A Plot: Adam wrestles with the fact that he is a cool kid and no longer a nerd, while his original friend group isn't as lucky.
B Plot: Beverly attempts to have a more grown-up relationship with Erica and Barry before they head back to college.
- Be Careful What You Wish For: Beverly is thrilled about Barry and Erica's dependence on her until it reaches the point where they treat her like a maid instead of a mother.
- Big Eater: Adam's first attempt to bring everyone together with pizza fails when the jocks take it all, with one using four slices to make a double-decker pizza sandwich.
- Comically Missing the Point: Adam's second attempt to bring everyone together, talking about Schwarzenegger films, mainly fails because the jocks think the point of Terminator was "explosions" and "getting time travelers to bone".
- Commonality Connection: Adam tries to find one between the jocks and the nerds, so he doesn't have to give up either his new popularity and popular girlfriend or his old friends and hobbies. They turn out to both enjoy pizza, bumper cars, and Arnold Schwarzenegger, but with their different opinions on those subjects, the only things they genuinely have in common is making fun of Adam's bad Arnold impersonation...and, as he realizes in the end, Adam himself.
- Didn't Think This Through: Adam's third and final attempt to bring everyone together is via bumper cars. Although Brea immediately points it out, it takes all of the nerds getting aggressively bumped around by the jocks for Adam to realize it may not have been the best bonding activity.
- Dude, Where's My Respect?: Beverly's reaction when Barry and Erica make one too many unreasonable demands, and advice from the Kremps to talk things out like adults falls flat, kicking them out of the house when she fails to receive it. Though she's initially aghast at her own reaction, Murray says she was in the right to assert herself, and the children apologize after spending a few hours outside and realizing/remembering all she does for them.
- Godzilla Threshold: Both Mrs. Kremp and Beverly acknowledge how insane it is when Bev asks her for parenting advice.
- Hidden Depths: One of the jocks is against playing an imported copy of Super Mario Brothers 3, not because it's nerdy, but because he loves animals and can't sanction turtle abuse.
- Manchild: Geoff is worried about Erica and Barry regressing back to babies when their summer jobs end (with them being fired) and Beverly pampers them on the last week before they leave for college, which quickly proves to be accurate (to the point that Barry is at one point swaddled in a blanket).
- She Cleans Up Nicely: A male variant, in that Adam shows up to the first day of school with contacts lenses and a healthier complexion. Immediately, the popular jocks accept him as one of their own, not subjecting him to the same trash-dunking as his old friends.
- Stranger in a Familiar Land: Adam thinks he's this when his nerd friends abandon him, but Mr. Glascott convinces him that he can be a multitude of things as he grows up, rather than sticking to just "nerd" or "jock".
