Recap / Total Drama: "Dodgebrawl"

The two teams are pitted against each other in a no-holds-barred dodgeball smackdown. Meanwhile, Heather and Courtney try to put a stop to Lindsay and Tyler's blossoming relationship.

Tropes:

• Always Need What You Gave Up: Courtney expresses regret that the Killer Bass have voted off Eva, who is dangerous but was their most athletic team member. Her regret proves apt when the challenge of the day is announced to be a game of dodgeball.
  Courtney: We are so sucking right now! Okay, Eva was a psycho, but at least she was an athletic psycho!
• Ambiguous Situation: Was it a total coincidence that the next event would be a game of dodgeball just after Eva had been voted off, or did Chris deliberately set it up knowing that the Killer Bass were at a disadvantage?
• And This Is for...: Courtney inadvertently hits Gwen in the face with a spoon's worth of oatmeal during breakfast. During the dodgeball match, Gwen beams Courtney with a ball and declares it to be payback for the oatmeal.
• Apologetic Attacker: DJ apologizes for hitting Gwen with the dodgeball (the first time anyway).
• Attack Pattern Alpha: Duncan dubs his strategy "rush the new guy", saying he picked it up in Juvie.
• Battle Cry: Owen gives one after Lindsay is taken out:
  Owen: Great Gatsby, that is it! GAME OOOOOOOOOON!!! (proceeds to curb-stomp the remaining Bass members)
• Be as Unhelpful as Possible: For the entire game, Noah simply reads his book and gives sarcastic cheers instead of playing with his team, which gets him voted off at the end of the episode.
  Noah: Woohoo, way to throw those murder balls! Go, team, go!
• Big "NO!": Tyler lets one out after accidentally hitting Lindsay with a dodgeball.
• Big "WHY?!": Owen when Harold catches the final dodgeball and wins the challenge for the Killer Bass.
• Bowdlerise: In the American version, as usual.
  • Courtney's lament in the confessional that "We are so sucking right now!" changed to "We are so stinking right now!"
  • Heather's taunt directed at the Killer Bass, "How does it feel to suck so much?" was censored, but the word "suck" wasn't replaced with anything, so Heather says, "How does it feel to so much?" which doesn't make sense.
• Brick Joke: Sort of. Courtney threw oatmeal at Gwen (aiming for Heather) at the start of the episode, and Gwen then eliminates her in the last round, stating the aforementioned oatmeal as to why she did so.
• Bring It: The dodgeball game is intense from the very first second. Heather opens the animosity by telling the "fishies" to bring it while motioning with her finger. Shortly after, Harold gets to throw, prompting Leshawna to taunt him to "Bring it, stringbean!"
• Bullet Time: Harold finally earns the Killer Bass' trust that he can earn them the victory when he dodges one of Owen's throws by bending backwards, a scene which is shown in slow-motion.
• Butt-Monkey: Sadie. Throughout the episode, she not only gets pelted several times by the balls, but never actually gets a chance to throw a ball.
• Call-Back: Gwen and Duncan, who stayed awake the longest last episode, are still super tired.
• Crouching Moron, Hidden Badass: Cody, who proves to be quite skilled at dodgeball, Owen, who ends up being the Gophers' best player by a mile, Courtney who actually manages to threaten Duncan into getting into the game and Harold who, despite bombing early in the game, ends up winning it for the Bass.
• Curb-Stomp Battle: Owen delivers one of these to the Bass in the second round, taking out all of the players within a few seconds.
• David Versus Goliath: Harold vs Owen when it's Down to the Last Play. The former being the David with a Geek Physique and the latter being the Goliath who is not only three times the size of Harold, but has been the heaviest hitter for the Screaming Gophers in the challenge. Harold ends up winning it for the Killer Bass by catching Owen's final ball.
• A Death in the Limelight: Noah gets lots of focus heckling his team, which results in his elimination.
• Digging Yourself Deeper: Noah was already not doing himself any favors by not contributing to the challenge at all the entire game. Once his team loses though, his deadpan remarks of "weak effort" and "lack of team spirit" just make everyone else even madder at him, resulting in his elimination. It doesn't help that he apparently has no idea why everyone is so mad at him after they lose, acting like he did nothing wrong.
• Dodgeball Is Hell: The plot revolves around a dodgeball game. Noah in particular has a real low opinion of the game of dodgeball.
• Down to the Last Play: In the final game, it's down to Owen for the Gophers and Harold for the Bass. Harold has managed to dodge all of Owen's shots, but during a timeout, Geoff tells Harold that it's not enough to just dodge and suggest that he attempts to catch a ball to get Owen out, since Harold isn't strong enough to throw a ball. Owen throws his final ball hard enough to send Harold into the plexiglass wall. However, Harold reveals that he caught Owen's pass, giving the Bass their first win.
• The Dreaded: Duncan threatens his team not to wake him up for most of the challenge and they are so terrified of him that they comply until they have no other choice. Even DJ, who's really big and strong, is apprehensive about waking him up.
  Duncan: Wake me up, and it'll be the last thing you do.
• Early-Installment Weirdness: Justin gets hit several times in the face by dodgeballs without complaining or freaking out about his looks getting ruined. In the second season, he would see himself as hideously deformed whenever receiving a blow to the face and would even try to weasel his way out of certain challenges using his modeling contracts in order to prevent any sort of blow to his face or body.
• Epic Fail:
  • Most of Tyler's attempts at throwing. When he throws four balls, the first one hits Chef, the second almost hits Chris, the third one flies at the spectating Gophers, and the fourth hits Lindsay...who he wasn't trying to hit.
  • Harold throws a dodgeball as hard as he can; it just rolls to a stop at Leshawna's feet. She picks it up, smiles evilly and nails him with it as he runs away and Screams Like a Little Girl.
• Exhausted Eye Bags: Unsurprisingly, Gwen and Duncan have those, still tired after the stay-awake challenge.
• Face Doodling: Harold has kept the Killer Bass up all night with his snoring and that's after they already didn't get any sleep for a multi-day challenge. In retaliation, someone, almost certainly Duncan, pranks him by drawing a mustache on his face. It backfires because, even though everyone laughs at him, Harold actually likes the look.
• Facepalm:
  • Tyler tries to come up with a one-liner to intimidate the Screaming Gophers, but what he comes up with is "we're gonna bring the dinner to the table and then we're gonna eat it!" Courtney can only slap her face in embarrassment.
  • Courtney facepalms a second time when she can't conceive of a possibility for the Killer Bass to still win the challenge.
• Food Slap:
  • Courtney hurls a spoonful of oatmeal to Heather for taunting the Killer Bass, but it hits Gwen in the face instead.
  • After Noah complains about the Gophers voting him off and says they just voted out the only one with any brains, he gets pelted with marshmallows and Leshawna declares, "You need to learn a little respect, turkey!"
• Foregone Conclusion: Noah does nothing to help his team during the challenge and spends the entire time hurling insults at everyone, while nobody else on the Screaming Gophers even comes close to his level of uselessness. When he inevitably gets the boot, Chris acknowledges that this time it wasn't the most dramatic campfire ceremony ever.
• Groin Attack: Heather throws a dodgeball at Tyler's groin, though he was benched at the time, and it was unlikely that she directly aiming there.
• Heavy Sleeper: Courtney reminds Harold of his persistent snoring throughout the night, which kept everyone up, most notably Duncan. He's also the last to arrive for breakfast.
• Hit Flash: When Owen is bombarded with four dodgeballs at once, the moment of impact is hidden behind a black screen with rapidly brightening and fading stars.
• Huddle Shot: Owen gets hit with four balls at once during the dodgeball game. He is knocked down and as he slowly recovers from the impact, he blurrily sees the other Gopher dodgeball players on the field huddle around him to check up on him.
• Hypocritical Humor: Noah said that his team had a weak effort, from the guy who did nothing throughout the whole game.
• Imagine Spot: Harold has one in which everyone is excited about him arriving for breakfast and cameras are snapping pictures.
• Implied Death Threat: Duncan tells his teammates that if they dare wake him up, it would be the last thing they do.
• Inelegant Blubbering: Owen after the Bass win the match.
• Irony: Thanks to last week's elimination of Eva, the Killer Bass are now without their most athletic teammate...right before a challenge where her athletic skills would be surely needed. Of course, it's likely no coincidence considering what a Jerkass Chris is.
• Jaw Drop / Stunned Silence: The Gophers have this reaction when Harold dodges all of Owen's throws.
• Jerkass Has a Point: Considering how pathetic Harold's attempt at a throw was and didn't show off his dodging skills until the 11th hour, Duncan and Courtney had solid reason for keeping him on the bench for most of the game.
• The Juggernaut: Owen, who easily steamrolls the Bass for most of the game.
• Lame Comeback: Before the first game starts, Tyler tries to snark back at the Gophers after Heather insults them, but what he comes up with is...
  Tyler: Oh yeah? You're going down! We're gonna bring the dinner to the table, and then we're gonna eat it!
• Lampshade Hanging: After Noah gets kicked off, Chris admits this wasn't exactly the most dramatic elimination.
• Lazy Bum: Noah doesn't help his team and just reads a book for the entire dodgeball game. They end up voting him off.
• The Load: Noah spends the entire challenge on the sidelines reading and hurling insults at his own teammates, doing nothing to help them win. Then when the Screaming Gophers inevitably lose, he has the gall to accuse them of putting up a "weak effort". Naturally, this manages to piss off his entire team and get him sent packing.
• Moment Killer: A heartwarming moment between Tyler and Lindsay after he hits with a dodgeball is immediately broken when Trent softly hits him with a dodgeball, even though Tyler was already out when he crossed onto the other team's side of the court.
• Mutual Kill: DJ and Gwen knock each other out of the last round this way.
• Never My Fault: Noah is genuinely shocked when the Gophers vote him off for not helping at all during the game, and snaps, "Good luck, because you just voted out the only one with any brains on this team!"
• Non-Action Guy: Noah, who's the only camper to outright refuse to compete... which results in his elimination.
• Pun-Based Title: The title is a play on the game "dodgeball".
• Sarcasm-Blind: Lindsay when Noah said how mentally challenging the challenge is.
• Screams Like a Little Girl: Harold when he's running away from a dodgeball thrown by Leshawna.
• Shock and Awe: Cody rubs a rubber dodgeball on his shirt, charges it with static electricity and hurls it toward Katie, making it act like a homing missile and chase her around.
• Shout-Out:
  • Heather calls Gwen "Sleeping Beauty".
  • Noah makes a snarky reference to Fight Club.
    Chris: The first rule of dodgeball is...
    Noah: Do not talk about dodgeball?
  • Owen mentions The Great Gatsby in his Battle Cry.
  • DJ and Gwen both balls that hit each other at the same time references a scene in Kill Bill.
  • After Owen is hit by four dodgeballs in a row, red and white stars fly around on a black screen while pow sound effects play, much like in Tom and Jerry.
  • Harold dodges Owen's balls like the iconic scene from The Matrix.
• Star-Crossed Lovers: Lindsay and Tyler begin an actual relationship, or something like it, but the resident Alpha Bitch on both of their teams are strongly against it.
• Stone Wall: Harold cannot throw a dodgeball and knock someone out to save his life. However, he's excellent at dodging them and is able to successfully catch the ball from Owen, the strongest dodgeball player on the Screaming Gophers, which is how he wins the challenge for the Killer Bass.
• Taking the Bullet: As the dodgeball challenge reaches its deciding final minutes, both teams become more beaten and more vicious. One tough ball comes flying towards Gwen, so her suitor Cody jumps in front to protect her. All in all, the cost is higher than the gain. The ball hits him in the crotch and Gwen gets taken out by a ball to the face moments later.
• Tempting Fate: Courtney says to DJ and Katie that Cody would be an easy out, only for Cody to curb stomp the two of them.
• There's No Kill like Overkill: Duncan's strategy, which involves the entire team attacking one target.
• Thinks of Something Smart, Says Something Stupid: Tyler asks Lindsay to go on a walk with him. Lindsay thinks to herself "Have to say no. Have to say no." because Heather doesn't want her getting cuddly with anyone on the other team. She ends up saying okay and goes on the walk.
• This Cannot Be!:
  • Owen over losing the final game.
  • Noah inexplicably over being eliminated.
• Throw the Dog a Bone: Geoff tagging Harold in so that he can finally play after being kept off the court by the other Bass teammembers. This ultimately comes back to reward Geoff and the Bass with their first victory.
• Unskilled, but Strong: Tyler struggles to hit anyone with a dodgeball throughout the episode, though when he does actually manage to hit someone he tends to hit pretty hard. This allows him to participate in the final round while Harold is benched.
• [Verb] This!: As Heather throws a canoe onto Tyler, she tells him "Why don't you dodge this?!".
• Zerg Rush: The main basis for Duncan's "rush the new guy" strategy from Juvie. The Killer Bass gather as many dodgeballs as they can on their side of the field, then all five of them throw balls at a single target at the same time, who is unable to avoid or catch them all.