Reagan finally has the job of her dreams, but a single text from Ron may threaten to change everything.
Tropes:
- Ambiguously Human: The Robes say that Reagan, should she accept her promotion to a position equal to theirs, would become the single most powerful human on Earth and Reagan outright asks the Robes if they're actually human under those robes and masks, which they deflect. At the ending, they also dismiss Reagan as "only human" and have been planning for 10,000 years. However, in their story of how the order was founded, it's revealed that the founding members were cavemen smarter than their brethren. So they were human, but it's unclear if they are now, assuming their story is even true.
- Artificial Limbs: Reagan has a prosthetic pinky finger thanks to J.R. shooting her in the previous episode.
- Been There, Shaped History: Every great disaster in history was in someway orchestrated by the Black Robes. Locusts, the Black Plague, the Titanic sinking, etc., all to prevent larger disasters from wiping out humanity. However, the ending implies they are lying about their reasons.
- Bittersweet Ending: Using Alpha Beta's alternate timeline data, Reagan come to the realization that Ron would be happier without her in his life and erases all memory of her from his mind. Rand and JR are now in Shadow Prison for their crimes and Reagan is now Head of Cognito just like she wanted, the Black Robes even offering her a position with equal authority to theirs. She eventually accepts, both to utilize her project for the world and to uncover the secrets of the Black Robes. However, it's implied that they have something more sinister in store for her and the world called "Project X37".
- Call-Back: While preparing to erase their identities, Reagan and Ron burn off their fingerprints with the same device Brett packed and accidentally used on himself back in “Unpresidented”.
- Career Versus Man: Reagan is torn between a happy, humble life with Ron, a man she loves and is very compatible with, and finally getting her dream job of heading not just Cognito Inc. but also becoming "partner" with the Black Robes. She tries various timeline simulations to see if there's a situation where she can have both and realizes there isn't. Eventually, she chooses Career and lets Ron go.
- Close-Enough Timeline: Brett tries to push that a timeline where Air Bud is a documentary is fine, but Alpha-Beta states that it's really not and that dogs will take over the planet if Air Bud is allowed to lead their evolution. Brett manages to stop this from happening by banning dogs from playing basketball, but Air Bud begins evolving into a human-like state anyway.
- Deface of the Moon: One of the reality glitches they have to fix is getting a Pepsi logo off of the moon.
- Dramatic Irony: At the start of the series, Reagan dreamt of heading Cognito Inc, but her distractions (i.e. obsessing being better than her father in every way) and attitude force her to work with Brett. In this episode, she finally becomes CEO, but is distracted again (in this case, too busy choosing between the job she always wanted and a normal life with Ron), and so she temporarily puts Brett in charge until she sorts things out.
- Even Evil Has Standards: The Black Robes are not above using tragic disasters to control and protect humanity but even they think Cthulhu is "fucking nuts."
- Fire-Forged Friends: Thanks to his help in the previous episode, Alpha-Beta is finally treated like another Incognito Inc. employee and can sit at the main table.
- Hidden Depths: Trendy gossip queen Gigi has seen every Air Bud movie.
- Humans Are Morons: According to the Robes, most of humanity is Too Dumb to Live without the few intelligent ones controlling them, which is the idea on which their Order was founded.
- I Want My Beloved to Be Happy:
- Seeing that there is no way for her and Ron to be together without her either leaving the shadow government behind, or having their relationship become strained one way or another, Reagan opts to let him have his memories erased, and have a happy life away from the Illuminati and eventually end up with a woman who isn't her.
- There is also a platonic example when Reagan tells Brett she is wanting to run away with Ron. Brett wants Reagan to stay but when presented with examples of how miserable her life at Cognito Inc is he’s instantly supportive of her finding happiness with Ron.
- It Amused Me: Myc decides to see how far Brett will go to finish the mission when Reagan puts him in charge, mainly because he is sure it will come to some asinine conclusion.
- Like Father, Like Daughter: Much like Rand in the previous episode, Reagan here tries to find the perfect scenario in which she can find a future with her and Ron and her job at the same time, repeatedly failing to find one. Unlike Rand, Reagan is mature enough to know when to call it quits.
- Leaning on the Fourth Wall: Many of the leftover cosmic anomalies from project Reboot have resulted in what Alpha Beta calls "Plot Holes" to explain away inconsistencies in the lore.Gigi: Oh, of course, like how some celebrities are reptoids and others are randomly Illuminati. It's like Illuminati stuff came later!
Myc: Or like how I used to say I wasn't an alien, and then you guys found out my species arrived on an asteroid.
Alpha Beta: Exactly, all of these plot holes were caused by the machine. - Loophole Abuse: Brett wants to stabilize the timeline, but doesn't want to erase Air Bud. He is also told that if Air Bud stays, dog kind will eventually evolve to the point of overthrowing humanity. However, he finds a simple solution: Like the movies, the loophole is that there is no rule that says dogs can't play basketball, or any professional sport for that matter... but if there is, they can't prove their superiority and evolve. With Senator Brian's help, a country-wide ban on dogs playing any professional sport is legislated.
- Married to the Job: Reagan tries to find a way in which she can have both her relationship with Ron and her promotion to working directly under the Robes, but finds that any attempt to mix the two will result in their relationship becoming strained one way or another, and that the only way for her to be happy with Ron is to leave the shadow government behind with him. In the end, though, she can't bring herself to leave it behind, knowing that humanity can be better run with her at the helm, and opts to let Ron have a happy life, erasing his memory and giving him a chance to be happy without her, while preparing to create the new algorithm to better humanity.
- Misery Builds Character: The Black Robes seem to operate on this logic on a socio-political scale as a necessary evil. When they reduced the population with the Black Plague, it resulted in Isaac Newton's accomplishments. The rainforest burning is meant to curb an invasion of tree monsters. The Titanic sinking prevented an invasion of Atlantis.
- Not-So-Well-Intentioned Extremist: The Robes reveal that they orchestrated the many horrible events throughout history and today because those events ultimately helped or will help humanity in the long run. However, the ending implies they have more sinister plans.
- Plot Tailored to the Party: Subverted. The Black Robes explain to Reagan that their group originated in the caveman era, when a few smart people realised that they need to secretly manipulate the masses for the greater good of humankind, because people would end up killing themselves if left to their own devices. This is a great fit with Reagan's personality and skillset, because she's both smart enough to come up with such manipulation schemes and moral enough to want to use them for the greater good, not just for her personal benefit. We even see that Reagan imagines the first caveman Black Robe to look like her. However, the episode's ending strongly implies that the Robes came up with this origin story exactly because it would appeal to Reagan, and that their real plans are something much more nefarious.
- Refugee from TV Land: One of the anomalies from Project Reboot comes from a timeline where Air Bud actually happened. According to Alpha Beta, if that anomaly solidifies, it will result in dogs hyper-evolving into dog people and enslaving the human race.
- Secret Test of Character: The Black Robes didn't put Rand in charge of Cognito out of a bad call. They did it to test Reagan to see if she was worthy of a partnership with the Robes.
- Shout-Out: Mothman confesses that he was trapped in a timeline where he was turned into Jeff Goldblum from a teleporter accident, a reference to The Fly (1986).
- Take a Third Option:
- Defied for Reagan's plot line. Reagan attempts to have both her improved job and romantic life with Ron, but finds that she can't have both.
- Played straight for Brett's plot line. He can either kill Air Bud, or let a Planet of the Dogs-type scenario to play out as the result of dogs evolving into a superior species from developing from their ability to outperform humans in basketball. He instead chooses to ban dogs from basketball. Though, according to Alpha Beta, this seems to have fixed the problem, the fact that Air Bud can now talk, walk upright, and has grown opposable thumbs suggests that this trope may be defied here too eventually, if not now, though Brett dismisses this notion.
- A True Story in My Universe: The last glitch is an Air Bud from a reality where that movie is a documentary.
- Unreliable Narrator: The Black Robes claim to have been born at the beginning of humanity, as the first smarter human beings realizing that their intelligence wasn't taken seriously and they needed to guide humanity from behind the scenes to ensure its thriving, offering Reagan a position as their equal. The end reveals they are actually going behind her back and implies they aren't human, and perhaps have never been, casting doubts on everything they have told.
- The Unreveal: Reagan is interested in finding out more about the Robes, including what they look like without getting the chance. They do, however, imply not to be humans.
- A Wizard Did It: Continuity errors are explained in-universe as being caused by Project Reboot like the Illuminati that wasn't mentioned in season one and Myc being an alien when he previously said he wasn't.
