http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Recap/TheAdventuresOfBatmanAndRobinE5HouseAndGarden
Several plant-related crimes (in which greenish beasts attack wealthy bachelors, steal money, and poison them) take place. The prime suspect of this is Poison Ivy, now out of Arkham Asylum and married to her former psychologist there, biology professor Steven Carlyle, who has two sons from a previous relationship, Chris and Kelly. Batman interviews and then spies on Poison Ivy, but finds nothing out of place. After Robin (as Dick Grayson) is kidnapped and held for ransom by one of the plant beasts, he explains to Batman that the professor doesn't have custody of his children, and that Chris and Kelly are
girls. Breaking into Poison Ivy's greenhouse, Batman finds a bed of plastic fruit, and opens it to reveal a lab. There it turns out that Carlyle was kidnapped and had his DNA used to create disposable plant people with his DNA: first resembling children (Kelly and Chris), then turning into a clone of the professor, then becoming a giant beast. However, Batman and Robin never manage to catch Poison Ivy, because the "Ivy" they fight is also a clone.
Tropes in this episode include:
- Actually a Doombot: Ivy escapes by leaving a plant-duplicate of herself to battle Batman.
- Alliterative Name: Chris Carlyle.
- Anti-Villain: Poison Ivy. Even Batman recognizes that all she wants is a quiet and peaceful life—the problems only arise because she wants them on her terms.
- Black Widow: Ivy, but not for money. And she doesn't kill her victim. (She does worse.)
- Blessed with Suck: An interesting example in that Ivy's poison-immunity power is the reason that she can't have kids of her own through biological means.
- Body Horror: The creation of the plant clones is
Squicky to say the least. Their destruction isn't pretty either. - Born from Plants: All of Ivy's new children come from a special plant she bred with samples from her and (unwillingly) Carlyle.
- Bound and Gagged: Dick Grayson is kidnapped out of his dorm room and bound up for ransom.
- Cactus Person: Poison Ivy's henchmen start out looking like children but end up as grotesque, hulking plant-men with toxic cactus spikes on their bodies.
- Continuity Nod: As Poison Ivy flees at the end of the episode, she looks over a photo album of her time in Gotham. Included in this album is a picture of Bruce Wayne and Harvey Dent (a reproduction of their groundbreaking at Stonegate Penitentiary in "Pretty Poison") and a picture of Ivy and Harley Quinn (a reproduction of their team-up in "Harley and Ivy").
- Contrived Coincidence: The Gotham police and Batman are both unaware of Dr. Carlyle's children being in his ex-wife's custody and girls, despite that information being public. Robin, who is aware, is conveniently not around when Batman visits Ivy the first time and kidnapped for ransom against Bruce Wayne the second time. While his being around at the start would've seen Ivy's plan fall apart immediately, he only has the chance to set the record straight after Ivy has escaped from Gotham.
- Danger Takes a Backseat: The kidnapping of Dick Grayson must have really shaken Bruce up, because he completely fails to notice the enormous plant-monster hiding in the backseat of his car until it accosts him and gives him the ransom demand as he's driving down the highway.
- Death of a Child: Even if they're actually humanoid Planimals, they look and act like children.
- Decoy Getaway: Ivy created a clone of herself for just this reason. She escapes while Batman is dealing with it and the other clones.
- Distress Ball: Dick can't get a break even when he's in civilian guise.
- Drop Dead Gorgeous: Subverted hard with Poison Ivy's clone. Her face shrivels up and rots as she melts into steaming chlorophyll sludge.
- Evil Is Sterile: Poison Ivy's immunity to toxins comes at the cost of being unable to have kids through biological means.
- Failed a Spot Check: The Gotham police and Batman are hit with his multiple times. The latter is completely unaware that Ivy has been declared legally sane and released from Arkham half a year ago. Both also investigate Ivy due to the recent string of poisoning incidents, but don't come across the revelation that her husband has daughters (not sons) and that his ex-wife is the one who has primary custody of their kids. Those details would be in Gotham's public records and very accessible, let alone to the police. It takes Robin (who had a class taught by Carlyle and saw his daughters once briefly) to point this fact out to Batman.
- Falsely Reformed Villain: Poison Ivy blurs the lines a bit. She's out of prison, marries a biology professor and takes care of his two sons, Chris and Kelly. Batman spends half the episode tailing her and yeah, she seems OK. The catch? She wants to have a family on her terms, so she's locked up her husband and replaced him with a long series of plant/human hybrids using the professor's DNA. Robin realizes something's amiss when he points out the real Chris and Kelly are supposed to be girls.
- Fan Disservice: Watching clone Ivy's beautiful face decay within seconds like sped up footage of rotting fruit.
- Foe Romance Subtext: As always, Batman and Ivy.
- One can't help but remember that their "intense relationship" as Pam put it involved quite alot of kissing.
- The way he spies on her, if viewed without context, could very easily be misconstrued as an old boyfriend checking on his former lover's new life from a discreet distance.
- Him tenderly cradling clone Ivy's body as she dies is impossible not to see from a more romantic angle.
- Hypocrite: This exchange between Batman and Pamela when she finds him snooping on her.
Pamela Isley: There are laws against spying on people.
Batman: There are laws against poisoning them too.
- I'm Melting!: When several of Poison Ivy's "children" come in contact with weed killer.
- Known Only by Their Nickname: Dr. Carlyle has a child who goes by "Chris." While that can be used as person's real name, "Chris" is usually short for names like "Christopher" (for boys) or "Christine" and "Christina" (for girls).
- Medical Rape and Impregnate: The real Carlyle was hypnotized into loving Ivy when she was his patient, frees her, is held prisoner in her greenhouse, and used as a donor for her plant children. He's clearly enormously traumatized when set loose.
- Near-Villain Victory: Ivy almost fooled Batman here. Not easy to do. If not for a poor choice of victims, she'd have gotten away with it completely.
- Painful Transformation: Ivy let's the plant children drink a formula that among other things, give them spikes and turns them into hulking creatures. The children groan and yell throughout this rapid transformation which even cuts their lifespan down to a few minutes. One of the children actually yells during transforming from pain.
- Properly Paranoid: Batman's obviously learned from his past encounters with Ivy, rigging her greenhouse's sprinkler system to release herbicide. Just in case.
Robin: What's that?
Batman: Insurance.
- Short-Lived Organism: Poison Ivy creates a plant that produces human/plant hybrids with a lifespan of several days. When Batman busts the operation, Ivy needs some muscle quickly, so she gives the newborn creatures a formula that accelerates their growth so that they'll only live a few minutes but hopefully kill Batman within that time.
- Shout-Out: The plant children incubators created by Ivy resemble the pods.
- The whole premise of the episode seems to be one to David Cronenberg's The Brood.
- The episode title is a shout-out to the long-running magazine Home & Garden.
- Stacy's Mom: A radiantly young looking bombshell like Pamela Isley is the last person anyone would expect to dress and act like a typical, middle class soccer mom.
- Stalker without a Crush: Batman monitoring Isley as she goes about her day.
- Stopped Dead in Their Tracks: Batman suspects Ivy (now married and stepmother to two boys) is still up to something when wealthy bachelors are being afflicted by a toxin, but all his leads lead to nothing. That is, until while driving back to the Batcave, Robin tells Batman that Prof. Carlyle is the father of twin girls. SCREEEEEEECHHHH!!!
- Tomboyish Name: Batman observes some heartwarming interactions between Pam and her stepsons, Chris and Kelly, but realizes that something's up when Robin explains that he knows Ivy's "husband" and reveals that Dr. Carlyle actually has daughters.
- Troubled Fetal Position: Dr. Carlyle is like this when Batman and Robin find him.
- Ugly Guy, Hot Wife: Downplayed. While "Dr. Carlyle" is by no means hideous, he's rather average looking. His "wife" on the other hand is a drop dead gorgeous knockout.
- The Vamp: While you pity Dr. Carlyle for the traumatic horror show Ivy subjected him to, he really should've known better than to let his guard down around Gotham's most notorious sexpot temptress, allowing her to cozy up to him for a kiss.
- Vine Tentacles: Isley's suburban home and little greenhouse are covered with them, acting as her security system, which Batman learns when stealthily observing her daily, civilian routine. Unlike his previous viney entanglement Pamela isn't looking for a kiss, instead wordlessly ordering the vines to release Batman so she can reassert her supposed innocence. Later in the episode though, they act as sinisterly as you'd expect something grown by Poison Ivy to, restraining Batman, Robin and Dr. Carlyle so the cactus monsters can kill them.
- Was It All a Lie?: The marriage was a sham, and she wanted to have a family on "her terms," but was Ivy lying when she told Batman she really was happy? No.
- Wham Line:
- What Measure Is a Non-Human?: Ivy's plant clones are treated as this, at least by Batman.
- You're Insane!:
Poison Ivy: I meant it when I said I wanted a family that loves me. I just wanted it on my terms.
Robin: Lady, you're nuts!
