on the floor, pretending it's a credit card, and by the time Larry picks it up everyone is gone.
- The Password Is Always "Swordfish": Gumball insists even Richard wouldn't be stupid enough to make the password "password" as Darwin suggested, and it doesn't work. This really WAS Richard's password—Anais figured it out earlier and changed it, with the one she chose being deliberately obvious (the hint automatically narrowed it down to three people) because finding it out was part of her plan.
- Unflinching Walk: As the episode ends, Anais finishes using the computer and swaggers away as Darwin and Gumball literally explode with rage behind her.
- The Unsmile: Darwin and Gumball's first attempt to be nicer to Richard is giving him extremely creepy smiles which look like their gums are being pulled open by hooks.
- Worth It: When the kids are fighting over the computer, Darwin throws a cup full of upright pencils on the seat right before Gumball sits on it. Gumball doesn't budge.
