YMMV / The Epic Tales of Captain Underpants

• Accidental Innuendo: "Who's pumped to dump?!"^note From a celebration in honor of Horatio Dump, the guy who invented garbage dumps In-Universe.
• Bizarro Episode: While the show is already pretty weird, "Captain Underpants and the Monstrous Mayhem of the Massive Melviathan" is especially so. A good chunk of the episode takes place in a dream dimension that George and Harold control and the main villain is a giant kraken-like creature with Melvin's facial features and glasses.
• Broken Base: The comic book narrations. Some think the deliberate badness is hilarious and fitting, other think it's trying too hard and goes much too fast.
• Crosses the Line Twice:
  • Mr. Ree's backstory in episode 5. What else can you say about a backstory where multiple people are apparently mortally wounded by paper cuts?
  • In "The Angry Abnormal Atrocities of the Astute Animal Aggressors" there is a scene where we see Krupp's emotions discussing a plan to get rid of the kids. Hungry Krupp's idea? Eat them.
• Die for Our Ship: Thankfully averted with Ms. Yewh. During her appearance, many fans felt uneasy when Mr. Krupp fell madly in love with her since they preferred to ship him with Edith the Lunch Lady. Unlike Edith however, Ms. Yewh shows no romantic interest in Mr. Krupp and ends up having a crush on Mr. Ree, the school janitor.
• Ensemble Dark Horse:
  • Bo Hweemuth has proven to be one of the most popular characters on the show thanks to his sympathetic backstory and how much of a lovable, good-hearted boy he is. It helps that he’s paired up with a lot of the other kids.
  • Heck! All of George and Harold's friends are seen as great additions to the cast, thanks to their diverse, multi-layered, and colorful personalities.
• Evil Is Cool: Second only to Poopypants, Melvinborg has become increasingly popular in the fandom.
• Fan-Preferred Couple: George/Harold/Melvin, Bo/Gooch, and Erica/Jessica/Dressy all have notable fanbases.
• Genius Bonus: In the season 2 episode "The Dastardly Deeds of The Devious Diddlysaurus" George and Harold enter the time toad and a few dates fly across the screen: 1999AD, 1475AD, 79AD, and 753BC. The scene is quick enough that one might think they're random numbers, but if you're familiar with Rome you'd realize they're all important dates in its history: 1475 was when the Empire is considered to have officially ended, 79AD was the eruption of Mount Vesuvius, and 753BC is when Rome was supposedly first founded.
• Harsher in Hindsight: In the movie, there is a scene where Captain Underpants is terrified of a bee that a shrunken Poopypants is riding on and swats it away. In Season 2's, "The Harmful Horrors of the Harrowing Hiveschool", we find out he's allergic to bees.
• Hilarious in Hindsight: The initial conversation between Ms. Yewh and Mr. Ree when they first meet at the end of their debut episode becomes this after we discover Mr. Ree’s first name in Season 3.^note It’s “Toilette”.
  Ms. Yewh: Where am I? And what’s that smell?
  Mr. Ree: Smells like victory.
  Ms. Yewh: No, it smells like a toilet.
• I Knew It!: For some fans, after The Reveal at the end of Season 1, the revelation that Grace Wain was Erica Wang’s future self at the end of Season 2 was kind of obvious.
• Jerkass Woobie: Much like with the movie, Mr. Krupp falls into the this territory, especially after episode 11, where we finally meet his mother and get a glimpse of what his childhood was like.
  • Melvin since it's heavily implied, mostly by the Halloween movie special and his mother's comments, that he has no friends and is very lonely deep down.
• Launcher of a Thousand Ships: So far, Bo has been looking like this. While there’s the Fan-Preferred Couple of him and Gooch, the show itself has given us Ship Tease between him and both Other Sophie and Dressy, with those pairings getting fans as a result.
• Magnificent Bastard: The Splotch is an alien robe who, after his first defeat, becomes a boisterously affable schemer aiming for world domination. Managing to posses school janitor Mr. Ree, he uses his secret lair to create fabric softener that, when used, allows him to control robes and anyone that wears it, planning to use it at the Robe-O-Con to create an army. Recognizing Captain Underpants as a threat, he successfully frames him for a robbing spree in order to incapacitate him. Upon being found out by George and Harold, a prepared Splotch utilizes his powers to battle the Captain, matching him in skills while using his new robe army to gain an upper hand, only being completely stopped by outside help.
• Moe: The entire Jerome Horowitz student body is too adorable for words.
• Moral Event Horizon: Future Melvin crosses it in the season 2 finale when he decides to leave Harold and George for dead in Krupp's brain. Even Present Melvin was disgusted and decided to betray him because of it.
• Narm Charm: Like the books and movie it's based on, most of the humor comes from running with the silliest, most juvenile ideas imaginable, and it works.
• Nausea Fuel: The scene in episode 6 where Mr. Krupp eats spoiled guacamole that the boys made as a prank (even though they warned him not to), and then proceeds to extensively throw up (twice!) behind his desk. And if that weren’t enough, he then slips in his puke.
• Nightmare Fuel:
  • The creepy ventriloquist dummy that resembles Mr. Krupp. It borders on Unintentional Uncanny Valley territory.
  • In season 3, we get a recurring stop-motion clown called Gigglenose who comes with his own disturbing circus music. This is lampshaded in his first appearance:
  Barefoot Farmer: Kids, in my day clowns was funny!
• Padding: A majority of the jokes tend to run on much longer than needed.
• Rescued from the Scrappy Heap: Mr. Meaner was highly despised as a result of what happened in the twelfth book, but this series helped get him back in the fandom's good graces, mainly because of his hilarious lines.
• Ship-to-Ship Combat: Thankfully averted with the Bo x Gooch shippers and the Bo x Other Sophie shippers. Both sides are more than willing to respect the other's preferences and there has yet to be any serious fighting between the two groups.
• Squick:
  • The above-mentioned puking scene in episode 6.
  • Melvin’s Mom flirting with Smartsy Fartsy (who, may we remind you, is a sentient fart) in episode 13.
• Strawman Has a Point: Mr. Krupp and Melvin wanting to cancel Halloween isn't completely unreasonable. As Erica pointed out, Halloween is just more work for the adults buying candy, decorating and cleaning up said decorations and any pranks made afterwards.
• Toy Ship: All the ships listed above fall under this category since they all consist of children.
• The Un-Twist: Grace Wain is Erica Wang's future self. Considering that we were introduced to Melvinborg in the Season 1 finale along with how Erica is always 3 steps ahead of everyone, the reveal was a little anticlimactic.
• They Wasted a Perfectly Good Character: Fans are starting to feel this way about Mr. Krupp. Thanks to The Movie giving a more sympathetic portrayal as a lonely Jerk with a Heart of Gold along with the season 1 finale showing a few hints of potential redemption, there was hope that Krupp would get significant character development and change into a better person. But 3 seasons and a holiday special later, fans were disappointed to find how Krupp is still the same cruel-hearted, idiotic, self-serving jerkhole who is still able to get away with tormenting the children and just about everyone else around him without consequences.
• They Wasted a Perfectly Good Plot:
  • Most fans have this sentiment for "The Soggy Salvation of the Swirling Sweatnami". While it does a great job in exploring Mr. Krupp's backstory and explains why he's so full of hate and wickedness, it tarnishes the possibility of him becoming a genuinely good person if given the opportunity. This is further cemented when Erica at the end claims that Krupp was just "born evil" and how George and Harold decide that it's futile to try and help him.
  • A lot of fans felt this way about the Season 2 episode "The Bombastic Blathering of Brainy Blabulous", as it would've been a perfect opportunity to basically be the 8th book in animated form, but they never capitalized on it. Season 4's "The Disturbing Dilemma of the Dysfunctional Doppelgängers" got the same reaction.
  • Much like the above example, some fans had similar feelings towards "Captain Underpants and the Dastardly Deed of the Devious Diddlysaurus", which would've been another good opportunity to introduce one of the franchise's Team Pets; Crackers, the Pterodon that George and Harold adopted during their time travel escapades in Book 7.
  • Season 4 in general as it only lasted 6 episodes despite the space setting having so much potential for more.
• Unexpected Character: To the surprise, and delight, of the CU fandom, Edith the Lunch Lady makes a cameo as a Christmas caroler during the "Mega Blissmas" Christmas Special.
• The Woobie:
  • With how much of a Butt-Monkey he is, you can’t help but feel kinda bad for Jerry Citizen. Even George and Harold felt guilty when a prank they pulled on him drove the poor man to tears.
  • Bo Hweemuth. Until George and Harold help him out, he gets saddled with a reputation that paints him as a fearsome bully, all because he spends most of his time alone in the ceramics room. Then, when he finally befriends the other kids, Melvin kidnaps him and turns him into a mindless clay monster.
  • Other Sophie. Compared to Sophie One, Jessica treats her badly most of the time.
  • Gooch. Unlike the other ButtMonkeys the little guy doesn't have any malice and rarely even knows what's going on, yet will often take a blow from the Monster of the Week, get swallowed by the school python, or get told by Jessica to replace the Sophies for a while and not let him speak.

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