The Cooper Extraction is the 11th episode of the 7th season of The Big Bang Theory.
Plot Synopsis: This episode is an anthological spoof of It's a Wonderful Life. Sheldon has to go to Texas to tend to his heavily pregnant sister (Missy). Meanwhile, everyone else still in Pasadena ponder how their lives could have changed.
The Cooper Extraction contains examples of:
- Actually Pretty Funny: Leonard is normally an Insecure Love Interest when it comes to Penny potentially ending up with other guys, but he's among the group that find's Amy's scenario about Penny trying to hit on Sheldon hysterical.
- Alternate Timeline: This episode indulges in alternate timelines, none of them being shown to be better than the current universe the show is in.
- Big Eater: Raj imagines that if it weren't for Penny, Leonard would be lonely and single and eat his way into severe obesity because there wouldn't be anyone to see him naked. But of course Raj would be fat too for the same reasons. They live together in Raj's apartment and eat very unhealthy. Then Stuart pops up and it turns out he's obese too.
- Bring My Brown Pants: In Penny's scenario, Leonard pees himself from nervousness when trying to ask her out at the Cheesecake Factory. Leonard is unamused and insists it wouldn't have happened, though both Raj and Howard agree it's believable. As payback, Leonard has Penny and her boyfriend Zack pee themselves in his scenario.
- But for Me, It Was Tuesday: Amy wants to know if Sheldon held the baby and how it made him feel. He says looking into the blank, innocent eyes of a being who couldn't begin to comprehend anything he said to it was just another day at the office.
- Christmas Episode: One Sheldon isn't present for, due to needing to go back to Texas to help with Missy's pregnancy. Everyone else promptly throws a party, to which Sheldon is touched because they didn't include him.
- Freeze-Frame Bonus: In the "Leonard's Fat" timeline, you can see a really obese Batman on the cover of the comic book Leonard's reading.
- Held Back in School: Sheldon mentions that it took Missy six years to graduate high school.
- It's a Wonderful Plot: Invoked. Inspired by Bernadette bringing It's a Wonderful Life to watch, the others imagine what life would be like if Sheldon was never born and also what if the 7 characters never discovered each other.
- Mistaken for Gay: In Bernadette's scenario where Penny never introduced her to Howard, she does seem attracted to Howard... at least until she witnesses him being spoon-fed by Raj who then cleans his face afterwards and promptly loses interest.
- Ms. Fanservice: Penny in one scenario strips down to her underwear to flirt with Sheldon in a universe where Leonard isn't around.
- Not Distracted by the Sexy: In Amy's scenario, Penny tries to seduce Sheldon, but he doesn't take, saying he's saving himself for "a cute, bespectacled neurobiologist with hair the color of mud."
- Nutritional Nightmare: In one fantasy, Leonard and Raj while living together eat huge quantities of fattening food to fill in their loneliness (in this universe, they never met Bernadette or Penny). They indulge in an entire cake for breakfast and a whole turkey (chicken?), ham and lots of large sides such as mashed potatoes for dinner.
- One-Person Birthday Party: In one scenario, Amy is weeping and singing to herself the Happy Birthday song with just one cupcake because she's still lonely and didn't meet Sheldon.... so she's with Stuart.
- Shout-Out: One of Howard's What If?'s involves him keeping the body of his deceased mother in her bedroom, talking to her and bringing her food as if she is still alive, and imagining her talking to him; all like Norman Bates in Psycho.
- Took a Level in Jerkass: Sheldon's mother (Mary) seems a lot more aggressive and demanding towards her son than usual forcing him to do disgusting, unbearable work treating a highly pregnant Missy screaming in pain.
- What If?: The episode is about the cast imagining what other directions this show could have gone in.
