My Life as a Teenage Robot -- Episodes 301-302

First Aired: 5 October 2008

"Weapon of Mass Distraction" (Episode 301)

Directed by: Chris Savino, Chris Suave, Rob Renzetti

Plotline

The girls at school went absolutely gaga for Travis, the cute new boy from Hollywood, California. Travis loved the attention until saw Jenny. His fear of mechanical things got him taunted. When he worked up the courage to talk to Jenny, Jenny told him she would get taunted as well. They were seen together throughout the rest of the day and would get taunted as a pair. Travis would get uneasy when he saw Jenny fight the coin robbers who disappeared in a mysterious fog. Travis's phobia of anything mechanical originated when his dad got mauled in a machine at his job. He eventually recovered. Now Jenny wanted to seem more human-like to him.

Jenny wore more human-like clothes to school the next day. While Travis was struggling to ask Jenny out on a date, the same coin robbers surrounded by extreme weather (caused by a "weathered one") caused trouble. Jenny went back and forth to fight and hear what Travis has to say. When the fighting was finally over, Travis was excited to hear Jenny say yes for a date even though she didn't hear his entire question.

When they went to a movie, Jenny was happy that she was on a real date. Unfortunately, the coin robbers and the "weathered one" wreaked havoc again. Jenny refused to interfere despite seeing the theater get torn into and hearing people scream. Travis convinced her to do something about it so she jumped into action. After capturing the robbers and the weather guy, Jenny realized her relationship with a guy afraid of robots was never meant to be.

Travis was angry that Jenny would sacrifice a town of innocent people just for one date. He walked away from her, causing Jenny to be boyfriend-less. Brad came along and told Jenny not to adapt to other's comforts but to be herself. Jenny stubbornly rejected this advice but proved she was still proud of her robot powers.

Trivia

• This episode was directed by 3 directors instead of 1 or 2 in other episodes. This happens once again in the next segment. The final time his happens in the series is in the episode "Enclosure of Doom".


• Travis' father resembles silent movie star Charlie Chaplin. In Travis' flashback sequence, the factory scene was based on a scene in the silent film "Modern Times" starring Chaplin himself.


• "Modern Times" was also the name of the movie Jenny and Travis went to see on their date.


• This is another time a villain broke the Tremorton dam. The first time was in Sibling Tsunami (S1).


• In the black tornado scene, you'll see an old lady on a bike in mid air with a black dog in her basket near the tornado. This was a reference from the beginning dream sequence in The Wizard of Oz.

Goofs

• There was a place on which the hail fell during the hail storm called the "Do-Over Motel." It looks more like a hotel since it's a tower and cars can't drive directly in front of their rooms.


• After Jenny hung those bad guys on a fancy fence by their shirts, she said, "People just don's respect fine art anymore." After that, she just tossed the stolen muesum exhibits through a broken window like they were trash. Not even she respected fine art.


• Not even she respected fine art. Maybe it was to be said that nobody respects fine art, especially not her. It was to show it was not quite her thing.


• After Jenny broke a huge hole into the ground with rockets in front of the elementary school so water can fill it, the elementary students jump in and use it as a swimming pool. After Jenny blaster that hole, the hole seemed deep enough so all the dam water can fill it. Shouldn't those kids drown because the hole is really deep?


• On top of that they had swimsuits and pool gear ready during school hours; unless they were planning on taking a field trip to a swimming pool anyway.


• Brad just randomly showed up at the end to preach. The writers just felt they had to put him in at the very end though he had no reason to be there. This was his only appearance in this episode.

Quotes

Jenny: "Hey, Travis!"

Travis: "Jenny, you look, uh, covered up."

Jenny: "Well, when I'm not in 'robot action mode,' I don't need to expose all those

crazy devices of mine."

Travis: "Wow. So how often do you use them?"

Jenny: "Oh, hardly ever. Yesterday was a total anomaly."

Travis: "You're not just saying that, are ya?"

Jenny: "No. [gets in his face] So we can hang out, right?"

Travis: "Well, sure, I guess."

Jenny: "Hi, Travis."

Travis: "Oh, my gosh, what happened to you?"

Jenny: "Uh, really rough paper towels?"

Janitor: "Talk to the school board."

Travis: [to Jenny] "How dare you risk people's lives to keep a stinkin' date? I was just getting used to being with a robot but I can never get used to being with someone so selfish. Good-bye!"

Brad: "I think you've learned a valuable lesson today; always be yourself. You're special just the way you are. It's important to stay true to yourself and..."

Jenny shoves Brad

Jenny: "Save it, beanpole! Who are you, my mother?" [zooms away]

Brad: "You should be proud of your robot powers."

Zaps toward Brad. Brad dodges the impact.

Brad: "Thattagirl!"

TLDR

Jenny went on a date with a boy who was afraid of mechanized contraptions. With his fear and Jenny's crime fighting, the relationship didn't work.

"There's No Place Like Home School" (Episode 302)

Directed By: Ray Pointer, Bob Nesler, Greg Miller

Plotline

In September, Jenny was excited for the start of the new school year. Come November, her misery landed her in Vice Principal Razinsky's office. He told Jenny to change her attitude or she would get 3 days' suspension. She considered dropping out of school but she didn't want to be the dirty, ugly hobo on the curb outside the school. Jenny was enthusiastic about her mother's suggestion for home school. When she announced out loud about going to home school, no one including Brad and Sheldon but excluding Brit and Tiff, was happy.

On her first day of home school, Mrs. Wakeman showed Jenny the holochamber where the virtual classroom would be. During Mrs. Wakeman's lectures, Jenny would not pay attention which did not benefit for the pop quiz she failed. For the next day, Jenny would cheat to get her in-class answers correct by using frequency waves to get her information. Mrs. Wakeman caught on to what she was doing so she jammed the waves. Later on, Mrs. Wakeman wanted Jenny to be more interested in school and get into college. She did research on different kinds of extracurricular activities.

When the special activities were offered to Jenny the next day, Jenny thought her mother worked too hard to come up those ideas. She ran off. No matter where she went, whether in the sewer or in a space crater, her mother followed telling about the educational significance of each place. No matter how much she disliked it, she wanted to go back to her old school.

Ah! Good ol' Tremorton High! She was glad to be back. Razinsky notice that Jenny's attitude changed and called her mother to thank her for the impact. She was offered a substitute teacher position. One day, the regular teacher of one of Jenny's classes couldn't be there so they had a substitute to take the job. One could not guess whom they took off the street to fill this position.

Trivia

• Even though there were 3 directors in this episode, this was the only episode in the entire series that Rob Renzetti did not direct.


• The title is a Wizard of Oz reference. Toward the end, Dorothy tapped her heals together 3 times in her ruby slippers and says, "There's no place like home" 3 times. Someone on the crew must be a huge "Wizard of Oz" fan seeing all these reference throughout the series.


• At the idea of being home schooled, Jenny said, "No more classrooms, no more books, no more teachers' dirty looks." Yes, this line was used in the Alice Cooper song, "School's Out" but the line was originally used in a poem school children would chant on the last day of school: "No more pencils, no more books, no more teachers' dirty looks. Kick the tables, kick the chairs, kick the teacher down the stairs" (among other variations). Source: http://www.mamalisa.com/blog/no-more-teachers-no-more-books/(broken link)


• The cheerleading coach from Grid Iron Glory (S1) reappeared.


• Who's Ms. Fossilbottom? Is she an old lady teacher?


• It was this episode, the Christmas episode (S2), and Dressed to Kill (S1) when the regular "THE END" card is not used. In this episode, the "camera" pans out showing "THE END" where the month should be on a calendar, keeping with the "flipping calendar" theme shown at the beginning of the episode.

Goofs

• In the title card, why were the calendars gridded all pyramid-like and not in a grid a we know them? Maybe calendars of that universe are like that.


• Razinsky called Mrs. Wakeman "Noreen" again. Do these writers think "Nora" and "Noreen" mean the same thing and are interchangeable?


• Also, is she "Mrs." (certainly not "Mr."), Ms., or Dr. (with a doctorate)? "Ms. Wakeman" was written on the blackboard in the holochamber classroom but she verbally addressed herself as "Dr. Wakeman."


• Mrs. Wakeman gave Jenny an automatic F on the first pop quiz when Jenny said she didn't know any of the information on the quiz. Some teacher Mrs. Wakeman was; not encouraging Jenny to try to answer the questions even though she said she knew nothing.


• goggle strap alert: When Jenny flew to the North Pole to escape her mom, Mrs. Wakeman popped out of nowhere and her goggle strap was mistakenly colored black, not yellow as it should.


• Also in the next scene, when Jenny hid under an asteroid in a crater and Mrs. Wakeman (in a space suit) found her, her goggle strap was once again black. I might forgive this one as a yellow strap might blend in as the same color as the glass of her space helmet.

Quotes

Jenny's waiting in line to use the restroom

Schoolboy: "Wait, you're a robot. Why do you need to use the..."

Jenny: "NONE OF YOUR BUSINESS!"

Vice Principal Razinsky: "This is a place of learning, Ms. Wakeman. Would you agree that we cannot tolerate disruptions?"

Mrs. Wakeman and Jenny: "Yes."

they look at each other then look away

Mrs. Wakeman: "It all began with a HUGE EXPLOSION! Gradually the universe cooled and the planet Earth began to form."

After Mrs. Wakeman suggested to Jenny she could get involved with the prom

Jenny's "prom date" crashes through a wall

XJ-8: "You look lovely tonight. Would you like a nosegay?"

XJ-8 thunks a single dead flower onto Jenny's desk

Vice Principal Razinsky: "Ms. Fossilbottom is out sick today. Luckily, I found a substitute teacher at the last minute."

students gasp

TLDR

Jenny thought being home schooled would be the best thing ever. It got even worse when her mom was teaching.

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