http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Recap/SupermanTheAnimatedSeriesS2E8Mxyzpixilated
Superman's latest week has been so odd that he wonders if he's going crazy. Things seem to be happening that no one else can see, and mixed up in it is a strange little man. Then the Man of Steel discovers that the bizarre occurrences have been caused by a 5th-dimensional imp, Mr. Mxyzptlk, who unfortunately wants to play games with him. The only way to get rid of him is to force him to say/spell/etc. his name backwards, but this only works for 90 days at a time, and each time Mxy gets angrier and more determined to beat him. Can Superman get rid of this exasperating imp once and for all?
This episode contains examples of:
- Accidental Misnaming: Subverted; Clark deliberately calls Mxy "Klytpzyxm" the second time the little guy appears, successfully provoking Mxy into saying it himself.
- Adaptational Attractiveness: Mrs. Gsptlsnz and then some! The orignal was a short imp not much that different from Mxy. This version is a stunning Jessica Rabbit-like babe.
- All Myths Are True: Mxy claims to have inspired the stories about imps, genies and leprechauns.
- Alternative Calendar: As Mxy builds his giant robot, the months of "George" and "Relish" go by, until he's finally ready on the 30th day of "Pants".
- Batman Gambit: Superman plays Mxy every time after the rules are set, especially in their last battle.
- Be Careful What You Wish For: Mxy wanted a mere mortal finally worthy of his time and who could be the ultimate challenge. He got it and then some.
- Big Damn Kiss: Gsptlsnz gives this to Mxy at the end following his final defeat.
- Complete Immortality: Mxy seems to be completely immortal: he mentions that he has been tormenting humans for centuries, he is capable of living in space without air or any form of vehicle, he removed his own head without ill effect, and any injures he sustained with his powers could be instantly healed.
- Cymbal-Banging Monkey: Mxy turns a Superman statuette into one of these at the conclusion.
- Dub Name Change: When this episode was dubbed for Brazilian viewers, Mxyzptlk was renamed "Mxyzpixilated". However, he retains his original name in "Little Big Head Man".
- The End... Or Is It?: Superman meets Mxy's condition and - supposedly - gets rid of him for good, but Mxy vows to find some way to return at the end. (And as a later episode shows, he does.)
- Epic Fail: After Mxy spends the entire three months of George, Relish, and Pants building a giant robot to fight Superman, he's banished again before Gyspy can even finish her countdown from five.
- Everyone Has Standards: Gsptlsnz says using their powers to torment others is "so three-dimensional."
- Forced Transformation: Mxy turns Ma and Pa Kent into chickens, then ducks, then ostriches, then, for "the sake of novelty", alien beasts, and finally an American Gothic Couple painting "for safekeeping" while he talks with Clark. Later, he turns the Daily Planet staff into a complete menagerie of animals.
- Freeze-Frame Bonus: The page that Mxyzptlk's comic-strip appears on is full of parodies of popular newspaper strips, all "starring" various DCAU staffers (e.g. Dini the Meanynote Which is ironically structured like a parody of Calvin and Hobbes). The "McGurk" strip was done by Siegel and Schuster.
- Gone Horribly Right: Again, Mxy sought out Superman because he wanted a mere mortal who could be the ultimate challenge and worthy of his time. As Mxy quickly discovers, his plan worked too well.
- Great Gazoo: Mr. Mxyzptlk is a Reality Warper from another dimension that enjoys playing pranks on humans. He claims to be the inspiration for the stories of genies and leprechauns — but after a while, he got bored of messing with ordinary people, but then Superman shows up.
- Guile Hero: Unable to use his strength to deal with Mxyzptlk, Superman has to rely on his brains to make the little guy go away.
- Here We Go Again!: Clark only says "here we go" when the Daily Planet staff gets changed into animals.
- It's Personal: At first Mxyzpltk only sees Superman as his playmate or play thing, but as Superman keep outsmarting him and getting him banished very quickly and easily, he becomes obsessed with beating Superman , and even builds a huge robot to destroy the Man of Steel. Averted with Superman who only sees Mxy as nothing more than an annoyance.
- Jerkass: Mxy. While most versions of Mxy mostly just want to toy around and have fun with Superman, sometimes even believing himself to be doing the Man of Steel a service, this one explicitly hates him and wants nothing more than to kill and humiliate him, not necessarily in that order.
- It Only Works Once: Tricking Mxy into saying his name backwards in the opening rounds. Actually, it only works twice because Clark's able to take Mxy by surprise during Round 2. From thereon out, Mxy catches on and Clark has to come up with other, non-vocal ways of tricking Mxy.
- Just Ignore It: Before the final confrontation of the episode, Clark puts on a great show of indifference to Mxy transforming the Daily Planet staff into animals and threatening to expose Superman's secret identity. He thus goads Mxy into raising the stakes from a ninety-day reprieve to a permanent departure.
- Last-Second Word Swap: After Mr. Mxyzptlk realizes Superman tricked him into skywriting his own name backwards twice, he says "Oh sh... oot my monkey."
- Loophole Abuse: Invoked. After being banished for the final time, Mxy vows to find a loophole in his promise to Superman that will allow him to return to Earth. As this is the episode's final scene, of course, nothing comes of that vow here. Instead, Mxy will have to wait until his next appearance before finding that precious loophole he can exploit (albeit one that ends up backfiring on him spectacularly).
- Madness Mantra: After Mr. Mxyzptlk is banished for a third time, he angrily repeats "Gotta beat Superman" again and again when he returns home.
- Moving the Goalposts: After Superman manages to get rid of him several times by tricking him into saying his name backwards, Mxy promises to leave forever if he does it twice in a row. (Which Superman still manages.)
- Ms. Fanservice: Mr. Mxyzptlk's wife Ms. Gsptlsnz is a blatantly sex-on-legs Head-Turning Beauty (especially when you consider her VA is Sandra Bernhard). She's basically Veronica Lake by way of Jessica Rabbit in terms of figure and hair, sultry voicing, and apparently spends her days lounging around the 5th dimension in a midriff-exposing shirt and unzipped Daisy Dukes. It comes to a head in a scene where she attempts to distract Mxyzptlk from his crusade against Superman, she gives what can only be described as a Power Perversion Potential montage, changing her look to various Sexy Whatever Outfit. In order: a Femme Fatale, a sexy schoolgirl, a pin-up inspired sailor outfit, a frilly bikini, a cheerleading outfit, a tropical dancer, a Betty Grable swimsuit, a bathrobe-bra-and-panties combo, then finally nothing but a Modesty Towel. Alas, her loving but temporarily obsessed husband is Not Distracted by the Sexy.
- Mundane Utility: Superman uses his heat vision to shave.
- Mythology Gag:
- The scene at the beginning with Mxy looking for his friend "McGurk" and then "finding" him by bringing the statue to life is from Mxy's original first appearance, way back in Superman #30 from 1941.
- Mxy turns Jimmy into a turtle. In the comics, a growth ray combined with a turtle turned the hapless kid into a giant turtle boy.
- Mxy turning Lois into a horse is a nod to her time as a superfilly
◊. - Lois confirms her sister Lucy is in this continuity, and is just as much of a pain.
- Mxy using his powers to make Streaky the cat fly, a nod to the cat gaining superpowers in the Silver Age comics.
- The strip "Mr. Mxyzptlk" is said to be written by Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster, Mxy's creators (not to mention Superman's).
- Mxy's claim of being the source of stories about imps, genies, and leprechauns is a nod to Lois & Clark. It's also a nod to a Superfriends episode where he pretends to be a genie.
- Clark's initial mispronunciation of Mxy's name (he pronounces it as Mix-ill-plick) is a reference to how it was pronounced in Superfriends
- No Indoor Voice: Mxy never speaks quietly and often yells. What do you expect from Gilbert Gottfried?
- No Ontological Inertia: After Mxy is banished for good, everything returns to the point immediately before he starting turning the staff into animals.
- Noodle Incident: Mxy spends three months creating a giant robot to fight Superman. We never hear about what happens, but he pops back into the fifth dimension a few seconds after leaving.
- Not Distracted by the Sexy: Gsp tries to get Mxy's attention with various come-hither outfits, but he remains focused on building his giant robot.
- Obfuscating Stupidity: Superman plays dumb with Mxy twice. First is when he claims not to know which one of them is supposed to say Mxy's name backwards. Second is when he makes several writing mistakes, getting Mxy to spell-check and mark off the necessary letters.
- Offscreen Moment of Awesome: Despite Mxy showing up with a giant robot (that he spent months building), Superman somehow managed to defeat him in three seconds.
- Oh, Crap!: Mxy several times, immediately after realizing that he just triggered another banishment.
"Aw nuts!"
- Preemptive "Shut Up": After completing a Humongous Mecha, Mxy goes off to mess with Superman again, gloating as he disappears. His wife ignores this, knowing it won't go well. When Supes banishes him back immediately after her countdown of five reaches three, he tells her "Not. One. Word." before she can say a thing.
- Pronouncing My Name for You: When Clark initially mispronounces his name, Mxyzptlk corrects him and provides the handy mnemonic (which he illustrates using his powers) "Mix", "Yes", "Spit", "Lick".
- Punctuated! For! Emphasis!: Mxy to Gspy after his robot plan fails: "Not. One. Word."
- Reality Warper: Mxy can use his powers to alter reality in several ways, such as turning the Daily Planet staff into animals, or bringing Rodan's Thinker to life.
- Relative Button: Clark becomes livid after his parents are turned into alien beasts. Mxy is actually scared of him.
- Screw This, I'm Outta Here: After Mxy turns the staff into animals, Superman just gives up and leaves. That was part of his plan, though.
- Seen It All: Clark doesn't blink an eye when he sees a penguin walking by his computer desk. Afterward, he only says "Here we go" when the Daily Planet staff change into animals.
- Shirtless Scene: Clark when he's shaving himself in the privacy of his bathroom before Mxy interrupts.
- Shout-Out: The Daily Planet comics page◊ has a couple of these. One strip is "Dini the Meany", which sounds similar to Dennis the Menace (US), but with an art style similar to Calvin and Hobbes. It's attributed to "Bill Wemissu"note A reference to Bill Watterson having retired from creating Calvin and Hobbes. Also on the page is "Gleen", with an art style directly lifted from Peanuts. "Dini" of course is a reference to Paul Dini. "Gleen" is probably a reference to Glen Murakami, who did art for the show, as the strip's scene suggests the trials and travails of an animation director. It's likely the whole page consists of shoutouts to the crew.
- Sore Loser: To say that Mxyzptlk doesn’t take losing to Superman well would be a huge understatement, becoming more and more enraged and totally obsessed by beating Superman as the episode goes on.
- Stalker Shrine: After being permanently banished back to the Fifth Dimension, Mxy's home now contains an obsessive amount of Superman memorabilia. It just underscores how Mxy's been consumed by his hatred and how he's stuck trying to figure out a loophole to exploit to return to Earth.
- Symbol Swearing: A rather clever visual instance in the climax. When Clark blows off Mxy's blackmail threat and takes off unconcerned (as part of his final Batman Gambit). For a moment, Mxy just stands there in disbelief...then erupts into a psychotic rage. The twist is that instead of any furious shouting or dialogue, we get instead Symbol Swearing above his head.
- Take That!: The way Clark pronounces Mxy's name and how the latter gets mad at him is a clear jab at Superfriends.
- The Thing That Would Not Leave: According to Lois, her sister does this whenever she visits.
- This Is Gonna Suck:
- Tricked into Signing: Superman tricks Mxyzptlk into writing out his name both on paper and then in the sky after Mxyzptlk caught on that Superman was tricking him into saying his own name all the time.
- Ugly Guy, Hot Wife: Mxyzptlk and Gsptlsnz. He's a tiny, balk unattractive guy, while she's a Head-Turning Beauty.
- Unknown Rival: Mxy bexomes obsessed with the idea of beating Superman, while Superman just sees him as a pest, though a very annoying one.
- Victory Is Boring: Mxy cites this trope as his reason for challenging Superman. After centuries, he's tired of effortlessly besting your average rank-and-file mere mortal; there's just no sport or fun in it anymore. In Superman, Mxy sees the ultimate challenge he's been looking for and worthy of his time and talents.
- Wham Shot: The reveal in the climax that Clark wasn't flying in random directions across Metropolis to evade Mxy in their final clash. He was actually tricking Mxy into skywriting his own name backwards twice.
- Why Don't You Just Shoot Him?: Gspy sarcastically asks this when Mxy gets tricked the third time, giving Mxy the idea to create a giant robot to kill Superman.
- Women Are Wiser: Gsptlsnz chastises Mxyzptlk using his powers to torment others. She says he should just destroy Superman outright instead of play games, but she also knew exactly how that would go.
