Verminous Skumm crosses a line and creates a horrible emergency for the Planeteers when he creates a new, super-addictive drug called Bliss. While visiting her uncle and cousin, Linka unwittingly consumes some of the drug.
This episode includes examples of the following tropes:
- Above the Influence: Wheeler usually flirts with Linka heavily and makes no secret that he wishes she'd return his feelings. However, when she comes onto him, flirtatiously asking him to try the drug "for [her]", he knows she's not in her right mind and refuses to take advantage of it, focusing on trying to break her denial and get her sober again. He also treats her in a supportive but non-amorous way while she's undergoing withdrawal at the end.
- Addled Addict: Befitting the episode's Drugs Are Bad message, it portrays all addicts who get any significant screen time as pretty messed up (to say the least).
- Linka's cousin Boris starts out as a charming teenager but has undergone a Descent into Addiction offscreen by the time he appears. His father is worried about him; he calls Linka (his favorite cousin) names after she tries to take his drugs away and tells Skumm that he'll steal her power ring in exchange for more. When Skumm tells him to bring Linka instead, he balks, but the threat of being cut off leads him to drug Linka with contaminated food. Ultimately, he overdoses and dies on screen.
- Linka herself goes from a driven young woman to a haggard mess who only cares about getting her next fix. When Gi tries to keep her from taking another pill, Linka attempts to blow her off the roof of the Capitol building (which is luckily circumvented by the cloudiness of her mind in a drugged state). She only manages to yank herself out of it after seeing her cousin overdose and ends the episode in withdrawal.
- The background Bliss addicts are perfectly willing to do anything Skumm asks to keep taking the drug, from giving him everything of value that they have to attacking a group of teenagers.
- Big "NO!": Skumm's last scene ends with a howl of "No!" as he realizes that he ate one of his own pills and is doomed to suffer the same things he inflicted on Linka and the people of Washington D.C.
- Bittersweet Ending: Leaning unusually hard on the "bitter." Skumm's Evil Plan is ruined and unusually for the show, he even receives some karma in addition to the setback. Linka has found the willpower to conquer her addiction and she has her friends to help her. However, her favorite cousin died from an overdose, she's heartbroken, and she has a painful road to recovery ahead of her.
- Break the Cutie: The episode puts Linka through the wringer. She becomes addicted to the drug Bliss after her cousin Boris slips it in her food, and then near the end of the episode, Boris ODs on Bliss and dies. Luckily, the process of healing the cutie has begun by the episode's end.
- Chain of People: One of the zombie drug addicts grabs Ma-Ti, who screams for help. Kwame pulls him back, causing them both to fall off the Capitol dome when the addict lets go. Only Wheeler grabbing Kwame's ankle at the last minute, just barely keeping them anchored, prevents both of them from falling to their deaths.
- Coincidental Broadcast: After Boris leaves thanks to a fight they had about his addiction, Linka returns home to find a note from her Uncle Dmitri saying that there was some trouble at the embassy where he works. She turns on the television to see a broadcast about a mob of Bliss-addicted vandals.
- Crisis Catch And Carry: While Linka and Ma-Ti are running from Skumm, Linka falls and doesn't see the hurry to get up. Kwame and Wheeler, barely ahead of Skumm's mob, grab her under one arm each and pull her along.
- Cry into Chest: When Wheeler pulls her away from Boris's body, Linka throws herself on his shoulder, sobbing as she admits the drug cost her her cousin and laments that she can't stand the agony of withdrawal.
- Delusions of Beauty: Played With; while Linka is flirting with Wheeler and offering him a pill, he pushes her over to a mirror so that she can see what the drug is doing to her physically. She laughs and says she looks beautiful. Ordinarily, Linka is gorgeous and even with the drug affecting her body she's good-looking. However, she's red-eyed, haggard, and obviously the worse for wear to anyone who's not under the influence.
- Destroy the Villain's Weapon: Captain Planet manages to stop Verminous Skumm from selling any more of his designer drug Bliss by forming a flame tornado that destroys both the last pieces of Bliss and the notebook containing the recipe for it. Well, one piece of Bliss managed to survive, but Skumm accidentally eats it and gets doped up himself, much to his horror when he realizes.Captain Planet: So much for the product.
- Dramatic Irony: The viewer sees the moment that Boris gives Linka a pastry with a pill inside and therefore knows that she's addicted before her teammates even know there's a problem. Wheeler offhandedly saying that Linka is too smart to let herself get hooked on such things therefore comes off as cruelly ironic.
- Drugs Are Bad: Skumm's drug Bliss is realistic, in that it does make people feel good for a while, but you must take more and more to get the same high and withdrawal is very painful. Dragging down the gritty realism factor somewhat are its effects on its users (glowing red eyes, turning addicts into literal raving zombies), and how it is made and peddled exclusively by a malevolent human rat mutant.
- Feel No Pain: People high on Bliss don't feel it even when they injure themselves. Boris falls on the curb during the opening segment and just starts laughing rather than holding the injury or any other expected response. The addicted mob keeps coming after the team despite Wheeler setting the grass on fire, and Boris throws himself through a window with no apparent reaction. Gi even suspects he doesn't know how badly injured he is.
- Five-Second Foreshadowing: When Captain Planet is finally summoned, he threatens to give Skumm some of the Bliss and see how he likes it. Shortly afterwards, that’s exactly what Skumm (unintentionally) does to himself.
- Forced Addiction: Skumm's scheme involves making a designer drug called Bliss. His victims include Linka's cousin Boris, who offers to steal Linka's ring after being unable to afford more. Skumm tells him to bring him Linka instead. Boris tries to refuse, but when Skumm threatens to leave him suffering withdrawal otherwise, he gives in and drugs Linka's food. This hampers the team because Linka doesn't have the clarity of mind to use her ring.
- Getting High on Their Own Supply: An accidental example; while Wheeler and Captain Planet destroy most of the drug and its recipe, a single Bliss pill gets stuck in some cheese Skumm is holding on to as a snack. Not knowing this, Skumm eats it. Almost immediately, he begins feeling odd, and looking at himself in the reflecting pool is enough to show him that he got himself into the same situation that he smugly put dozens of people through.
- G-Rated Drug: Verminous Skumm starts selling a drug called Bliss to everyone. Of course, it doesn't turn out well for the users. It has some exceedingly nasty side effects; in addition to completely negating the ability to feel pain (to the point where potentially fatal injuries are flat-out ignored), it is quite toxic and, judging from the fact that all the victims are in a hospital afterwards, has a really unpleasant withdrawal.
- In-Universe Nickname: Skumm calls the addicts "Bliss-brains".
- It's Okay to Cry: It's not a major Aesop, but near the end of the episode, Linka lies on a cot, in recovery from the drug. Wheeler reassures her that it's okay that she needs to cry, citing what he's been told about how intense withdrawal pains are. Linka answers that it's not as painful as losing her cousin.
- Laser-Guided Karma: Skumm gets a large number of people hooked on a very horrible drug, even driving Linka's cousin Boris to give her drugged food without her knowledge and being responsible for Boris's death. In addition to the standard thwarting of his evil plan, he eats a piece of cheese that got the last remaining Bliss stuck in it. Soon afterwards, he realizes what happened and what will happen to him as a result and screams a Big "NO!".
- Laughing Mad: Among other symptoms, Bliss causes fits of hysterical laughter, even when the person has injured themselves or suffered some other setback. It's probably related to the pain numbing.
- Mutual Disadvantage: Although Skumm coerced Boris into drugging Linka to cripple the Planeteers, her drugged state carries disadvantages for him as well, namely that Linka can't use her Wind power to attack her teammates. It ends up saving Gi's life during the standoff on the Capitol building.
- No Escape but Down: After getting Linka away from Skumm, the Planeteers run into the Capitol building and shut the doors. However, the addicted mob ultimately breaches the place anyway. The team keeps running, eventually ending up on the outside of the Capitol dome, where the only way out is down. Luckily, when they finally manage to summon Captain Planet, he helps them back to safety.
- No Help Is Coming: After the team reaches the Capitol building to find it deserted, Ma-Ti uses his Heart power to figure out why they can't find the police. He reports that everyone who didn't fall to the drug fled the city.
- No Sympathy: Wheeler is rightfully angry when Linka reveals that Boris drugged her food, causing her to get hooked in the first place. When Gi tends to Boris's self-inflicted wounds, Wheeler tells her that he was the one who turned Linka into an addict. Gi argues that the drug made him do it, but Wheeler points out that no one forced Boris to take the drug; the way it messed him up is on him.
- Oh, Crap!:
- When the team manages to summon Captain Planet, the normally jovial superhero goes into Tranquil Fury mode as he calls Skumm out on how low his scheme du jour was and says he should dose him with his own drug. Skumm immediately shifts from smug to alarmed as he begs the Captain not to make him an addict.
- Skumm has this reaction when he realizes the cheese he ate had a Bliss pill in it, and crawls over to the river to see that sure enough, he's undergoing its affects.
- O.O.C. Is Serious Business:
- Linka is usually completely on-board with stopping the eco-villains and spends her first scene driving her teammates crazy with her perfectionistic tendencies. After being drugged, she tells Ma-Ti not to be so uptight about Skumm while he's trying to get her to safety, having stopped caring about anything except Bliss.
- The normally jocular Captain Planet drops most of the wisecracks and becomes coldly furious when summoned to combat Skumm, who's become a drug-dealer and gotten Linka (and most of the city) hooked.
- Outliving One's Offspring: Linka's cousin Boris gets addicted to a powerful drug called Bliss, and eventually dies of overdose. By that time, her Uncle Dmitri, Boris's father, has disappeared from the plot, but he's implied to be still alive, given that at the end, she only mourns Boris, and not both of them.
- Passive-Aggressive Kombat: As the Planeteers are preparing to take a little time off, Linka and Wheeler get into a sniping match about the former's perfectionism. While talking about her plans to visit her favorite cousin, Linka declares that she's missed him and adds pointedly that he's charming.
- The Perfectionist: The Planeteers' first scene shows Linka going through a pre-flight checklist, even exasperating the normally phlegmatic Kwame. Gi quips that Linka has her picture in the dictionary next to "perfectionist." This just makes it even more blatant when she becomes addicted.
- Platonic Declaration of Love: A tragic version happens midway through the episode. Boris, unable to afford the higher prices, offers to steal Linka's power ring in exchange for more of the drug. Skumm tells him to bring in Linka instead, in exchange for all the Bliss he wants. Boris refuses, saying that he loves his cousin, which might ordinarily signal his freeing himself with The Power of Family... and Skumm replies that, in that case, Boris can just live with the agonizing Bliss withdrawal. Boris gives in and gets Linka addicted to Bliss.
- Please Wake Up: Boris overdoses on Bliss and collapses, leading Gi to declare him dead after failing to find a pulse. Linka initially denies it, claiming Gi is lying and attempting to wake Boris up. When Wheeler gently reiterates the truth, it breaks her denial and she crumples to his chest, finally admitting how horrible the drug is.
- Rapid-Fire "No!":
- Linka screams "No!" three times in quick succession after being told Boris is dead.
- Skumm does this when he realizes he polluted himself at the end of the episode.
- Right for the Wrong Reasons: Inverted with Wheeler, who is wrong for the right reasons. When Gaia calls the other Planeteers in to brief them about the situation in Washington, Kwame puts the information together with Linka's bizarre absence and wonders apprehensively if she could be one of the people high on Bliss. Wheeler dismisses the possibility, saying she's too smart to do drugs. He and the others later find out that she is high on Bliss, but he was absolutely correct in that her addiction was not of her own volition.
- Roaring Rampage of Rescue: Defied twice. Upon seeing Skumm messing with Linka, Wheeler wants to charge off to save her and pummel the villain responsible. The others luckily stop him, reminding him Skumm has a mob.
- Sensual Slavs: Played for Drama. Though Linka will flirt with Wheeler under the right circumstances, it's portrayed as genuine attraction filtered through her Tsundere attitude rather than seduction. However, under the influence of addiction, she plays on his feelings for her to convince him to try the drug.
- Slipping a Mickey: After claiming that he's stopped using Bliss to reassure Linka, Boris gives her a blintz with a pill in it, taking another for himself. Linka, unaware, swallows it.
- Soft Glass: Averted. After Wheeler slams the window Linka opened in his face, Boris just takes the direct route and throws himself through it. He starts visibly bleeding and Gi, while patching him up, says he's badly hurt.
- Special Aesop Victim: Linka's cousin Boris becomes hooked on the Bliss and dies of an overdose.
- Swapped Roles: Because of Linka's addiction, Wheeler is the voice of reason between the two for once.
- Take Over the World: Skumm only mentions it briefly, but Skumm becoming a drug-dealer serves as a way to conquer the planet. If no one else has a clear mind, he can easily take over.
- A Taste of Their Own Medicine:
- Furious at the depths Skumm has sunk to, Captain Planet thinks out loud about dosing him with Bliss, much to the villain's horror. However, the Captain ultimately says that Skumm is lucky he's more honorable than Skumm is. He simply destroys the drug and its recipe and throws Skumm out of a helicopter.
- Skumm does end up having this happen to him, by his own doing when he inadvertently eats a piece of cheese containing the last Bliss pill.
- Technically-Living Zombie: While the crowd of Bliss addicts Skumm sics on the Planeteers aren't undead, they act a lot like zombies, blank-eyed and moaning (about Bliss rather than brains or flesh) and use brute force rather than tools or cunning to get past blockades most of the time. Wheeler actually calls them "zombies."
- This Is Unforgivable!: When summoned, the Captain is not happy with Verminous Skumm turning innocent kids into mindless, drug addled zombies that would obey Skumm's every command if it meant they could keep poisoning themselves with Bliss — especially because he victimized Linka and tried to get her and her fellow addicts to kill the others. Captain Planet was not only uncharacteristically angry, saying that this was low even for Skumm, but also he only cracked two jokes and even they were used without irony.
- Too Dumb to Live: The Bliss addicts are too high to register when they get injured. When a mob of addicts are sent after the Planeteers, they don't stop even when Wheeler blocks them off with a wall of fire. Skumm taunts that the Bliss addicts don't care about injuries, only about running out of Bliss. Linka's cousin Boris also fell under this as soon as he took Bliss, first not caring that he hit his head on a curb or biking through traffic, then crashing himself through a window where he bled heavily. Finally, he dies of overdose.
- Traitor Shot: Boris is so bent on getting more Bliss from Skumm that he even offers to steal Linka's ring to use as payment when he can't afford the heightened prices. When Skumm instead demands Boris to give him Linka instead, he refuses, saying that he loves his cousin and would never betray her to him, to which Skumm then responds that he can just go ahead and suffer. Boris then frowns, showing his decision. In the end, Boris does betray Linka by drugging her just so he could get more Bliss pills.
- Unexpectedly Dark Episode: The episode focuses on drug addiction in all the pain that it involves, and it ends with Linka's cousin dead and her mourning while undergoing painful withdrawal.
- Unusual Euphemism: The episode uses the term "mind pollution" to refer to drugs, though this is not exclusive; the characters also use the word "drug" more than once.
- We Need a Distraction: Ma-Ti comes up with a plan to get Linka away from Skumm, but says he needs someone to distract the villain. Wheeler volunteers and sets Skumm's bag of Bliss on fire, leaving him too mad to notice Ma-Ti sneaking up and running off with Linka until they're some distance away.
- What You Are in the Dark: Wheeler is constantly hitting on Linka and usually gets shut down. However, the episode sees Linka gets addicted to drugs and, while high, she flirts with him, asking him to try the drug "for her." They're alone at the moment, except for Linka's cousin, who's as addled as she is. Wheeler doesn't even consider taking advantage - indeed, he's disgusted by what has happened to her and urges her to get clean. For all his harassment, he still wants her to respond to him out of her own free will and unclouded mind.
- Wretched Hive: Washington DC descends into chaos as more and more people get addicted. The city soon becomes lawless as addicts commit crimes in order to get payments for more Bliss. Non-addicts flee the city, leaving it to the mob. By the time the Planeteers arrive to save Linka, the place resembles the setting of a Zombie Apocalypse movie with Bliss addicts standing in for the living dead.
- You Leave Him Alone!: When Linka downs a pill, Skumm puts his hand on her shoulder while encouraging her to feed her addiction. Wheeler yells at him to take his paws off her and nearly charges him. Luckily, Kwame grabs his shoulder and reminds him that he can't get through Skumm's mob.
