And Knowing Is Half the Battle: In the last scene, Static and Rubberband Man address the audience about how dyslexia and other reading difficulties can be overcome with hard work.
Bad Guy Bar: Tarmack is playing pool at one, and Carmen Dillo tries hitting him up for money. Shiv and Onyx also appear in the background.
Bullying a Dragon: Tarmack is a powerful, angry brute, yet Specs, Trapper, and Carmen Dillo actively antagonize him under the assumption that he won't pummel them. They are very wrong.
Continuity Snarl: In "Bad Stretch", Adam was eager to read his fanmail, despite that in this episode, he has dyslexia.
Dramatic Irony: When Static tries to hurry to the device that will take out the city, Gear tries to assure him they have nothing to worry about. After all, Rubberband Man is there with the written instructions on how to turn it off, so everything's okay. Except, what Gear doesn't know is, Rubberband Man can't read.
Dumb Muscle: Specs and Trapper exploit (and mock mercilessly) Tarmack's stupidity in order to get his labor for practically nothing.
Evil Is Not a Toy: Specs and Trapper manipulate Tarmack to rip him off for his work. When Carmadillo points out he is being ripped off, he goes after them ticked off.
Foil: Tarmack is openly Dumb Muscle and lashes out at those who ridicule him. Though far smarter by comparison, Rubberband Man sees his dyslexia as a source of shame and would rather be accused of being a screw-up than tell anyone the truth.
Foreshadowing: Adam's unread fan-mail. This is the first tip-off that Static gets about Adam's illiteracy.
Jerkass Ball: Gear's open frustration with Rubberband Man's mistakes, not knowing they're caused by reading difficulties. As noted in the Useful Notes page for Dyslexia this is very much Truth in Television: undiagnosed dyslexics often have to contend with the perception that they're lazy or stupid.
"L" Is for "Dyslexia": This episode reveals that Rubberband Man is functionally illiterate due to severe dyslexia. As is typical for the trope, this is portrayed as him viewing letters as jumbled or inverted. Despite getting most of its facts right, the And Knowing Is Half the Battle segment at the end suggests that this is an accurate portrayal of dyslexia, which is an oversimplification at least.
My God, What Have I Done?: Rubberband Man over hesitating to press the override button and thus allowing Tarmack to escape with the fusion engine. It gets worse when he realizes how much damage the fusion engine can do.
Never Learned to Read: Subverted. Adam did learn to read, but it's extremely difficult for him, so most of the time he doesn't bother. He knuckles down to read the instructions to defuse a ticking time bomb, but it clearly takes a ton of time and effort.
Race Against the Clock: When the fusion engine's magnetic containment field gets damaged, Rubberband Man has only two minutes to figure out and perform the shutdown instructions. He just barely succeeds.
Smart Ball: Static quickly deduces that Adam can't read, based entirely on the lack of reading material in his house and his hesitation in Alva's lab.
What the Hell, Hero?: Played with. It's a Dramatic Irony case where Gear calls out Rubberband Man on going into a condemned building despite the sign saying so, unaware that the latter has dyslexia.
