The Loose Screw
Wander and Sylvia get stuck between stopping a planetary invasion and helping an elderly lady fix her broken-down ship.
Tropes appearing in The Loose Screw:
- Alliterative Name: Stella Starbella. Also rhymes.
- Call-Back: Wander uses his phrase, "It never hurts to help" from "The Nice Guy"
- Cassandra Truth: Stella said she didn't need any help and that Mittens was her pilot and Mechanic. Wander and Sylvia didn't believe her, but she wasn't an old lady confused.
- Chekhov's Gun: The super-sonic socket wrench Sylvia uses to fix Starbella's ship is later used by Starbella to escape Mandrake's Death Trap.
- Cloud Cuckoo Lander/Crouching Moron, Hidden Badass: Starbella acts like a dotty old lady at first, but turns out to still be a fairly competent Cool Old Lady.
- Evil Laugh: Mandrake attempts one, but it devolves into a coughing fit.
- Evil Old Folks: Mandrake, balancing out his old nemesis Starbella.
- Homemade Sweater from Hell: Starbella makes some for Wander and Sylvia. Wander's is extremely baggy on him and Sylvia's tears off of her since it's too tight.
- I Was Quite the Looker: Starbella used to be prettier and more curvaceous when she was younger, as seen from a poster of her on the wall.
- Never Mess with Granny: Starbella is an old woman who is still quite capable of kicking butt.
- Old Superhero: Stella Starbella. And her archnemesis Mandrake the Malfeasant is an old supervillain.
- The Password Is Always "Swordfish": The password to deactivate the self-destruct on Starbella's ship is...Password.
- Save the Villain: Starbella saves Mandrake from his exploding ship.
- Self-Destruct Mechanism: Sylvia accidentally activates the one on Starbella's ship. Mittens later activates the one on Mandrake's ship.
- Shout-Out:
- The part where Wander, Sylvia, and Starbella are trapped in the hourglasses that fill up with sand, nearly drowning them is a shoutout to either Aladdin or an episode of the Adam West Batman series.
- Stella Starbella is a shout out to Stella Star and Barbarella.
- Mandrake the Malfeasant is a parody of Ming the Merciless.
- Mittens bears a passing resemblance to Garfield in his early years.
- Source Music: When we first hear Stella's theme song, it appears to be background music but it's later revealed it's Mittens singing it.
- Villainous Crush: Mandrake has had one on Starbella for years, though she's not interested.
The It
Lord Hater tries to work his way to the top of the villain leader board by ignoring Wander's game of interplanetary tag.
Tropes appearing in The It:
- Big "NO!": Peepers lets one out at the end when Lord Hater high-fives a Watchdog, thereby tagging him and making the Watchdog it.
- Bob from Accounting: The Watchdog that Hater accidentally tags is Ted from Accounting.
- Bond One-Liner: Peepers says "Freeze Tag!" right before freezing Hater in coldbrrnite.
- Call-Back: The Villain Leader Board from "The Axe" is the main focus of the episode and Lord Dominator has taken up the number 1 spot.
- Can Only Move the Eyes: The only part of Hater that isn't frozen in coldbrrnite is his finger, which is constantly twitching.
- Character Development: Peepers by now realizes that if Hater is obsessed with Wander to simply carry on a mission without him, or make sure Hater is incapacitated when chasing him, and ensure that the Watchdogs are on Peepers's side.
- Comically Missing the Point: After Wander plays "got your nose" with Lord Hater.Peepers: Sir, you don't have a nose!
Hater: Yeah, because Wander stole it! Get back here! - Continuity Nod:
- The food court from "The Prisoner" is seen again.
- Wander sings his song from "The Little Guy" while Hater is frozen in cold-brr-nite.
- Demoted to Extra: Wander only pops up occasionally and Sylvia only makes an appearance at the end.
- The Dreaded: Hater manages to scare 10 villains off the leaderboard with his game of tag.
- Flaw Exploitation: After seeing Hater chase off the villain the Watchdogs were infiltrating while still playing tag, Peepers decides to use Hater's obsession to climb to the top of the leaderboard. Peepers says as much.
- Giving Someone the Pointer Finger: After breaking free from suspended animation. Hater proceeds to charge at anything with just his pointer finger.
- Here We Go Again!: Not only does Hater have to reclaim his #10 spot on the Villain Leaderboard from Ted from Accounting, but Wander starts playing the "got your nose!" game with him.
- Human Popsicle: Peepers freezes Lord Hater in cold-brr-nite.
- Inconvenient Itch: Hater starts to scratch the spot where Wander tagged him as he tries to ignore it and pay attention to Peeper's plan.
- Leeroy Jenkins: Hater messes up Peepers's stealth mission by chasing Wander and trying to tag him.
- Mook Promotion: Played for Laughs at the end with the Watchdog Hater tagged by accident.Peepers: Okay, here's the elaborate, multi-part plan to defeat our new arch-nemesis...Ted from Accounting.
- Nice Job Fixing It, Villain: Subverted; at first it seems that Hater messes up Peepers's stealth mission with his game of tag, but then it turns out the villain they're invading doesn't want to be tagged either and runs for it. Peepers then uses the villain's fear of tag to Hater's advantage.
- Not So Above It All: Peepers offers to be tagged "it" so Hater can focus on the invasion, but can't bring himself to be tagged.
- Overly Long Gag: Hater screaming "Tag!" during the invasion montage.
- Pet the Dog: Parodied when Peepers starts sobbing at the end; Sylvia starts patting him and saying, "There, there. It's not gonna be okay."
- Punny Name: The Affectionate Parody of Carbonite is called "Cold-brr-nite".
- Rhetorical Question Blunder: While Lord Hater is trying to assure his minions he's not going to let Wander distract him:Lord Hater: Do you think I'm going to let some silly game ruin my chances at galactic superiority?
Watchdog: Uh, you do seem to do that a lot, so... (gets zapped by Peepers) - Sanity Slippage: Eventually, Hater just runs around screaming "Tag!" while foaming at the mouth.
- Serious Business: No one, not even Hater's villainous rivals, wants to be tagged "it".
- Shout-Out:
- Lord Hater being frozen in carbo- er, cold-brr-nite is a direct reference to The Empire Strikes Back, as is the battle between him and Peepers leading up to it.
- Ted from Accounting saying "I have the power!" after being tagged parodies He-Man's Transformation Sequence from He-Man and the Masters of the Universe.
- Single Tear: Peepers cries one when he realizes that Lord Hater ruined their stealth mission by chasing Wander.
- That Reminds Me of a Song
- Villainous Breakdown: After Hater starts chasing Wander again, Peepers starts to sob into his hands. You know it's bad when Sylvia offers a comforting pat.
- Villain Episode: The first one of the season, and the only episode where Hater rockets himself into the galaxy's top 10 list of rogues.
- Yank the Dog's Chain: Right when Hater makes it into the top 10 of the Galactic Villain Leaderboard, he high fives a Watchdog, inadvertently tagging him and making him it which also replaces him with said Watchdog.
