While watching the cheerleading team struggle to perform their routine, Darwin and Gumball begin to think that something is missing. When Mr. Small warns them that not all is right in the world and that things are disappearing, they figure out that one of their classmates has vanished and set out on a quest to find her.
This was a very meta episode, as it was full of self-aware observations about the nature of the show. It may not have come as close to breaking the fourth wall as “The Kids”, or even “The Finale”, but the fourth wall was definitely weakened by what we learned. You see, back in season one there was another dinosaur in Gumball’s class. This dinosaur, a sauropod named Molly, only had a few speaking roles but was most notably seen in “The Pressure”. Despite her relative insignificance, fans grew fond of her and questioned why the show stopped using her in season two. I noted her absence as well. This episode provided the writers’ response to these questions in the form of Mr. Small’s dialogue: they found her boring. Mr. Small went on a tangent about how Elmore is a weird place full of weird things, and that the world must have been pretty bummed that it created somebody as boring as Molly. That’s fascinating. I never found Molly boring, especially when compared to other characters in season one who never did anything, like Idaho. Still, the way that the writers directly addressed the fans in this episode was an intriguing tactic and I’m curious to see if she will actually become a regular character again since she was rescued from the void.
Even if you didn’t know any of that and watched the episode without remembering who Molly was, you would have probably enjoyed it as it was a very good episode. If anything, it may have been more enjoyable for people who didn’t remember Molly because a lot of the early jokes seemed to be betting that most viewers would be just as dumbfounded as Darwin and Gumball were. I said in my previous recap that Mr. Small is the funniest member of Elmore Junior High’s faculty and this episode demonstrated that perfectly. He’s wonderfully absurd and pretty much everything comes out of his mouth with so much energy. His line about being able to navigate the void so easily because he’s usually spaced out anyway was pretty nifty. Once the characters enter the void, the episode really takes off. In addition to Molly, there were references to other things that the show’s staff deemed mistakes – both from the show and real life. Astute observers could see things like Darwin’s former CG model, which was changed early on in the show’s production, but there were also jabs at real annoyances like Clippy or Crazy Frog. Between this episode and “The Job”, it’s safe to say that Elmore is one really messed up place. Ben’s said in interviews that he has big plans for the show and wants to build up for the series finale. I’m inclined to believe the fourth wall is eventually going to be falling down.
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