The Pancake Batter Anomaly is the 11th episode of the first season of The Big Bang Theory, and the first appearance of the "Soft Kitty" song.
Plot
When Penny returns from a trip to Nebraska, she brings home a flu virus. Sheldon gets sick and the guys run away and hide out at a movie theater playing all five Planet of the Apes movies (from 1968 to 1973) to avoid his whining demands ever since the last time they took care of him. Sheldon extracts servitude from Penny instead, costing her a whole work day and then using her like a personal nurse. Leonard then makes up false stories to Penny to ward off her calls to get back home and treat Sheldon. At the theater, Leonard has his glasses broken and decides to sneak back into the apartment and get new ones without being noticed. However, he gets caught by Penny who was being forced to do menial tasks for Sheldon and as Leonard tries running away with her (while visually impaired), he injures his head by running into a support beam.Sheldon and Leonard sit sick and injured on the couch just waiting to recover or for Penny (or anybody) to return and take care of them, neither of which are likely to happen soon.
Tropes
- Annoying Patient: Guess who. Anyone with even just passing familiarity with this show knows that Sheldon is even more annoying than usual when ill: he expects everyone around him to drop what they're doing to attend to him. In this episode, he forces Penny to cut her shift at the Cheesecake Factory short and expects her to give him a sponge bath, rub ointment on his chest, sing to him, etc.
- Code Emergency: "Code Milky Green" is an alert that Sheldon is sick, and must be avoided at all costs.
- Continuity Snarl: The entire plot of the previous episode was motivated by Leonard and Sheldon wanting to avoid Penny's atrocious singing at all costs. Now in this episode, the illness must have so scrambled Sheldon's brain that he actually asked her to sing to him.
- Didn't Think This Through: Penny questions Sheldon coming into the Cheesecake Factory and dining in while he's sick, instead of ordering delivery.
- Dirty Coward: Leonard feels awful about letting Sheldon enslave Penny when she calls him on the phone, but not enough to take her place.
- Downer Ending: Sheldon and Leonard sit on the couch sick and injured grieving and awaiting recovery. Since they've pissed Penny off, there's no one to take care of them.
- I Ate WHAT?!: Leonard realizes that he's been making pancake batter in a measuring cup Sheldon uses for urine samples.
- Idiot Ball: Leonard for not taking his glasses off before his chimp mask thus leading to his glasses falling on the ground in a dark movie room and Howard stepping on them by accident.
- Laser-Guided Karma: Just as Leonard was ready to leave Penny at the mercy of Sheldon, Howard and Raj abandon him when they see Penny caught them redhanded.
- Made a Slave: Penny by sick Sheldon. She's pressured to do everything from feeding him, applying Vaporub on his chest, to singing him a lullaby.
- Mistaken for Destitute: One of Penny's co-workers at the Cheesecake Factory warns her that a crazy homeless guy came in. She takes a look, and sees Sheldon dressed in multiple layers and blowing his nose.Penny: No, just crazy.
- Momma's Boy: Howard still relies on his mother to make him breakfast.Mrs. Wolowitz: WHAT DO YOU WANT FOR BREAKFAST?!!!Howard: CHOCOLATE MILK AND EGGOS, PLEASE!
- No Inside Voice: This episode is the debut of Mrs. Wolowitz, who will become known for her volume.
- Noodle Incident: Sheldon has gotten sick a few times before in the last decade, and Leonard, Howard and Raj all had to take care of him and listen to his complaints. Howard mentions specifically how the "great ear infection of '06" was the catalyst for planning ways to never do this again.
- Plot Hole: Why couldn't Howard and Leonard hide at Raj's place? Raj's apartment, as first seen in "The Bad Fish Paradigm", seems adequate for the three friends to spend a day away from Sheldon.
- Screw This, I'm Outta Here:
- Leonard scrambles half-dressed to get out of the apartment the second he hears Sheldon announce he's sick.
- Penny as well when she's had enough of Sheldon's nursing demands and sees Leonard returned home.
- When Leonard gets caught by Penny trying to retrieve his glasses, Howard and Raj abandon him.
- Sick Episode
- Typhoid Mary: Sheldon believes this trope applies to Penny, even referring to her as "Typhoid Penny."
- Ungrateful Bastard: Sheldon, as usual.
- Woken Up at an Ungodly Hour: Leonard calls Howard first thing in the morning to warn him that Sheldon is at "Code Milky Green." The phone also wakes up Howard's mother, who bellows "WHO'S CALLING AT THIS UNGODLY HOUR?!" In the middle of Leonard's call, Howard gets another call from Sheldon, asking for soup. Howard pretends to be his mother and also gives him the "ungodly hour" line.
